Special issue on Data and Methodological Issues for New Insights in Global Marketing: A Commentary

International marketing research has always been considered more complicated than domestic marketing research, as the collection of accurate and reliable data in international markets is an even more intricate and complex endeavor (Craig and Douglas 2005). Differences in language, culture, and stage of cultural development, on the one hand, and the chance of selection errors due to lack of sufficient and reliable information, on the other, make the use of standardized research approaches and methods difficult and often infeasible. In a complex global world, the call for more rigorous methods to analyze and interpret international data is nevertheless more necessary than ever. The four articles in this special issue address different gaps in the current toolbox available to international marketing researchers. Before elaborating on these four studies, I would first like to discuss a couple of evolutions in international marketing that make rigorous research in global marketing even more challenging and exciting now and in years to come. The explosive growth of world trade has unleashed an increased need for information about markets throughout the world. Interestingly, this need for information is typically examined from the perspective of large, corporate multinational enterprises. Nevertheless, the rise of global value chains and the digital transformation of the economy offer new opportunities to participate in the global economy for small and medium enterprises (SMEs), which until recently were underrepresented in international trade (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development 2021). The improved access to digital technologies substantially lowered SMEs’ barriers of entry into global markets. This evolution allows SMEs to internationalize at a fraction of the cost, making it easier to find customers abroad and take part in global trade and export. Paradoxically, in spite of this digital revolution enabling firms to find new export opportunities, collecting information about and benchmarking performance in foreign markets remains challenging for most SMEs. The lack of dedicated workforce and limited resources on the SME side typically reduce the extent of both external and internal knowledge that SMEs can rely on to assess and adjust their foreign operations. This is all the more difficult because, despite prior research on the measurement of export performance, no specific measurement frameworks have been attained. Moreover, both financial and nonfinancial elements play an important role, making it even harder to construct robust holistic metrics. Because smaller firms also face greater challenges in navigating foreign markets, getting better tools to track their performance in these markets is paramount in helping SMEs—and the many people they employ—take advantage of these opportunities in international markets and succeed in the long run. In addition to these challenges, companies face increasing cultural diversity of marketing operations as they expand abroad, making it all the more important for researchers to collect information on the changing lifestyle and consumption patterns across the world. Although global accessibility of information has improved substantively over the last decade, several issues remain. For one, with an ever-expanding pool of countries for which data become available, the question arises whether classic metrics need to be updated and revised. Given the increasing availability of information from typically underresearched regions and countries, the heterogeneity in the measures and metrics using this expanded pool of information requires further examination. For example, what are the implications for the measurement of cultural values and cultural distance, some of the most-used concepts in international marketing (Steenkamp 2001)? Traditionally, notions of culture are defined by geographical country. As these nation boundaries blur and change, deterritorialization of culture may follow (Hernàndez i Martı́ 2006). This raises the following questions: To what extent do cultural value and distance metrics based on the Hofstede (1980) or Schwarz (1999) dimensions need to be revised? Moreover, how should we interpret changes in cultural values over time based on these Hofstede or Schwarz metrics? Do changes in these metrics truly reflect evolutions in cultural values, or are these evolutions an artefact of the increased