Adapting to Local Tastes to Gain and Edge of International Competitors
Juven builds integrated organisation platform software that empowers organisations of all sorts to build, engage and grow community. We believe that organisations should have access to beautiful, intuitive and reliable tools to create greater impact.
Local Platforms Don’t Lose Out to the International Competition
Local event management organizations such as Evention, and ticketing platforms such as Ticketflap and FringeBacker have gained solid reputations as market leaders in Hong Kong. The services and features they provide matches up well against international competition. They do this by providing a local twist to better cater to local organizations and communities.
Event services provided by these local platforms creates a unique experience by merging smooth interface experiences with the language flexibility to cater to the local audience. Ticketflap, the local giant of ticketing platforms, outperforms the heavily governments-subsided application Urbtix in just about every category of user interface and user experience by a large margin. Their services include marketing and promotion in different offline advertisements and social media platforms, which has helped them gain an edge in exposing their brand within the Hong Kong market. Moreover, by allowing users to pay through various channels, including ones that are unique to Hong Kong, they have made the user experience extremely friendly for locals.
Some organizations aim to target a niche group of customers to maintain a sustainable frequent customer base. art-mate, a local ticketing company that focuses on promoting art community events, has prudently integrated their platform to work with Urbtix, the government’s current ticketing system. By tapping into the government’s system, art-mate greatly expanded their pool of customers because they could now sell tickets for events that was previously only accessible on the official Urbtix platform. art-mate has thus ensured that it will have a customer base for those who prefer a better experience over Urbtix’s more primitive interface.
Local organizations also utilize language to provide an edge against the international competition. Fringebacker, a crowdfunding platform for charitable organisations, focuses on targeting organizations that holds large fundraiser events. They are also the only bilingual crowdfunding platform in Hong Kong. This makes their services more accessible for local people as more Hong Kongers, can use it to back local events, especially those not accustomed to using full-English websites. Another example of language preferences attracting a bigger local market would be Taobao against eBay or Amazon, despite all three websites providing a large catalog of items for purchase from all locations, local customers prefer buying from Taobao assuming that most items would be more inexpensive, with faster and cheaper shipping from China.
Lastly, local organizations try to promote themselves using local cultural nostalgia. Not only does this make the organization feel more appealing to the public, but it could also generate curiosity from foreign users. Understanding of the local traditions, history and culture, gives organizations different opportunities to highlight their brand and appeal to local and international consumers. Lee Kum Kee, a local food company based in Hong Kong, specializes in manufacturing different local sauces. Starting out as just a local producer of oyster sauce, they have now grown into a global organization with products sold in over a hundred of countries, because they have embraced Hong Kong history and culture for their brand, and fortifying their legacy as a century-long global family business.
Companies and organizations should not be intimidated by international competition if they can adapt to the unique advantages they have in local history and culture. Successful adaptation can be a huge boost to brand identity and provide an advantage even on the international market.
