Book Review

The Mirage of Global Market:

How Globalizing Companies Can Succeed as Markets Localize?

(A book by David Arnold)

By: D. Manggala (February 26, 2004)

Despite the huge discussion about global trade and market, only a few companies have been successful internationally. It means there are only a small number of companies that has been successful in implementing global marketing. Why are so many companies failed in the global market? How to be successful? What are the best ways to be successful? Those are very common questions today; yet, only a few answers have been published. Here, David Arnold, an independent marketing consultant and educator,  offers a book that discusses and tries to provide answers for all of those questions; the book is titled The Mirage of Global Market: How Globalizing Companies Can Succeed as Markets Localize. This book is published recently (dated in 2004) by a very respectful publisher, Financial Times-Prentice Hall.

The main thesis of this book is that companies need to understand that they have to manage their products/services/brands globally but market them locally. Arnold believes that while companies are growing larger, market are growing smaller. Therefore, companies must pursue “International Marketing Management” instead of “International Marketing.” The author explains all the differences of those two terms in a quite length in his books. His backgrounds and experiences as an international marketing professor at Harvard Business School and currently as a consultant in international marketing allow him to discuss a lot of things that help companies to understand the growing global market.

One of the strongest points of this book is its ability to show the common mistakes of companies in global market. Arnold shows us very clearly that many companies are often trapped in illusion that the foreign markets are much bigger than its reality. This might be the reason why Arnold chose “mirage” in its title that he wants to show us that many companies are only see the “illusion’ of global market, not the facts. According to Arnold, many companies tend to exaggerate the foreign market size; this is the reason why there are so many companies failed in the global market.

 Furthermore, this book provides a good explanation of the importance of using the bottom-up approach rather top-down approach in assessing foreign markets. As explained in Chapter 2 of this book, bottom-up approach is based on products-market, while top-down approach is based on country’s demographics and economics data, which makes bottom-up approach, according to Arnold, is more accurate than the other. The other thing that this book explains very well is its explanation about how to “buy globally, sell locally” (p. 122-25). Arnold uses MasterCard sponsorship of the soccer World Cup as the example, and it really can provide a detail and clear model to support his thesis.

The references and sources are another strong point in this book; it provides very proper and accurate explanation on some important backgrounds for the global market. Arnold is very successful in discussing the “globalization” controversy and its impacts to marketing by referring to Levitt’s article “The Globalization of Market” and Douglas and Wind’s article “The Myth of Globalization.” These two articles are giving us the view from both sides in the issue of globalization which Arnold has a very good job in placing those articles in Chapter 4 and then giving his insights about why both articles are important for marketers.

Even though this book is, in overall, an excellent book, there are some aspects that should make this book better. Firstly, there are not so many examples in this book. Usually, a marketing book is more enjoyable if it has a lot of examples because marketing is more “art” than just a “science”. Providing more examples will bring vivid descriptions on some of the issues in the book.  We can see another marketing book which provides many examples, for instance Marketing Management by Phillip Kotler, which attracts many readers because of its richness in real examples from the contemporary businesses. Maybe this is because The Mirage of Global Market is not intended to be a text book, so it tries to limit the examples in attempt to not make the book too thick. However, Arnold should provide examples for each argument to support it and to help the readers in understanding his points.

Secondly, this book is not very concise in explaining some of its important points. The author mentions in the preface that this book is driven by his students and managers that need a concise book that managerially focused on international marketing. It is very hard to consider this is as a “concise” book because it more likes a compilation of essays rather than straight forward explanations about how to tackle some of the issues in global market. This is a book that will give the readers many insights on global marketing, but we cannot say this is a concise book.

One other weak point is still related to the previous weak point; this book is not an action oriented book. Some readers may be mislead to think that this book is a kind of “how-to book” that will provide a clear step by step to be successful in global market. If you read the descriptions in the book’s jacket you will find some description that could be misleading. The following passages are excerpted from the book’s jacket:

“If you’ve been struggling in global markets, this book will diagnose your problem—and prescribe your cure.

·         Why ‘global’ companies can fail—and how yours can succeed…

·         Which market to enter—and how to decide…”

In fact, it is very hard to find the “cure” that is mentioned in the above statement. This book provides many excellent insights that may inspire students or managers in global marketing field, but if you are looking for a straight forward “cure” you will not find tit in this book.

          Besides those three weak points, in overall this is a very insightful book. Some of the arguments are very original that will absolutely provide new perspectives to its readers. The way this book gives new paradigm to me about global market reminds me about another book that helps me see global trade in new perspective. That book is The Borderless World by Kenichi Ohmae. Arnold and Ohmae have similarity in explaining their analysis and arguments; both of them like to write many topics and sub topics with short passage for each topic. That method, on the one hand, can help the readers to get many insights because the richness of the topics discussed; on the other hand, maybe many readers will very hard to find the practical aspects of the book especially because there are only a few explanation for each title or sub title.

          In conclusion, The Mirage of Global Markets is an important book in understanding the global market because it provides many insights that are critical for global marketers such as the common pitfalls in assessing foreign markets, the importance of bottom-up method in predicting a foreign market, the concept of “buy globally, sell locally” and the difference between international marketing and international marketing management. Some readers may find it is a little bit difficult to find action-oriented points in this book because most of the topics are not discussed very deeply. However, as a companion to a regular global marketing text book such as Global Marketing Strategies by Jeannet/Hennessey , this book is very recommended to all readers.

Book Reviewed

Arnold, David. The Global Markets: How Globalizing Companies Can Succeed as Markets Localize. Upper Saddle River: FT Prentice Hall, 2004.