Marketing and innovation characteristics of Belgian International Niche Market Leaders

Details

Supervisors

Kamp, Bartholomeus

Faculty

Louvain School of Management

Degree label

Master [120] en Ingénieur de gestion

Abstract

In the 1980s, a German Professor, Hermann Simon begins to spread the term of “Hidden Champions”, aka International Niche Market Leaders (INMLs). Despite their recognized high profitability, very little literature has been dedicated to them until now (most of it written by Simon himself). This master thesis’ purpose is to identify Belgian International Niche Market Leaders, their general characteristics and then study their marketing and innovation specificities more in depth. Marketing being a very broad subject, I decided to limit the researches to the main three topics found in the literature: value proposition, globalization and relationship with the customers, and then to compare the findings to what had already been written. The information was harvested through series of interviews among four companies fulfilling previously set selection criteria. Information was then compared first with the available literature and then between the four Belgian companies themselves. Belgian International Niche Market Leaders share a lot of characteristics with their foreign peers. The main two similarities between all INMLs are their value proposition and the emphasis they put on customer relationship. On another side, regardless of the type of good (product or service) traded, quality is INMLs’ main focus and price comes later on the list of priority. Therefore, these companies like to pamper their customers and look for constant feedback on products and/or services in order to get valuable insight on a day-to-day basis, to improve both product and service quality. From a sustainability point of view, globalization is necessary for INMLs to stay in business. Indeed, given the specificity of the product they manufacture, their home market often reveals to be too small and they soon shift to foreign markets as well to survive. Innovation is also of vital importance for INMLs. Innovation sources are multiple, but two sources are heavily highlighted: leadership and customers. Company’s management are staying on top of new technologies and trends to give their R&D department the best insight on the shape of the years to come. Moreover, customers feedback is most valuable to improve the next products or to get new ideas. Innovation also seems to give companies more visibility and brand awareness. Despites some common points, differences with the literature were also outlined during the investigations. However, those divergences with foreign INMLs are linked to Belgium itself. Indeed, Belgium’s small size forces INMLs to look abroad for customers sooner rather than later and force them to consider any measure possible to protect their business. Finally, the topic everybody (literature as well as Belgian INMLs) converge on is the fact that customer intimacy and product quality are International Niche Market Leaders’ biggest marketing strengths.