Videocast as a reflection of cross-cultural communication. Advertising international brands: case study

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FEDERAL STATE AUTONOMOUS EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION

FOR HIGHER PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION

NATIONAL RESEARCH UNIVERSITY HIGHER SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS

Faculty of Humanities

BACHELOR'S PROJECT

Videocast as a Reflection of Cross-cultural Communication. Advertising International Brands: Case Study

Field of study: linguistics

Degree programme: Foreign Languages and Intercultural Communication

Deryagina Ekaterina Vitalyevna

Moscow, 2020

• Table of contents
• 1. Introduction
• 1.1 Relevance of the Topic
• 1.2 Objectives and the Gap of the Existing Research
• 1.3 Structure of the Thesis
• 2. Literature review
• 2.1 Cross-cultural Categories Influencing the Process of Creative Expression
• 2.2 Advertisement Classification and Categories
• 2.3 Cross-cultural Aspect of Commercial Video Creation Process
• 3. Methods
• 3.1 Data Collection and Procedure
• 3.2 Brands-participants
• 3.3 Measurement Tools
• 4. Case Study. Results
• 4.1 Case study. IKEA
• 4.2 Case study. Nissan
• 4.3 Case study: Apple
• 5. Discussion
• 5.1 Interpretation of Results
• 5.2 Limitations
• 5.3 Future Research
• Conclusion
• References
• 1. Introduction
• 1.1 Relevance of the Topic
• The theme of the present paper is dedicated to the topic of human interaction through video materials, communication of brands and their target audience in particular. With the rapid development of technologies and globalization humankind devised more elaborate and complex forms of communication. People started expressing themselves with the help of visual and verbal art - musical compositions, theatrical performances, oratory, fine arts, dance and calligraphy. Communication means adopt and take the forms that do suit the daily life of humankind.
• Nowadays we cannot imagine our lives without visual means of communication, such as videos on various streaming platforms, images in social media, documentaries, tv programs and video-calls and messages. Starting from the end of the 19^th century, when Auguste and Louis Lumiиre held the screening of the first ever cinematographic piece, videocasts became the integral part of self-expression, social and economic spheres. Nowadays people use videocasts for various reasons and purposes. Video materials convey the most information of all the communication means nowadays. Pieces of life and imagination merged together into one material object, integrated visual and audio content give us full picture of any situation. In the 20^th century people first thought of using videocast as a marketing strategy. On July 1, 1941, humankind witnessed the first ever paid commercial to be broadcasted on television. American watch brand Bulova launched the first TV advertisement to promote their products in a completely new and highly effective way (Stewart, 1941).
• When creating a message that is supposed to convey certain type of information, there is a vital need to consider target audience. (Ang, 2014). Without knowing your target audience there cannot be successful transmission of the message - the appropriate tools, forms and language need to be implemented. This remains the same for creating such message as video commercial of a product or service: marketing specialists first need to consider the target audience of their brand or product and then center their advertising campaign around related factors. These factors include various features - age gap, income level, gender, education level, marital or family status, those are common for the creation process of any commercial. However, there is a whole other level of factors when a brand goes international. Rapid globalization led not only to the development of communication means, but it also opened the possibility for more brands to become visible on the international market. To be recognized in a foreign country brands undertake specific measures - they create promotions of products and services that appeal to cultural preferences. When creating a commercial for another country, the territorial factor becomes one of the most important to consider (Galvin, 1998).
• Marketing specialists need to take into account the notions and phenomena that are studied by cross-cultural specialists. Scholars developed various strategies and models that help people grasp the essence of certain cultures, such as Hofstede's cultural dimensions, the Lewis Model of cross-cultural communication (Lewis, 1996) and many other cross-cultural tools. Even though we live in the age of rapid unification, when a lot of borders between nations get washed out, there still exist unique features inherent to particular cultures. Importantly, even the smallest details create huge differences in daily lives and perceptions of various nations. However, the existence of those differences should not deter one from communication and contact, this fact should, on the contrary, spark interest and curiosity. When making effort to understand another culture, we expand our own horizons. (Hofstede, 2001)

In the past several decades many scholars have become interested in the comparative analysis of video content created by brands of different countries of origin. For instance, scholars examined television advertisements for children and covered the underlying factors that dictate the distinguishing points of video commercials, such as, for instance, a stronger inclination of the Asians towards advertising products through more traditional values (Mindy et al., 2001). The study written by R. Taylor, M. Hoy and E. Haley (1996) portrays the difference between French and American methods of advertisement, authors examined the argumentation aspect of commercial creation process. The appeal in French advertisements is created through a visually pleasing image, while American consumers put emphasis on the informative side of advertising and, therefore, pragmatic function should be boosted in the scripting process. Importantly, the functional and artistic styles of commercial differ from one country to another, as well as the placement of accents in video advertisements: whether information on cost, new features or main characteristics of the product should be included in the commercial (Sknarev, 2014).

As can be seen from the papers provided above, there is a wide variety of research on the cross-cultural differences in commercial video materials; however, the limitations of existing research need to be addressed. First, the vast majority of comparative analyses on the topic are concerned with advertisements created by brands for local population. Existing research papers examine the differences in national advertising strategies of diverse brands, while in this paper I aim to provide an analysis of commercials created by international brands for various countries. Secondly, with the rapid development of communication and marketing strategies many international brands annually change their advertising policy in accordance with global trends, therefore, existing findings gradually become outdated. Content analysis conducted in this paper will be based on relevant video materials dated from 2018 to 2020.

This paper will examine the degree to which international brands illustrate cultural peculiarities in commercial video materials and to what extent do companies adapt visual components of advertisement to suit the common style of a particular territorial realm. The analysis of visuals, including editing, frame filling and choice of settings, will be conducted through the paradigm of holistic versus analytical approach (Nisbett, 2004), Hofstede's cultural dimensions and the concept of low- and high-context cultures will be implemented to address the presence of culturally charged behavioral patterns and symbolic images in the commercials.

1.3 Structure of the Thesis

The present thesis is divided into five chapters. Following the introduction, the second section will be devoted to the theoretical introduction to the relevant literature about the cross-cultural tools and models relevant for current research and information on the marketing strategies: classification, functions and types of argumentation used in commercials. This chapter will also provide a summary of previous research conducted on the topic of cross-cultural differences in national advertisements. The third chapter will give an outline of empirical study, first section is dedicated to the data collection process and procedure of content analysis, then ample information on target brands and measures used will be given. In the fourth chapter the results of the case study will be presented starting with data interpretation and descriptive analysis. The final chapter of thesis contains discussion section including main findings and interpretation of results on the research question. Finally, the limitations of the study and further research suggestions will be covered.

2. Literature review

The following section serves the purpose of theoretical basis for the present study. First, the cross-cultural models and theoretical background will be examined, the necessary frames and tools implemented in further research will be discussed. Next the marketing framework will be given to present an overview of necessary for understanding categories and classifications of commercials and argumentation used in advertising campaigns. Final section of the theoretical part will be dedicated to the examination of similar studies to present categories compiled in previous years of research of cross-cultural aspect of commercial materials.

2.1 Cross-cultural Categories Influencing the Process of Creative Expression

Cross-cultural specialists study cultural features from many different perspectives, over the lifetime of humankind each nation reached certain milestones shaping the worldview and the perception of people. Religion, climate, historical events, technological innovations and dozens of other factors compelled cultures to take a form of what we see nowadays.

While it is hard to attribute each and every small detail to a certain cultural domain, Gert Hofstede developed a model that now serves as a theoretical base for a great number of works and research on the issue of cross-cultural communication and its peculiarities. Gert Hofstede is a Dutch social psychologist, a former IBM employee, he conducted his analysis of the survey data he had collected at IBM at the individual respondent level and further elaborated the findings by contextualizing respondents by the countries. By using such approach Hofstede was able to examine cultural attributions rather than individual personalities. Scholar developed the 6 cultural dimensions that give a valuable insight into the nature of a certain nation. By attributing cultures to certain types, we get the understanding of behavioral patterns common for specific culture. First, in 1984 Gert Hofstede devised a typological model consisting of the four primary cultural dimensions - power distance index (PDI), individualism (IDV), uncertainty avoidance index (UAI) and masculinity (MAS). These initial dimensions regard the anthropological problem spheres that are dealt with in different ways depending on the national society. By 2010 after examining more of the cultural peculiarities and patterns Hofstede added 2 more cultural dimensions: long-term orientation (LTO) and indulgence versus self-restraint. (Hofstede,1984)

Aside from cross-cultural area Hofstede's dimensions theory is widely used in many other fields of research including psychology, linguistics, marketing and organizational communication studies. Therefore, the Hofstede's dimensions serve as a multisectoral tool for content analysis and is used in interdisciplinary research, like the one conducted in this work (Smith, 2006).

In the following section I will provide a thorough description of societies according to Hofstede's dimensions. Such a profound description is needed to create a complete picture of modern social spheres and explain the reasoning behind behavioral patterns inside various cultures. Nowadays in commercial video materials brands tend to use images of an everyday life of their audience to advertise products successfully. However, this very everyday life differs from culture to culture. As this research paper is based on the analysis of advertising videos of international brands created for different countries, there is a vital importance to ensure full understanding of relevant cultural differences by providing exhausting information on cross-cultural peculiarities.

The most known of all six dimensions is the Individualism versus Collectivism. This category regards the degree to which society feels and maintains the interdependence between its members. This category reflects the self-image of a person in a group - whether a person defines themselves as “I” or “We” (Hofstede,1984). In collectivistic societies it is common for members to put own interests lower than that of their group - interests of the nation prevail over the individual's. In collectivistic cultures people develop lifelong loyalty to their in-group and see it as a source of protection, there exists a strong sense of mutual codependence and reliability. On the contrary, in individualistic societies, which constitute the minority of the cultures over the globe, single person's interests prevail over the interests of the nation itself, personal development and wellness is a primary concern of the members of individualistic societies. People are not classified according to the in-group characteristics, but what matters is their personal features. Since childhood members of the individualistic societies are taught to define themselves as “I” and recognize other people's “I”s as distinct and independent sets of personal characteristics. The codependence in such societies is seen as an unhealthy and abnormal relationship and cannot be accepted. Overall, in collectivistic societies people are seen as sets of gears functioning together in order to maintain an effective and successful performance of the whole mechanism, namely, a country, while a single member of an individualistic society can be associated with a whole mechanism itself: individual has to maintain own development and performance in order to stay active and relevant among other mechanisms.

In one of her works, Valerie Solanas (1967) - American writer, a representative of a highly individualistic American culture, gives a particularly illustrative definition of a society:

A true community consists of individuals - not mere species members, not couples - respecting each other's individuality and privacy, at the same time interacting with each other mentally and emotionally - free spirits in free relation to each other - and co-operating with each other to achieve common ends.

Both concepts of privacy and free relations mentioned in the definition provided reflect the individualistic attitude of culture representative. Even though author speaks of cooperation and common ends of the group, community still consists of separate individuals respecting each other's “I”s and personal characteristics.

This dimension influences all the social institutions and its print can be traced in many spheres of individual's life: family and relationship with other members of in-group and out-group as well, education institutions, workplace, virtual space such as social media and also relationship with the state.

In the collectivistic societies extended families prevail and the relationship between the family members and relatives, even the distant ones, are stronger and of a great value. People avoid confrontation and discourage the imbalance in the family and the in-group. Overall, the image of a big and amiable family has a positive connotation and is seen as something members of collectivistic societies can strive to achieve in life. For the individualists it is more common to have a nuclear family, single parent families are not unusual as well. Parents encourage their children to look after themselves from the early childhood - independency from family members is seen as an achievement. Children are expected to leave family homes and live separately without relying on family resources as well.

In collectivistic societies workplaces and schools are seen as another family for people, harmony in such institutions is a measure of success and prosperity, such places become an in-group in an emotional sense of that word. In contrast to that, both schools and workplace in individualistic societies are seen as places where individual can show own skills, dominate and enhance own performance (Chatman & Barsade, 1995).

When speaking of the concept of trust through the Collectivism versus individualism paradigm the drastic difference in perception is worth to mention . The concept of trust is rooted in the underlying social values of any culture, trust is seen as an expectation that arises within a community of cooperative behavior, based on the commonly shared norms in the group. (Fukuyama, 1996). When dealing with a brand or an organization of any kind, members of collectivistic societies rely more on a personal kind of relationship - whether people they fully trust work or support the brand, whether they use the products. Word of a mouth is more likely to be of a significance in such societies. Moreover, the brand gets popularity and recognition when a trusted celebrity or a well-known person promotes it. Brand in such societies is seen through people related to it. Conversely, in the individualistic societies people are more likely to try the products and see for themselves, as they do rely on own perception more. It is easier for them to trust the company, if the organizational values coincide with their own preferences and lifestyle. Brand is seen as a unity, a separate institution, and each individual has its personal relationship with a brand rather than with any representatives of it. (Sasaki, 2019)

Another category is power distance. This dimension regards the degree to which people expect and accept the authority over them in life. Power in any society is not distributed equally among its members, hence, power distance index reveals the attitude of people in certain culture towards the distribution of power in the country, institutions and organizations.

In countries where Power Distance Index is high there exists a sense of dependence in the minds of people: people with a lower rank or position in the society or organization either prefer such relationship or take it as something given and unchangeable. Moreover, generally, people in such societies do not want to change the situation - in their eyes authority represents stability. However, there also exists a phenomenon of counter-dependence - a complete rejection of someone's power, such psychological state still remains a form of dependence. And even in that case the outcome is still likely to be the same - less powerful members do not approach the ones with authority directly (Hofstede et al., 2010).

Interestingly, this dimension is mostly concerned with people of lesser authority. Contrary to the popular belief, leadership only exists as a complement to the subordinateship, not vice versa. Behavioral patterns of those who are “dominated” shape the way the more powerful ones act and establish their authority among society members (Forsyth, 2009). When researching the power distance index of a culture it is way more insightful to examine the behavior and attitudes of the ones who are being led, but not the leaders.

Therefore, when speaking of the countries with a lower power distance index the subordinates are more vocal and defy the forms of inequality in the society. There is no relationship of dependence on the leaders, at least it does not exist in such form as in the large PDI societies. It is easier for people to contradict the ones with authority and question their strategies and decisions. Communication between leaders and subordinated exists more in a form of consultation, which is called the relationship of interdependence. Hence, the emotional distance is smaller than in the large PDI cultures (Kirkman et al., 2009).

Even in modern societies we can still trace the situation of inequality in many social institutions: workplace, educational facilities, families and in the state in general. Socioeconomical status, level of education and many other variables play significant role when speaking of the power distribution factor. In the countries where the power distance is relatively low children are treated more as equals as soon as they start to act in a proper way. Parents try to teach their kids how to control own lives rather than depend on anyone else. There is less restriction and more encouragement to act actively, question existing state of things. When getting older parents become more of a friends or equals, there is no formal respect shown and all the decisions can be made without permission or advice from the elder generation. Since, such social programming starts all the way from the early childhood, children act the same at schools - there is no striking difference between communicating with peers or the older children. The hierarchy at schools does not exist in an explicit manner - age doesn't define your value and relevance in the group. When speaking of value, the ability to express own self is what matters, teachers expect initiative more than deference. On the contrary, in the large power distance societies the ones with less power can and should be restrained, starting from the early childhood younger generation is taught obedience. There always exists a concept of respect towards the older ones, which concerns relationship with relatives and family members and also communication between children at school - the younger ones express formal respect to the older children. Such relationships remain almost the same throughout the lifetime of a person - even after gaining an economic independence from the family there still is parental authority, which is seldom questioned. Children are expected to support the older generations after becoming financially free, however they still communicate with formal deference, there is no equality even if the resources are provided by children. Moreover, initiative in the class can only be expressed by the teacher, who represents authority and control in the class. (Hofstede, 2001).

The third dimension of Masculinity versus Femininity is concerned with the object of motivation in life - for masculine cultures motivation lies in the conventional concept of success, while the more feminine cultures find incentive in enjoying what they do. Nations differ in the ways they construct the value systems in the group. The roots of this dimension go back to the traditional forms of role attribution - men were expected to be successful and strong, dominating in the group of other males, while women had to take care of the relationship in the family, create amiable and homelike environment around themselves. There is more to the emotional factor when understanding the dimension of masculinity and the social programming. A society can be called feminine when there is an overlap of emotional gender roles, every member regardless of the gender is expected to be concerned with the quality of life, should be modest and tender. However, when examining masculine societies there is more of distinction in emotional gender roles - men are to be assertive and strive for success, while women are expected to be tender, modest and concerned with the quality of life and relationship (Hofstede, 1984).

Notably, there are more issues and themes that are taboo in masculine cultures rather than in the feminine ones - social media and media services in masculine societies tend to provide information on touchy subjects in a more veiled and vague form, while members of feminine societies speak straightforwardly and rarely use substitutionary words.

Masculine and feminine cultures differ in the conflict resolution strategies - that concerns not only individual members of the society, but also political forces and organizational communication. There is less violent confrontation in feminine cultures, as collaboration and accommodating are preferred. Negotiation and reaching a mutually pleasing outcome are prioritized in the societies with lower masculinity index, while “let the best man win” remains the strategy for conflict solving in the masculine cultures (Hofstede, 1998).

The next Hofstede's dimension is called uncertainty avoidance, this category regards the degree to which people fear the ambiguity of unknown situation. The term uncertainty avoidance was first proposed by sociologist James G. March (1975), as he was examining the ways organizations deal with the inability to predict future with high precision. This feeling of threat gave rise to the institutions and preventative methods that allow people to avoid such situations and deal with them at the early strages, for instance, bureaucratic systems differ greatly from country to country and that has to deal with the UA score of the culture.

The ability to handle ambiguous situations dictates the ways religion, technology and law develop in the society, cultures with a higher uncertainty avoidance index design more complex strategies and preventative methods to lighten the burden of unknown future. As a result, members of such cultures have a higher level of anxiety (Durkheim, 1951) if compared to the ones with a lower UA index. Anxious cultures tend to be more expressive in communication: abundant set of nonverbal features of communication, tendency to raise voice and express emotions actively.

Uncertainty avoidance index correlates with the masculinity index in several aspects: one of them is the attitude towards ideas. There are considerably more topics that are marked as taboo in high UA societies. Children from the young age are taught to avoid certain topics and questions, as there exists a belief in a single truth and all that doesn't match that truth is seen to be dangerous. However, in the lower UA cultures people are given a benefit of a doubt towards unknown or controversial situations (Hofstede, 2001).

Next Hofstede speaks of the long-term orientation category, which refers to the ways each society maintains links with own past when dealing with present and future. Within this dimension Hofstede reveals the correlation between ability to adapt to modern challenges and preserve own traditions and also scholar examines the motivation behind people's actions. In this sense, this dimension matches some aspects of Masculinity Index - people in high LTO societies seek successful future rather than short-term satisfaction.

The universal truth about what is considered good and evil tends to exist in the short-term orientation societies, while in the high LTO cultures these notions obtains a more vague and flexible form - concepts of good and evil much depend on the circumstances. For the low LTO cultures, if A is true and considered good, then the opposite, B, has to be false, on the other hand, in long term orientation countries if A is true, then B might also be true, B sparks curiosity and interesting, and can be examined (Hofstede, 2001).

The sixth dimension is called Indulgence. Regardless of the culture, people always have their personal needs and desires, however, this needs of an individual differ greatly in accordance to the upbringing and social programming. Indulgence category regards the extent to which people of certain cultures appease those desires. For this category Hofstede introduces terms Indulgent culture and Restrained culture.

In restrained cultures the reality is that desires related to simply enjoying life and having fun should be curbed or at least deserved by an individual. Strict social norms discourage members of a group from leisure activities, as it is seen as not important and unproductive. IBM statistics shows that restrained cultures do not put as much value on having amiable atmosphere in the community, despite, the community itself being tight. On the other hand, in indulgent societies people tend to maintain friendly relationship (Hofstede, 2001).

Even such a nonverbal emblem as smile is perceived differently in restrained and indulgent societies: in the countries where the IVR (indulgence versus restrain) index is lower “smile” is perceived as a suspicious behavior and less formal pattern, if shown to a stranger, while in indulgent countries this emblem is a common accompaniment of any communicative situation.

All those dimensions and peculiarities described cover the majority of social life inside a culture. It is important to mention that all the dimensions overlap, which helps to see a complete picture of any national group.

Apart from Gert Hofstede many scholars examined the ways societies differ from one another. There is a great number of research made on the topic of Western and Eastern cultural peculiarities. Richard E. Nisbett is among the scholars studying those two consolidated cultures - East and West. In one of his works, apart from examining the reasoning behind the individualistic and collectivistic attitudes of western and eastern cultures the scholar also studies the notions of Holism and Analytics. Those two terms regard the way of seeing own self and the reality around: both mentally and physically. When speaking of holistic system, the following definition will be implied: holistic system is a generical ontological dependence of the constituent parts (Esfeld, 1998). The implementation of the term in the cross-cultural context will be elaborated through the findings of Richard Nisbett provided below.

Nisbett states, that ancient philosophy directly influenced the ways people perceive the world and objects around. Ancient Chinese philosophers saw world as a phenomenon consisting of continuous substances, hence, the world represents a unified and interconnected wholeness. Even in the modern eastern view all the objects in the world constitute a never-ending and interlaced unity, something seamless. On the contrary, western way of world perceiving has its roots in the ancient Greek philosophy - world consists of separate objects which can be combined in different ways, moved and replaced. The primary feature of an object is not in the way it exists in the world, but what are its specific characteristics. Overall, westerners tend to see the objects, while in the eastern cultures the notion of substance is the prevailing one (Nisbett, 2004).

The foregoing point was proven in the experiment of cognitive psychologists Mutsumi Imae and Dedre Gentner (1994). Scholars analyzed the features people of different nationalities see as primary in objects: American and Japanese respondents were shown an object of a certain shape and recognizable material, then two trays were displayed in front of the participants: one with an object of the same shape but made of a distinct material, and the second one with a differently shaped object, but made of the same material. Respondents were asked to point at a tray representing the one that was first shown to them. The majority of the westerners were prone to choose an object from the first tray - same shape, while the eastern participants were promptly pointing at the second one - same material. As a result of this experiment the tendency became visible - in eastern culture substance prevails over the shape, and vice versa for the representatives of the western cultures. This tendency leads to a more broad and profound inference: there is a literal difference in the ways western and eastern people see the world.

Nisbett states that Western representatives have an analytical view, they focus on the salient objects and their characteristics. Easterners on the other hand have a holistic view of concentrating on the continuities and relationship in the environment.

This worldview also concerns the way people see social institutions. At the same time as modernization and technical progress transformed the ways of manufacturing products and services, the atomistic attitude of westerners extended to the understanding of organizations. Nowadays any work process can be divided into separate modules, and, as a result, we have dozens of departments concerned with a single sphere. As already mentioned in the Hofstede's dimensions section, some people see organization as a faceless wholeness functioning to perform certain tasks and delivering products, employees and machines are seen more or less on equal term - units of organization which represents a rather analytical vision. Others, namely, easterners, view organization as a group of people completing tasks, relation in the organizations determine the way the whole integrity performs.

There is also present evidence on the fact, that western people pay less attention to social world than easterners. Behavioral patterns, interactions, social relationship are of a more value in the eastern cultures. Nisbett (2003) provides the following comparison that gives us an illustration of holistic versus analytical view of own self in the social context, “Westerners are the protagonists of their autobiographical novels; Asians are merely cast members in movies touching on their existences” (p. 87). Asian people also tend to view events holistically - they take into perspective the overview of other people.

Holistic perception regards the environment, the wholeness of the picture, goes from the general to specific, while the analytical viewpoint concentrates on the objects, goes from the specific to construct a bigger picture out of the independent details and objects. One of the most representative experiments was conducted by Taka Masuda (2001). Participants of western and eastern nationalities were asked to describe an animated image illustrating underwater environment. Asians tended to first characterize the picture in a whole and then mention other details, notably, eastern respondents made more references to the background details and smaller pieces of the picture. At the same time western representatives started to describe the image from the objects, namely, moving ones and those of a bigger size, the percentage of references to the background objects was considerably lower than that of the eastern respondents. Moreover, among Asian representatives there also exists a tendency to pay more attention to the relations of objects in the environment, hence, even the slightest inconsistencies in objects location would be noticed when creating a video material or a sequence of frames or images (Miyamoto, 2006).

Another relevant to the present work concept is “context”. Edward Hall, an American anthropologist and cross-cultural researcher, introduced the notions of low and high context cultures in his book Beyond Culture in 1976. He examines the communication inside the cultural groups and all the tools that people use in message exchange. Hall examines the form of a massage - how explicit it is, how directly the idea is expressed. The concept of context correlates with the verbal and nonverbal means of communication. For low-context cultures it is common to express own thoughts explicitly with the use of verbal communication, there is a requirement to elaborate and explain, otherwise, a person might be misunderstood. High-context cultures, on the contrary, do not necessarily need to verbalize every message, moreover, the nonverbal communication does not need to be explicit. Representatives of high-context cultures notice the smallest details and gestures and get all the information needed to envision a full picture. Furthermore, in high-context cultures, if verbalizing something, speech doesn't need to be exact and specific, representative of such cultures can grasp the meaning from the vague and abstract notions presented by their interlocutor. (Hall, 1976)

As well as studying context of cultures, Edward Hall also introduced the terms polychronic and monochronic to describe cultures according to their understanding of time as a concept and as the part of everyday life. He studied the ways time influences our attitudes and reactions. Monochronic cultures prefer to perform activities one by one and stick to a sequence - time is seen as a line. In polychronic cultures representatives can do several things at a time, they do not find time commitments urgent or a “top priority”. Relationship for polychronic cultures are more important than tasks and goals, conversely, monochronic representatives value careful planning and task orientation. (Hall, 1959)

2.2 Advertisement Classification and Categories

As this paper is concerned with commercial materials, video clips in particular, there is a need to speak of marketing strategies and define basic categories of the sphere before moving to the analysis section of the research.

As we know, advertising, being one of the most influential and efficient components of marketing, can also be related to a promotion - the fourth P of marketing mix. Advertisement is a type of communication that implements certain tools of mass media and aims to persuade audience or influence it in a particular way (Wells, Burnett, 2003). Throughout the development of communication means and technology, advertising pursued different agendas, that were dictated by the time and social state. At the beginning of the 20^th century commercials were mainly aiming at stimulating sales, within the spawn of approximately 20 years advertisement became a tool utilized to find and deliver a unique commercial offer. Later on, organizations begin to use advertisement to create a brand image, and, finally, by the end of the 20^th century commercial campaigns aim to represent, to create certain messages, that will distinguish one brand from many others and resonate with the target audience. (Vasilyev, 2004)

Advertisement serves as a multifunctional tool, it manages several spheres at once: economic, political, social, informative, aesthetic, and phycological. In this paper we will regard the latter four of the spheres.

Social sphere regards the influence advertisement has on the society as a whole, it has certain impact on the cultural mentality of the audience and enhances the development of social institutions, overall, forms societies perception in the particular spheres of life. Informative sphere manages the awareness, this concerns not only the awareness about the available products, but also technological and scientific achievements of humanity, relevant movements and values, global changes in the world. Advertisements also aims to rationalize the consumption of products and services. Psychological sphere is realized through the process of programming: people develop certain patterns in evaluation of environment and own self-esteem. Aesthetic sphere considers modern tendencies in design and fashion and influences our taste. Certain advertising campaigns can be regarded as pieces of artistic creation and creative human output. Speaking video commercials-wise, there is a great number of famous film directors that worked on the creation of advertising clips, for instance, David Lynch, Federico Fellini, Guy Ritchie and Claude Lelouch (Bernadskaya, 2007).

There exist several classifications of advertising, one of them is particularly relevant for the present research - the scale of outreach. This classification regards territorial factor: advertisements can be local, aimed at a certain district or city; regional, aimed at a certain area of a country; national, targeting whole country; international, created to cover several countries; global, aimed to encompass the whole or the majority of the world. In this paper national commercials created for different countries by same international brands will be analyzed.

As advertisement in this paper is regarded as a kind of communication, therefore, it would be reasonable to develop an understanding of communication theory that can be applied to advertising. Advertisement is often attributed to the area of mass communication, as it usually targets greater audience. Commercial materials, including video clips, have certain function: informative, expressive, suggestive, pragmatic. All the functions can be used at an appropriate time of campaign duration and also can be utilized simultaneously - depends on the needs of the brand. Informative function - awareness of innovation, expressive function - emotive programming and control over mood, suggestive function - instills positive attitude towards the product and encourages to make a purchase. Pragmatic function - rationalization of the purchase, provides sufficient argumentation in favor of the project (Danna, 2002).

There also exist different types of argumentation in commercial campaigns. Marketing specialists design chains of reasoning to prove certain thesis, namely, they prove the positive characteristics of the product and necessity to purchase. There exist different types of argumentation that can be implemented in the video commercials.

The first one is Inductive reasoning - inferences from particular cases to the general case (Copi, 2006). For example, marketing specialists can use several positive reviews or cases to illustrate one property of their product. The second one is the Deductive reasoning - inference in which the conclusion is of no greater generality than the premises (Sternberg, 2009), if the general case, the underlying value is true, then the outcome is supposed to be true. The next one is Analogy, when providing an analogy, we are faced with two objects with same, often positive properties, could be used to introduced a new product of the same brand. Emotive argumentation is concerned with emotive appeal in the advertisement.

2.3 Cross-cultural Aspect of Commercial Video Creation Process

Overall, the market of advertising is considered the biggest segment of world economy. Nowadays, there exist a global tendency of marketing communications, namely, commercial campaigns, becoming more complex in their essence. Due to globalization process a lot of companies choose to broadcast global commercials, for instance, a video clip advertising a certain product or service similar for all the countries, they do not choose to adapt video materials to cultural realms. On the contrary, Francis Fukuyama rejects the view that globalization is leading to cultural homogeneity, asserting that it is only leading to homogenization of certain aspects of the economy and society, therefore advertising market will still vary from country to country. (Fukuyama, 2013)

Moreover, the trend for global commercials does have several issues. First, there is a problem of translating product names and texts in the commercials. This problem could be solved with the help of an experienced translator or a profound user of two engaged languages. Second issue, and the most relevant, lies in the field of cross-cultural communication. Marketing specialist have to consider a great number of cultural peculiarities when launching a global advertisement in order to not offend any country's population and create a really effective commercial. Therefore, there exists a better solution - to create regional or national types of commercials for each territory to achieve better results in targeted countries (Bernadskaya, 2007).

When understanding the peculiarities of marketing strategies used in the process of commercial creation, such as argumentation, functions, types and aspects of impact it has on the target audience, we see the need to adapt all those features to cultural realms in order to create effective message and communicate it successfully to the clients.

Bernadskaya (2007) acknowledges the global trend of unification, which does really affect the marketing aspect of communication. However, there still exist certain peculiarities that need to be considered in the process of designing of commercial video material. The scholar compares Russian, American and Japanese audience and their “taste” in commercials. If speaking of the Japanese commercials, considerably more attention is paid to the expressive function of advertisements: both images and texts appeal to the emotions, while Russian audience is more attracted when the pragmatic function is boosted - logical argumentation in advertisements, appeal to such notions as “success” and “power”. (Muzikant, 1998)

Brnadskaya states, that part from Hofstede's cultural dimensions there is a need to consider several other factors. First, the specifics and limitations of national legislation of any country, national values and traditions. Secondly, there is a prohibition of comparative advertisements in such countries as Germany, France, Italy and United Kingdom. Notably, some countries limit the involvement of children in the advertising content, for example, it is prohibited in Switzerland to demonstrate children in dangerous situations or, for instance, show children eating in Italy. Moreover, in Austria brands cannot directly address children in the advertising message. There are certain limitations when advertising drugs or alcohol in various countries, certain words and figures of speech are not allowed in commercial communication. Marketing specialist have to consider differences in customers' expectations towards certain products: the way it is posed, what features to consider primary, or the way of utilization of the product, for instance, when advertising water in the U.S. the accent should be placed on such features as “clean” and “healthy”, while in European countries the emphasis is on the mineral properties of water.

Nonverbal features play a significant role in commercial communication. When speaking of the video commercials kinesics is of a high importance. Kinesics can be defined as communication and perceived meaning from facial expressions and body gestures (Birdwhistell, 1952). In video advertisements a wide range of nonverbal signals can be used: emblems, signals with a verbal equivalent (Efron, 1969), and affective displays, usually facial gestures that help to communicate certain emotions (Ekman, 1998). The use of such signals can significantly differ from culture to culture. For instance, Hofstede speaks of such affective display as “smile” and examined the case concerning McDonalds employees in indulgent and restrained societies. In American culture it is common for personnel to smile at customers, as they are required to do so by the management, and it is considered to be a part of the corporate culture in the U.S., a highly indulgent society. However, when trying to mimic this practice in the restrained societies, McDonalds faced a dubious reaction of the customers. In low Indulgence country, Russia, clients were repelled by such facial expression, as they found it strange, offensive to certain extend. (Hofstede, 2010) Therefore, it is important to pay attention to nonverbal communication in order to create an effective advertising message.

When speaking of the marketing strategies in the feminine and masculine cultures, there is a need to pay attention to the family roles. Gender roles define the customer behavior in certain countries, for example, in low masculinity countries it is common for husbands to go shopping for foods, or, when purchasing a car, a husband will involve the partner to make a final decision. Hence, taking those factors in consideration, marketing specialists can use more appropriate images and characters in the video clips, so that audience regards those commercials as relatable. In masculine cultures cars in general are seen as status symbols and in commercials are portrayed as something that can enhance the power and raise the profile of a customer, a man in the majority of cases. As can be concluded, even such thing as gender of an actor in the commercial plays a significant role. Importantly, marketing specialists need to pay attention to the taboos that are common for masculine cultures, as some phenomena and topics are not to be raised in masculine societies. For example, it would be completely inappropriate to use sexual undertone in commercials in the majority of Muslim countries, which are highly masculine (Bearden, 1996).

Uncertainty avoidance plays a great role in customer choices. Low UA cultures tend to buy more convenient products: ready-made products, frozen foods, snacks. So, when choosing from the range it is better to consider convenience feature over any other. Furthermore, uncertainty avoiding cultures find the commercials featuring specialists and experts more reliable and have greater effect on customers.

Speaking of the analytical and holistic vision and its influence on the creation of commercials, there is a need to wisely implement the object- versus substance-orientation concept. For western, mostly analytical audience a commercial needs to be concentrated solely on the product, be less detailed and mention only primary features of it. This way western tunnel vision won't get distracted throughout the video clip. On the contrary, for the holistic Asians it is important to put a product into certain environment, show, how it can exist in real life, show the connections with customers and how it can be utilized. More details can be added, more aspects can be covered. Notably, they are not to be direct and explicit, Asian cultures tend to use more abstract and vague notions, there often is no need to put all the product features in words, as those can be understood through the symbols, images and nonverbal communication. This fact is also connected with the context of cultures, whether those are low- or high-context ones. Holistic cultures usually can also be described as high-context ones, therefore, there is more attention to details from the audience of the commercials. As a result, Asian commercials are expected to create a story around the product or service, the primary function of the advertisement is to visualize how a certain product becomes a part of customers daily life and environment. (Hall, 1976)