Going global has become an integral part of the growth strategy for many businesses. It is estimated that cross-border shopping will make up to 20% of eCommerce in 2022. In today’s digital world, even a startup with little money can earn a significant revenue with a good global marketing strategy.
These days growing businesses of all sizes consider global marketing to create a footprint all over the world.
Follow these steps to promote and sell your products or services globally:
1. Research about the target market
This is the first and the most critical step of any global marketing plan. If you have a website, look at your own analytics and see from which countries most of your website visitors are from.
Research the:
- Trends in those countries
- Market size for your product or service
- Competition
- Local substitutes for your product or service
The more effort you spend on this step, the lesser will be the surprises and hurdles in launching your products in a new country. It also allows you to zero in on one country to begin with.
2. Localise your offerings
You may have to customize your product or service depending on the trends, tastes and pain points of customers in your target country.
One of the best examples in this area is McDonald’s India. To cater to the tastes of the Indian customers, McDonald’s for the first time offered products like:
- McAloo Tikki Burger
- Veg Pizza McPuff
- Other products using spices preferred by Indians
They also removed the products from their international menu which contain beef and pork. McDonald’s has taken to heart the saying, “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.”
3. Indulge in brand promotions
People trust those they admire. To increase your brand awareness in a new market, you can benefit from the help of influencers. These are social media stars with many followers.
Reach out to the local influencers and offer free products in exchange for their testimonial.
Another option is to request them to endorse your product to their audience while using it themselves. iFluenz is a great website where you can search and find the right influencers.
You must also actively engage with your target audience on their favorite social media platforms, as 37% of customers find purchase inspiration through social networks.
These days even a small business can create waves on the internet by promoting good content that makes people stop scrolling.
4. Create a website to make yourself visible on the internet
To engage in global marketing, you will need a responsive website so potential customers can find you.
If you are entering a new market with English as the first language, then you have the option of using your existing website or creating a separate local website. A separate country-specific website helps you in:
- Speaking with your prospect in their language
- Creating region-specific content
- Celebrating local holidays with sales
For example, Amazon India promotes the Great Indian Festival on their Amazon India website this way:
As a comparison, here is how Amazon US promotes their Black Friday Sale, which takes place the day after the American holiday of Thanksgiving every year:
As you can see, Amazon tailors their approach to the particular market —and you can too.
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5. Offer the preferred local payment method
Customers want to pay in their local currency and therefore you need a reputed platform that can accept payments in multi-currency and transfer the payments in your account seamlessly.
There are a number of trustworthy providers in India presently that can offer these kinds of services like PayPal India, PayU, CCAvenue.
6. Manage shipping and returns
If you are into eCommerce, then order fulfilment (i.e. receiving, processing and delivering products) is the core process of your business.
For international transactions, the process becomes complex due to the involvement of multiple parties, different geographies, and so on. For cross-border transactions, there are primarily three models of order fulfilment:
Merchant fulfilment
You ship the product yourself from inventory you manage and store. This method involves substantial shipping costs and the same should be communicated to the customer at the time of placing the order.
There are real-time shipping cost calculation APIs that you can integrate with your website for this purpose. Website builders like GoDaddy’s Online Store handle this for you.
Third-party fulfilment
You hire a vendor (possibly in the target country) to hold the goods in bulk and ship them directly to customers when an order is placed. Obviously shipping costs are lower in this case, but you will have to pay for fulfilment.
Drop-shipping
You market the product and when the order is placed, you send the details to the manufacturer who delivers the product directly to the buyer.
Benefits of a global marketing strategy
Global marketing is about strategizing to extend your business into new markets across the globe. It is a complete process of:
- Research
- Planning
- Creating
- Promoting your products in other countries
Expanding your business globally can create immense opportunities for your business. Here are some of them.
Growth opportunities
New markets offer added business opportunities for you. You can start offering your products to a completely new audience, resulting in an increased topline.
Brand reputation
Global marketing increases awareness of your business and establishes trust in your brand. You must have often seen reputed brands like Coca-Cola claiming proudly that they are present or serving in 200+ countries or so on.
Product improvement
As mentioned above, moving into a new market requires research on the target audience. Many times, the product needs to be localized to serve the target segment in a better way. This allows you to analyze your offerings from a different perspective and transform them to make them more useful and helpful for your customers.
To cater to the needs of the market, Uber started offering a cash payment option to its customers for the first time in Hyderabad, India.
After its success, the option was rolled out to several other developing markets where cash is still the preferred mode of payment over cards. This is a prime example of how global marketing works.
Global marketing might be your ticket to growth
Expanding into another country introduces your business to new markets and gives you the opportunity to get more customers. Before you leap into global marketing, do proper research and planning including:
- Identifying a large target market
- Promote your products to that market
- Get the supporting infrastructure ready, including payment and shipping
Listen and learn as you get to know your new target markets. Then use that knowledge to tailor your products or services for them.
Best of luck in your global marketing efforts!