Market research can have a bigger role to play in international business development than when selling to your domestic market.
Why?
Because you need to start from the beginning when learning about foreign markets.
You can look at international market research from 3 angles:
Primary Market Research
This is the hardest. This is the market research no one wants to do.
Why?
This is where you gather information about your market. This information gives you what you need to:
Position your products
Find the right offer
Find the right price
You need to be in direct contact with your market to find the right answers. The only way to do it right is by rolling up your sleeves and doing it.
Secondary Market Research
This is the easiest. This is the market research everyone thinks about doing first.
Why?
This is gathering information online, getting published reports. This information gives you:
Broad industry information
Regulatory and legal information
Industry and country trends
This information is usually easy to find or track down. The publicly available information may be out of date though. And you may have to pay consultants or research firms high prices to get current information.
Ongoing Market Research
This is what most people forget to do. This is the process you need to set in place in order to get:
Wider international business intelligence to improve your overall marketing and positioning
Current market research to identify trends
Without ongoing international market research you can easily go off course.
It Is A Process
Don't forget...
International business development cannot follow pre-set templates.
It is a process. You need to have the right tools and a strategy to help you through this process.
Marketing is part of this process. And market research gives you the tools.
In international marketing you equally need both:
Market Research - to define your international market and learn how to get to know it
Marketing - to communicate, build relationships and persuade
And you can see why market research comes first.
In international marketing the process of defining your international market takes a bit more time, effort and skill than when marketing to your own country. You need to develop your market research more.
Don't Forget Your Tools
You also need to adapt your international marketing to provide the tools you need to make the best business decisions for your international business development.
Don't forget any of these 3 aspects of market research:
Primary Market Research
Secondary Market Research
Ongoing Market Research
Carry out all three and they will give you valuable tools for your international business development.
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Cindy King is a Cross-Cultural eMarketer & International Sales Specialist, aligning businesses with different cultures. She has over 25 years field experience in international business development and helps mid-sized business owners create international business development strategies that shorten time to profitability.
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