Country Analysis Assignment 

Country Analysis Assignment 

MKTG 469, fall 13 

 

Based on our research, we feel it would be a great idea to bring in Ikea into South Africa. Because it has not been introduced in Africa and Capetown is a developing city, we feel it will be able to adapt to this market. my part of the project is to focus on executive summary, mode of entry strategy and product decisions of maketing strategy  

 

The goal of this assignment is for your group to put together an in-depth analysis of the 

country that you have been assigned. The analysis should be concluded with your 

assessment of 1) the potential of the market in general, 2) possible risk factors associated 

with marketing to this country, and 3) for which industries or product/service categories 

there seem to be particular marketing opportunities. Your country analysis should thereby 

help you decide what product you would like to launch into the country and also provide 

you with the necessary background information for designing a strategy for that market. 

 

Your country analysis report should be about 10 pages of text, excluding title page, table 

of contents, list of references, displays and table, and any appendixes you choose to 

include. You will not need to include an executive summary for this report. 

 

One of the main tasks of the assignment is to conduct thorough research about the 

country. It is important that you specify the sources you have used for the information 

you present in the report. The list of references should include information about all the 

sources you have used for the paper and you also need to use a reference style that allows 

readers to find the source of a particular claim or data point in the text. 

 

The report should include the following sections: 

 

1) country background – history and basics. This section would include information like 

language, size and composition of population. 

 

2) economic situation – this section should describe the state of the economy in recent 

years, as well as discuss the likely growth/contraction rate of the economy in the coming 

years. You would look at indicators such as GDP and GDP growth rate (the first half of 

chapter 7 discusses these indicators). The main conclusion should focus on the spending 

power of the population now and in the near future. 

 

3) trade relationships and regulations – You would begin this section by looking at the 

development of trade (for example, as reflected in the BoP) for the country) and the main 

trading partners. Also, what are the main goods that the country exports/imports? You 

would also want to describe any general trade agreements that the country has made. 

Since you do not focus on a particular product category you cannot specify the exact 

nature of the country’s use of trade barriers, but you should try to provide a general 

assessment (use the overall assessment available on wto.org). Finally, this section should 

also provide basic information about the currency of the country. These issues are 

described in chapter 2. 

 

4) the political/regulatory environment and business climate – this section should 

provide an overview of the political system of the country. You would also want to 

include a discussion on the regulatory environment in terms of ease of doing business, 

corruption, and political risk (chapter 3).  

5) cultural factors – what are cultural factors that may influence consumer preferences as 

well as what cultural factors may influence how to best conduct B2B interactions in this 

market? For example, you would want to include the Hofsteede measure of cultural 

differences. These topics are described in chapter 4. 

 

6) conclusion – overall assessment of market in terms of its attractiveness, issues that 

need to be considered when marketing to this country, and particular industries/product 

categories that would likely do well in this market 

 

Chapter 6 in the textbook provides a comprehensive list of resources for your data 

collection and we will also discuss relevant sources for each section in class. You should 

also try to find one or two few pieces of more in-depth analysis about the country in 

sources such as export.gov, the Economist, the Wall Street Journal, Businessweek, 

Forbes, and other relevant news outlets.