The Life-Long Customer

The Importance of Understanding Culture Before Marketing in Southeast Asia with Lars Voedisch, Principal Consultant, PRecious Communications

March 22, 2022 Revenue Rhino Season 1 Episode 130
The Life-Long Customer
The Importance of Understanding Culture Before Marketing in Southeast Asia with Lars Voedisch, Principal Consultant, PRecious Communications
Show Notes Transcript

For marketers who want to expand to Southeast Asia and tap into the endless opportunities it presents, trust is key.

According to Lars Voedisch, Principal Consultant and Managing Director at PRecious Communications, jumping directly into business in the region may not always do the trick. Prioritize building relationships and coming up with a mid-term plan, he advised.

Learn more about communications and marketing in this fast-growing region.  Listen to our podcast now!

“Just directly jumping in with “let's do business” might backfire badly. You need to build relationships and trust. You need to have a midterm plan, not a short term in here and just sell Fire and Forget, that might be really, destructive in your long-term opportunities here.” - Lars Voedisch, Principal Consultant, PRecious Communications

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Introduction: 0:04
From Revenue Rhino, I'm Brad Hammond, and this is The Lifelong Customer Podcast. We're interviewing successful sales and marketing leaders in discussing ways in which they're building lifelong relationships with their customer.

Brad Hammond: 0:20
Welcome to the Lifelong Customer Podcast. I'm your host, Brad Hammond. And today, I'm really excited to have Lars Voedisch. He's the Principal Consultant and Managing Director at PRecious Communications. Lars, it's really nice to have you on.

Lars Voedisch: 0:34
Thanks, Brad. Very happy to be here.

Brad Hammond: 0:36
Really excited. So can you please tell our audience a bit about yourself? Who is Lars?

Lars Voedisch: 0:43
Sure. I'm originally from a country in the middle of Europe, Germany, but now in Asia for close to 19 years. 20 years of experience having worked in in-house communications, started dabbling in journalism when I started out. And now, having worked in some of the large global agencies in public relations, and now running my own venture for about 10 years. That's PRecious Communications. We're about 60 people in the region. But I mean, I'm so glad in my career I worked with Dow Jones, shook Rupert Murdoch's hands. Some people will say yea, others will say nay, but it was a great experience.

Work with DHL when it became yellow. Also, some people don't remember that was always the case. And throughout the journey, I had really the pleasure and honor working with brands like Citibank, Coca-Cola, The Economist, Lufthansa, Porsche, we did a Driving Academy for journalists. That was awesome. And that’s across multiple countries, so that's really an exciting journey so far. The best is yet to come.

Brad Hammond: 1:55
Yeah, totally. That's awesome. And for those that don't know out there listening, tell us a bit about PRecious Communications, what you guys do, what your focus is on?

Lars Voedisch: 2:06
Sure, so we are a multi-award winning regional communications consultancy focused on what I call greatest Southeast Asia. So we're based out of Singapore. And for those that are not familiar with Southeast Asia, it's like 650 million people in between Australia, India, China, and then China, Japan, and the rest of the Middle East Europe there. And we have our own operations right now covering Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Australia, Philippines, Vietnam, where we are expanding into and we are part of a global network where we can also run campaigns, and we just do that frequently from Japan, to the U.S. from Pakistan to Dubai.

Brad Hammond: 2:54
Very cool.

Lars Voedisch: 2:55
And within the last two, three years, we've done more and more from the classic media relations moving more into an integrated marketing space. If you look at it from a sales funnel, it's really looking from just brand awareness. Also, how can we increase intent and get people excited to interact with brands, and that could be government programs, it could be NGOs, it could be Chambers of Commerce and these kinds of things.

Brad Hammond: 3:26
That's awesome. So let's dive into today's topic, which is how companies should approach the Southeast Asian market. Obviously, you said, you know, 650 million people, many different countries, huge opportunity for companies out there. How should they be looking at Southeast Asia? And how do you get into that market? Say we're a company from Australia, the US, Canada, you know, maybe Europe, and we're looking at Southeast Asia, this big opportunity. But how do we get started? How do we approach this market from a marketing standpoint, communications PR?

Lars Voedisch: 4:05
Thanks. Yeah, it's a very exciting area, right? Geographic area, the people is really- it's not that- it's very diverse, right? You have different cultures, religions, languages, history for hundreds of thousands of years that are all together. So it's not a homogeneous kind of landmass or people. So you really have to think about which markets do I want to enter first? And where am I, right? Because for some countries, we had big currency fluctuations, where suddenly if you have your list price in US dollars, and suddenly it increased by 50%, are you still viable for that market for people to buy into, right? Or you have countries where you have more constant government change like Thailand. You have countries like Vietnam, that's run by one government, basically, since the war that shall not be named. 

And, you know, it's just the opportunities that are there is so exciting. It's the growing middle class. It's people that grew up with mobile first as their digital device. So they don't remember those dial up nightmares. They are- some of them are highly educated. And you have an average GDP growth of 4% to 6%. That's on the surface, the macro level. But then you really have to deep dive and say, Okay, do I want to go and be in the logistics play? Then you most likely look into where's the infrastructure, right? So Thailand traditionally has automotive manufacturing, or has Japanese electronics manufacturing for a long time. Are you more in the hospitality space? Are you in medical where Singapore is massively investing into?

So it's really like, understanding which industry and vertical are you in and how mature of an audience do you need for your brand to be there? And then as the purchasing power that's required, that's growing. But it's, again, it's multiple languages. And we've seen a couple of global companies are trying, oh, let's do Southeast Asia. You have to do one market at a time, unless you really have maybe at an enterprise level, where you roll out and then every global branch need to do it. But otherwise, you have to really conquer one kingdom at a time.

It's like the anecdotes you use, the jokes that you want to put, or the puns you want to put in your marketing, understanding that for some countries, it's the Christmas holiday season as we might know it. For others, it's Ramadan is the biggest thing for consumer sales, or it's the 11.11, 12.12 from China coming in, or it’s Songkran festival in Thailand. So it's really understanding what's the cultural framework that you have to adhere to, and not the other way around.

Brad Hammond: 7:10
Totally. So really, you know, we say Southeast Asia, but it's really the Vietnamese market, the Philippines, Singapore, you know, they're all these individual spaces that all add up, you know, together to be Southeast Asia. But it sounds like as a brand is approaching this market., think in terms of what is our Philippine strategy, what is our Vietnamese strategy and kind of go from there?

Lars Voedisch: 7:39
Yes. And it's like, you know, if you- we did some work on a hospitality story for the Philippines. And you can look into the internet and said, okay, they have 10,000s of islands, what makes it a logistical nightmare. But if you're in the water plane business, that means you have 10,000 landing strips. I'd really like making it work for you is the important part, right? And are you only focusing on the key capital markets, where you most likely have a higher purchase power and these things? Or do you want to really become a mass play, then you have to approach it very differently?

And we've seen some country- as some companies here that conquered that because they localize their offers from Traveloka to Grab. Grab took over the Uber assets in or merged with them a couple of years ago, and they just had very spectacular NASDAQ listing that are kind of following a little bit of the concept of what we've seen in China with super apps. So that one app that you use every day, from groceries, to food ordering, to your transport, to going into the FinTech space.

So we see a lot of innovation in the FinTech space, for example, because it's an- we can't understand it, but there are tons of people that don't have a bank account or a credit card. So you have unbanked and underbanked. So how can you help them with banks not wanting to put up branches there, or they don't have the kind of income streams that we used to where digital innovation, mobile access can actually help them with payment models, with loan models, getting access to learning, getting access to money, getting access to jobs, health and these kinds of things. And that makes it really exciting. And that's where we need to plug in, right?

Brad Hammond: 9:34
Yeah, totally. So I'm a marketer out there. And I'm thinking about our global strategy in Southeast Asia. How do I know like which market to go after first? It sounds like you got to go kind of one by one. Where do I start?

Lars Voedisch: 9:49
Traditionally, Singapore is a great kind of landing part to evaluate because it's really- it's a hub for greater Southeast Asia, where you have a lot of brands sitting here, a lot of budgets are controlled here, right? And it's a tough market. It's just 6 million people, 40 times 60 kilometers. So you have a high density of decision makers with a small audience. So really, it's a testbed. But then it's really like from here, it's a good hub to then go out. Most companies would have Indonesia on their on their deck because just of over 200 million people. It's just the pure size of the country and the opportunities, right? Others would say, hey, we want to go Malaysia because it's maybe more at the maturity level of the economy.

So it really depends on where do you think your product fits in from a marketing. It's really product market fit, where you really have to think about where’s the market? Is my product acceptable? Because the typical thing, you don't want to be the first in the market. You want to be the last one. So how much would you have to spend also on market education, right? And we've seen that like, foodpanda came here and spent tons of market education then delivery came up. They didn't need to explain the concept. They just were focusing on CBD areas, better product, higher margins. Didn't need to explain the market. We’re the same like that, just better. And they had a good role when they when they entered the market, right?

Brad Hammond: 11:29
Yeah, totally.

Lars Voedisch: 11:30
It's really depending on where you want to go in. Is it the meet to product? Where are you on the cloud journey? We still have countries like Thailand, to some extent, where purchase departments, IT departments, like on-premise installations. So just cloud infrastructure is a thing. Or data, where is your data stored? A lot of countries are still catching up and have basic rules in place on what can you do with your banking, customer data? Where can you store it? So then you need to think about also where's your cloud infrastructure on data centers? And so on and so forth, Right.

Brad Hammond: 12:07
Totally. So sounds like there's a lot of intricacies to every market and cultural things you have to think about and all this. Let's talk about what is a good local partner strategy? Should we go recruit people from Indonesia and kind of have them as a local partner? Should we set up a base of operations in Malaysia, and then those people work with folks in Indonesia, or what it's a good strategy there?

Lars Voedisch: 12:38
Just by the pure need to have local language knowledge, you need somebody who has been in the market and knows the market, and can also understand where, you know, like, Oh, we're the big global brand. We're entering, everybody should welcome us with open arms doesn't work anymore, right? So what's the need that you sold for that market at that point? And market always means people, right? So I would- either you need a strong local partner, it could be a distributor, a channel partner, it could be a JV set up and/or somebody that worked really well, somebody who has been educated overseas, also do as the American, the European, whatever, Japanese mindset, but also knows how that relates.

So you need somebody often to play that translator in both ways, otherwise, you might actually end up like Bill Murray in Lost in Translation where you don't know how does it fit in? How do I fit in, right? So yes, having a partner in all kinds of different shapes or forms, that knows both worlds and can adapt how it works in one market, how can we make it work here is very, very crucial. And that's what we do sometimes for our clients to play that role, say, hey, yeah, that works. But this one might not.

Brad Hammond: 14:02
Yeah, totally. So I'm a marketer, maybe in the US, thinking about, you know, our strategy and all this. Where do I go about finding these partners? Do I just have our recruiting organization go pound the pavement? Or do I book a plane ticket and fly over there and just start meeting people? What’s a good avenue to start building these relationships and connections and all?

Lars Voedisch: 14:23
There are multiple ways, right? So one thing, of course, and that's a little bit self-serving, I have to admit, but marketing agencies like ours, a lot of times are those bridge builders, because hey, you should talk to the association of SMEs in Jakarta because they are working with your kind of customers. They might be the best people to work with, right? Sometimes Chambers of Commerce are actually a great starting point because they also have their market entry offers.

And then you have like in Singapore, you have the Economic Development Board that really wants to make it easy for brands and companies to enter the market. So they have support services that can tell you, hey, this one- or if you set up an office here, you actually might get some grants, do market readiness assessments and these kinds of things, right? And then the oldest trick in the book, look at your competitors that might have been here already, what they have done and what worked for them or not, right?

Brad Hammond: 15:26
Love that. That's awesome. So as we're wrapping up here, this is all awesome advice. And I think people love stories and they love to, you know, hear those stories. You've been obviously involved in a lot of different things. You've been on multiple Boards and Board of Directors and all this and in many different countries. What's a fun story as wrapping up that you have to kind of share in the small communication space at Southeast Asia?

Lars Voedisch: 15:55
For the longest time, our Indonesia team told us two things don't work in Indonesia when you want to do media relations and marketing. One is embargo. So you sent a story to them beforehand, because then sometimes they just- they want to adhere to the embargo, but their editor doesn't care and publish it. Second one is virtual events don't work. That was pre-COVID, right? And then we didn't have a chance. And actually it works really well. So we doing embargoes with stronger relationships that we built over the time.

And, yeah, we had great online events with Zoom now, where the infrastructure was catching up. But yeah, I mean, the story was, actually we tried embargoes and the journalists say, Yeah, we embargo. It's Monday 9am. But then down the chain, it got lost in translation within the media publishing house, and suddenly it was up like the day before it, like everybody panics, who do we call on a Sunday to take it offline, right? Like, once the cat is out of the bag, how do you try to get it back into it?

Brad Hammond: 17:08
Yeah, totally. So a that's a fun story. So last question here, what key advice should other marketers out there that are thinking about Southeast Asia and all this takeaway, what key advice would  you have for them?

Lars Voedisch: 17:25
A lot of Asian countries- and you know, there are I think 41, over 40 different countries. Just here in Southeast Asia, there’s 11, are about building trust. So just directly jumping in with let's do business might backfire badly. So you need to build relationships and trust. Once that, it might be a lifelong kind of business opportunity. But jumping in with hey, let's do a deal that's it's all [inaudible] that might be the wrong way to be successful. You need to have a mid-term plan, not a short term in here and just sell Fire and Forget, that might be really, really destructive in your long-term opportunities here.

Brad Hammond: 18:18
I love that. Well, that's great advice. That's an awesome to have you on here on the podcast. Really appreciate all your wisdom and insights and expertise and all that.

Lars Voedisch: 18:28
Thank you. Thanks for having me. I mean, I'm still a foreigner after nearly 20 years here. And so I'm learning every day. And I'm always amazed by our or our colleagues, or journalist in the markets that tell me like, hey, maybe you want to consider that or why haven't you done that? It's like, yes, but you know, you don't know what you don't know. So it's really like, dip your toe into the water. Otherwise, you never know how it feels.

Brad Hammond: 18:51
Very cool. So quick plug. How can others get ahold of you out there? They're listening to this and they're like, hey, I want to chat with Lars.

Lars Voedisch: 18:59
Sure. Just go search for PRecious Communications, preciouscomms.com or Google my name. They're not that many with my combination of first and last names and then you'll get a hold of me.

Brad Hammond: 19:12
Sounds great. Awesome. Well, thanks so much for joining, Lars, and you have a great day.

Lars Voedisch: 19:18
Thank you. You too. Thanks, Brad. Take care.