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MTV Networks: The
Arabian Challenge

Paper by: Cézanne Kooter
Cross Cultural Training
th
18 of May, 2016

  
As the business world has been increasing globalization this past century, it
has without a doubt become much easier to expand your company beyond
the reach it had before the rise of the internet, providing suppliers and
demanders from all over the world communication between each other
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A high risk, which than relates to a higher return if played right
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This makes it for companies
much easier to work with different cultures as they have a much better
understanding and appreciation for them
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Companies
continue to look for opportunities around the world in search of profitable new
markets, outsourcing facilities, acquisitions and alliances
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MTV is an example, of a company that has been very successful
worldwide, dealing with different cultures and localizing their strategies, whilst
still maintaining their brand identity
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The Arab culture is quite preserved comparing it to the western and
American culture
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It is a multitude of ethnic and linguistic groups
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Worldwide there are over 200 million
Arabs
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This loyalty influences all
aspects of an Arab’s life
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The perspective of the Arab world is in many ways different from the
way the western world perceives it
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The first is atomism, which refers to the fact that
Arabs focus on parts rather than on the whole
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The third one is
wish versus reality, which denotes that Arabs express emotion in a forceful
and animated fashion
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Importance of justice and equality is the fourth one
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And than the final one is paranoia, which discusses that
Arabs may seem paranoia to western standards
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2, 2006)
The core ideas and values of the Western culture are slightly different
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The first is reason, which indicates that thoughts
and perceptions should be reality- or fact-based (Aristotle 384-322 BC)
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Happiness is the third
value, and it signifies that worldly happiness should be the focus of each
person’s life
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e
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And the
fifth, and thereby last one is capitalism, which focuses on recognizing the right
of private ownership, capital, accumulation, exchange and profit
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The three most varying dimensions are Power Distance, whereby UAE
scored 90 and the US 40
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Hierarchy in an organization is seen as reflecting
inherent inequalities, centralization is popular, subordinates expect to be told
what to do and the ideal boss is a benevolent autocrat
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This
implies that the United Arab Emirates is considered a collectivistic society
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Whereas in the United States this is the other way around,
being very individualistic, focusing on “me” instead of “we”
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In these cultures there is an
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emotional need for rules (even if the rules never seem to work) time is money,
people have an inner urge to be busy and work hard, precision and
punctuality are the norm, innovation may be resisted, security is an important
element in individual motivation
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Source: https://www
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com/arab-emirates
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As Dana El Baltaji, Special Projects Manager at Trends magazine in
Dubai stated in 2008 said, …”it’s an American brand … The challenge,
therefore, is transforming a notoriously risqué channel into the Middle
Eastern-friendly platform for music and creativity without stripping MTV of its
edge
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The Middle East would provide MTVN (MTV

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Networks) with a huge potential given its huge youth population, which
however would not go without having to face any challenges
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Next to that, it could to be challenging as well to adapt content to suit
the local tastes since the Middle East included many different countries
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Also, because of the big difference in culture, MTVN had
to “glocalize” their brand in the Middle East, however not too much in order to
maintain what it stood for
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Next to the cultural obstacles, MTVN also had to face also some firm
competition
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And especially, since not only MTVN had the
hands on the information about the big percentage of youth in the Middle
East, others had seen this business opportunity clearly as well, and knowing
that, of course they were not going to ignore this
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In order for MTV to be successful, they not only had to find the right
content but also find ways to connect and captivate the Arabian youth, who
were already used to numerous sites and TV shows to watch and listen to
multiple music channels and videos that they favored
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They had made proper research to
the market and analyzed well its competition and target audience
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They planned to project itself as unique and
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different from the other channels by proposing itself as a platform wherefrom
the Arab youth could let their local concerns be heard as well as promote their
musical talent
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So,
not only would MTV Arabia provide entertainment but would also influence on
its global reach to promote the musical talent of Arab youths
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And to show the effort, MTV would also be able to export Arabic music
and culture worldwide, being able to do this through their global network
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The fact that the programming line up
would contain more local content – composing 40% of the content to be aired
on MTV Arabia - was another pinpoint of the strategy that MTV wanted to
implement
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And because of the
‘Think Globally, Act Locally’ mindset, MTV not only ventured with a local
player in the Arabian media industry, called the Arab Media Group (AMG),
which had eight radio stations and three daily newspapers, but also made
their teams with a mix of different Middle Eastern cultures
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On top of all this, MTV did not only want to provide
entertainment, but also wanted “… to encourage education and look for
solutions to problems such as unemployment
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This was part of their “wider, ongoing multi6  

 

  
platform strategy encompassing consumer products, digital media, hotels and
theme parks …” (Singh)
As a conclusion, I do think MTV has a good chance to succeed in the
Middle Eastern market because of their well implemented strategy to combine
their global brand content with the local culture, and showing that they are not
trying to impose their own Western culture fully into the Arabian market, whilst
still maintaining what they stand for
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And next to that, scanning the environment properly
by finding information and forecasting relevant trends, competitive actions,
and circumstances that would have affected operations in the region they
wanted to expand to
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”
However, 3 years later after the launch, John Parell wrote an article on
the Digital Production website in which he interviewed Bakish
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Bibiliography
O
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Arab Cultural Awareness: 58 factsheets
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org/irp/agency/army/arabculture
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(2016)
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Chapter 6
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com/95257353/international-management-deresky-8th-edchapter-6-flash-cards/
Gilbert, D
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Reality- or fact-based thought and
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slideshare
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(2016)
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geert-hofstede
...
html
Parnell, J
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MTV Arabia 'a work in progress' Retrieved May
17, 2016, from http://www
...
com/article-2465-mtv-arabia-awork-in-progress/
Purkayastha, D
...
MTV Networks: The Arabian Challenge (Unpublished
master's thesis)
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