Export Experts: Gathering International Market Intelligence
Seven experienced exporters share tips on gathering international market intelligence, including why and how to gather information, cleverly leveraging your existing network, things to research and the step-to-step approach to success.
Transcript of this video –
0:06 Gathering International Market Intelligence [Heather Ranck] There’s a reason they call
0:26 it intelligence.
0:27 Intelligence makes you look intelligent.
0:30 So, “know before you go” is an adage companies should live by.
0:34 Do your due diligence before you travel internationally
0:37 and you will be much more confident and successful by being well-prepared
0:43 and knowledgeable about a market before you go there.
0:46 [Cherie Harms] We do, 17-25% of our business is exporting, and we have the capacity to do more.
0:53 So when we have a response from, and most of our leads come via email,
1:01 I like to check out the customer because we want to make sure that they don’t sell
1:05 to another customer or that they’re using our product legitimately.
1:09 And the best way for me, the first place that I go to is the Commercial Service.
1:14 [Jon Engelstad] The thing I wish I would have known before I started exporting is researching
1:17 the markets a little more carefully instead of just going there hoping to find somebody.
1:23 And then realizing that it is going to take a lot of time.
1:26 In the international markets it seems to be relationships are really key.
1:32 [Doug Hartley] Local knowledge is very important, and doing your homework.
1:37 So, whatever online research you can do, whatever published research you can access
1:44 and coming to me and looking for guidance on where to look for that information,
1:51 or have me go and find it for you.
1:53 [Don Aberle] We look at a country and we find out what our products compete against.
1:58 You know, and then we go through the trouble to find out the prices.
2:01 It does no good to go into the country if your product, if you’re uncompetitive.
2:05 [Tom Shorma] So what we’ve found is a very effective tool in markets
2:09 that are just developing is to participate in the Commercial Service’s catalog program.
2:15 That puts our name out in front of prospective customers and in fact at a very low cost,
2:22 help them find us so that we can then develop a travel plan, which in fact,
2:29 is happening as we speak today with two of our sales people traveling to Brazil to meet
2:35 with prospective customers, some of which were generated from the catalog program
2:40 that was conducted several years ago in Brazil.
2:43 [Jake Kamrud] As you know, it’s very expensive to travel overseas and make cold calls
2:47 and try to meet people knocking on doors outside the US.
2:51 It’s just very expensive, the travel costs, the time, so we do a lot of research ahead of time
2:56 to make sure we know the right people before we go on these trade missions.
2:59 [Jon Engelstad] One of the other things I did as we began our exporting was,
3:05 there was an Exporttech program that I was made aware of, and we participated in that
3:10 and we were able to develop a matrix, take a look at the top countries where our product,
3:14 where we could market our product, where we wanted to put our efforts and the kind
3:20 of the processes that we needed to follow in developing that.
3:23 So, we were able to put together a plan using this program, which was very helpful
3:28 because initially, you know, we really didn’t have any idea how do we begin,
3:32 where do we start?
3:33 And that program was very helpful in giving us the resources the outline
3:37 for doing it and the continued support.
3:41 [Aaron McWilliams] Something we do is look at the value
3:43 of a client, the annual value of a client.
3:46 We’re looking for a thousand dollar value for every one of our clients.
3:49 So, if we can offer products to them that can assist in selling through faster, or, you know,
3:57 or if we need to reach out to those clients a bit more to remind them to reorder,
4:02 we’re always looking for that average value in a client.
4:05 If we can hit that average value in a client and hit our number of prospects,
4:10 than our company will be self-sustaining.
4:12 [Vania Resende] I think the first step for a new-to-market company is
4:16 to check not only the commercial side of their business, but also the cultural
4:22 and economic aspects of the new market.
4:24 We have the Country Commercial Guide where we have a lot of information on every aspect
4:31 of that market, like a cultural aspect, economic aspect
4:36 and also how to do business in that market.
4:39 [Kent Gibbons] For example, in South Africa we went through the Initial Market Check,
4:43 we had a mini booth at the USA Pavilion and at each of these milestones there was plenty
4:50 of interest, and we knew at that point that we actually had to bring a piece
4:54 of equipment over and put it on display.
4:57 A lot of this equipments’ values are such that no one was going to buy it from a picture,
5:03 so at that point we kind of had to just go ahead and just display piece of equipment.
5:09 We did that very same thing at NAMPO trade show in South Africa, tremendous interest
5:15 and we actually sold that piece of equipment the first day of the show.