Where Clarity Strengthens Your International Sales
October 21, 2008 by 
cindy
Clarity is vital in cross-cultural communication. It builds trust. Any lack of clarity in your communication can potentially cause those dreaded cultural blunders.
And clarity is also key in international sales. In addition to building trust, clarity makes the sale easier.
Why?
Because, when you bring clarity into your sales and marketing, your sales strategy becomes stronger.
Here are 7 areas where clarity strengthens your international sales.
Your Products And Services
Do your international clients understand what your product is and what it can do for them?
Clearly define products or services.
Your Ideal Foreign Client
Do you know who your ideal foreign client is?
Do you have a very clear picture of your foreign client’s demographic and psychographic profile?
Clearly identify your ideal client.
Your Sales Pitch
Do you know what it is about your product that interests your product foreign clients?
Adjust your sales pitch to clearly target your foreign prospect.
Your Sales Process
Do you know how your international clients want to be sold?
Are you approaching your international prospects in the right way to make a sale?
Outline a clear sales process for your international clients.
Your Marketing Message
Do you clearly communicate the value your foreign client will get from your product and services for your ideal client?
Is this the value he perceives? Or is it the value you perceive?
Make your marketing message clear for your international clients.
Your International Communication
Are your marketing and sales materials easy to read for your international audience?
Can you improve the clarity of your communication? Can you make it easier for your international readers?
Aim for clarity throughout all of your communication.
Your Offer
Do your international clients immediately understand your offer to them?
Do they know that you want their purchase? Have you answered all of their objections?
Give your international readers a clear call to action.
Work For Clarity
When you come across a clearly crafted sales strategy, it can appear to be easy to do. But in fact, to bring clarity throughout your international marketing and sales, you will need to work at it.
As you can see above, you need to have an intimate understanding of your ideal international clients. This takes time and effort on your part.
The good news is that this work is well worth your effort. An international sales strategy with clarity is one of your best investments for your international business development.
| 2.9 |
Build Trust With International Clients
October 14, 2008 by cindy
Last updated 27 October 2008
Trust is vital in all business relationships. In international business you can lose trust without even knowing why.
Fortunately, there are two very simple tactics to creating trust in cross-cultural communication. And you also have a variety of communication tools you can use to build trust.
Consistency And Clarity
Consistency and clarity are the two main factors in building trust in international communication.
The Good
The good part is that consistency and clarity will also benefit all of your communication. For both domestic and foreign clients alike.
The Bad
The bad part is that this takes work. Even when you think your communication is clear and consistent in all aspects, your international audience may find small flaws.
The Ugly
The ugly part is when you do not make the effort to apply clarity and consistency throughout all of your communication. The cultural blunders caused by neglecting to build trust can be ugly. And of course, this can lead to a loss of international sales.
Building Trust Through Consistency
 |
Building Trust -
|
Consistency For International Business Success
 |
Consistency For International Business Success• What is the best way to create your international websites? • How do you prepare for a global presence online? |
Where Clarity Strengthens Your International Sales
 |
Where Clarity Strengthens Your International Sales• How can you add more clarity to your international sales strategy? |
Create Clarity With A Consistent Vocabulary
 |
Create Clarity -
|
Communication Tools To Build Trust
When you plan your international communication strategy be sure to choose the communication tools and platforms that build trust.
Tools For Clarity
Publish A Glossary For Clarity And Consistency
 |
Create Clarity And Consistency -
|
Tools For Consistency
Case Studies can be used for marketing to both your domestic markets and your international markets. If you already have some case studies with your domestic clients remember to make these visible to your international readers. Of course you should aim at getting a variety of case studies with international clients. But their main value in an initial international business plan lies in their trust building capacity.
Best Small Business Tool For Building Trust In International Clients
 |
Case Studies -
|
Easy Small Business Strategy Strengthens International Client Relationships
 |
Case Studies -
|
Cultural Web Tools For Trust
Another way to tweak the trust response you get from your international audience is to adjust how you use web communication tools.
Try to adapt your trust-building communication tools to meet specific cultural needs.
Cultural Web Tools
 |
Guide To Cultural Web Tools• How can you tweak your web site to improve your cross-cultural communication? • How can you create trust more easily in your different foreign markets? • How can you connect faster with your international clients? |
More From Cindy On Building Trust
Interested in reading more on Cindy’s personal opinions and experiences with culture customized content?
Here are some articles from her blog:
 |
Read The Whole Story
 |
This is part of the Get International Clients Business Guide 5 - Connect With Your International Markets This is where you can read more on how to connect with your international markets. |
Need Help?
Need instructions?
Need to see where this fits in?
Still confused? Review your answers in the first Core Business Guide
Simply click on one of the 8 different color coded boxes immediately below to access other core business guides.
| 2.9 |
Internationalize Your Website 1 - Make Your Website Easy To Read For All Of Your Readers
February 21, 2008 by cindy
Last Updated 17 August 2008
The majority of internet users world-wide are non-native English speakers. Even among native English speakers there is a wide variety of different vocabularies.
These visitors to your website may have more difficulty in reading English than you do.
First Steps To Website Internationalization
Your international visitors will probably not use the same every day vocabulary as you do. If a foreign visitor cannot understand your website easily he will not stay around long.
The question is whether your website is written for all of your international readers.
If your website is well targeted to your local domestic markets, the chances are it does not communicate well outside of that market. And even worse, it may even be pushing your international clients away.
There are things you can do to make your domestic website friendlier to everyone. This is called website internationalization. Read more
Internationalize Your Website 2 - Be Reachable By Phone To Everyone
February 20, 2008 by cindy
Last Updated 17 August 2008
Can everyone reach you by phone?
Are you making the phone process easy so that everyone can actually call you?
Can your international clients reach you easily by phone?
First Steps To Website Internationalization
These questions may sound obvious. And you will probably say yes to all of them. Think again.
Calling from abroad is not always as easy as you imagine. Even today situations still arise often enough where people abroad desperately try to reach someone by phone and just cannot get through.
Cross cultural miscommunication happens often enough in all situations, including communication by phone.
Improve Your Reachability By Phone
When cultural miscommunication happens, you need to be reachable. Being reachable can help you to answer questions before they become issues of miscommunication.
The question is: Are you always reachable to your international clients? Read more
Internationalize Your Website 3 - Show The World Your Location
February 19, 2008 by cindy
Last Updated 17 August 2008
Decent cross cultural communication depends on breaking down the natural barriers of mistrust inherent in all inter cultural relationships.
Good cross cultural communication is built once trust has been built between the two cultures.
First Steps To Website Internationalization
One of the key elements of internationalizing your website is trust.
First you have to look at all of the different barriers to trust on your website. One very simple barrier and very big barrier to trust in cross cultural communication is an absence of stating your location.
What is the one of the first things two people do when they meet each other? They ask where they are from. This question comes up even faster when you know you are speaking to someone from another country. The question is inevitable.
Tell The world Where You Are From
Some companies don’t put their address online. Some companies do not put it up clearly. Some companies think they have their address clearly indicated online, and yet their international readers don’t find it quickly enough.
Internationalizing your website means making your website friendlier to all international visitors. You need to put up your address and then need to find it when it suits them.
First let’s look at what not to do. Read more
Website Internationalization Before Localization
February 14, 2008 by cindy
Last updated 20 August 2008
An Easy To Read Website For Your International Visitors First Impression
Creating a localized website will be a lot easier if your website is already easy for your international visitors to read. Ensuring your website is easy to read for foreign visitors to your website is an important step in internationalizing your website.
So how can you do make your website easy to read for your international visitors?
Most of the reasons why national websites fail to communicate with their international visitors are directly related to not implementing all of the standard best practices in creating a good website.
You have probably heard of most of these guidelines when creating your company website for your original market. But did you really apply them as best you could? Simply failing to implement a few of these will turn your international clients away and leave them with a bad impression of your company. Read more
Is Your Website Sabotaging Your International Business Development?
January 27, 2008 by cindy
Last updated 20 August 2008
Well, your website probably is sabotaging your international business development. Especially if you have not given thought to your international visitors.
This is one of the first trials small businesses face when reaching international markets.
You see, when you first created your website you probably made it for the market you know well. And that’s normal. Nothing wrong there. The thing is, as your website grows you attract a wider audience. An international audience. And this international audience, well, it will not respond to your website the same way as your current audience.
Your website can even create negative effects on your international readers. This is all about the intrinsic barriers in cross cultural communication.
Business practices are different in different cultures. We are all used to doing things in a certain way. We all get used to doing business this way and it is easy to think that it’s the best way and everyone does or should do things the same way.
Your online business is visible to people with different business practices and expectations.
No More Sabotage
Here are a few frustrating experiences international prospects have when visiting online businesses in different countries: Read more
