The Challenges Of Gathering Reliable Information For International Decision Making

Challenges Faced by International Managers

Doing business at international locations is always challenging due to the several external forces such as market forces, competitive forces etc. Getting access to reliable data is even more challenging. The level of the challenge gets increased when such things are related to emerging and developing economies. This can be due to a number of pitfalls which do not just affect the reliability of data but are also full of risks that can potentially harm the business (Terjesen, Hessels & Li 2016, p. 302). There can be many barriers to accessing the reliable data such as availability & reliability of data, inappropriate method for the data collection and reliability of primary data suppliers. International management can face these barriers due to various reasons like basic infrastructures, cultural differences, political & legislative issues, accessibility and communication barriers (Gorodnichenko & Talavera 2017, p. 257). The main purpose of this study is to understand why international managers face challenges to get the reliable data from emerging and developing economies such as Indonesia.

Language translation into the local language is one of the biggest pitfalls of doing market research in emerging economy like Indonesia. There can be a few words missing from the dictionary of other regions. For example, Russian people use many variants for the word “fresh”. Each of the variants has a notable difference than the others. Such differences are lost when a foreign language is translated into the Russian language (Sousa & Tan 2015, p. 89). ‘Thank you’ is used in America and the European countries as a matter of routine; however, in other parts of the world, things can be different. For example, ‘thank you’ in India is often seen as ironic and sarcasm. These few examples suggest one evident fact that language translation in terms of a market survey is a potential challenge.

Such issues can affect the quality of data and also cause the adverse consequences. There are various modes to enter a foreign location. Few of such options are merger & acquisition, joint venturing, outsourcing and imports & exports. Imports & exports mode is the most recommended form considering that minimal investments will be made. Exporting quality should be good to get more orders in the future. Such requirements can be affected if the data lacks in quality. A quality data is much more important than large-scale data to export the relevant products (Cunha et al. 2014, p. 206).

Language Translation

Considering the above-mentioned challenge, it is advisable to hire local market researchers who could help to convert the language and answer the data. This can possibly help to overcome the issue which is quite probable with the international market research. However, it is important for the local researchers to have the adequate tools and resources to conduct a deep marketing research. It is particularly more a problem to get the data from rural customers than from urban. It is, therefore, necessary for researchers to constantly innovate with strategies to get more data. Reliability of the data should also be ensured (Cyr 2016, p. 241).  

 The market research industry in Indonesia is at its stagnant stage which means that the recommended strategy to approach to local researchers will not work. The Indonesian government has taken some positive moves to improve the business efficiency of the market research industry. Efforts are also being given to align the practice with the global business standard. However, it has not worked so far. Research agencies have so far struggled to understand the needs of their clients. Moreover, recommendations were also not very effective. These are due to the undetailed analysis of the data. Hence, businesses in Indonesia are desperate for new research agencies (Asia-research.net 2018).

There was a time when the research was used to be done with pencil and paper or by the telephone. Those days have gone now with the advent of digital surveys to conduct the internal market research. However, it is also full of challenges as well as there are evident differences in the worldwide adoption of digital technologies. Platform variance poses pressure on researchers to design universal questions. Universal questionnaire and visual materials are designed especially for laptops or PCs. However, there are regions where people are accessing the internet for the first time on their mobile phones. Such facts make it necessary to also use mobile phones for conducting the survey. Market researcher will need to design the questions in a way that it is both accessible and less time consuming (Busnaina & Woodall 2015, p. 788).

In emerging and developing economies such as Indonesia, India, Turkey etc. people use their laptops or PCs to access to market research. However, in few other parts of world mobile phones are used. In those regions, the best way to generate the data and also reach to more people can be effectively attained by doing a mobile-based survey. It is already happening in developing nations like India and Africa. However, a mobile-based survey can also suffer a failure while interacting with the Germans. Germans have a tendency to use the long words which means that the questionnaire will easily make up a couple of pages. Moreover, participants will need to invest a fair amount of time to go through the entire set of questions. It may test their patience and can possibly encourage them to quit the survey half-way or even do not head for it at all (Stromeyer et al. 2015, p.508).

Data Collection Methods

However, Indonesia being the Asian countries should not have that much of an issue as that in Germany. It is recommended to use the mobile phone based survey with people living in Indonesia. It is advisable to use less text for a mobile-based survey. As stated earlier, a mobile survey may not be that handful in Germany as people use the long words which will make the survey paper a bit lengthier. Hence, it appears as if there are no such formats available to market researchers which could be translated effectively between different regions. It is, therefore, recommended to use the variety of versions of digital surveys to suit the feasibility of regions (Chatterji et al. 2016, p.123).

Culture influences the response style. In certain cases, respondents are more susceptible to indicating the strongest approval or disapproval on questions they are asked about. At their disposal, they often seem like being bias to answering the questions. They tend to have a separate response pattern which compels for making answers in either ‘yes’ or ‘no’. They make such answers irrespective of what their feelings are. Such a tendency is very specific with a collectivist culture which is commonly being found in the Asian countries. They are fuelled with a feeling or tendency to maintain a healthy interpersonal harmony. They do it so because the group is more important to them than individuals. This is why they intentionally try to keep the group in harmony while sacrificing their personal opinion. That leads the Asian people to agree on what they are asked about (Adeleye et al. 2015, p. 7).

 Such places like Indonesia can be challenging at a time when it is needed to identify why a particular product has failed to succeed. It is also difficult to test new innovations because the international business has the unreliable data. It is like committing the mistake by relying on data which has respondents intentionally making the invalid responses. When these people are asked about a new product, they tend to give a very solid response to it with phrases like “it is truly a very good idea”. They probably do it only to make a prompt ignorance of that new product (Yang & Kang 2015, p. 94).

There have been methodological advances in recent decades in regards to dealing with such tendency. One of such ways is simply to benchmark new product study against the historical data of past launches. Historical data will consist of past releases and the pre-launch responses of people. This can also help to know the discrepancy that is there in the responses and what actually they did. The strategy can help international managers to conduct a detailed statistical analysis in Indonesia about a future performance of a new product. Positive responses can then be analyzed to know that higher ratings are of fewer values in countries like Indonesia than that are in the United States and Western Europe. Going for relative rather than the absolute differences will help to identify the response nature and the data reliability (Chatterji et al. 2016, p. 127).

Conclusion 

In summary, it can be concluded that language translation, data collection method and the response styles are three pitfalls which will affect the market research in EDMEs like Indonesia. Language translation can be made free from flaws by hiring the local market research agency; however, Indonesia is struggling to have a reliable firm. A mobile application can be more effective than online surveys made for laptops and PCs. However, this strategy might fail as well in others parts of the world like Germany. For response styles, international managers must conduct a detailed statistical analysis of the past products’ launches. 

References 

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Asia-research.net 2018. Perspective: The Future of Market Research in Indonesia – ASIA RESEARCH Magazine. [online] Asia-research.net. Available at: https://asia-research.net/perspective-future-market-research-indonesia/ [Accessed 15 Aug. 2018].

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