Aligning businesses with different cultures

To generate better results, you must either change what you do or change how you think. To continually exceed your sales goals and better manage your mindset, alter your thinking to become process driven rather than result driven.

Ask yourself if you have processes in place — for sales, prospecting, follow up, time management, customer service — that you can trust. When you look at your daily schedule, does it outline the specific and measurable tasks and activities in which you need to engage to move you towards your goal?

Chances are, salespeople who are solely focused on the end result don’t have a process in which they have faith. As such, they concentrate more on trying to control the outcome; pushing for what they want rather than managing their process. After all, you can’t trust and manage the process if you don’t have a process in place!

Trying to achieve more without a process to guide you is like driving from New York to California without a road map while wearing a blindfold. Not only is it stressful, but you’re bound to wind up somewhere other than your intended destination.

Schedule time to develop your process for attaining each goal in order to have a clear path. As a starting point for developing your process, review your successful sales. For example, if you’re looking to generate a certain number of sales each month, what daily activities will help you reach that goal? What skills or tools need further development? For example, work to refine your introductory cover letter or e-mail, create a solid template for your prospecting and voice mail approach, and increase the frequency of follow-up calls. Thinking about and carrying out these tasks directs your focus to the process.

Once you have outlined a path and a success formula to follow — X number of calls produces X number of prospects which produces X number of sales — allow the doing, that is the process, to be the reward and the pleasure, not just the end result. This way, you can be responsible for your future goals without having to worry about them. If you continue your quest with your eyes focused on the finish line, you’ll miss out on the journey. Therefore, be careful not to hook yourself onto the future and enjoy the process of reaching your goals today.

Knowing your limit provides you with the freedom to trust the process that you’ve put in place. After all, there’s always more to do. There’s always more that can be done at the office, at your home, or in your life; another call that can be made or another e-mail that can be read.

Exceeding your monthly sales quota will be the result of the cumulative efforts you make and the day-to-day activities in which you engage. When you’re mindful of the process, you have the opportunity to recognize and to celebrate your accomplishments — even the little ones — rather than pushing for or waiting until the “end.” Because when do we ever get there?

One of the first practical issues you encounter when marketing to international markets is how to structure the information on your website.

As the volume of your international communication grows, you will need to organize this effectively online.

Segment Your International Content

How do you organize all of your country specific online communication? There are different ways to segment your content:

• Language
• Country
• Regions

You need to separate different product or content needs for different countries. Once you do this, you will need an appropriate communication platform to fit both:

• Good international marketing practices
• Good Search Engine Optimization

Not so long ago, the only option for good country specific online marketing appeared through localized websites. Website Localization refers to creating a website registered in your foreign market.

Website Localization is still the best step if you company has a sales presence in other countries.

For smaller companies, this is often too big of a step to start with. You might not want the extra website management tasks involved with Website Localization.

If you are just starting to penetrate your international markets, you do have other good options for segmenting your international communication and getting good international web marketing.

Search engines, and Google in particular, are constantly improving your international marketing options. Google’s Webmaster tools give you good international search engine optimization.

You can keep your foreign language content or your different country specific content on your main website.

This means you actually have three choices in separating your culture specific content on your website:

Sub Directories

• www.yourcompanyname.com/countryname

Many people start here. It is very easy to set up.

If you are just starting out and have minimal content for each country or different culture, you may want to use Sub Directories. This:

• Is very easy to set up
• Gives your business time to grow

If you have more than a couple of different countries, you should look at the next option: Sub Domains.

Sub Domains

• www.countryname.yourcompanyname.com

This is an easy method to separate and manage your country specific content.

If your website is on one topic aimed at different audiences, it makes sense to go for Sub Domains.

• This keeps all of your content on the same subject on one server.
• You can guide your country specific SEO with Google Webmasters tools to get visibility in foreign searches.

If Your Content Is On The Same Subject:

The two options above are perfect if your content is on the same subject. Both Sub Directories and Sub Domains:

• Link everything to one domain name.

By keeping all of your content on the same subject on the same website, you will have:

• Better search engine results
• Easier website management

Companies with offline sales strategies in different countries should use the next option: a Top Level Domain website.

Website Localization With Top Level Domains

This is an example of a Top Level Domain or TLD:

• www.yourcompanyname.fr for France

If you sell different products or services to different countries, or if you have a strong business presence in a country, use a Top Level Domain.

TLD’s often represent a distinct business advantage in most cultures:

• Your company becomes a “local” company.
• Stronger cultural marketing

TLD websites are on different servers and require more website management. A TLD always has a stronger marketing appeal within your foreign market.

More International Web Marketing

The recent improvements in multilingual SEO will continue and lead to even stronger international web marketing.

Your choice on how you set up your different cultural content on your website is a marketing choice now more than ever.

Once you set up the right platform to organize your international communication, your international web marketing will work for you. Then all you have to do is concentrate on your country specific marketing and get more international clients.

Cindy King is a cross-cultural copywriter and international sales specialist, with over 25 years field experience in international business development. She has a strong North American – European identity.

Cindy runs an international web marketing company, King Business Tools, based in France. She helps mid-sized companies expand internationally with cross-cultural web marketing solutions to close international lead cycles faster.

Get more free international business information on her Live Portfolio at: Get International Clients.

Last Updated 17 August 2008

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