Target audience and message alignment for integrated marketing communication of luxury products: entering the Chinese market

The purpose of this study is to identify opportunities to match marketing communication message strategies with the target audience characteristics in the Chinese luxury market entry context. Therefore, consumer behaviour and psychographic marketing segmentation fields are being reviewed in a holistic view in order to identify the similarities and connection points. Through the analysis of the messages in advertisements placed in a certain luxury and fine living magazine, message creation strategies are being anticipated.

Letters from the War of Ecosystems – An Analysis of Independent Software Vendors in Mobile Application Marketplaces

The recent emergence of a new generation of mobile application marketplaces has changed the business in the mobile ecosystems. The marketplaces have gathered over a million applications by hundreds of thousands of application developers and publishers. Thus, software ecosystems—consisting of developers, consumers and the orchestrator—have emerged as a part of the mobile ecosystem. This dissertation addresses the new challenges faced by mobile application developers in the new ecosystems through empirical methods. By using the theories of two-sided markets and business ecosystems as the basis, the thesis assesses monetization and value creation in the market as well as the impact of electronic Word-of-Mouth (eWOM) and developer multihoming— i. e. contributing for more than one platform—in the ecosystems. The data for the study was collected with web crawling from the three biggest marketplaces: Apple App Store, Google Play and Windows Phone Store. The dissertation consists of six individual articles. The results of the studies show a gap in monetization among the studied applications, while a majority of applications are produced by small or micro-enterprises. The study finds only weak support for the impact of eWOM on the sales of an application in the studied ecosystem. Finally, the study reveals a clear difference in the multi-homing rates between the top application developers and the rest. This has, as discussed in the thesis, an impact on the future market analyses—it seems that the smart device market can sustain several parallel application marketplaces.

The long, small war : kokemukset epäsymmetrisestä sodasta Irakissa vuosina 2003–2008

Tämän tutkielman tarkoitus on selvittää, miten epäsymmetrinen sodankäynti Irakissa vuosina 2003–2008 vaikutti Yhdysvaltain armeijaan ja merijalkaväkeen. Päätutkimuskysymykseen vas-tataan selvittämällä historian kokemuksien vaikutus siihen miten Irakin sotaan valmistauduttiin. Tarkoituksena on myös selvittää miten epäsymmetrinen sota ilmeni vuosien kuluessa ja miten amerikkalaiset kehittivät varusteita, koulutusta, organisaatioita ja doktriiniaan sodan kuluessa. Lähdeaineistona on käytetty englanninkielistä kirjallisuutta. Suurin osa aineistosta on operaati-oon osallistuneiden sotilaiden ja siviilien kirjoittamia. He ovat kirjoittaneet joko omien koke-muksien pohjalta tai sitten teoksissa on haastateltu tapahtumia todistaneita avainhenkilöitä. Li-säksi on käytetty sotilasammatillisissa lehdissä julkaistuja artikkeleita, asevoimien ohjesääntöjä ja eri puolustushallinnon sekä riippumattomien tutkimuslaitoksien tekemiä raportteja. Opinnäyt-teiden osuus on vähäinen ja haastatteluja ei ole käytetty. Tutkimusmenetelmä on aineistoanalyy-siin perustuva kirjallisuustutkimus. Työssä korostuu lähdekritiikki ja lähteiden vertailu, koska ajoittain lähteissä esitetyt tiedot ovat kirjoittajien omia näkemyksiä historiallisista tapahtumista. Vuonna 2003 alkanut Irakin sota kehittyi vuosia kestäneeksi taisteluksi epäsymmetrisesti toimi-vaa vihollista vastaan. Irakin sodan kynnyksellä operaation suunnittelussa ei huomioitu hyökkä-yksen jälkeistä vakauttamisvaihetta riittävällä tarkkuudella. Seurauksena oli se että Irakin ajau-tumista sekasortoon Baghdadin valtauksen jälkeen ei voitu estää. Liittouman päätös lakkauttaa Irakin omat turvallisuuskoneistot vaikeutti tilannetta entisestään. Vuoden 2003 lopulla Irak oli ajautumassa etnisten ja uskonnollisten ristiriitojen vaikuttamaan kumoukselliseen sotaan. Seu-raavat vuodet Yhdysvallat pyrki viholliskeskeisellä strategialla kukistamaan epäsymmetrisesti toimivat kumoukselliset taistelijat. Keskeisinä tutkielman havaintoina on, että Yhdysvalloilla on paljon kokemusta epäsymmetri-sestä sodankäynnistä. Historian kokemuksista johtuvien asenteiden ja vuonna 2003 vaikuttaneen poliittisen ilmapiirin vuoksi Irakin sodan miehitysvaihetta ei suunniteltu kunnolla. Yhtenäisen strategian puute aiheutti ongelmia sodan alkuvuosina. Tänäkin aikana osa joukoista toteutti on-nistuneesti vastakumouksellisen sodan operaatioita, jotka vaikuttivat uuden doktriinin syntyyn. Doktriinin avaintekijä oli uusi ohjesääntö FM 3-24, jonka opit olivat keskeisessä asemassa vuonna 2007 alkaneissa operaatioissa. Näiden operaatioiden menestyksen taustalla oli monia tekijöitä, mutta myös amerikkalaisten uudenlainen ymmärrys siitä miten taistella epäsymmetri-sesti toimivaa vihollista vastaan. Sotakokemukset synnyttivät uusia varusteita, koulutusta ja organisaatiomuutoksia. Suurin vaikutus on kuitenkin siinä, miten vuoteen 2008 mennessä epä-tavanomaisen sodankäynnin merkitys asevoimien tehtävissä oli noussut aiempaa tärkeämmäksi.

"Daily Mail" map of the war in China

Kartta kuuluu A. E. Nordenskiöldin kokoelmaan

Show me your brain! Stories of interdisciplinary knowledge creation in practice. Experiences and observations from Aalto Design Factory, Finland.

This dissertation centres on the themes of knowledge creation, interdisciplinarity and knowledge work. My research approaches interdisciplinary knowledge creation (IKC) as practical situated activity. I argue that by approaching IKC from the practice-based perspective makes it possible to “deconstruct” how knowledge creation actually happens, and demystify its strong intellectual, mentalistic and expertise-based connotations. I have rendered the work of the observed knowledge workers into something ordinary, accessible and routinized. Consequently this has made it possible to grasp the pragmatic challenges as well the concrete drivers of such activity. Thus the effective way of organizing such activities becomes a question of organizing and leading effective everyday practices. To achieve that end, I have conducted ethnographic research of one explicitly interdisciplinary space within higher education, Aalto Design Factory in Helsinki, Finland, where I observed how students from different disciplines collaborated in new product development projects. I argue that IKC is a multi-dimensional construct that intertwines a particular way of doing; a way of experiencing; a way of embodied being; and a way of reflecting on the very doing itself. This places emphasis not only the practices themselves, but also on the way the individual experiences the practices, as this directly affects how the individual practices. My findings suggest that in order to effectively organize and execute knowledge creation activities organizations need to better accept and manage the emergent diversity and complexity inherent in such activities. In order to accomplish this, I highlight the importance of understanding and using a variety of (material) objects, the centrality of mundane everyday practices, the acceptance of contradictions and negotiations well as the role of management that is involved and engaged. To succeed in interdisciplinary knowledge creation is to lead not only by example, but also by being very much present in the very everyday practices that make it happen.

The Utilization of Chinese Social Media in Internationalization into China: Perspective of a Western Company

The purpose of this qualitative research is to analyze western-based companies’ social media usage in internationalization into China and to identify social media presence’ impact on the internationalization process. Additionally, the benefits and challenges a western company may face while using social media in China will be illustrated. Competitive advantages, knowledge, networks and relations, and costs and risks could be identified as the key antecedents for successful internationalization. A great social media presence could create a competitive advantage for a western company while competitive advantages may be communicated in social media marketing, knowledge and networks can be enhanced and utilized in internationalization via social media two-way communication. The biggest benefit for internationalization resulted from decreased marketing costs due to cost-effectiveness of social media. The results revealed that cost effective brand awareness was the main benefit from the social media usage in internationalization into China. However, companies struggled with the limited resources and despite of understanding the importance of Chinese social media, lacked sufficient resources for the social media operations. Companies should determine clear strategy and goals that they are willing to achieve via social media in internationalization process, and allocate required resources according to the social media strategy. Localization of the social media operations is important in China, and business-to-consumer companies tend to benefit more from the social media presence. Business-to-business companies may increase the brand’s credibility by successful Chinese social media operations.

THE ROLE OF CULTURAL AWARENESS IN BUILDING CHINESE HEALTH FOOD BRANDS Using Netnography in Searching Cultural Arguments to Be Used for Marketing Health Foods in China

Despite the complexity of the Chinese culture consumer product businesses should apply them in building brands for Chinese markets. There are reasons to believe that cultural values and attitudes affect the buying behavior of Chinese consumers. Companies that wish to create brands in China should therefore be aware of the prevailing cultural values and consumer attitudes. This thesis will examine which values and attitudes mostly affect Chinese consumers of health food products. The study will be done by conducting a netnography. Because netnography is actually a collection methods rather than a single method, other auxiliary methods will also be applied. These methods are emotion, language and sentiment analysis (ELS analysis). Emotion analysis will be conducted because cultural values are mostly built on emotional basis. Sentiment analysis will assist in recognizing the key factors that help to locate values and attitudes. Because the netnography will be conducted in Chinese web forums by a non-native researcher, linguistic aspects should also be analyzed in parallel with emotions and sentiment analysis. The study shows that the Chinese consumers of health food products put much importance on functional, analytical and collectivistic attitudes as well as social and psychological values. Of all the twelve cultural values defined, the role of family rose above all. Also perseverance, frugality, guanxi and harmony were highly presented. The attitudes were found by recognizing certain attitude factors. Of all the factors, health foods’ functional benefits and aesthetic content together with consumers’ value consciousness surpassed other factors. Besides these results that can be applied by foreign health food companies willing to enter Chinese consumer markets, also academia can benefit this new approach for conducting ethnographies online.

Entry Modes of Finnish Food Enterprises in Chinese Market

China’s phenomenal economic growth and social development have brought along interesting opportunities for Finnish companies. One intriguing sector offering significant growth potential is the food industry. Due to the local food safety issues, rising disposable income level and changing consumer habits, the demand for foreign food is increasing. Finnish food companies have much to offer in terms of high quality, food safety in production, technological development and innovation. The purpose of this study is to examine how the Finnish food enterprises choose their entry modes in the Chinese market. This study increases understanding of entry modes the Finnish companies can use to successfully enter the unpredictable market of China in the food industry context. The study examines the industry specific challenges and the possible solutions to them. Qualitative research is selected as research methodology for this study because the intention is to understand the reasons behind the Finnish food enterprises’ entry mode choices in the Chinese market. The study is conducted as a qualitative case analysis. Six Finnish case companies operating in the food industry were interviewed. The results of the research indicate that most of the food industry companies use exporting as their entry mode to China; only one case company used an investment mode. This study illustrates the significance of the factors related to company’s background, mode concerns and Chinese market influences in the entry mode choice.