I had a UGC campaign that absolutely crushed it in Russia. 18% engagement, solid conversions, clients were happy. So naturally, I thought: “let’s scale this to the US.”
It bombed. Like, spectacularly. We got 2% engagement and maybe half the conversions we expected. I was confused. The content was the same. The audience targeting seemed reasonable. The creators were good.
Then I talked to someone from the US market who pointed out: the humor doesn’t translate. The pain points we’re addressing aren’t the same. The level of “authenticity” that Russian audiences reward is actually seen as unprofessional in the US. The price point sensitivity is different. The platform algorithm preferences are different.
In Russia, creators can be super casual, funny, even slightly rough around the edges—audiences trust that. In the US, there’s this expectation that if you’re promoting a product, it should feel at least somewhat polished and trustworthy-looking. It’s a different culture entirely.
What I’m doing now is treating Russian and US campaigns as completely separate strategies, even when it’s the same product. I work with American experts who understand the US market nuances. I study what’s actually working in each market instead of copying frameworks. I ask creators directly: “Does this resonate here?”
It’s slower and more expensive upfront. But the results speak for themselves.
Who else has had their “winning” strategy completely fail in a new market? What did you learn from it?
This is a critical insight, and it’s exactly why raw metrics without context are dangerous. Your 18% engagement in Russia wasn’t actually comparable to 2% in the US—the baseline is different. The definition of engagement is different.
When you looked at why the US campaign underperformed, did you break it down by:
- Which specific content elements failed (was it the creative, the messaging, the creator type, the audience targeting)?
- How you’d expect that demographic to behave (is 2% actually bad for that audience segment, or is it actually acceptable)?
- What adjustments would have been needed?
Because that tells you whether the strategy failed or just the execution.
I’m asking because I’ve seen teams pivot strategies too quickly when they actually just needed to localize the execution. Other times, they hold onto strategies too long because they haven’t diagnosed what’s actually broken.
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Also—did you use the American experts exchange within the community to get feedback before launching in the US, or was this a post-mortem analysis? Because if you had diagnosed the differences earlier, you might have saved budget and avoided the failure cycle.
You just described the difference between scaling and adaptation. Scaling means doing more of the same. Adaptation means changing the strategy for context. Most founders and marketers conflate these, which is why they get burned.
Here’s what I’d add: the US market is way more fragmented than Russia. A strategy that works for a Moscow audience might work across the entire Russian market. But a strategy that works for, say, a coastal urban audience in the US might completely flop in the Midwest. Did you think about where in the US this campaign needed to work?
Also—you mentioned you’re now working with American experts. Are you actually asking them “why did this fail?” or just asking them “what works here?” The former gives you an understanding for next time. The latter just patches this one campaign.
One more thing: that 2% engagement number—did you compare it to what US competitors in your space are actually getting? Or were you just comparing it to your Russian baseline? Because if you don’t know what “good” looks like in the new market, you have no way to judge whether the strategy itself was wrong or just underfunded.
This is exactly why partnerships and community are so valuable. If you’d connected with US-based marketers before launching, someone could have flagged that the strategy needed localization. Now you know it for next time.
I’m curious—did this experience change how you approach selecting creators for new markets? Are you now prioritizing creators who are actually from that market and understand the local culture?
Because I think that’s where a lot of Russian brands go wrong. They find technically-skilled creators, but the creators don’t understand the market’s sensibilities.
This is a common trap. We’ve made the same mistake on the client side—assumed that a winning strategy in one market = winning everywhere. Usually costs us money and credibility before we figure it out.
How are you billing for this learning process now? Do you charge clients differently for new-market campaigns, knowing that localization takes more work and carries more risk? Or are you absorbing the extra cost?
Because my question to you is: did this campaign failure hurt you financially, and if so, are you making sure future clients pay for the adaptation work upfront instead of discovering the need for it mid-campaign?
I’m in the middle of doing exactly what you’re describing—taking something that worked in Russia and trying to make it work globally. Your story is making me realize I need to slow down and actually talk to market experts before I scale, not after I’ve already wasted budget.
Question: how much of the failure was strategic (wrong audience, wrong message) vs. tactical (wrong creators, wrong timing)? Because if it’s mostly tactical, maybe the strategy could have worked with different execution. If it’s strategic, then the whole approach needs rethinking.
How do you tell the difference?
Also—you mentioned working with American experts now. How did you find them? And did your Russian network even know good US market experts, or did you have to look completely outside your existing circles?
This is super helpful from my side because I work with brands expanding to new markets, and I can see it coming a mile away. Brands try to use the same brief, same talking points, same tone—and then they’re surprised when the content doesn’t land.
My question: when you’re now working with American creators on localized campaigns, are you giving them more creative freedom? Because I think that’s key—local creators need to actually understand what works in their market, not just execute a Russian playbook with an American accent.
Do you brief differently now for new-market campaigns?