Abstract:

The Italian Institute for Foreign Trade (ICE) is a public organisation whose institutional tasks concern the promotion of the image of Italy and the development of foreign trade. At the time of the study the trade exchange between Italy and Japan was at extremely low levels. For that reason, ICE decided to try to formulate an integrated marketing strategy for promoting Italian products in Japan. To achieve this end, it was decided to launch a major research project in Japan, and ICE engaged PRAGMA to plan and coordinate the research. Traditionally, ICE has been mainly involved in sectorial promotions in the business community. The research and marketing approach in this case was to observe the total picture among not only the business community, but coordinating and integrating the views of Japanese consumers and Japanese opinion leaders as well.