This article from the American Marketing Association's newsletter -- "National Culture Influences Acceptance of Product Innovation" -- sparked a discussion in our office today. The article reports on research that was intended to "determine how consumers in different countries respond to product introductions. A new product might enjoy rapid acceptance in one country, but not in another."

To cut to the chase, the results of the study showed that "culture exerts a relatively high level of overall influence on diffusion: More than 50% of the products’ diffusion rates can be attributed to cultural influence." and that "the cultural aspects of masculinity and power distance are positively associated with diffusion rates, and the dimensions of individualism and long-term orientation are negatively related to diffusion rates."

The discussion we had centered on the difference between acceptance of innovation and diffusion of innovation. This article seems to use the words interchangeably, and I've always thought they were the same, but my colleague has said they're not. Once we've had a chance to discuss it further, I'll report back.

The other part of the discussion centered around the recommendation that a new innovation would do better if introduced into a collective culture (as opposed to a more individualistic culture). Said my colleague, "By its very nature, a collective culture tends not to do individualistic things, and often, innovations fall into that category."

My response was, assuming that the action of a diffusion process is to get the innovation to a tipping point, maybe that tipping point is easier to get to in a collective culture. If in a collective culture the opinion leaders are more quickly followed than in an individualistic culture, then it makes sense that the tipping point at which the adoption curve would begin to grow exponentially would be reached more quickly.

Feel free to discuss this amongst yourselves!