It's a mistake to think of one Asia: Cheil's Bruce Haines

Marketers would be making a big mistake if they think they can take Asia in one big sweep, says Mr Bruce Haines, Global Chief Strategy Officer, Cheil Worldwide. “Korea is as different from Japan as it is from China. Similarly, Delhi is different from Mumbai. Finding things of commonality across these different economies is going to be difficult. There is no one Asia.”

However, when pressed to find a common uniting factor in the diverse Asian story, Mr Haines said it was “velocity”. “The thing that unites these Asian economies, whether developed, emerging or partly developed is that they have all skipped stages in technology upgrade. For instance, in mobile, some markets just skipped landline technology and went on to mobile phones,” he says.

“The ability of Asian consumers to pick up, develop and use technology is what differentiates them from Western markets,” he emphasised, in an interview to Business Line on the eve of AdAsia2011.

As a westerner working in Asia — Mr Haines has been based in Seoul since 2008 – the Cheil CSO will be presenting the outsider's view during a discussion on the Asian Creative on Tuesday .

The Asian ability to adopt technology also presents a creative challenge, Mr Haines said, as the Western paradigm cannot be replicated since there is a large degree of complacency and cynicism in these markets about “this is the way we've done things always.”

Mr Haines said what he found energising about the Asian market was an innate enthusiasm here and willingness to try something new all the time.

In Korea, he says he has been completely bowled over by the Balli Balli (the Korean expression that means ‘fast fast') way of doing things. “This spills through in everything – the way they do business, they shop, their practices,” he said.

“Thirty years ago, I point to the view outside my office in Seoul and tell my visiting executives, it was all just rice fields, today it is a dynamic urban agglomeration. Thirty years ago, Korea was poorer than Zimbabwe. Today, the level of sophistication in the market you see in Korea is due to the sheer drive to get things done,” he says.

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