Selling to Newly Emerging Markets

Significant sales opportunities exist in newly emerging markets around the globe--and many of them are missed. Because sales and marketing executives lack familiarity with the structure of the markets and the risks of working in them, Miller says, they often have little understanding of how to enter them. In this unusually well-researched book by an experienced international marketer, Miller concentrates on the unique characteristics, opportunities, and sales methods associated with newly emerging markets. He pays special attention to economies in transition in the newly independent states in Russia and the rapidly expanding markets throughout Eastern Europe. His book will be essential for organizations contemplating expansion internationally and for executives and scholars in educational and multilateral institutions with important interests in understanding new markets and how to benefit from them.

Miller maintains that because of a lack of familiarity with developing countries, executives in many organizations perceive inordinate risk in doing business with them. His book attempts, therefore, to provide the experience and insights that many well-trained but internationally inexperienced managers lack. He defines the typical characteristics of these markets, the factors that are important to market selection, and ways to reduce operating risk. Of critical importance is the choice of an appropriate market entry strategy, and Miller focuses on the relative merits of different types of foreign representation, plus the advantages and drawbacks of strategic alliances that involve direct investment and technology transfers. The result is a timely, useful, readable volume for sales executives almost anywhere, certainly for those in companies that have come to understand the importance of doing business globally.

RUSSELL R. MILLER is an international marketing consultant with wide and varied experience in marketing and strategic planning. For more than 20 years he was the senior vice president of international marketing for Zenith Electronics, and he has also held positions with AT&T, General Electric, Unisys, Ampex, and Boeing. As a recent advisor to the World Bank, the United Nations Development Programme, Vienna-based UNIDO, and the IESC, his assignments included those centering on the emerging markets of the former Soviet Union and on issues involving privatization, enterprise restructuring, and the conversion of defense industries into competitive, commercial enterprises.