Page 187 - Aamir Rehman - Dubai & Co Global Strategies for Doing Business in the Gulf States-McGraw-Hill (2007)

Making Your Pitch: Marketing to GCC Buyers 171

catching on to this understanding: the cosmetic and fragrance com-
pany Coty reportedly shot a special ad campaign for the Middle East.
The ad shows only the face of Jennifer Lopez, in stark contrast with
ads shown in other markets that are more sensual and revealing. 8
A second key message relates to the depth of information pro-
vided and explicit comparison with competitors. Gulf ads are typi-
cally concise and direct rather than deeply informative. Even firms
selling complex products like mobile phones and electronics may
be well served to focus their advertisement on the brand attributes
and lifestyle they wish to communicate, as opposed to product
specifications and technical details. That information, if conveyed
at all, could be communicated at the point of sale or elsewhere.
The finding that explicitly comparative ads are far less com-
mon in the GCC states than elsewhere has evoked no shortage of
hypotheses seeking to explain it. One is that the buyer in a GCC
market is more concerned with exclusivity and being “special”;
therefore reference to other products is counterproductive. Another
theory, which I feel would apply to luxury categories, is that the
buyer may be less price sensitive and, therefore, the product’s being
a “better buy” (i.e., less expensive) than its competitors’ matters
less. Yet another theory, which seems too vague and broad, is that
the Gulf is consensus oriented and, therefore, direct negative com-
ments about competitors are seen as insensitive or even unethical.
While none of these explanations seems particularly compelling,
the observation that comparison ads are less common than in the
United States is an important one for marketers to bear in mind.

Good for the Goose, Not for the Gander
While, for the purposes of this book, we discuss “Gulf advertising
norms” as a common set of principles, styles and tastes certainly dif-
fer from market to market. UAE ads, as confirmed in the
International Journal of Advertising study, do tend to feature women in
long clothing, but more provocative ads can sometimes be shown.
In the course of our research, we looked into the differences in
advertising norms among GCC markets. One market insider and
expert pointed us to a European ad that, in her experience, would
be acceptable in the UAE but certainly off-limits in Saudi Arabia 9
(see Figure 6.5).