Branching out: How to market to customers overseas: Image: Supplied
If you’ve been running a business for a few years, you might be starting to think about branching out and attracting more customers. This means looking abroad and seeing whether your services translate over the borders. If you find that it does, then you’re faced with a challenge.
How exactly do you market to those customers? You can’t really use the same marketing scheme that you use at home, right? However, the marketing scheme you already have will be pretty close to working internationally.
You just need to know what you are doing and how it can be manipulated to work overseas. With this in mind, here are a few ways you can update your marketing plan and create a business that works anywhere:
One of the most important things to do when marketing abroad is to keep your marketing channels ticking over. No matter whether you are utilising b2c or b2b marketing channels, many of them are already going to transcend borders. This means that they’re ready to draw any international clients in. Therefore the use of social media is going to be particularly important. Try to steadily de-localise some of your posts, and you will find that more customers will be drawn in as a result.
There’s no doubt about it, your target customers in the UK are going to be slightly different to your target customers in Australia, even if they’re the same in their needs. Every market is different, whether it’s in the language or the culture itself, so conduct precise research and familiarize yourself with the location that you are targeting.
It might sound like an obvious point, but if you’re targeting an audience who cannot understand what you are selling, your marketing schemes are not exactly going to work very well. You need to find out everything there is to know about website translation, as well as content, price lists and catalogue translation, and you need to carry it out efficiently. That is to say, you need to ensure there are no mistakes. Seeing just one mistake is likely to put a customer off and make them think this product is not really for them. Therefore efforts need to be made to ensure adequate attempt to translate their own language.
Doing business in another country means you will have to follow that country’s laws and policies. This is not a problem, so long as you research their market policies and ensure your company is complying with all the regulations. If you do not, then you might find that your marketing strategies are stifled before you’ve even begun to feel the effects.
One other thing to be aware of is your customer service. Your customer service might already seem to be on track and it very well might be. But it is likely to be tested further once you have international market interest in your business. You need to ensure your employees are ready to deliver a good experience. Furthermore your website needs to be adapted to deal with likely customer queries from abroad. This is another means of marketing that will not only keep all your customers happy. Also ensure that your new international customers are comfortable with returning and use your services regularly.
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