5 Tips For Expanding The Reach Of Your Business Overseas
When it comes to business, the world really is your oyster! Exporting products and expanding your business overseas is a great way to grow your enterprise and find new markets. It can be a bit of a minefield to navigate for the uninitiated. There is language, custom and legal barriers to break through if you want to be successful. You’ll need to do your research thoroughly. Here are five top tips for expanding the reach of your business overseas.
Invest In Translation
Don’t assume that everybody can read English! Translation is extremely important if you want to get your product or message to people in different countries. The translation of websites is particularly important. Traditionally, companies would have to send all of their copy to a translation service that would manually translate each sentence. A modern system for translation management will use neural machine translation software to translate entire websites almost instantly. Modern software is able to assess the context, as well as the content of a sentence. If needed, invest on someone with a strong degree in media communications to help in this aspect.
Conduct Market Research
Just as any good business would conduct domestic market research before launch, it is crucial that businesses expanding overseas know about the markets they wish to expand into. Foreign markets can be oversaturated with similar products to your own, have cultural differences that make your product undesirable or have a particular niche that would be profitable to fill. You won’t know for certain unless you do your research.
Understand Cultural Differences
Cultural norms define appropriate business conduct, and they differ around the globe. It is vitally important that you take cultural differences into account when pursuing business overseas. Business is undoubtedly a social activity – interaction with other humans is crucial for business success. Your interpersonal skills must include an ability to adapt to the norms of a host country.
Learn The Law
If you are going to be expanding your business overseas, it is likely that you are going to need to export your product. Import/export laws and customs procedures are complex and vary hugely from nation to nation. The situation is fluid, with changes in these legal frameworks happening all the time. If, for instance, you wanted to expand your business into the United Kingdom, you would find that import/export and customs laws have still not been well defined after the departure of the UK from the EU. It is a good idea to consult an export lawyer before embarking on exporting.
Find Local Distributors, Sellers And Promoters
Doing things from a distance is not always the best method. As much as you learn about the market, the culture and the language, you’ll not be able to negotiate the intricacies of a foreign realm as considerately as a local person at first. Making connections with local distributors, sellers and promoters will allow you to make genuine inroads into a foreign market. The process of hunting down partners is often a time consuming one. Make sure to network outside of your comfort zone.
