CM1011 – Team Assignment 2 30-4-2011 1

A literature report on Nike’s advertising strategies

Pip Cloo (), Koen Glotzbach (345346), Giulia Meyer (), Renate Rocha () & Milou van der Zwan
(304042)
Lecturer: Brandellero, words: xxx, online version:

The intention of advertising is to capture attention and to persuade the audience to consume
by creating an emotional desire for the product. People do not really need Nike shoes, but in a
way, they are made to believe that they do. The better the advertising strategy of a company,
the more popular its product or, in the case of Nike, the brand as a whole. Nike as a brand
name is associated with certain qualities and if these are positive in the minds of consumers,
they will put their trust in the brand and prefer buying products of this particular brand over
that of other brands. Because an effective advertising strategy is of so much importance, there
are many scholars examining what strategy fits best for a product to sell and what factors
influence consumer’s behavior.
In a cross-national comparative research, we want to examine the differences between
advertisements of Nike in the US and in China – both having large consumer markets but
totally different cultures. Hence, our research question: To what extent do the advertisements
of Nike as used in the US and China between 2000 and 2010 differ from each other regarding
to their adaptation to cultural aspects? But before conducting a research, a literature review
has to be done. Therefore, we will here elaborate on Nike’s advertising strategies as described
in literature and on the web. We will focus on four main areas which are the most relevant for
answering our research question: The company Nike, Globalization and glocalization, China
and America and Nike its campaigns and strategies.

Nike
Nike corporation’s advertising strategy has proved to be successful internationally. The
company was founded in the United States in 1962 – then called Blue Ribbon Sports, but then
became Nike Inc. in 1980 – and markets products in clothing and sports equipment, which can
be recognized by the ‘Swoosh’ logo (Harvey, 1996). In the 1970s and 1980s, Nike treated the
international marketplace as a single entity. Most of their US-focused advertising was the
same in all nations in which they were selling products. This approach proved to be financially
limiting. Therefore, as some other companies, Nike’s strategy changed in the 1990s. Since the
mid-1990s, it was realized that to secure global presence while still earning profit, a
multinational company has to operate within local practices and sensibilities. Nike made a
“country-by-country plan” and thereby the company adopted a ‘glocalizing’ approach.
CM1011 – Team Assignment 2 30-4-2011 2

International Nike thus developed into transnational Nike, which takes local differences into
account when promoting its products (Andrews, 2008).
One of the reasons for Nike’s success is that it is a sports brand. To engage local
consumers and markets, transnational companies use something recognizable for that
culture in its advertising strategy. Celebrities are often successfully used to attract
consumers and to inspire confidence, but sports can clearly engage large groups of
people. Sports unite people and can represent a nation. By focusing on local sporting
cultures, Nike as a sports brand can represent the sporting culture of a nation (Andrews,
2008). But it can also represent a whole world region, as with globalization, international
sports organizations promote certain sports by organizing international tournaments
(Harvey, 1996). European football for instance, engages a large group of people in
Europe, or even worldwide. This strategy of making the brand popular is not only used
by sport brands: also Coca Cola seems to have found a way to integrate sports in its
advertising.

Globalization & glocalization

According to Harvey (1996), globalization has reality of its own, which can be independent
from individual countries. However, these nations are necessary to produce laws which guide
the global market and cannot disappear. Globalization leads to nationalism, which can be a
reason why companies decide to glocalize their products. On global level many companies
have lost their national identity, this is caused by the absence of a global government. These
companies have thus political power in the global world. With regard to the sport industry this
is an issue, because there is not an official policy maker. One of the developments in
globalization is that companies do not focus on one country anymore; they spread themselves
to other countries. Nike started producing its products in countries where the costs were low
and they expanded their production with new products. The strategy Nike uses is the
“multitier partner strategy” (Harvey, 1996); developed partners produce the most expensive
products in small amounts; the developing partners produce only for Nike the large amounts
of products. Nike uses strategies as “acquisitions, strategic alliances and delocalization of
products”. (Harvey, 1996) Another consequence of globalization is the interconnection and
homogenization of cultures; moreover they copy each other’s values and norms. Movements
are, as a reaction on this homogenization, developed. In sports this can be for example
women, who also want to be involved. Globalization is the reason for homogenization of
sports to Western forms of sports, social movements do cause change in socialization of sports
CM1011 – Team Assignment 2 30-4-2011 3

and movements try to oppose the dominant forms of sports. The global market is contributing
to a global mass consumption culture. (Harvey, 1996)

Factors of comparison
When pursuing glocalisation (as described above), great sensitivity to local cultures is needed.
The need for this sensitivity makes glocalisation difficult, especially when countries differ so
much as China and the USA. Comparing these two countries, we can identify two originally
political systems: As McKenzie (2006) describes, China has a communist government, whereas
the USA has a libertarian government. Strongly related to this political area are some social
and cultural practices, which may be divided into two areas: culture and economy.
Looking at the first category, politics, we should denote McKenzie’s (2006) statement
that the Chinese government exercises a great deal of power to control public opinion and
social unrests through tough regulation, although it is increasingly allowing libertarian features
as a free market economy in special zones. This is in contrast with the US, where a libertarian
approach to politics is present and market instead of government regulation is favoured.
The second category, culture, constitutes of personal and societal factors. Some obvious
but important factors are described by Sinclair (2008) as “natural barriers” (p. 81). Firstly
language: Although in China English is being pushed as the second language, Mandarin still is
the most widely-known language of China (McKenzie, 2006). Secondly, he mentions physical
and demographic issues as the amount, differentiation and spread of the population. We could
add religion to this list of cultural aspects, but also Johnston & Gao (2009) expend it: They
describe that a great barrier in communication between the two countries is that China has a
low and the US a high-context culture, which means that Chinese use more implicit clues (both
in spoken as in body language) when communicating, while Americans are more direct. The
authors also describe that Chinese are collectivistic, while Americans are more individually
oriented. Lastly, they also describe that China has a high and the US a low-power distance
culture, which means that Chinese accept authority more easily than Americans.
For the last category, business, an important factor mentioned by Sinclair (2008) is the
absence of consumerism in China: Only a very small part of the population associates brands
with certain benefits and emotions, while most inhabitants focus on price and quality when
choosing products. This means that advertisements should focus on quality and price and that,
consequently, companies in the US are rule-setting (steering the market), while in China they
are not.

Nike its campaigns & strategies

CM1011 – Team Assignment 2 30-4-2011 4

Resources
Andrews, D.L. (2008). Nike Nations. Brown Journal of World Affairs, 14, 41 – 53.
Cfar, Inc. (n.d.). Nike's 'Just Do It' Advertising Campaign. Retrieved April 23, 2011, from Centre
for Applied Research http://cfar.com
Dayal-Gulati, A., Lee, A.Y. (2004). Kellogg on China: Strategies for success. Northwestern
University Press.
Deng, T. (2009). "Just Done It“: Nike's New Advertising Plan Facing Global Economic Crisis.
International Journal of Business and Management, 4, 3, 102 – 105.
Harvey, J., Rail, G. & Thibault, L. (1996). Globalization and sport: sketching a theoretical model.
Journal of sport and social issues, 20, 258 – 277.
Johnston, L. M., Gao, H. (2009). Resolving conflict in Chinese & US realms for global business
entities. China Media Research, 5, 104 – 117.
Kierzkowski, H., Chen, L. (2010). Outsourcing and trade imbalances: the United States – China
case. Pacific Economic Review, 15, 56 – 70.
McKenzie, R. (2006). Comparing media from around the world. Boston, USA: Pearson
Education.
Sinclair, J. (2008). Globalization and the advertising industry in China. Chinese Journal of
Communication, 1, 77 – 90.