An Empirical Sturdy On International Market Segmentation Strategies Of Branded Sportswear And Shoes

With the further development of reform and opening-up,China is now standing on the international stage with a much more open attitude.The international trade,in the meantime,has achieved a skyrocketing growth.But compared with that of western developed countries,Chinese brands of sports industry are optimistic no more,which to a large extent sets barrier to its further development.In spite of the negative conditions for domestic companies,Adidas enjoys satisfactory market performances.Known as the second largest manufacturer in sports industry,Adidas is the only global sportswear manufacturer that can compete with Nike.It leads a fashionable and professional style in both international sports events and people’s daily life and provides practical reference for a fashionable life with its accurate sense of fashion and trend.Successful international market segmentation strategies are also great additions to its further development.Chinese companies need to draw lessons from successful international brands so that they can make better use of the global market proactively yet prudently.Especially when the 15-year protection period offered by World Trade Organization(WTO)was over in 2015.Under such circumstances of increasing competition and pressure,necessary steps should be taken to deal with much more sever competition in the global market.In addition to all those practical factors,theoretical support is also quite necessary.In recent years,related fundamental researches in market segmentation are almost complete.To complicate matters worse,the development of e-commerce presents completely different characteristics from traditional business development model.More and more researchers show great solicitude for the selection of categorical variables and methods of market segmentation against such a backdrop.Empirical studies in different industries through meticulously designed statistical ways become a great attraction for researchers from different countries.The field of branded sportswear and shoes has a close relationship with both people’s daily life and sports competitiveness of a country.Through the compound model of factor analysis and cluster analysis,the author takes Adidas as an example and examines its international market segmentation strategies,based on which some enlightenments and suggestions can be provided for domestic sports brands in this field.This paper mainly falls into six parts.At the beginning of the thesis,the author introduces the research background,research purposes and significance as well as research methods.Compared with the sports industry in western countries,China is a relatively late starter in this field.While domestic companies are facing greater challenges in the process of internationalization and shrinking market share in both domestic and foreign markets,a growing number of companies still strive to enter into the global market even without the protection period provided by World Trade Organization.Adidas is a big winner in marketing due to its accurate international market segmentation strategies and high brand loyalty.To study its related strategies through quantitative methods and qualitative methods is beneficial for domestic companies to build their own brands and avoid certain risks in marketing.The second chapter shows the definitions of target market,market segmentation,brand loyalty and customer satisfaction together with the research statues in detail.In the subject of marketing,target market is the main focus of a company.Market segmentation,however,is one of the most essential concepts based on the product differentiation.When the process is no longer subject to the boundary of a country,market segmentation automatically has multinational properties.Brand loyalty is often regarded as an invisible asset that becomes the cornerstone to success for a company and mobilizes the support from appropriate market segmentation strategies for a company.And customer satisfaction is mainly about customers’ experiences.Nowadays,variable selection and method study are two hot topics.Based on the related criterion of variable judgment,proper variables can be determined before a real segmentation.The selection of variables also vary from one another in different marketing contexts.After the selection,certain statistical tests can be also conducted to make sure of its statistical significance.Researchers from home and abroad have already made some attempts concerning the first topic,leaving more room for further exploration on the second one.Greatly driven by the advance of mathematics and statistics,related methods for the second topic also evolve from traditional qualitative analyses to quantitative analyses.In the third part,the author starts with the phylogeny and then makes a comprehensive representation of the product groups and premises of successful international market segmentation strategies of Adidas.Distinguishing itself as one of the biggest manufacturers in sports industry,Adidas has five groups of products.Ever since its birth,members of Adidas have been making dedicated effort to provide high-quality products for both ordinary people and celebrities.To test the quality of its products in real stadiums is the most efficient way for Adidas to gain momentum in development.As a result,many international sports events are sponsored by Adidas.In the meantime,accurate market positioning and expanding strategies as well as excellent performances in the global market provide a firm foundation for its successful international market strategies.After having an overall understanding about Adidas and research status in the sports industry,a theoretical model is firstly built.Later,some rudimentary knowledge about scales is summarized,based on which a scale is constructed with nine attitude statements for data collection.After finishing the design,a two-stage investigation with fifty and three hundred participants respectively is launched among five universities in Dalian.While the first fifty questionnaires based on the scale are distributed to test its validity and reliability on the first stage,three hundred formal questionnaires are granted in those five-universities in proportion on the second stage,based on which factor analysis and cluster analysis are conducted one by one.The interpretations of the results of empirical analyses and evaluations on the compound model of factor analysis and cluster analysis are also presented in this part.The fifth part gets some enlightenments from the empirical analyses and provides some suggestions domestic sports brands on the basis.Fi-ve countermeasures from creativity improvement to proper promotions are introduced in detail.However,since the empirical analyses are subject to a relatively limited area,a product group is also eliminated in consideration of students’ limited purchasing power,suggestions in this part are for reference only.They need to make a concrete analyses of concrete problems instead of treating everything equally.At last,some conclusions on Adidas and its international market segmentation strategies are drawn from the analyses.Although China still has a long way to go in the sports industry,domestic companies still cherish the hope of winning the competition in the future if they pay more attention in their international market strategies and learn from other successful brands’ strengths.