How to maximize profit potential when selling to international markets

Image by athree23 from Pixabay

Modern businesses have the benefit of technology to make globalization easier than ever before. A company based in one country can easily sell products to customers in another country on the other side of the world. The internet makes this possible, as do advancements in supply chain technologies. As a result, many companies have taken the plunge and attempted to sell in foreign markets. However, some receive more success than others – why is this the case?

It comes down to maximizing your profit potential, which basically means putting your business in the best place to make a huge profit. When you look at international markets, you’ll quickly identify a few key things that make a massive difference:

Properly translated websites

Nowadays, you can use a free tool to translate your website from English to another language via Google Translate. While this can be convenient, it’s not the best way to go about translating a website. Google is good, but certain things might be inaccurate, which will annoy international customers. We spoke about the importance of translating your website in a previous article. As a brief recap, it basically lets customers understand your offerings with more clarity. To maximize your potential, you need to have it professionally translated by a native speaker. This ensures everything is 100% accurate and you offer the best customer experience.

International SEO

SEO is the process by which you rank your website in search results. But, did you know that your English website might not have the same ranking for searches done in a different country? It’s not something you think about, but it makes loads of sense. Say you sold shoes, you’d aim to rank high for searches including ‘shoes’ as a keyword. If you were selling to people in Italy, they wouldn’t use the same keywords! Instead, you’d need to focus on searches including ‘scarpe’, which is the translated version of shoes. So, work on developing an international SEO strategy to ensure the translated versions of your website appear in search results within the specific countries you’re targeting.

Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay

International payments

Of course, you need to ensure that international payments are enabled via your website. This means that people can pay in their local currency. It’s well worth reading an international payment guide before doing this as there is plenty to consider. Still, let’s focus on the benefits and why you need to do this. Simply put, people are more likely to buy products when presented with the price in their local currency. It lets them see exactly how much they will pay, rather than trying to figure out the conversion rates. You’re making the buying process much easier for customers, boosting the chances that people will buy from you. If someone has to leave your site to do some conversion calculations, there’s every chance they’ll just give up and buy from a different site.

Technically speaking, anyone can sell to international markets if you have the right supply chain in place. However, if you want to make as much money as possible, you need to consider the three things listed above.