Incisive Marketing

I’ve recently had the pleasure of working with some India-based clients. Working across cultures has always been a mixed blessing for me. While I love the reminder that there is a greater world out there beyond the U.S. marketplace, sometimes I crave the simplicity of working with people who already “get it.”

Specifically, the big issue seems to be context. How can you use words to explain a writing style or tone, being incisive vs. wordy, the overuse of tired buzzwords, cliches, and the like when you’re still battling the Queen’s English vs. American English? Annual turnover or revenues? When talking about design, how do you use words to describe a look-and-feel that seems dated or tired? Even with a myriad of examples to point to on the Web, how do you get your offshore design people to understand that a banker doesn’t appreciate a Web 2.0 style the way a high tech exec might? Or, that the ads that Americans see in print, on billboards, and even the TV shows we watch, influence our sense of design and appropriateness — every day.

The economics of producing marketing content offshore are compelling. I find that production costs are about a third of what they are here. Even creative is considerably less. Factoring in the obligatory back-and-forth required to spell out every detail (no, we don’t use A4 paper in the US), there are still costs savings to be had.

However, I’m not looking for a new career just yet. Until there is universal context that transcends our global marketplace, I’m not worried.