Doing business in another country carries more challenges than face time with employees. Logistical issues become potential stoppages, and coordination is much harder when everyone works remotely. Fulfillment also becomes a challenge when your customers aren’t in the same country. Making sure that employees are paid, following up with your clients, delivering your products, and complying with regulations all play a role in the success of an international venture.

Payment Logistics

One of the challenges in delivering payment to contractors is how to get it to them. If they are working in a country your bank or digital wallet doesn’t offer service to, how can you send money online? Ria Money Transfer solves this dilemma with door-to-door service that can hand deliver cash to your recipient.

Cryptocurrency is rapidly becoming another medium for exchange. Digital wallets are adding this functionality to their existing accounts to catch up. Transferring Bitcoin or Ethereum gives employers a payment system that can reach clients and contractors all over the world. The recipient uses the coinage directly or changes it into cash as needed.

Client Service and Care

Ensuring cohesive customer service isn’t easy when your customers don’t all speak the same language. You need to localize your website and your service department. Localizing your content makes manuals, FAQs and valuable content accessible to audiences of many backgrounds.

Ask yourself:

• Where are my primary customer bases located? Different countries mean a mix of languages. Go granular with your data to figure out which regions are most likely to buy from you.
• Where are my headquarters? This defines your primary language in most cases, but it’s useful if you’re considering local business in addition to the international market.
• Which languages am I most likely to deal with? Start with your top three and drill down as needed.

For many, English is the simple answer but you should not rely on a tool like Google Translate to solve this problem. If a significant portion of your customer base speaks another language, hire a translator for your most important content.

Fulfillment

Shipping can either kill your revenue, lead to chargebacks or complicate fulfillment in other ways. You have a few infrastructure challenges ahead of yourself. The first is supply chain management. You need to be sure you can acquire the materials you need to build and maintain your stock. Next, you need to have a way to get that stock to a customer.

Digital businesses that offer a service may not deal with the same fulfillment complexities but have other issues to contend with. For example, a marketing firm might need to send executives or employees to a site in order to meet with potential clients or long-term customers.

Fulfillment isn’t simple, but the tools behind it have gotten easier. Staying in touch with your suppliers is easier through email and multiple customer service points. They also have better access to information related to your shipment, with better tracking information updated regularly.

Regulatory Compliance

Every government is going to have regulations you must contend with. Not only in your country of origin but elsewhere your business may run afoul of local laws. In the US, for example, Multinationals are required to disclose financial information on a country-by-country basis. Certain countries may not respect copyrights, others might demand certain worker conditions.

You need more than a cursory understanding of the laws that apply to your business. Legal representation is a must in almost every international business scenario.

Final Thoughts

International business offers profit potential beyond what any local business can handle. It also carries incredible logistic challenges requiring strategic partnerships. Make sure you make good decisions if you want your venture to last.

Categories: General