As the planet shrinks (figuratively speaking) and the global marketplace expands,
the desire, if not the need, for American companies to do business abroad
is only increasing. Doing this well means that more of us have to make some
fundamental changes to how we view our companies, our products and services,
and the relationships we create and maintain with customers.
According to Bill Decker, an authority on international business who has worked
in 72 countries, this largely comes down to understanding the culture within
your foreign market and adapting your business strategy and tactics accordingly.
His perspective on doing business internationally, building customer relationships,
and leveraging social media includes the following observations:
- Having an employee who can speak French does not mean you have an employee
who can do business in France.
- Many cultures associate a low price with low quality, and may not buy for
that reason alone.
- Social media can be better for strengthening existing customer relationships
than for generating new customers.
- Crowdsourcing can be a successful (and non-confrontational) way of engaging
customers online.
INTRODUCTION
The Internet has no geographic borders. And there are no boundaries to the
conversations that cut across the social Web. As companies do business in
more and more countries, they need to know how to support, engage with, and
learn from their customers, wherever they may be and through whatever channels
they prefer to use.
Bill Decker is the founder and principal of the Denver-based company, Partners
International (http://www.partnersinternational.com), and author of Lessons
from the Road: Global Business 1-2-3. He has lived overseas for 14 years,
in Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and parts of Africa, and he has worked
in 72 countries. His specialty is helping clients decide which foreign markets
to get into, creating appropriate strategies for doing so, and connecting
them with partners on the ground in those locations.
The starting point for doing this is knowing the cultural norms for doing business
in these global markets. So we are tapping into Bill's experience and expertise
to understand the cultural aspects of customer relationships and social engagement
outside the U.S.
CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS AND SOCIAL MEDIA IN A GLOBAL MARKET
Entering Foreign Markets / Finding the Hole
PATRICIA SEYBOLD GROUP (PSG). Your company is called "Partners International." That
could mean a lot of different things. What do you want the name to convey,
and how does it relate to the work you do?
BILL DECKER. I help companies find business partners in foreign markets. There
are a few phases of that. The first phase is building a customer-centric
strategy, which should have two parts. It includes (1) how we are picking
a market (or how we are picking one market over another), and (2) what is
the mode of entry into that market. The reason the mode of entry is so important
is your business may look very different in a foreign market then it does
here. So, it's about figuring out which market we're going into and what
we're going to do in that market. Are we going to do the same business, or
are we going to change our business model a little bit? What type of partners
are we going to have?
That's what I do, help answer these questions. While this is all happening,
there's also an education process. People call it training, but what I'm
trying to do is get the organization smart about what it's doing, as opposed
to working as a broker and keeping the buyer and seller apart. I'm trying
to smarten them up about their foreign markets and get them to know their
business partners.
PSG. So you're helping businesses identify appropriate markets abroad, and
learn about the ways customers behave in those markets. In so many different
countries, the relationships must vary widely between how companies acquire
new customers and service and support their customers. Can you talk a little
bit about your approach to that as it relates to educating your clients?
BILL DECKER. Well, when you help a company set a strategy, you do what no company
wants you to do: lock key executives in a room for 3 to 10 days (they don't
want to give up the time or spend the money on a facilitator). So, while
this strategic planning process is being developed, the company is starting
to get smarter about what will work and what won't work in various markets.
And you ask "What does the company offer?" That's the first thing
that companies think of. And then they ask, "What does the customer
need?" Or, as the French say, "Cherchez le creneau…find the
hole." Of course, they should be asking these questions in reverse.
So, while I'm helping them build their strategy, we're looking at the company
and we're looking at the world, and we're trying to rate one country versus
another using criteria that are specific to the company. For example, people
will say, "Let's go to China, it's the biggest market." That's
a horrible way to rate a country, because the obvious question is, "The
biggest market for what?" I always use the example that Greece, with
seven million people, eats more cheese—not just per capita, but raw
tonnage—than all of China. So, if you're selling cheese, then China
is not the biggest market, even though it's got a billion and a half people.
If you're looking at social media, you may say, "China is the biggest
market." Well, 600 million people in China never saw a toothbrush, so
they don't have a computer and they don't have a cell phone. So knock about
a billion people off of that billion and a half population. Now we have about
500 million people. Market size is what Americans often go with, but there
are other things like product adaptability, and whether or not there are a
mix and a complement of cultures. And do our executives even want to go to
these markets (because it's going to take a lot of time)? How is the American
stigma perceived? Are we loved, are we hated? All of these kinds of factors—and
I've come up with about 70 of them—go into a matrix, so we can actually
grade a country and an opportunity, one versus another.
Myths and Facts on Doing Business in Foreign Markets
Please download the PDF to see the table.
Table A. Americans make many assumptions about what goes into doing business
in markets outside the United States. This table presents some of the most
common myths, along with the corresponding facts.
Language and Culture
PSG. Let's dig into the cultural aspects of your matrix. American organizations
and Americans are often criticized for being insular in their thinking and
in their business relationships. American companies may know how to do business
with Americans, but they don't necessarily know about the cultural issues
around doing business in other countries. How should companies think about
language and culture as they look to do more business around the world?
BILL DECKER. Culture is the biggest stumbling block. It isn't language; language
is only part of culture. A culture is a way of doing things and a belief
system. The biggest mistake Americans make is in really not respecting or
being interested in the culture they're about to work in. And then, when
they are interested, they often do something quite sophomoric. They will
learn how a Japanese person hands out a business card, and feel, "Well,
that's cross-cultural training."
When it comes to culture, what you're trying to answer is: What are the norms?
What are the values? What are the belief systems? How do these people make
decisions? What do they regard as truth? Until you understand this, you're
really not going to effectively sell into these markets.
Some of the top mistakes come from American ethnocentrism. Because the whole
world wants to eat McDonald's and drink Coca-Cola and watch the NBA, we feel
everybody is very pro-American and everyone will do things our way. That's
completely false. This ethnocentrism has to end.