Perreault−McCarthy: Basic
Marketing: A
Global−Managerial
Approach, 14/e- Demographic
Dimensions of Global
Consumer Markets
Text © The McGraw−Hill
Companies, 2002136 Chapter 5
literacy affects the way information is delivered—which in marketing means pro-
motion. Unfortunately, only about three-fourths of the world’s population can read
and write. Data on illiteracy rates is inexact because different countries use differ-
ent measures. Even so, you may be surprised by the high illiteracy rates for some of
the countries in Exhibit 5-2.
Illiteracy sometimes causes difficulties with product labels and instructions—for
which we normally use words. This was one issue in the infant formula conflict. In
an even more extreme case, some producers of baby food found that consumers mis-
interpreted a baby’s picture on their packages. Illiterate natives believed that the
product was just that—a ground-up baby! Many companies meet this lack of liter-
acy with instructions that use pictures instead of words. Singer used this approach
with its sewing machines.
Even in Latin America—which has generally higher literacy rates than Africa
or Asia—a large number of people cannot read and write. Marketers have to use
symbols, colors, and other nonverbal means of communication if they want to reach
the masses.^8Marketers can learn a great deal about possible opportunities in different coun-
tries by studying available demographic data and trends. The examples we
considered here give you a feel, but much more useful data is available. For exam-
ple, The World Factbookis prepared by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for
the use of U.S. government officials, but it is available to everyone. It gives facts
and statistics on each country in the world. This book can be accessed at the CIA’s
website (www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook). The World Bank publishes The
World Development Indicators,another excellent source for statistics on individual
countries. It is available at the World Bank’s website (www.worldbank.org/data/wdi).
The International Programs Center of the U.S. Census Bureau also publishes an
analysis on world population and related topics called World Population Profile.You
can also access useful statistics for individual countries at the Census Bureau’s web-
site (www.census.gov/ipc).Much segmenting may
be required
Where does your state
stand?
After finding some countries or regions of possible interest (and eliminating unat-
tractive ones), much more segmenting may be required. To illustrate how useful
demographic dimensions can be in this effort, we will consider specific characteris-
tics of the U.S. market in some detail. For additional data on the U.S. market, you
can go to the Census Bureau’s website (www.census.gov). Similar ideas apply to
other markets around the world.Population Trends in the U.S. Consumer Market
Exhibit 5-3 is a map of the U.S. showing the relative population for each state.
The “high areas” on this map emphasize the concentration of population in different
geographic regions. Note that California is the most populated state, with Texas a
distant second. New York, in third place, still has almost as large a population as Texas,
but Texas’ population is more spread out. More generally, the heavy concentration
of people in the Northeast makes this market larger than the whole West Coast.Internet
Internet Exercise Visit the website for the CIA’s World Factbook
(www.odci.gov/cia/publications/factbook) and compare the profile data for
Canada and Australia. How are they similar and how are they different?