Page 310 - Introduction to Business

284 PART 3 Marketing

A country’s population and income determine its attractiveness as a market. Some
countries have very large populations.

China 1.3 billion
India l.1 billion
Indonesia 210 million
Brazil 170 million
Russia 146 million
Pakistan 138 million
Bangladesh 131 million
Nigeria 127 million 7

Others have very small populations. For example, Botswana, Estonia, Gabon,
Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Kuwait, Latvia, Lesotho, Mauritius, Mongolia, Namibia,
Oman, Slovenia, Swaziland, and Trinidad and Tobago have fewer than 2 million
people.
As with population, there are wide disparities in incomes. Switzerland has a per
capita income of $38,140, followed by Japan with $35,620, Norway with $34,530, and
Denmark with $32,230. Austria, Hong Kong, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands,
Singapore, Sweden, and the United Kingdom have per capita incomes of $24,000 to
$27,000. On the other hand, many countries, chiefly those in Africa, have per capita
incomes of less than $300 per year. 8
The U.S. government spends over $3 billion a year to help companies either to
begin marketing their products or services overseas or to expand already existing
operations. A good deal of this funding is to provide information about overseas
markets.
• The National Trade Data Bank contains over 200,000 government documents
dealing with international markets.
• The International Trade Administration contains both country and product
experts who have information on overseas markets, as does the U.S. and
Foreign Commercial Services.
• The International Data Base, located in the U.S. Department of Commerce’s
Bureau of the Census, helps firms identify and analyze potential foreign
markets.
• U.S. Export Assistance Centers (USEACS) help identify attractive overseas
target markets.

The Marketing Environment

LEARNING OBJECTIVE 4
Identify and describe the components of the marketing environment.
In addition to the market, marketers need to understand what is occurring in the
marketing environment Areas outside marketing environment. The marketing environment consists of competition,
the firm (competition, technology, technology, the economy, the legal and political arenas, and culture. Develop-
economy, legal and political arenas, and
culture) that companies need to monitor ments in these areas can positively or negatively affect companies’ operations. If
and react to positively affected, marketers will want to take advantage of the opportunities
available; if negatively impacted, they need to decide what to do to minimize the
damage. Since the marketing environment exists outside the firm, little or no
control can be exerted over what happens; firms pretty much have to operate
reactively.

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