" (Tian, 2001).
As a result, not only does culture influence marketing, but marketing also influences culture. Marketers can act as agents of changes within a culture. The interactions between marketing and culture can be examined from three perspectives. .
First, culture defines acceptable purchasing and product-use behavior for both consumers and business. For example, quoting from the advertising agency Lowe UK's 2002 HSBC television campaign, .
"In the U.K. it is deemed disrespectful not to finish a meal provided by your host whereas in China, if you do, it is questioning the generosity of your host".
Secondly, each element of culture influences each component of the marketing mix. Promotion, for instance, is strongly influenced by the language. Product acceptance is affected by culturally based attitudes towards change. .
Thirdly, marketing also influences culture, especially by contributing to cultural borrowing and change. In the long run, as more markets become global and standardisation of marketing mix increases, the rate of cultural changes will also increase. .
Nonetheless, cultures may change slowly, and specific products many meet with protracted resistance. Therefore, the primary task for marketers is to locate the similarities in various markets and strategically make them available for entering into the new markets cross-culturally. This is achieved with International marketing research data. Marketing cross-culturally is a process during which marketers need to continuously adjust their behaviours and marketing programs to fit into the targeted markets.
Measurement Reliability.
It is critical for firms to have access to reliable and relevant research in order to develop successful marketing campaigns. Misinterpretation or mismanaged research can result in undesired, far-reaching implications. In psychometrics, "Reliability is formally defined as the proportion of observed score variation represented by true score (as opposed to error) variation, where the observed scores are assumed to be the sum of independently distributed true and error components" (David, Douglas, Silk, 1981, adapted from Lord & Novick, 1968).
