International Marketing in a Globalized World. An Analysis of Italian Consumer Preferences

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2021 in the subject Business economics - Offline Marketing and Online Marketing, grade: 1,0, , language: English, abstract: During the last decades, globalization has altered world economies, societies, and cultures, and thus created a new dynamic reality. Today, companies and managers are continuously faced with the standardization versus localization controversy, and even though numerous studies and theories have been published, including Theodore Levitt's renowned 'The Globalization of Markets', to date, no solution has been reached. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to determine the influence of Italy's representation in marketing campaigns and thus provide a framework for managers and marketers of international as well as Italian companies who wish to market and advertise their goods and services in Italy successfully. Following the analysis of existing literature, to test the hypotheses that the greater the representation of the Italian culture and values, the higher the purchase likeliness and positive feelings associated with a campaign, an online-based survey was employed. Subsequently, the collected responses were analyzed utilizing the Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test and the Kruskal-Wallis Statistical Test. The tested hypotheses were statistically significant, and an increase in both purchase likeliness, as well as positive feelings, was registered in marketing campaigns portraying the Italian culture. The results suggest that marketers and firms that decide to represent the Italian culture in their marketing campaigns and advertising and hence implement a localization strategy are more likely to increase advertisement appreciation along with sales. Though, having Covid-19 altered world balances, it is recommended to repeat the analysis at a distance of one year. Also, further research is essential in order to evaluate the impact of price on Italians' buying behavior, as it was not incorporated in the conducted study.