The ultimate objective of any ambitious company is to expand their reach indefinitely until they conquer the global market. These aspirations should guide and influence how you choose to scale and reinvest in your business. As your company grows beyond its regional or domestic market, you’re offered the opportunity to capitalise on growing sales and greater exposure by opening up your company to a more international audience. It’s this that the below article explores, helping you plan for a more expansive and ambitious future in the international marketplace.
A Matter of Timing
Choosing when, how and where you scale your business should be a decision taken with due diligence. If you happen to scale a little bit too early, you might find yourself overstretched to the point that you enter debt. On the other hand, if you scale too late, you’ll have missed an opportunity to gain more business and experience in the international marketplace. Make a balanced decision based on your financial capacity, and the capacity of your team to handle a heavier workload. Never take big risks when scaling – it’s always best to be a little conservative in your decision-making in this respect.
Market Internationally
When you do make the jump in scale, it’s time to make a concurrent jump in your marketing efforts. You want to land in the international market and hit the ground running, with exposure and visibility levels high from the start. Therefore, you should shift your marketing strategy to be more international. This can mean everything from advertising in different languages to outsourcing to marketing companies based on your new target markets. If you choose the outsourcing route – which usually guarantees an ROI – ensure you’ve budgeted for it in your planned expansion phase.
Change Commerce Platforms
If you’re feeling direct from your website, then you’re going to need a sales platform that can accommodate an international audience as you scale to conquer new and exciting markets. Find a company to help you expand to offer international ecommerce through software and solutions that’ll help sales fly through your site, whether conducted in Sydney or San Francisco. With a well-made and frictionless server, you’ll find that more customers click-through to the point of sale, allowing you to capitalise on your burgeoning new audience.
Offices Abroad
The final step in your successful expansion is to establish further offices in centres of commerce around the world. For instance, if you’re generating many sales in the East Asian region, then it’s advisable for you to have a small team working on customer service and objective deliveries in a well-linked Asian city like Hong Kong, Singapore or Shanghai. With offices abroad, you’ll be far better-placed to serve your regional customers and you’ll have a foot in the door when it comes to local marketing and partnership fostering. When the time comes, send a team to establish new offices abroad – the final stage in your world-conquering charge to market dominance.
These four tips should help those companies looking to expand internationally with their sales – whether that be through smart international marketing, or the use of a better-equipped sales platform to offer your products to an international audience.