Global Marketing Communications and Strategic Regionalism

This article examines how ideas of global standardization, localization, and regionalization are played out in relation to global marketing. Its aim is to deepen present understanding of global marketing communications and corporate strategy through case studies examining corporate responses to the issues of global standardization, localization, and regionalization. To do this, a research project was developed: an exploratory analysis of the advertising trade-press literature over a ten year period (1997-2007) mapping how three major multinational corporations (MNCs)-Coca-Cola, McDonald's, and Colgate-Palmolive-engage with marketing from the global, to the local, and the regional. From this exploratory analysis, two key developments emerge. The first is that, despite individual variations in each corporation's response to global marketing, in broad terms the dominant global marketing approach is one of 'glocalization'. The second key development and key argument of this paper is that, while the reemergence of 'regionalization' in analyses of global marketing and corporate strategy is becoming more prevalent, the term as presently understood requires significant conceptual revision. Thus we propose and develop the concept of 'strategic regionalism' as a valuable umbrella term for capturing some of the nuances of regionalization as it pertains to and is practiced within global marketing communications and corporate strategy.