Posts Tagged ‘business development’

Companies from multi-million dollar corporations to small business ventures all over the world have faced the tough question of whether or not they should spend more money on marketing or sales. The funny thing is when you think about it is that each of these departments is attempting to accomplish the same thing: the promotion of the company and incurring of sales. For this reason alone many businesses lump their marketing and sales together under one umbrella. As a small business owner, you have this luxury.

However, it is imperative that you understand that marketing and sales is not the same thing and that there are different activities involved in each. When utilized correctly, marketing and sales can go hand in hand in promoting your company and making it successful. When they are misunderstood and mismanaged, the effects can be devastating. Marketing and sales strategies are best when they are used as an integrated unit. Before you can do that, you must understand how each division works.

Marketing is the part of your company that is charged with getting your customers attention and getting them to buy your product. It is really a persuasive art form, and the successful marketing department utilizes this persuasion in every marketing campaign they launch. They want to attract as many people as possible and will do so by branding your product, advertising it, promoting it through a variety of means, and using public relations to get the product out there. When marketing is performed properly and is effective, the customers are going to buy the product.

This is where the sales department steps in. Marketing brings the people in and sales close the door behind them. The sales department is interested in making a single sale at a time. They focus on the individual customer in an effort to make the sale, get a signed contract, or get the customer to enter into an agreement with your company. To do this, they can cold call customers, use an incoming call center to engage in the customer, or directly sell the product.

You can see the cycle. Marketing gets the customer ready to buy and sales closes the purchase. Sometimes it is necessary for marketing to provide the customer with additional information so they can make a decision. Sales will step back and wait to close the deal. As you can see, when these two departments are used together, they are an effective weapon for your business.

To start using a combined marketing and sales strategy you need to take a look at your contacts and customers and sort them out. One set will be current contacts and customers who simply need to continue being persuaded to purchase your product, called the warm lead. The other set will be contacts and customers who have never heard of nor have no interest in purchasing your product, called the cold lead. You should always start with the current customers and target promotional devices towards those who need a good reason to invest in what you are selling. Sales move in when the lead goes from a cold lead to a warm lead to seal the deal.

Always try to develop an integrated marketing and sales strategy that is in balance. When you do this, the two departments will be able to work in tandem to bring your company success.

If you have the right product or service, you might want to consider exporting, or in fact make a serious attempt to export. Exporting can be both a challenging task and a rewarding opportunity. If carried out with foresightedness, exporting can really be an activity worth following that’d deliberately yield you increased profits, and greater market share.

8-Impactive Ways of Exporting to Success

Here are the ways that can help you achieve success in exporting:

• Define your goals and objectives, and focus on them. Make a deliberate commitment that would otherwise give you confidence to compete internationally, and transcend national borders. Keep in mind that exporting is an activity that takes time and energy, and if you have no long term and short term goals, you are bound to fail. Ideally speaking, your long term goals would be the ones which you wish to achieve a year from now, or most probably in future. On the other hand, your short term goals would be the ones which you wish to fulfill in 5 to 10 days or within the period of one month. You as an exporter need to carefully identify your priorities.

• Do a SWOT Analysis. The acronym SWOT expands to Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats, which are helpful in determining the strong and the weak points in your export strategy. Moreover, as a successful exporter, doing meticulous SWOT analysis is also instrumental when indicating the future opportunities or threats perceptible in the markets chosen, and what strategy should be formulated in dicey market conditions.

• Develop an Export Plan. A well researched and a detailed export plan is the secret to exporting success. A structured export plan would be your guiding light, when you make the move towards exploring foreign markets. An export plan would ideally help you to act effectively, rather than reacting to the international market challenges and risks. A well structured export plan would comprise: Company’s Description, the target market and its industry; analysis of the target market and its industry; Individual Business Objectives of your company; financial requirements and forecasts; SWOT Analysis of the competitive market and in contrast to your own etc. A workable export strategy planned by you would also help you in aligning support from financial institutions, freight forwarders, consultants, and various other strategic partners. Furthermore, in order to achieve success as a legitimate exporter, you need to think along the lines of customer profiling, sales and distribution channels; financial requirements and forecasts; and many other potential factors.

• Conduct Market Research. This would help you in taking a firm stand while you make an export marketing decision based entirely on the socio-economic, political and cultural factors. Moreover, market research saves you time, money and energy. It provides you with a holistic view about the export market you want to penetrate. There are two types of market research, such as, Secondary market research and Primary market research. Secondary market research would help you collect information from various published resources such as books, newspapers, market reports, studies, periodicals; and the Internet. Secondary market research is a cost effective and readily available means to refine your export information requirements. Primary market research on the other hand aims to make a direct link with the industry experts, customers, and other potential sources of information. Primary market research involves one-to-one interviews and consultations. An exporter should make an attempt to reach primary market, after he has become familiar with the potential markets.

• How to enter the foreign market? Now that you have done plenty of market research and developed a workable marketing strategy, it is important to see how and what market strategies would work potentially well for your target market. There are basically three go-to-market strategies. These include Direct Exporting, Indirect Exporting and Exporting through strategic partnerships. Under the direct exporting method, there’s direct marketing and selling to the client. In the Indirect exporting method, an agreement is done with an agent, distributor or a trading house for the purpose of selling the products in the target market. The third go-to-market strategy, it may be feasible to forge strategic partnerships with other companies or individuals that would harmonize your export business.

• How to get your product or service exported to the foreign market? Exporting is a dynamic activity, and every market where you intend to export, have different market regulations, which cover health, safety, security, customs and duties, packaging and labeling. It is also important that you establish an affable relationship with the freight forwarding company and a customs broker. This would help overcome the hurdles in compliance and shipping documentation.

• How to arrange the finances in exporting? Business returns are only evident if you invest your time and money. Moreover, it is also important to see that you have financial stability and secure cash flow. Therefore, as a professional exporter you should develop your financial plan so as to address the imminent cost requirements involved in exporting. The plan should also address to the immediate as well as long term budgetary needs.

• Search financing options for your Exporting Success. A good exporter is the one who materializes a workable financial plan so as to take care of the hidden costs involved in exporting. The plan would include at least a two- to three-year cash budget that would cover overhead expenses, as well as the capital budget. A capital budget is the one that helps the exporter to rightly assess the cost-benefits of the export objectives, and is also considered as an effective operating plan to make precise assessment of the expenditures involved therein.

Exporting is as professional as any other business activity. Therefore, you need to plan out things well in advance. With export professionals working round the clock at Khanstellation Group, Inc. you have the right export team and strategy working in place. Our exporting solutions also help the exporter save you money, and increase returns on investment.

In our increasingly global society, many companies cannot afford to live with the illusion that their domestic markets will always be strong. For this reason, many companies choose to market overseas as well.

By taking a venture into international markets, a company can offset seasonal fluctuations in sales and increase profits in general through exposure to a greater number of prospects. Further, technical proficiency is often increased by expanding into markets with greater expertise in certain areas of technology. In addition, expanding into foreign markets can minimize a company’s risk of losing market shares to customers who themselves take advantage of the Internet to look for suppliers of goods and services in foreign markets.

There are many benefits to marketing a company’s products or services overseas, but the decision to go international must be made carefully. Cultural and language barriers, political issues and variations in religious beliefs, societal norms, and business negotiation styles impact how business should be conducted with international counterparts.

Two steps can prepare an organization for an overseas effort. First, an international marketing plan must be developed, and second, the organization must determine how it will enter the new market.

Since creation of a dedicated export department can be an overwhelming and expensive task, an alliance with an outside party can reduce the time and effort it takes to become established in a foreign market. One option is to establish a joint venture. Another is the use of an export management company (EMC). An EMC like Khanstellation Group has contacts and knowledge of foreign cultures and governments that can smoothly facilitate an international effort.