Whether you’ve had success nationally in recent years or are just starting out in a completely international business, the operations and functions of working your business over country border lines can bring about more problems than you might realize at first thought. Yes, getting an order from another country is exciting, but without properly prepping and planning for international business dealings, you could find yourself floundering.
To help businesses just starting to dip their toe in international waters, here are three tips for getting started in international business.
Find A Way To Communicate
If you’re planning to do business in a country that speaks a language you’re unfamiliar with, you’re going to need to come up with a way to communicate with your customers, retailers and manufacturers without becoming lost in communication barriers. While you may think you can solely rely on email communication and translation apps, you could soon find that you’ve painted yourself into a corner.
Miranda Morley of Demand Media shares with Chron Small Business that problems in communication can prove to be catastrophic for small businesses looking to branch out into the international world. For this reason, options such as translators or interpreters may prove to be an expense you can’t afford to live without.
Find A Way To Work Your Finances
Jonathan Blum, a contributor to Entrepreneur.com, states that while financial software such as PayPal makes sending and receiving money simple even across borders, one thing you need to be constantly aware of are exchange rates. Depending on the country in which you’re doing business, managing and tracking favorable exchange rates for your business can get pretty complicated. To save yourself from having to learn the hard way, Blum suggests for businesses to team up with an internationally-savvy financial institution that can help make transactions and exchanges seamless for your company.
Find A Way to Move Merchandise
Especially if you have a very small business or not a lot of experience with shipping and receiving, you may find that moving your merchandise all over the globe isn’t quite as easy as you may have hoped. According to Natalie Burg, a contributor to Forbes, not doing your homework about shipping internationally could cost you some big bucks.
Because different countries have different laws about tariffs and taxes, you may have to pay a lot more money to send your merchandise overseas, something that may or may not fit into your company’s budget on a second thought. So before you begin filling orders from all over the world, make sure you understand just how much it’s going to cost you to get those items to their destination.
Expanding your business to other countries is a great way to move more units and break into markets you never thought imaginable. By understanding just what international business can mean for your company and what it requires, you could see huge success in this venture. Good luck!
Originally posted on November 2, 2015 @ 7:56 am