How To Learn From Intercultural Communication Difficulties

Small businesses not used to intercultural communication, can easily find dealing with international prospects challenging. It is sometimes hard to figure out exactly how your sales message has been received. You may have difficulty understanding what your international prospect needs to hear from you.

Just like with your own local leads, some of international prospects can appear to be ready to make the sale, some are hesitant and some just do not appear to be interested. With international clients, it is often not easy to interpret their reactions.

How do you know if you should step up your sales pitch, slow down or if it would be better to pass the ball to one of your colleagues who is a different gender than you are?

Often you naturally realize that you need to do a little more adjusting in your communication style to fit your international prospect.

This is especially true when your client is not following you, or appears to want to be someplace else in your sales process. The result is that you may appear less professional than you would want. Destabilizing situations can arise.

Things can even become comical. Or worse, you can have a frustrated prospect losing patience with you and moving on. Your international clients like to feel understood. How do you avoid this type of scenario? There is only one thing to do. Open your high power listening antennas and proceed slowly. Ask your prospect simple questions to confirm what he needs to have addressed.

Adjust your communication accordingly. If your prospect appears excited about your product or service, reconfirm this a few times. This will give him the time to assimilate things more deeply.

If your prospect appears to be uninterested, do not assume you should not spend time with him. This may be normal for him. He might be used to different sales practices and needs time to adjust to yours.

Again, put on your high power listening antennas and proceed slowly. Ask questions to confirm what he needs to have addressed. If you prospect seems to be hanging around, find out what is of interest to him in your product or service and get him to open up. Sometimes international prospects require a little more personal attention in the beginning.

Creating a multicultural relationship requires time and effort for both parties. The extra time can well be worth the investment. International prospects can become very loyal long term customers if they are happy with your products and services.

Good international clients will often provide you with much more word of mouth advertising than your local clients. When you think you have mastered the international communication skills to handle your international prospects, remember to set up a systematic case study and referral strategy.

At the time of sale when your international prospects actually become your clients, gently initiate conversation about your company’s Case Study plan.

Talk to them, ask what they are hoping to get out of your product, if they have had any specific problems they are hoping to solve with your product, And then tell your new international client that you have a company plan where you follow up with clients at the appropriate time to see how they liked the product.

Ask if you could do that with their company. Who should you call? International clients will often be happy for such communication.

This will also show them you are very interested in serving them even if they are located far away.

This article is part of a series on International Market Research. Here are the other articles in this series:

• Take Action To Uncover International Business Opportunities
• 7 Initial Market Research Ideas To Define Your First International Expansion
• Initial International Market Research Can Feel Like A Cliff Hanger
• International Market Research - Don’t Get Stumped When Digital Age Communication Fails
• 5 Success Keys For Small Businesses Developing Into International Markets
• 5 Factors To Consider When Marketing To Different Cultures
• Music In Cultural Differences