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With all the party political rhetoric, it is easy to convince

yourself that the single European market is frequently only a

socio-political concept, where the proposition of global branding and

marketing delivery is a pipe dream.

Walking through the centre of almost every main city on the Continent,

however, and the ubiquity of McDonald’s and Benetton, to name but two,

are a sharp reminder that not only is pan-European branding and

marketing alive and kicking, but that it’s here to stay and will grow in

importance.

For marketers everywhere, there are only a few essential challenges that

we face. How do we grow market share profitably and cost effectively,

and how do we defend our position by anticipating and reacting to the

initiatives of our key competitors?

These principles possess an international dimension for all marketers,

regardless of whether they believe their focus to be national or global,

as it is not sufficient to assume that because a business perceives it

operates in its home market alone it will not face a challenge from a

competitor from beyond its borders. Whether or not that organisation

seizes the initiative first and examines the potential for export is a

decision it must take itself - the real truth is, of course, that the

home market and the home competitive set is now at least

Europe-wide.

But if the market opportunities stretch across Europe, what tools are

readily available to help the marketer talk to and service the needs of

millions of people who speak dozens of languages and emanate from

hundreds of diverse cultural backgrounds?

A handful of global mega brands have for some time begun to scope the

opportunities at continent-wide level, with the telemarketing industry

providing communication solutions to these international players.

However, so far this continent wide perspective has been restricted to

just that - handful of organisations. But two key drivers for change in

recent years are precipitating an explosion in the capability of

communications to transform the business opportunity for far more

companies and brands across Europe.

The first driver is clearly technology. The accelerated integration of

the internet provides a worldwide technology solution that is now

transforming call centres into ’customer contact centres’ with the

ability to provide cost effective communication irrespective of

location. Progressive solutions in EDI, voice recognition - voice to

text/text to voice - are also assisting the global unification of

technology.

The second driver is the liberalisation of the telecoms market. (Value

added services within the telecommunications market are all the rage -

intelligent network (IN) services such as Virtual Private Networks

(VPN’s), internet telephony and Least Call Routing capabilities.)

The removal of many of the old restrictions which ensnared state run

telecoms businesses now presents an opportunity to look beyond

geographically defined markets to a situation where the customer may

call the shots.

Where does this leave the marketer wishing to talk to this culturally

diverse community of people?

In essence, it offers them one thing - freedom. Freedom to create single

or multiple brands. Freedom to create single or multiple customer

communications processes.

But this freedom is as unnerving as it is exciting, for the potential to

grow is probably only equalled by the capability to fail. In short, the

stakes are raised much higher than ever before.

But how does the marketer reconcile the benefits of a pan European

communications strategy - which undoubtedly offers the potential cost

effectiveness of a single marketing position, and the attraction of a

single customer experience, with the increasing trend toward the concept

of one-to-one marketing, which has supplanted the marketer’s preference

for mass, then segmented, then niche marketing?

If we want to know an individual’s priorities and perceptions in order

to best meet their needs and maximise their involvement with our brand,

how do we justify a ’one size fits all’ approach to our public

proposition?

The answer must almost certainly lie in an open-minded approach to

cross-border marketing. While real-scale benefits are within the grasp

of a continent-wide strategy, true communications success is underpinned

by a sure understanding of the perceptions and needs of the customer

groupings which are being targeted.

This is a non-prescriptive and hard-working approach, but it is a

foundation on which the strongest campaigns are built. Think about these

two examples; Nestle markets its instant coffee under the brand name

Nescafe across Europe, with the benefits of continental recognition, but

changes the formula to suit the tastes and expectations of individual

countries. Unilever, however, owns a large ice cream business across

Europe, but markets this - albeit within the same basic corporate

identity - under a range of different local brands, reflecting the

heritage of what for many consumers is basically a nostalgic

proposition. Thus, what we know as ’Walls’ in the UK becomes ’Ola’ in

Spain, and so on.

This open-mindedness is reflected in standard-setting provision within

telemarketing. InTelMark, part of Omnicom, the US-based global marketing

business, is steadily building its presence within Europe from its base

within the UK. From a core of experience and expertise in managing

global brands for global businesses - including clients such as Renault,

Kellogg and British Airways - we are developing our call-centre strategy

in a measured way.

From a practical viewpoint, this means balancing the provision of

skills, languages and cultures of our people, with the implications of

integrating call-centre technology and costing structures to best meet

the needs of our clients and their customers.

Within telemarketing, then, the well-worn sales cliche, ’The answer’s

yes, now what was the question?’ has never been truer. The real

benchmark which separates the best from the rest is how sensitively this

solution is tailored to assess then meet the needs of the marketing

brief, seizing upon economies of scale where they exist, and focusing on

the particular requirements of a local market need where this best

delivers customer loyalty