Page 175 - Aamir Rehman - Dubai & Co Global Strategies for Doing Business in the Gulf States-McGraw-Hill (2007)

CHAPTER 6

Making Your Pitch: Marketing to

GCC Buyers

INTRODUCTION
You return to your hotel room after a day of business meetings in
Dubai (or another major Gulf city) and turn on the TV set while you
unwind. As you flip through the satellite channels, much of what
you see is familiar: Hollywood movies, European television chan-
nels, and other signs of Western culture. As you surf the cable chan-
nels, you come across a commercial that reminds you of so many
that you’ve seen before—it features young, attractive, hip people
enjoying themselves while music plays in the background. You see
a familiar logo—Doritos chips—and will soon hear the classic
Doritos crunch. Only after you turn up the volume do you realize
that the music is from the Middle East and the language being spo-
ken is Arabic. Not until then do you remember you’re in Dubai, not
Dallas.
A major advertising CEO has noted that “the challenge [of
global marketing] is to take the best of an international brand and
localize it.” So far in this book, we’ve discussed how the GCC
1
countries present an increasingly attractive market, full of opportu-
nity for multinational companies that approach it strategically.

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