The Power of European Marketing

“What are the pitfalls and keys to success for a online marketing campaign to go European?”

The question is the one many marketers ask themselves, how can my campaigns be successful in Europe and how to approach such a complex market?

Here are a few thoughts on the matter.

What not to forget on your way to success:
- Build a European expert team whilst leveraging non other regions best practices: it is important not to start from scratch, of course Europe is different and complex BUT you do not have to reinvent the wheel, you already have optimized campaigns and key successes in other regions so ADAPT them!
- “Think European” and integrate cultural differences and customer behaviours in your campaigns: Western Europe is 15 countries with different maturity and adoption of the Internet, one size does not fil all.
- Work with European premier partners with local market expertise rather than globalising partnership with existing partners. Some partners will not have a European presence and will manage Europe from the US, Big mistake as you are cutting yourself from the market and its evolution.
- It takes more than translating content to build an effective website: adapt to different sale patterns to match customer needs and shopping habits)
- Understand legal practices in your campaigns when promoting special offers  

What not to do on your way to success:
- Individualise European countries too : you will loose time and resources by doing so
- Forget about localisation or have text translated by non native speakers
- Not taking into consideration that within Europe all countries have not reached the same maturity and Internet adoption rate
- Prevail economy of scale vs customer experience: some aspects of European campaigns can be managed and optimised on a global scale BUT it is important to have strategy developed on a country basis
- Not knowing the market and not taking a graduate approach (ie launching campaign in every single market rather than choosing pilot campaign, analyse and optimise)

To put it in a nutshell
European wide campaigns demand a considerable degree of prior research, time and commitment. It is possible to address all European customers by using a balance of globalisation and individualisation.
Think global but act local I would say ie global when it comes to leveraging best practices and global organisation in executing the campaigns and local in terms of expert knowledge, partnership, design and delivery of the results. 

You also need to set the right expectations and build your forecast according to the country readiness and potential. Not all European countries will be as powerful and as mature as the UK but they will all be getting there.