Subject: Issue 23 Part 2: Japan-Land of the DRTV Rising Sun and Croatia's Media Handicaps
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. January 2003 Global Source Marketing's Overseas Partners
. Issue 23 Part 2: Japan-Land of the DRTV Rising Sun and Croatia's Media Handicaps
in this issue
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How Do You Judge a Winner?

In Japan the marketers look to past European and American sales information about a product in order to determine their willingness to test in their country. If there is a green light the tape will be dubbed into Japanese (or super imposed text)-this requires a translation and adjusting the running time of the commercial.

Croatian marketers do not weigh the current success or failure of a product in the European or American market as heavily as the Japanese. Rather they look for particular product categories that have sold successfully in Croatia. In most cases they will use the American made commercial and will make appropriate language adjustments, plus customize the ordering screens.

Global Source Marketing's Japanese partner named a product called "Stainerator" as the best American made commercial they have ever worked with. This product was introduced to the domestic market in 1986, and is still selling overseas today. Parts of the US infomercial were adapted for Japanese home shopping television presentations. Fitness Product commercials are the Croatian preferred choice of American made commercials. The look, feel, and selling power of these commercials drive Croatian interest in this category.

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Dear Reader,

How does it work in these two countries? This article gives you an eye into what makes DRTV, and eventually numerous other avenues of distribution possible. We are going to focus on the preliminary steps in marketing on foreign soil-namely DRTV. Further issues will explore the additional ways overseas marketers will sell and distribute your products-such as print, radio, magazines, newspapers, direct mail, and eventually retail.

In-Country Media And How it Works
Croatia is dominated by State owned broadcast television. There is only one station that is not owned by the government, so this severely limits commercial available media time. There are no cable stations at all. Croatian TV does accommodate 30 minute length commercials, however they also can air 15 and 10 minute lengths as well. Commercial time is only available from 11:00pm to 3:00am each day.

Global's Croatian partner does not buy television time outside of the country. They determine how much to spend on the media test according to the product category-the more popular a category (such as fitness) the more the marketer will risk in media dollars to determine success. If a commercial proves to be successful on one station, then the Croatian marketer will test two additional stations to prove consistent sales power of the product.

Global Source Marketing's Japanese partners work with a television broadcasting company such as FUJI-TV. They will have that company create their own program or use the translated American version, and run the media test at their own expense. Another option is to bundle several products together and showcase them on Japanese home shopping. This can lead to selling a large broadcasting company such as FUJI-TV (national Japanese distribution through DRTV) to air your product on their stations-if it sells well in home shopping first.

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Testing Media Details


The Japanese have numerous running times available for TV, so all American running times are workable in that country (30 minutes, 2 minutes, 60 seconds, etc.). Global Source Marketing's Japanese partner doesn't purchase media time outside Japan at the present time, however within Japan media is plentiful (TV, radio and catalogues). Primetime is not affordable for DRTV type of products, so most products are offered in "nighttime" hours-after 10:00pm..

Since the Japanese distributor for DR products utilizes media companies in a partnership arrangement-the amount of media risk dollars, criteria to determine success of an offer, and additional media testing are completely driven by each company or broadcasting network. The Japanese media organizations do not offer specific information on how they determine what is a successful test, or the steps they take in additional testing.

Next week-Rolling out a Successful Show in Japan and Croatia »

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