Market research is hugely valuable to any organisation. But understanding how consumers and decision-makers think and behave is rarely more important than when you’re trying to understand non-native markets. International business is big business – but it’s also a big investment. There are a host of issues to consider when you’re conducting international market research (for more, read our article on the topic). But getting the language right is perhaps the most obvious hurdle. So how is international market research affected by language differences?

Imagine you’re running a brand tracker to understand how your organisation is perceived across the world. You’ll need to localise the research in dozens of markets and yet still be able to draw broad, universal conclusions. For this, you’ll need to translate the survey into many different languages, whilst maintaining consistency of meaning and controlling for different emotive weights in the various dialects. Fail to do this, and the results you’ll get back could be misleading.

Why language matters

It’s not just language, of course. According to research from Columbia Business School, there are: “important cross-cultural differences in the processing, evaluation, and judgment of brand and product information. Much of this work suggests that cultural differences stem from pervasive socio-cultural … factors. For example, a good deal of research demonstrates that people have broad, culture-specific cognitive dispositions … which can guide consumer behaviour.”

But the same paper also stresses that language is a huge factor: “in recent work conducted in a consumer behaviour marketing context, we have found that structural aspects of a language can in fact critically affect one of the most basic aspects of consumer behaviour – categorisation of products. Grammar, phonology and semantics are fundamental building blocks to a linguistic system and should therefore have an impact on consumer behaviour.”

It’s not just what you say, then – but also how you say it, and to whom. All of which adds up to language, localisation, translation and interpretation as crucial building blocks of any international research project. Getting it wrong can be disastrous …

When language goes wrong

Many brands have learned the dangers of ignoring local idiom when they move into new markets. When Coca Cola first entered the Chinese market signs for ‘ko-ka-ko-la’ (the closest phonetic translation) were understood by locals as ‘bite the wax tadpole’ or ‘female horse fastened with wax’ depending on the tone.

This real life example highlights important language considerations, both in terms of asking the right questions and understanding the meaning of the answers when you’re working abroad.

Speaking their language

But hang on a second: isn’t all this slightly moot in the age of instant machine translation? Google Translate can handle dozens of languages, and even Microsoft Word now has a built-in translation function. While machine translation is improving in quality, it lacks subtlety, it struggles with idioms, and it misses the emotional salience that’s important to both qualitative and even quantitative research.

That’s even more important now that AI-type systems are being deployed to pull out topics, themes and even sentiments from research results. With systems like these, the meaning of local dialect or cultural implications could be missed. From a semiotic perspective, then, there are huge challenges with using AI for translation and analysis.

Another option could be to hire a language graduate to translate your surveys and responses. It’s true this is a step-up from the automated approach. But even if you can find a translator you trust, ensuring they understand the subtleties of local dialects and cultural nuances (see below) and the technical aspect of market research language is much harder. That’s where market research agencies like Kadence – with international offices across the globe and native speakers in house – come in handy. Having team members who instinctively understand the need to localise language and know how to do it is a major plus. After all, language and meaning evolve even over short time-spans so keeping up to date with trends and sayings is massively valuable. In Germany, for instance, 1200 new words and counting have come into being over the course of the pandemic.

The devil in the detail

The reason why all this is important is that just as culture varies widely between and within international markets, language has local subtleties. Even within English, there are layers of meaning that illustrate this point. Take the word ‘love’. He loves popping down to the shops with his mates on Saturday afternoon. She loves it when Leeds United score. They love their mum. She makes love to her sweetheart. They bask in God’s love. These are all very nuanced – and to a competent English speaker their varied meanings are obvious.

Then lots of countries have multiple languages – China, Malaysia, Belgium, Switzerland… there’s a very long list of places with minority language groups that a research project approached in the wrong way could marginalise. (Wikipedia has your back.)

Even when the language is clear, the nuances might not be. In Canada, for example, you need translators who know Quebecois, not just French. If you’re running field research in Mexico, you could stick to Spanish; or try to ensure the Spanish translation is appropriately localised for Mexican idioms; or even think about the indigenous languages that are still spoken by a minority of the population.

In the Philippines, Filipino and English are designated official languages. But Spanish is commonly spoken (a legacy of its own colonial role), as well as Tagalog, Minna and even Arabic.

That poses interesting questions about how your sample might be affected by language choice. Remember: you might only be interested in affluent consumers in a given market, say, and that means choosing the dominant language is no problem. But for a genuine look across a country – regionally and socially – a different approach might be needed.

Tone and culture – how these differences can affect international market research

Then tone has to be calibrated, too. Understanding why emotions are triggered in different cultures or regions is really important. In eastern Germany, for example, the long history of the Stasi secret police means that even though the country reunified 30 years ago, suspicion about intrusive questions lingers. That means a deftness in your translations will be important.

In France, questions about sexuality or religion are usually considered unacceptable unless you carefully rephrase the survey to yield the information you need. It’s true even in English: what’s the difference between ‘a hobby’, ‘a pastime’ and a ‘personal skill’? How might asking about those different categories affect the kind of responses you’d get?

Cultural salience is also a stumbling block. Someone in a focus group might quote a nursery rhyme to evoke a particular emotion or assumption. A native might pick up a lot of meaning; a foreign translator might understand the context; but a machine translation is just going to give a verbatim that lacks any appropriate meaning.

Practical considerations when it comes to language differences in international market research

When it comes to qualitative research, a lot of the nuance you need comes from non-verbal cues, and those are much harder to evaluate. Here, it’s not even a question of your translation services, you need ‘boots on the ground’.

From a quant perspective, there are practical considerations around research-specific translations. Some text will appear much longer when translated. For example:

ا هي المدة منذ زيارتك الأخيرة للطبيب؟
自您上次看医生以来有多长时间？
Wie lange ist Ihr letzter Arztbesuch her?
How long since your last visit to the doctor?
Berapa lama sejak kunjungan terakhir Anda ke dokter?
Gaano katagal mula noong huli mong pagbisita sa doktor?
¿Cuánto tiempo ha pasado desde su última visita al médico?
Combien de temps depuis votre dernière visite chez le médecin?
நீங்கள் கடைசியாக மருத்துவரிடம் சென்றதிலிருந்து எவ்வளவு காலம்?

That might mean the translation of survey questions has to be tweaked to be more practical or accessible to users depending on the format or technology being used in the field. It’s another reminder that having a single, integrated agency working on the project – handling the research design as well as the fieldwork and analysis – will bring many benefits.

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Beyond language – thinking about local context in international market research

We’re always mindful that when a global brand puts forward a research hypothesis, not only do we need to translate the language, but we need to be able to contextualise that hypothesis for individual markets. Equally, you also have to be able to take local outputs and fit them into a balanced global interpretation. A lot of that depends on the purpose of the research. Are we looking to assess uniform global products? Work out which markets to target? Tailor products or positioning for a local audience? That will shape how we make insights actionable for a brand.

This is where brands and their research agencies need deeper levels of understanding. Exposure to local culture, language, attitudes and even research norms makes a big difference to the value a project can deliver.

Ultimately, research projects need to be localised, not just translated. Miles in the US and UK; kilometres mostly everywhere else. That applies in a host of areas, not just weight and measures. Most people outside America are familiar with the frustrations of ‘US Letter’ being the default paper size in many software products! Ask a French sample how many pounds they would like to lose on their next diet, and you might get some confused responses.

Aiming for transcreation

With so many factors on top of the raw translation, many brands choose to ‘transcreate’ their research projects for new counties, not just translate them.

What is transcreation in translation?

Transcreation is “the process of adapting a message from one language to another, while maintaining its intent, style, tone, and context. A successfully transcreated message evokes the same emotions and carries the same implications in the target language as it does in the source language.” (Thanks again, Wikipedia.) This makes it the go-to approach for the many research projects that seek to reveal consumer attitudes or emotions to particular brands, products or categories.

In research terms it means identifying the purposes of the research – looking at the brief and how the insights will be used within the organisation – and asking how best those requirements can be met within different countries or regions.

Clearly many of the outputs may need to be standardised. But if the local research team understands the brief and the outputs, if they can parse the emotional intent of the research, they can recreate the desired level of investigation and effectiveness in another language. That might mean changing the actual content well beyond simply translating.

But it does also mean that the intent of the research project is translated, not just the words of a survey. Ultimately, marketers will get more value from their international research if they work with an agency that can deliver against the broad brief and desired outputs from a project using people with a deep understanding of different markets.

Looking for support with international market research?

At Kadence, we have offices in 10 countries across the world. We’re proud of the diversity within our offices too – with project teams spanning colleagues from Sweden to Taiwan. To understand how we can help you navigate the challenges of international marketing research, take a look at our international market research capabilities or get in touch to discuss a project.

Whether it’s an entirely new geographical region with a range of cultural, linguistic, and economic factors to consider or just a new age demographic — breaking into a new market is rarely easy.

There are all kinds of risks to try to mitigate and hurdles to overcome. Brands will never manage to avoid every potential pitfall, so a degree of complication should be expected.

Businesses that can minimize these risks and challenges can reap serious rewards. In this article, we’ll look at 5 of the biggest risks and barriers businesses typically face when entering a new market.

Let’s start with the risks.

The risks of market entry

There’s no risk-free way to enter a new market. Some may be easier than others, but problems are always possible. We can break down market entry risks into three main categories — internal, external, and legal.

Internal risks for market entry

Internal market entry risk factors are those that come from within the organization. These are generally easier to control than external risks but are often unpredictable and seriously damaging.

Management and organization

How well is your company structured? In your home market, it’s sometimes possible to function successfully with a flawed organizational structure. However, those drawbacks can become painfully obvious when you enter a new market.

Some common management mistakes include:

Unclear vision from leadership. A lack of coherent vision from the people in charge can lead to widespread confusion and inefficiency. Ensure your goals are established and communicated to everyone on the team.
Sudden staff changes. When a new member joins the team to replace someone else, they must have all the necessary information and direction. Failing to do this can often result in failures in communication and significant setbacks when entering your new market.
Lack of coordination. Working together effectively is critical in a new market — especially one far away from your home market. Your team members must be on the same wavelength, up-to-date with current processes, and in regular communication with each other and leadership.

Human error

Human error is one of those risks that we can’t always control. Mistakes happen in business and life, and while we can’t predict them very accurately, we can certainly say that people will make mistakes.

When entering a new market, a simple mistake can set a project back and send out ripples into the entire process. Usually, one or two small mistakes won’t mean the end of the world, but a series of minor errors can add up.

That could involve failing to convert currency accurately, using the wrong measurement units, or giving incorrect advice about cultural norms. In these cases, one small mistake can quickly snowball into a major setback if nobody catches it.

Logistical issues

Things like delays, accidents, labor shortages, transport and delivery problems, and other logistics and infrastructure challenges can be significant roadblocks for businesses when entering a new market.

These hurdles are especially relevant when expanding into developing countries and regions. Here, infrastructure and technology are often very different from what you might be used to in your home market, so it will be harder to predict delays and disruption.

Markets in developing countries sometimes use more manual processes, so there is often a greater need to work closely with local teams and sometimes the need to adapt your services.

Tech issues

The technology and equipment you rely on as a business won’t always work seamlessly. One considerable risk for market entry involves technology failing to get the job done effectively in a new market.

One example is the Internet of Things devices, which can be powerful assets for businesses when monitoring conditions and optimizing processes in manufacturing. However, if your devices or networks fail, it could cause a significant setback.

If you’re looking to enter a developing country, it’s worth bearing in mind that technological infrastructure can differ greatly from your home country. In some countries, we’ve seen a leapfrog effect, where newer technologies have been adopted to a greater extent, as there are fewer issues with moving away from legacy systems.

Cash flow problems

Entering a new market requires a lot of financial resources, and if the supply of money is interrupted or halted, it can cause major problems for your operation. If not promptly dealt with, internal issues like this can quickly stop a market entry attempt.

External risks for market entry

Businesses must contend with many external risk factors and risks that stem internally within their organization. These can be much more difficult to control and are often unpredictable.

Regulations

It’s essential to be aware of and comply with the local laws in your chosen market. One recent example is Europe’s GDPR law which requires anyone doing business with European customers, or any company based in Europe, to adhere to strict data privacy rules.

Local regulations and requirements are often overlooked — and this can be especially tricky in emerging markets where regulations can be harder to interpret if you’re unfamiliar with the landscape.

Failing to keep up with regulations can be high — the maximum fine for GDPR violations is €20 million or 4% of your annual global revenue. A mistake here can seriously damage your entire company, not just your new market activities.

Politics

Politics can be hard to predict anywhere in the world, although businesses can be reasonably confident that radical changes won’t disrupt their market entry efforts in stable regions.

However, all bets are off in less stable parts of the world. Revolutions, wars, and sudden and significant new legal changes are just some of the political risks you must contend with when entering a new market.

Sudden changes to government can have severely damaging effects on your business. One example is when Fidel Castro’s government took control of Cuba in 1959, seizing hundreds of millions of dollars of US-owned property and companies.

Social unrest

A country (and a market) is nothing without its people. Events involving social unrest and widespread disruption are constant sources of risk for businesses in many markets around the world.

Riots, protests, and revolutions can cause damage to premises and shut down businesses for long periods, while nationwide strikes can leave you without a workforce. It’s crucial to have a plan of action to ensure survival during civil unrest.

Major non-violent social movements and trends can also impact your business. If you fail to show solidarity or are perceived as insensitive to a specific public sentiment, this could cause reputational damage.

Cultural differences

Entering a new market often involves introducing your business to an entirely new culture, which comes with a whole host of new risks.

Brands need to be aware of different customs and cultural nuances. Failing to adapt can impact how your products and services are received in the new market. You’ll need to consider how culture will affect how your new customers will receive your marketing. A television commercial beloved in Western cultures might be perceived as grossly insensitive in more conservative cultures.

It’s easy to get excited about entering a new market and the potential it might offer your business, but you need to do your research upfront. Is there actually a market for your product? Will it need to be adapted for success? And at what point does this become unfeasible?

Knowing when not to enter a market is just as important as knowing when to invest.

Natural disasters

It isn’t just people that businesses have to worry about when entering a new market — nature itself is often working against them. Natural disasters are a significant source of risk when establishing a presence in certain parts of the world.

Hurricanes, earthquakes, floods, droughts, and many other disasters can quickly stop any market entry effort. They can destroy property, interrupt shipping, and close down entire economies in hours. Worst of all, it’s often impossible to predict when the next disaster will strike.

One way to mitigate damage is through insurance, although coverage in developing countries has historically been low. Research shows that only about 1% of natural disaster-related losses between 1980 and 2004 in developing countries were insured, compared to approximately 30% in developed countries.

Market issues

There are several external risks in the market. These can take the form of unexpectedly tough competition, fluctuations in the cost of services and resources your business relies on, and volatile exchange rates, leaving a dent in your profit margins.

Legal Risks

There are many legal risks to consider when entering a new market, and this type of risk encompasses internal and external activities.

Every region in the world has its own set of laws and regulations, which can change significantly even between parts of the same country. For example, it’s legal in many U.S. states to sell cannabis; however, this could carry a severe penalty in others.

Some legal risks to consider are lawsuits, patent rights, and data privacy regulations. To ensure you stay on the right side of the law, you must work with local lawyers in your target market. A major legal setback like a big lawsuit could end your market entry campaign, so ensure you stay on the right side of local laws.

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Barriers to market entry

As well as risks, there are also multiple market entry barriers to consider. Fortunately, these are far more predictable than the risks mentioned above. It’s almost guaranteed you will encounter these obstacles during your market entry journey, so it’s easier to prepare for them.

There are many barriers, but we will cover two of the main ones here – costs and marketing challenges.

Costs

Entering a new market is a costly endeavor. You’ll generally need considerable resources to make this happen, and costs can be much higher than expected.

Some market entry campaigns cost less than others — trying to reach a domestic demographic with your product is more financially workable than establishing a solid presence in a foreign market such as China.

A successful market entry will allow you to make back your investment over and over. But it’s important to understand what costs you might need to consider when entering a new market.

Export and import costs

Moving to a new overseas market typically involves a certain amount of moving goods across borders. Even if you establish a manufacturing base in your new market, there will be costs associated with importing certain materials and goods from your home market.

Switching costs

This refers to the cost involved in switching to a new supplier, brand, product type, or alternative. You might have to do this a number of times when entering a new market, and these costs can add up quickly.

Marketing costs

Reaching your target audience in a new market will require a certain level of expenditure, depending on how well-known your brand is. For example, KFC opening a restaurant in a new region will have less work to do than a smaller and less famous company. Costs include market research, advertising, digital marketing, and analytics.

Access to distribution channels

This is how you make your product available to your customers. Accessing and managing a distribution infrastructure in a new market comes with various costs.

It’s important to anticipate as many costs as possible when entering a new market. Even if you do a great job of this, it’s likely that some costs will still spring up and take you by surprise. Make sure you have the financial resources available to handle these unexpected expenses.

Getting your marketing right

As well as the many costs associated with market entry, another barrier facing companies involves marketing.

Marketing is essential to make your voice heard and your product known in your new market. You need to immediately start connecting with your target customers across various channels and establish your brand as an option.

Marketing in a fresh market comes with a range of challenges. We already covered costs above, but here are some other key marketing considerations:

Demand

Before you even set foot in a new market, do enough people want to buy your product? Your marketing campaign will be an uphill struggle if there isn’t existing demand for your offering. It’s much easier if people are already clamoring for what you have. This is where market research is crucial for helping you to size the opportunity.

Competitors

Entering a new market means — most of the time — walking onto another company’s turf. You’ll need to show your target audience that you can offer something better than your competitors.

Brand identity

Your brand has an identity; it can take a lot of work to import that identity and everything associated with it into a new market. How do you establish yourself in a certain way and send out the right message to your potential customers? Again market research is vital here to understand what to retain and what to adapt.

Customer loyalty to existing companies

We already mentioned your competitors. Many of the customers in your new market will have existing loyalties and strong ties to them. Luring customers away from a brand they have used and loved for decades is much more complex than simply attracting a new customer to your brand. You must stand out, offer something extra, and communicate this clearly. It’s worth paying attention to your competitors and what people like about them.

How will you reach your audience?

Consider how the people in your new target market get their information and spend their time. For example, if you’re targeting an older demographic, investing heavily in influencer marketing might not be a good idea. On the other hand, magazine and TV ads may work to great effect.

Cultural issues

If you’re expanding into an overseas market, you’ll need to consider the differences in culture and how this affects the tone of your marketing. Make sure your messaging doesn’t come across as offensive or inappropriate or appear tone-deaf due to a lack of understanding about cultural nuances and norms. Understanding cultural differences is an area where it pays to work with people who understand the culture intimately. Take the case of Starbucks — whose attempt to break into the Israeli market fell flat due to hubris and a lack of understanding of what the Israeli customers wanted.

Marketing can take a lot of work to get right, which is even more true when entering a new market. The most important thing is to research your new market as heavily as possible and gather as much information as possible before beginning your campaign. Also, be prepared to adapt your approach as you go along in response to data and feedback.

Market entry always comes with a massive amount of risks and challenges. No business can escape this, not even those with a global presence.

But when you get it right, you can reap significant rewards.

Kadence has helped companies of all shapes and sizes research their target markets and gather all the intelligence they need to lead an informed and successful market entry campaign. To find out how we can help you do the same, check out our guide to market entry or get in touch today.

How do you enter a new potential market?

Expanding your brand into new markets allows you to reach potentially vast numbers of new customers and grow your revenue massively. However, the process can be complex and filled with complications.

A market entry strategy maximizes your chances of success when moving into a new market. In this article, we’ll look at some reasons to consider moving to a new market, the differences between domestic and international markets, and some strategies you can use.

Market entry defined

Market entry strategy is a plan to expand the visibility and distribution of a product or service to a new market. Market entry research helps brands to expand into new domestic or international markets where the competitive, legal, political or cultural landscape might be less known.

Market entry research is the path to understanding a new market. It helps brands identify different success factors, reveal potential challenges, and discover hidden potential opportunities.

Why move to a new market?

First up, why should you consider moving to a new market in the first place? It’s challenging and expensive, so what are the reasons that make it worthwhile? Here are some of the main ones:

You’ll gain more customers and make more money – The number one reason to consider new markets is to grow your business and increase revenue by selling more products to more customers.
There might be no more opportunities for growth in your home market – If you’ve maxed out what your local market is capable of in terms of revenue, expanding to new markets may be the only way to grow.
You’ll reduce risk by diversifying your business – If one market suffers for whatever reason, you’ll have others to keep you going.

Domestic markets vs. international markets

Are you planning to enter a new domestic market or take your products overseas to sell in a foreign country? The approach for each of these will be very different.

Domestic markets

Typically, this will be much easier than entering an overseas market. The culture will be the same, everything will be geographically closer, and things will likely be very similar to your existing markets.

International markets

Global expansion is where things become more complicated. You’ll have to factor in several differences in how you currently run your business. These include:

Cultural differences
Administrative differences
Economic differences
Logistical challenges involved in transporting goods abroad

Things to consider

Before you enter any new market, it’s crucial to take some time to confirm whether you can afford the move. Can you afford the costs of exporting, working with intermediaries, tax, and all the other expenses involved? And what proportion of the market can you realistically expect to be able to serve?

You must also consider if the product or service will work in your intended market. Market research (both online and offline) plays an important role here — ensuring demand for your product justifies the export cost.

Risks of entering new markets

There are also numerous risks involved in entering a new market, including:

Country risks, like the possibility of political unrest, sudden changes, or financial issues that could impact your business.
Foreign exchange, such as the possibility of currency exchange rates changing, could seriously affect your bottom line.
Cultural risk, which essentially means the possibility of your new business venture running into challenges due to significant differences in culture and customs.
Weather unpredictability. Are you moving into a market where natural disasters and weather conditions could cause damage to your facilities and cost money?

Once you have carefully researched your new market and weighed the potential risks, you may decide it’s worth entering. If so, there are several different strategies you can employ, each with its pros and cons.

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Different market entry strategies

Direct exporting

Direct exporting is where you ship your products to the new market directly. You’ll have to handle all aspects of the process independently, from transport to payments to operations in the new market.

This method requires more resources and time compared to working with an intermediary. You’ll need to create an exporting infrastructure, train employees, and make and receive international payments, among many other challenging tasks.

On the plus side, this approach maximizes your profits as you don’t need to pay any third parties. You’ll also have complete control over your sales and marketing processes.

Indirect exporting

Indirectly exporting involves working with an intermediary. It has some advantages, such as:

Much lower risk. An experienced third party will take care of the exportation process, which minimizes the risk of failure.
You can focus on your own business and domestic markets without being occupied by your new ones.
Fewer resources are required on your part.

On the other hand

Profits are lower since you have to pay your intermediary.
You’ll be disconnected from your customer base, so you’ll miss out on important insights and lessons.
You’ll lose complete control over sales and marketing abroad.

There are several different options when it comes to indirect exporting. Here are some of the most common ones.

Indirect exporting with buying agents

Buying agents are representatives of foreign companies that want to buy your products. You’ll work through them when selling your products to your new market.

They’re usually paid by commission and will try to negotiate the lowest possible price. Sometimes, buying agents are government agencies.

Indirect exporting using distributors

You can sell your product directly to distributors or wholesalers, who will then distribute the product to retailers.

Indirect exporting through the management and trading companies

Export Management Companies (EMCs) exist to take care of all your export and sales processes in your new market.

It’s worth taking some time to research and find the correct EMC, as most specialize in a particular market and region. They’ll help you identify markets, find customers, handle all shipping and logistics, and more.

Indirect exporting through piggybacking

Piggybacking is where you allow another non-competing company to sell your product. This can work exceptionally well if the partner company already has a customer base and distribution infrastructure in your target market.

You’ll get immediate access to your new market but for a fee.

Producing products in the target market

Another option is to manufacture your products within the target market. This saves you the cost of transport and the many logistical challenges involved in exporting your product abroad.

However, you’ll also need to consider the many challenges in manufacturing your product abroad, legal issues, costs, possible risks, and more. Depending on your situation, this could be a good option.

(For more information on the most effective strategies for entering a new market, check out our top four marketing strategies article).

Franchising / Licensing

While franchising is often associated with fast food or quick-serve restaurants, it can successfully aid expansion in many different categories.

Franchising is where a semi-independent business owner (the franchisee) pays fees and royalties to the franchisor to use a company’s trademark and sell its products or services.

While franchising and licensing are both business agreements where certain aspects of the business are shared in exchange for a fee, a licensing agreement is typically more limited.

Entering a new market can be extremely rewarding and allow your business to move to the next level and achieve new growth. It’s essential to research all the options and ensure the export strategy you deploy is the safest and most effective for you. You’ll also need to thoroughly research the market to understand its potential and position your product for success, something we cover in our Ultimate Guide To Market Entry.

Kadence can help you do that. We have extensive experience assisting businesses by conducting game-changing research to create effective strategies for market entry. To find out more, learn about our market entry services or get in touch.

Market entry is the process of entering a new market, whether at home or abroad. There’s a lot to consider when taking this step, and it’s certainly not a simple process. In fact, for every successful market entry, about 4 will fail.

A new market doesn’t necessarily mean a new geographical area. It could mean selling your product or service in a new language or targeting an entirely new demographic of people. If you do choose to move into a new part of the world — especially if it’s abroad — this comes with its own unique set of challenges.

In this article, we’ll dive into a market entry and some of the challenges involved. We’ll also cover some steps you should take to maximize your chances of success in your new market.

Why enter a new market?

There are lots of good reasons why you should consider expanding beyond your current market. Some of the main ones are:

You want to gain more customers, grow your company, and increase your revenue. This is the most obvious reason — new markets represent untapped opportunities for growth and to make more money.

You’ve hit a ceiling in your current market. Perhaps you’re struggling to grow more where you currently are, which is an impetus to seek out new pastures.

There may be a legal requirement to offer your product in new markets. For example, you might be required to sell your product in different languages.

To keep up with competitors. If your competitors are expanding into new markets, you risk being left behind if you don’t do the same.

Domestic vs foreign market entry

Domestic markets will likely be quite similar to your existing markets, whereas international markets present some new challenges to overcome, such as differing cultures, laws, and languages.

However, foreign markets can also bring great benefits and the opportunity to become a truly global brand. If you decide you are ready to take the plunge and expand overseas, this will come with a whole host of brand new challenges.

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How to excel at market entry

Research the market

What is the size of the market? What is its growth rate? Where is the market heading and what are the key trends to watch? These questions can help organisations understand the potential return involved in entering a new market and are typically answered by a combination of desk research, interviews with industry experts and primary research.

Research your customers and what they want

This is important at any stage of business, but it’s especially crucial when entering a brand new market. The more different your new market is from your current one, the more important this step is.

How do you get to know your customers?

Focus groups
Online surveys (and other quantitative research methods)
In depth interviews (IDIs)
Telephone depth interviews (TDIs)
Online communities (and other online qualitative research methods)
Ask your sales team for their experiences of customers’ opinions
Spend time in that market. There’s a lot you can learn – from better understanding consumer behaviour to getting a grip on the competitive landscape

In your research, you’ll need to consider a few key questions, such as:

Will your product work in the target market? What works well in your current market might not take off at all somewhere else. Is there any real demand for what you’re offering, and does it justify the cost of entry?
Will you be dealing with different demographics of people? Will they have different pain points, goals, and budgets? How will you address these differences?
Will you need to adjust your marketing strategy or move to new channels? For example, if you’re trying to move to an older market, social media marketing might not be the best approach to take.

Research the competition

Who are your competitors in your new market and what are they doing? These will likely be different from the competitors in your original market, but this may not always be the case.

Entering a new market, you’ll immediately be at a disadvantage to established companies. You’ll need to overcome customers’ long-term brand loyalty and familiarity with other products, and you’ll be competing with brands that already know the landscape well.

You’ll need to work hard to beat your competitors while also fitting into the new market. As such, it’s worth spending time and resources so you can find out as much as possible about your competitors and learn from them. One advantage of being a new entrant is that you can avoid the mistakes other players have made in the past, helping you to optimise your strategy and get ahead.

Understand the culture

When moving overseas to a new market, the cultural differences can be vast. If you want to succeed, you’ll need to make sure your business is on the same cultural wavelength as your new market.

This means adapting to the culture and customs. The best way to do this is by working with people on the ground – or indeed by spending time there and getting a feel for a new place. We have offices across Asia, the US and Europe, so when we work with clients on market entry projects, we’ve already got a deep understanding of the culture of the market they want to target, which can be a huge advantage.

Understand the local laws and regulations

When moving into a new market, the last thing you want to do is run afoul of the local laws. For example, the EU’s GDPR regulation, built to protect the data privacy of EU citizens, applies strict rules for businesses. Failing to comply can result in a hefty fine.

It’s best to work with a local lawyer who can advise you about all the regulations you’ll need to be aware of and help you navigate this new legal landscape.

Have a clear future plan

When you enter a new market, it’s important to have a clear idea about where you’re going. How are you going to grow and scale? 65% of startups fail because of premature scaling — how will you make sure you grow at the right pace?

Take some time to put together a clear roadmap and market entry strategy that will ensure you develop and grow in your new market in exactly the right way.

Entering a new market is always fraught with challenges. It’s best to work with a team of experts who can help you formulate a strategy that works — guiding you through the complex and demanding process of making a move.

At Kadence, that’s our job. We’ve worked with countless companies, helping them lay the groundwork for a successful move into a new market. To find out how we can do the same for you, read more about market entry in our comprehensive guide, explore our market entry services or just get in touch today.

Many global economies are defined by stagnant growth, falling populations and saturated markets, making growth for brands a tricky proposition. In many ‘emerging markets’ there are still big opportunities grow… if you keep your eyes open.

Many businesses are looking to fast-growth, high-energy markets outside the so-called ‘developed’ economies to fuel their expansion. Unlike congested and sometimes shrinking economies in ‘the west’, many parts of the world are seeing rapid population growth, fast-rising incomes and are adopting transformative technologies without the burden of legacy investments. The result? Vibrant new opportunities for businesses.

But while entering any new market is a challenge for brands, moving into these more dynamic economies – often with very different cultures, business practices and consumer expectations – can be particularly tricky. Berlin isn’t the same as Birmingham, but many of the norms in both markets are recognisably similar. Head to Beijing or Bamako, and the assumptions you make about brand, product and business practices will be challenged.

Take a phased approach to understanding the opportunity afforded by new markets

The best way to understand your opportunity in different markets is to take the traditional phased approach to research. This involves the following considerations.

Which markets might we look at? Consider the number of consumers, the country’s income levels and the stability of its economic and political structures. You can also examine the maturity of business practices and think about geographic location, transport links and accessibility in-market.
What’s the macro environment like in a market we want to enter? Revisit all the above, in more detail. Focus on specifics – such as the transport and tech infrastructure; and business support networks (such as accounting firms or legal protections on IP) – and how the trends are evolving in those areas.
How does the competitive landscape affect its attractiveness? Pay attention to other outsider brands and how they’re doing; but also domestic rivals and potential competitors poised to move into adjacent markets.
What are the practical issues for market entry? In new markets further afield, transport links, language barriers, different cultural norms and local regulations can throw up roadblocks.
How do we adjust our product, service or messaging to optimise our offer there? As above, but remember that very different cultures and climates can challenge even the most basic assumptions about how a product will perform.

Step away from the generalisations

It’s vital to acknowledge that ‘emerging markets’ aren’t as uniform as the term suggests. Far from it. There are so many variations by region or category that talking about common features of ‘emerging markets’ is a dangerous over-simplification. And there are as many differences within countries as between them. This particularly true in countries where rapid urbanisation has seen a break with traditional cultures outside cities.

(That’s true for any generalisation, of course. Alcohol brands, for example, can’t even treat the US and Canada the same. North of the border, there are drinking-age laws set province-by-province, massively complicating online alcohol sales. They might look the same in terms of development and even geography and demographics. But they’re not.)

That’s not to say there are no rules that apply to entering markets that share particular attributes. The pace of economic or population growth, or the expansion of middle-class consumers with disposable income, might always be a feature of your selection process for target markets.

But in many categories, consumption is growing so quickly that only the real beneficiary of a ‘toe in the water’ market entry is likely to be knock-off brands and domestic substitutes able to adjust output more responsively to local conditions, especially where legal protections for intellectual property are less secure for global players.

All these caveats mean that in-depth research into new-market consumer appetites, infrastructure and competition is just as important in growth areas as it is in more mature markets.

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Assessing new markets – 5 key considerations

All that being said, knowing the likely biggest points of difference when entering markets with strikingly different fundamentals is still important. Five things to consider:

1. Affordability

In many emerging markets, disposable income may be much lower for large parts of the population. For global products, that means understanding the more affluent segments better and targeting marketing appropriately. For localised or commodity products, the question is cost. Can you use local manufacturing, logistics and even branding to deliver your product to a mass market?

2. Distribution

Getting product to consumers might be more challenging. For brands that rely on developed economy logistics partners, understanding infrastructure constraints, developing local contacts and ensuring quality of service is crucial. When Haagen-Dazs first entered China, it set up its own warehouse and delivery network to ensure the product reached consumers correctly.

3. Localised branding and marketing

What works well in Boston, may not succeed in Beijing. Cultural understanding is key to ensuring that your marketing and branding hit the spot further afield. Caveat: remember the urban/rural split. Many urban consumers are ‘world citizens’ and expect to be treated as such.

4. Watch for local rivals

The cachet of being a global brand can help enter emerging markets. But cost, customisation and the risk of ‘brand colonialism’ can make more assumptive Western brands seem out of touch and vulnerable to local alternatives.

5. Native teams

As a global market research agency, we benefit from having local teams in the markets we evaluate for clients. This means we understand the cultural context, consumer trends and broader macro situation. It is possible to enter emerging markets at arms’ length. But having local people in decision-making positions is the surest way to avoid clumsy cultural or operational missteps.

Look for leapfrog opportunities

There are plenty of upsides to emerging markets, too, beyond simply vast numbers of new customers. In some cases, our research will throw up opportunities that just aren’t available in mature markets at all.

Look at the way different platforms have developed to cater to the nuances of local markets, for example. In many fast-developing economies, traditional channels have been leap-frogged by the adoption of newer technologies. This often happens where older tech infrastructure has attained much less penetration, allowing a newer tech to fill a void.

In many African countries, for example, low population density and long distances between conurbations means traditional copper or fibre telecoms can be limited. But mobile telecoms are more practical and affordable. They offer a plethora of additional over-the-top services that have led to an e-finance and e-commerce boom. Entering those markets will require different thinking about distribution – as well as marketing and payments using creative local solutions.

Remember, e-commerce is not the same everywhere

The Philippines is another good example. In other countries, Facebook might be just part of your online marketing toolbox. But there, Facebook has attained an absolutely dominant position in e-commerce – for one simple reason. With lower average incomes, Facebook and local mobile companies realised their penetration was constrained by the cost of network data. So almost every plan has free Facebook data regardless of contract status. For market entry success in the Philippines, Facebook is going to play a big role.

But we need to distinguish between being available on those platforms on the one hand; and entering a market on the other – which involves boots on the ground. Yes, that’s more investment. But you’re also surrendering less of your margin to platform owners and logistics providers.

A staged approach to entering less well-understood markets, starting with the more popular local social networks or e-commerce platforms, allows you to refine the consumer profile. Companies also get time to get to grips with the legal and financial frameworks that might shape future involvement; and see how local fulfilment clarifies their operational options.

Don’t assume that tried and tested e-commerce strategies from the US and Europe will work everywhere in the world, however. Amazon, for example, simply doesn’t have a presence in some markets. In others, consumers can use the site, but limitations on distribution and other logistics mean delivery times, cost and availability are prohibitive. Local research about the best platforms for reach and fulfilment is a must.

Lazada, Shopee, Zalora and Carousel, are some of the top e-commerce sites in South East Asia. These names may not be familiar to firms outside the region. But they can play a crucial role for testing in these markets. Again, it’s worth working with people who understand how to optimise those platforms, as well as interpret the effectiveness of marketing on them; and what the results say about the potential for deeper market entry.

Understand the technicalities of new markets

Even online entry into a very unfamiliar market can be daunting. Moving in for formal distribution, licensing or agent agreements or even setting up locally or buying into a native business brings with it additional issues that need to be researched.

European companies with experience of entering new markets in the EU can find the regulatory and legal considerations in countries farther afield a challenge. Even in the US there are federal laws and individual state regulations over companies and property to contend with. This can make establishing a new business relatively tough. And that’s considered a ‘developed’ market.

In parts of South East Asia, many European companies report lengthy delays in registering businesses. Others discover that in some markets domestic firms have particular benefits. This could be a form of protected status, or reserved access to certain kinds of contract. This is worth exploring in due diligence especially if you plan to sell to government agencies that are often required to ‘buy local’.

Don’t make any assumptions

Most of the key factors for market entry will depend on exactly which market you’re looking to enter. There are very few hard and fast rules that apply across the generalisation ‘emerging markets’.

But there is a common theme from this guide that should frame your thinking: these markets change – fast. Before committing to entering any market – and especially ones evolving so rapidly – it really pays to research the opportunity fully. This is something that Kadence has helped many clients with, allowing companies to succeed in lucrative emerging markets. Find out more about our market entry services, or get in touch to discuss a project.

It makes sense to open up new markets for a successful product or service. But how do you know whether it’s worth the investment? What makes for a potential buyer in your home territory might not apply in a new location where the total addressable market could be much smaller or many times the size. Enter the market researchers. We explain how to calculate market potential.

Estimating sales can be a chore even when you have historical and well-honed market instincts to work with. But in a new market this is even harder. There’s no historical data to review and it’s challenging to estimate the kinds of expenses and risks that might crop up.

An inability to judge sales makes the decision of whether to enter a new market much harder. Without a decent estimate – of both sales and likely profits – it’s almost impossible to decide on how you might enter and what kind of investment to make there.

What’s the market really worth?

The starting point is to get a handle on the existing market for your brand or product in the new territory. A basic market analysis is a great starting point. Typically it breaks down into:

Market sizing (current and future)
Market trends
Market growth rate
Market profitability
Industry cost structure
Distribution channels
Key success factors

But within each category, there’s lots to research. A more superficial look at the data can be helpful for a ‘first cut’ look at which new markets you might want to enter. But a deeper dive into the numbers will be essential if you’re going to properly evaluate the strategy for what looks like a high-probability candidate.

That more sophisticated analysis could take the form of a total addressable market (TAM) analysis. This looks at both the TAM itself, as well as serviceable available market (SAM). This is the portion of TAM that your company’s products or services play inside; and serviceable obtainable market (SOM), the percentage of SAM which your might realistically reach.

Best guesses?

But getting to SOM for a brand new market isn’t a simple calculation. It’s not exactly easy in markets where you’re a known quantity and understand the competitive environment, either! For businesses in mature categories and with previous experience of being a new entrant to markets, it’s possible to make educated guesses. This can be refined with local research on factors that might shape consumer behaviour.

In some industries that data might be possible to obtain – from industry associations, for example, or government agencies. In others – and particularly in product segments that a relatively underdeveloped in the market you plan to enter – sales figures might be harder to come by.

Then there’s the difficulty of calculating market share. You will know what it might cost in contracts, infrastructure and marketing to build share in existing markets. But the assumptions may be way off-base for a brand new market.

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Talk to people

At this point there are two avenues:

Research sales results that have been achieved by other companies like yours. They don’t even need to be in precisely the same line of business. The lessons of other companies looking to sell into the new markets can reveal both the optimum routes in, the barriers to adoption and the appetite for new brands.

That might even mean contacting other businesses to ask their experience of making the adaptation to the new market – as well as learning about potentially important busy and slow seasons, noteworthy business practices and quirks of the system that might not have a direct bearing on the size of the opportunity, but will allow you to adjust your assumptions.

Talking to local partners, however, is probably the best way of calibrating your expectations. Even if you plan to enter a market by establishing a local entity and investing in your own facilities and marketing, you’ll still be working with many different counterparties. This can span everything from local professional services firms such as lawyers and accountants, to warehousing, distribution or media buying agencies.

They ought to be able to offer anecdotal evidence at the very least; at best, they’ll have insights into the size of the market and chances of capturing that crucial market share. And if the route to market entry is contracting with a local distributor, licensees or franchisees, their sense of the opportunity could be invaluable.

But above all, rigorous quantitative and qualitative market research will reveal a great deal about attitudes and appetites for your brand or product. The more you can contextualise the hard data on existing spend and potential market growth with consumer insight, the more realistic your evaluation will be.

Focusing on behaviour

One other way to address uncertainties about how a new market might embrace a product or service is to think not about that category, or even look at domestic rivals’ sales and strengths. It’s to create a strategy based on consumer behaviours.

If you can analyse why your brand, product or service is successful in its existing markets and break down the results into some key motivators or even behavioural traits of your consumers, it might be possible to assess where those traits are visible in a new market before you enter. In what situations is your product used? What type of people love it? What are those customers’ attitudes across different domains? What role does it play in their lives – and why?

That will require some pretty deep insight into the market you want to enter. Clearly it’s a more useful investment to make if there are other positive signals to encourage you in – fundamentals such as infrastructure, spending power or pre-existing local interest in your brand or product.

How good is your cost analysis?

Knowing your potential sales, market share and growth are all important. But the scale of the opportunity isn’t just sales – it’s profit. And even seasoned businesspeople can misstep when it comes to keeping costs under control in their market entry strategy. Here’s a brief list of costs that won’t affect domestic-only businesses:

Shipping costs – which can also fluctuate wildly, as we’re finding out during the COVID-19 pandemic. Consider, also, capacity. Shipping out of markets with a high balance of trade deficit (Europe, US, UK) to major exporters (China, for example) is much easier than going the other way.
Legal expenses – from registering a business in a new location, sorting out licensing, contracts, the right insurance cover… and complying with local regulations on everything from product labelling to anti-bribery laws.
Foreign taxes – and other local accounting quirks, which might be different depending on your headquarters domicile and the mode of entry into the market.
Translation services – for everything from contracts and technical specs, to instruction manuals and marketing.
Recruitment and HR – even a light-touch market entry will benefit from putting some employees into the new market to oversee set-up and manage local relationships.
Travel expenses – for the above, but also for ongoing check-ins with local teams or business partners.

What do you know about rivals?

Some lucky businesses will find an overseas market where there are few local rivals, legal and business structures that allow them to port across their defensive attributes from existing markets and a ready but as-yet-untapped consumer base. But those will be rare. So to properly understand the market potential, you’ll need competitor analysis. Our typical approach to this considers:

Who are your rivals in that market? Not just currently selling what you want to sell, but addressing your potential customers, too.
What is their range of products? How easily might they change?
How do they pitch their consumers? What messages are they using? Which channels?
What is their competitive advantage? What’s their cost base like? What could you replicate – and where can you out-compete them?
What’s their market share? How fragmented in the competition? What opportunities does that present either in terms of the industry cost-base or even acquiring smaller rivals?
What is their company structure? If they outsource (for supply or support) or license (to address the market), could those be vulnerabilities increasing your potential strength?

In summary

A lack of prior experience and knowledge can make it challenging for companies to assess the potential of new markets. We help lots of business overcome this – not just through the use of primary and secondary market research, but also by having people on the ground in many countries and regions to add specific local knowledge.

This creates a much more rounded view of the market potential – and the optimum ways to tap into it – than simply applying a cookie-cutter approach to market entry. The key steps:

Understand the demographic and economic drivers that underpin the total market for your products or services.
Think laterally about the broader factors – such as the types of consumer and cultural attitudes – that dictate market size.
Analyse existing market activity to deduce a TAM, SOM and SAM.
Conduct consumer research to evaluate your specific opportunity in the market.
Competitor intelligence will help you test assumptions about potential market share gains.
Rigorous local insights into costs and risks will reveal the profit potential – the ultimate rationale for market entry

Find out more about our market entry services, read our expert guide to market entry or get in touch with us to discuss a project with our team.

How you enter a market often dictates whether you’ll be successful there. Different approaches all have pros and cons – and deciding which to choose is as much about market insight as it is financial logic. So what are the four market entry strategies?

Export? Licensing? Franchising? Partnering? JVs? M&A? There are many ways to get into a new market. What situations typically suit each variety? What do you need to know about the market to select the most appropriate options? How do we assess the strengths and weaknesses – and their long-term effect on your business? Here’s our brief overview of your options for an entry strategy into a new market.

Early exposure: the passive way in

Online retail – and social media these days – mean brand exposure in new markets has become relatively easy. Social media shopping, for instance, is becoming an increasingly popular entry point for brands into new markets, particularly if they’re picked up by influencers. This could be by traditional media outlets (like fashionable magazines), web-based trend-setters (such as popular tech review channels on YouTube) or specialist social media influencers on global platforms such as Instagram and TikTok. Most markets have their own versions of these channels – and there are plenty of popular global options, too.

(Caveat: many global influencers, and those within markets, may need inducement to feature products or services. While ‘accidental’ market exposure is possible, you’re still likely to need some kind of strategy for this kind of introduction.)

But e-commerce can be a double-edged sword. Yes, consumers might get exposure to a brand online. But if it’s not available in their market, they can end up buying the next best thing that is available. Your brand could be doing an excellent category building job for local rivals.

It’s also worth looking out for platforms that are not global. In many markets, local e-commerce platforms have emerged. Any attempt to exploit the market will rely on having access to it. (We look into that further in our guide to entering emerging markets .)

In addition to working with local platforms, brands need to consider carefully how to fulfil orders and handle customer relations. Managing all these elements through third parties in a straight commercial relationship can work well. That said, there’s a massive gulf between entering a market virtually via e-commerce and getting ‘boots on the ground’.

That’s not just about commitment. Each of the third parties you work with is taking a chunk of your profit margin. And in some cases – particularly with perishable or heavyweight products, and especially services – the arm’s length approach just won’t work. To access that pool of consumers, you’re going to need a local presence. Here are some main routes in.

1. Structured exporting

The default form of market entry. Consumers and companies in other markets can easily buy your products wholesale, sort out logistics and handle local marketing. Increasingly, brands can ship internationally – riding the kind of passive market entry discussed above – but assigning a local trusted distributor to conduct transactions with your buyers, and even partnering directly with major wholesalers or retailers, is a perfectly good way in.

Working with the right partners can be a make-or-break decision. So thoroughly researching the key players, their terms of trade and their local reputations is vital. Even seemingly innocuous business practices can have a big effect on the way products are handled, sold and supported.

Having local agents doesn’t mean you can ignore the nuances of the local market. It still pays to get under the skin of local retail, for example, understanding any patterns of consumption and thinking about local tastes and behaviours that might shift how a product is presented. Even in an arms-length distribution agreement, it pays to tailor a product to local preferences. Chocolate brands, for example, must cater to both local biases on the flavour and texture of their product – but also the local climate. Getting under the skin of target consumers in new markets is something we’ve supported many businesses with as they’ve entered new territories.

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2. Licensing and franchising

Licensing is giving legal rights to in-market parties to use your company’s name and other intellectual property. Any licensee can produce and sell products under your name or offer services using your brand. In exchange, you get royalties or other payments. It can be an effective light-touch way of entering a market, especially if you’re a service business that needs a local workforce; or your products would benefit from local manufacturing.

But it’s not all plain sailing. How a licensee behaves towards customers, the quality of their output and the local spin they put on your product can affect the brand. That means thorough due diligence is needed on potential partners, and brands that come to the table with detailed research on their new market are much more likely to be able to tie down any important factors affecting those decisions into a contract.

Franchising is similar to licensing but requires a lot more heavy lifting up front. As well as researching any new market before entering it, brands should think about how they will structure any franchise agreement – which will require additional research into local legal structures and potential franchisees; working out what the franchise buys (for some businesses it’s little more than a licence; for others, it’s a suite of processes, marketing support materials and even hardware that come with the deal); and how they might be able to handle disputes with franchisees later.

3. Direct investment

For many companies, setting up a fully-fledged operation in the new market is a big commitment – but also brings huge advantages. This kind of ‘greenfield’ investment – ‘greenfield’ meaning the establishment of new facilities – means complete control over the operations in the new market. Many countries welcome foreign investment of this kind.

Some companies will choose only to enter new markets where this kind of investment is possible – for a variety of reasons. If the product is particularly sensitive to different kinds of handling, for example, or needs to be manufactured to particular tolerances, ownership provides a reassuring level of control.

If that’s the case, the legal and regulatory burden of different potential markets should be a factor in the due diligence process right at the outset. Having local legal and financial advice, in additional to in-market research expertise, is essential.

4. Buying a business

International M&A is still fraught with risks and paperwork, but even in a bad year – 2019 is the last we have figures for, and we might expect 2020 to be an outlier one way or another – cross-border acquisitions accounted for $1.2 trillion. (A ‘bad year’? That was a third lower than the US$1.8 trillion in deals in 2018.) The reason? Buying an existing business is a genuine fast-track for foreign companies to enter a new market.

Market research plays an even more important role in due diligence when you’re buying a business in unfamiliar territory. The traditional metrics you might assess – and even the gut feel of key decision-makers – have to be translated through completely different lenses of cultural and market norms. (Due diligence isn’t easy on domestic M&A deals; it’s much tougher abroad…)

That’s also true, to a lesser extent, with buying a minority stake in a business in your new market. This might mean less up-front investment albeit with less control, too. But in both cases, you’re also buying into local market expertise – which can be invaluable.

That’s also the big benefit of setting up a joint venture (JV) – a new partnership between your company and one or more parties where the ownership is shared. You get the benefits of a greenfield start-up; a lower investment than M&A or setting up on your own; local expertise baked in; and legal status as a native in the new market. Many businesses see a JV as a turnkey project: each party brings existing expertise and capabilities to bear for fast deployment.

But be warned: joint ventures only thrive when the contractual commitments of each partner and the beneficial ownership structures are crystal clear. And some big brands have come unstuck in joint ventures where the local partner’s vision for the product or service deviates from their own. Conflict resolution mechanisms are a must. Unsurprisingly, joint ventures are more common in time-limited projects where several contractors need a legal entity to collaborate on a very specific mission – and have clear terms for the joint venture’s dissolution.

Building your intelligence network

The choice of entry route will be dictated by many factors, then – consumer habits, culture, legal status, taxes and tariffs, local business practices, the transparency you can attain around potential partners and more. As a rule of thumb, the less exposure to cost and risk you have, the less control and margin you can secure.

Arms-length surveys and analysis can only tell you so much, however. Working with international agencies who have their own people on the ground in a new market not only means better access to the nuances of consumer behaviours and local trading rules – it also means dealing with people who have first-hand experience of running a business in that market. This approach has enabled to us to successfully support clients in entering new and lucrative markets.

You can learn more about our market entry expertise, or get in touch to discuss a potential project.

Entering a new market can lead to a massive boost to sales, brand strength and long-term profits. But there’s more to a market entry strategy than great products or services. Understanding the local market – its distribution channels, culture, economic and social trends – through a market research-driven due diligence process is crucial. And sometimes the most valuable insight is the hidden reason why you shouldn’t proceed…

The art and science of market entry

Over the past 40 years globalisation has redefined what it is to be an international brand. For decades, a handful of dominant players in markets such as food and drink (driven by marketing prowess) or automotive (reliant on economies of scale) had been able to enter new markets in ways that most businesses simply couldn’t imagine.

The rapid growth of global trade capacity, and particularly the ubiquity of the internet, has levelled the playing field. Today, a business in Bolton has myriad options for selling in Beijing; an Australian specialist retailer has lots of ways into the Austrian market.

But the process of choosing which markets to enter, how and why remains fraught with danger. The rewards of opening up a new market are potentially great. On the other hand, the cost can be significant, and the list of powerful global brands that have failed to successfully enter new markets is a long.

The factors to consider are varied: there are economic and social dimensions, competition from local companies, the quirks of regional distribution channels, cultural mismatches… and much more. That means undertaking a market-research-driven due diligence project before entering a new market is a must.

Why look elsewhere? The reasons for market entry

What motivates companies to investigate entering a new market? Every organisation will have its own reasons. Exploring them in detail is a useful first step in defining the later market entry strategy.

Brand growth

A huge proportion of value in modern enterprises is wrapped up in intangibles. That means increasing enterprise value requires diversification of the brand. Some very strong domestic brands can move into adjacent markets (Dyson, for example, can leverage its reputation for air-moving engineering from vacuums, to hand-dryers, to room fans and even hair straighteners). A select few can jump into non-adjacent categories (Virgin, for example). But opening up a whole new geographic market can establish a brand with many more consumers, boosting its value.

Saturation of existing markets

Once you have gained significant market share and consumer penetration domestically, it’s easy to see growth stall. Launching new products to address existing customers is costly and high risk. But taking proven products or services to a new market can create fresh upside for growing brands.

Optimising overhead costs

As businesses grow, they build up overheads – around head office functions, for example. They also build up niche skills and experience – in fields such as logistics, legal or financial. These scale well: the more times you can put your experts to work in a new market, the more productive they are. And the more markets you have, the lower the amount each one pays to meet head office costs.

Strategic partnership

Globalisation has meant businesses can easily work with partners in new markets – creating new opportunities for blended products and services. Local distributors, for example, might be pathfinders for a brand into a new market – demonstrating the potential for a more structured entry into that market.

There are plenty of other motivations, often overlapping. Knowing which is driving the decision to explore new markets will help frame the strategy for successfully entering one.

A phased approach to market entry

There are different phases to a market entry project. You need to size the opportunity to judge whether it’s worth entering a new market. There ought to be concept testing, especially for new categories or innovations in that market. Many clients focus on competitor analysis when they’re dealing with less well-known rivals.

Market entry has many dimensions – and no business is too big to skip them.

We work with a number of high-profile Japanese brands, global names that are already present in different countries in some form of another. But they still need to tailor particular products or brands to the local markets they’re looking to exploit; and understand the specific needs of consumers in those categories.

Market entry projects usually involve a series of questions, and typically each of these is a discrete engagement.

Key questions for any market entry project

Which markets might we look at?
What is the macro environment like in a market we want to enter?
How does the competitive landscape affect its attractiveness?
What is the best way to enter the market in practical terms?
How do we adjust our product, service or messaging to optimise our offer there?

While market entry studies are a vital tool in successfully growing a brand somewhere new, sometimes their value comes from showing that entering a new market will not be successful. Around 50% of these projects results in a recommendation not to go ahead as planned. That finding can emerge at any one of the stages above. Far from being bad news, it’s often the most valuable insight a brand can get. Market entry can be costly and complex – not doing so when the conditions aren’t right can save massive amounts of money and time.

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The world is your oyster. But where’s the pearl?

A crucial first step in investigating markets for entry is to analyse why a brand, product or service is successful in its existing markets. How is it used? Who are the type of people that love it? What are those customers’ attitudes across different domains? What role does it play in their lives – and why?

The next step is to look for markets where groups like this already exist. A good starting point can be detailed desk research – using tools like the CIA World Factbook for demographic information, or understanding cultural similarities to your home market through cultural awareness studies like the Hofstede Insights Culture Compass. But ultimately, it’s approaches developed precisely for the brand or product that will reveal good matches. Narrowing down the high-probability markets is hugely valuable for brands that don’t have other clues to go on.

Sometimes brands do have a clear idea from the outset which markets they want to enter. We worked with a company producing ceramics which had a light-touch arrangement with an international distributor. They started to notice a significant uptick in orders from Korea – which was obviously a strong signal that entering that market could pay dividends.

But that also meant understanding why was key to a successful market entry. Closer research revealed that an increase in purchasing power among the country’s middle class had made the designs more attractive; plus online shopping had taken hold and made previously hard-to-get products more visible.

Target acquired. Now what? Next steps in a market entry project

Specific country research starts with fundamental market insight and competitor intelligence work. Initially, that’s secondary research, analysing available insights for the particular category in question. After that, we might move on to interviewing people whose knowledge of the market will provide more nuanced insights.

Companies usually see this as their feasibility study, helping them understand who else is operating in their category, what regulations might be applicable, what the domestic distribution and supply chain infrastructure is like, and what investment they’re likely to need to make under different scenarios.

That industry analysis and expert insight helps generate a strategic overview of the market tailored to the client. Often that’s enough to substantiate the decision on whether and how to enter a market, especially if it’s a close match with the brand’s existing markets.

A good example is some work we did with an electronics brand looking to launch a new product in the US. The group already has a huge presence in America – but not for its new product, a battery system for domestic renewable electricity.

Our project involved interviewing a range of potential stakeholders – such as real estate developers, housing associations, planning authorities and environmental regulators – to get a holistic view of how that market might evolve. That enabled the client to take a realistic view of both the existing appetite for the product and current regulations; and how the landscape might change as they developed the product.

It’s not uncommon for a company to walk away at this point – there might be competitive, regulatory or infrastructure barriers that no mode of entry can overcome cost-effectively.

Frameworks to assess a new market

A structured framework can be valuable in assessing a new market. You might see great consumer interest – but if the regulatory stance is hostile, you have to think twice. One way of conducting a thorough overview of a market to pick up all those factors is to analyse the environment through different PESTLE lenses:

PESTLE

Political – how stable is the country? What’s the prevailing ideology? What biases – intervention in markets, say, or taxation – do politicians have?
Economic – how rich is the country? How is wealth distributed? What’s growth like, and where is it likely to continue?
Social – what’s the culture in the country? What are the typical social structures – family, work, community? What about religious norms? Education levels?
Technological – what’s the infrastructure like? How wired is the country? How lumpy is technology penetration? What about population ‘techiness’?
Legal – what rules are there about business ownership? How about liability laws? What recourse do overseas businesses have in the courts?
Environmental – how might the local climate affect the product or service? What about use of resources? Or end-of-life disposal of products?

Porter’s Five Forces

The next step is to get a grip on the competitive landscape, and that’s where tools such as Porter’s Five Forces come in. Michael Porter worked at Harvard University, and in 1979 he published a paper aiming to describe the ‘microenvironment’ for the attractiveness of any given industry – or, in this case, a new market.

There are three forces from ‘horizontal’ competition:

The threat of substitute products or services – what’s the alternative to your own offering that people might use? How are they achieving the same goals now, and what might shift their views?
The threat of established rivals – bearing in mind that in a new market for you, there will be lots of players who know how to operate there better than you do.
The threat of new entrants – being a new entrant to a market doesn’t mean others won’t follow, too. And if you’re establishing a new category in a market, that might tempt others in, or prompt local businesses to muscle in.

Two forces come from ‘vertical’ competition:

The bargaining power of suppliers – opening up a new market might help you gain economies of scale from higher sales volumes. But it also makes you more reliant on suppliers – especially around issues such as logistics.
The bargaining power of customers – understanding the broader competitive landscape will help you see what choices customers have; but, especially in the initial phases, they might need to be tempted to switch brands or try a new category.

Digging into the nuances

Those kinds of analytical tools mean companies can enter a new market with their eyes wide open. But they’ll still need to develop a sophisticated view of customers, competitors and regulations – the kind of insights that will tell them how they might enter a market, not just whether it’s a good idea.

That’s when they’ll commission more in depth market research and run projects like a market segmentation analysis to dig deeper into nuances they can exploit later to optimise their market entry.

At this point, they’ll be starting to research more detail on potential partners; exactly how they would use infrastructure to import, manufacture and distribute in that market; what specific customer niches exist; and even financial planning to take into account the kind of regulatory and cost-of-trade analysis they revealed in the feasibility study.

But above all they need to understand how their brand might be received. It’s not a given that you can simply transplant over your image or core messages.

Culture and behaviour: getting the key variables right

Cultural fit is hugely important. In this phase of the project, we would drill down into the local factors that might help a brand; or create barriers for its acceptance. This is typically a traditional market research exercise, exploring the behavioural aspects of consumers in the new market.

For example, we worked with a Japanese food manufacturer looking to expand into new Asian markets. But in the Philippines, it quickly became clear that there was no appetite for the more subtle flavourings and preservatives in the Japanese product. It was the perfect case of a potentially costly market entry being avoided through strong research findings.

That’s a lesson Pret a Manger learned in Japan, where it opened 14 sandwich shops across greater Tokyo in 2003. Just 18 months later, the company withdrew after its local partner, McDonald’s Japan, pulled out citing heavy losses. Superficial research indicated that Japanese people would love the convenience and novelty of eating-on-the-go sandwiches. But once the novelty wore off, sales dipped quickly. That combination of financial and cultural barriers hadn’t been picked up.

Speaking the language

As well as deciding whether the consumer will use the product, it’s important to explore the way in which it’s marketed. This is particularly important for brand with an established global image – the logos, slogans and even colour palettes that they’ve invested in heavily to define themselves – because those might have unexpected connotations in a new culture. Take, for example, the beauty treatment marketed in Japan as “for clear skin” – which translated elsewhere in Asia as “ghostliness”.

There have been plenty of cases of companies that didn’t do their market research with disastrous consequences:

Clairol’s ‘Mist Stick’ curling iron flopped in Germany: ‘Mist’ is slang for manure.
Coors’s slogan ‘Turn It Loose’ translated into Spanish is slang for diarrhoea.
KFC is known globally for being ‘finger-licking good’ – which translated as ‘eat your fingers off’ in China.
Also in China, ‘Pepsi Brings You Back to Life’ was interpreted as ‘Pepsi Brings You Back from the Grave.’

But rival Coca Cola entered the China market much more deftly. Initially, signs produced by local distributors for ‘ko-ka-ko-la’ (using symbols for the closest phonetic translation) were translated as ‘bite the wax tadpole’. But the company was developing its own local brand positioning, and settled on the symbols ‘K’o-K’ou-K’o-lê’ – which means ‘to allow the mouth to be able to rejoice,’ a far more apt trademark that it registered in 1928.

The money question – how to approach pricing

The other marketing fundamental that research can steer is pricing – a factor every market entry project needs to examine. Where is the competitive price point for consumers in the new market? What volumes and margins might you expect, based on the market opportunity? How does the new market stack up cost-wise – are you importing or manufacturing locally, for example – and what does that do to your opportunity to flex prices?

More broadly, the profitability of different business models often dictates whether and how to enter a new market at all. For some businesses there’s relatively little financial penalty to operating exclusively through local distributors. But at a certain point, issues such as volume of sales, cost of distribution, tariff levels, changes to local taxes and so on will shift the financial rationale. For example, we’ve already seen many UK businesses enter EU markets directly as a mean of offsetting post-Brexit tariffs, staffing, distribution and other costs.

The financial calculations can also dictate the viable means of getting into a market. At one level, that’s purely a ‘treasury’ consideration. How will profits be repatriated? What are the currency risks associated with the new market? How does banking and taxation work there? But how much you can control the brand locally – rather than relying on local agents – is also a factor. (We’ll look at the different modes for entering new markets in more detail in a separate guide.)

Know when to hold… and when to fold

All these factors are a reminder that even strong and established global brands don’t always have an easy time expanding into a new market. They might have some leverage with their global brand name. They have the resources to invest in market penetration. But to do so effectively – and without incurring higher opportunity costs elsewhere – they need data and insights to ensure their entry is tailored.

Even brands that take precautions to adapt to local culture can miss valuable clues as to their viability in a new market. Starbucks famously waited 47 years to open its first branch in Italy – wary of the very particular approach to coffee there. In 2018, its first shop opened in Milan. But the brand has struggled in the country. Limited research into new markets had affected the brand before, with its Australian business failing to meet the demands of local coffee-lovers; its Israeli operation closed in 2003 within two years of launch.

Granular, holistic research is the key

To gain the right insight to inform your market entry strategies, you’ll need to work with external agencies. For some very fast-growing and global brands, there might be a case for building an in-house team with the kind of expertise and experience needed to evaluate new markets in sequence. But when it comes to local research expertise and cultural understanding, the insights can often be two-dimensional.

McDonald’s Japan is a great example of using local insight to tailor what is, on the face of it, a universal brand. Every country has their tiny variations in the McDonald’s menu. But visitors to Tokyo will find radical departures such as Ebi Filet-o (a burger with breaded shrimp); Teriyaki McBurger; and even chocolate fries.

For many businesses – and business models – international expansion is likely to be a multi-year project with long pauses. That means bringing agencies to advise and evaluate each market entry is the only practical solution – especially if they bring specific knowledge on particular markets to bear.

At Kadence, with offices spanning Europe, the US and Asia Pacific, we are well positioned to support brands with market entry research. Find out more about our market entry services or get in touch to discuss a potential project.

How do you calculate your market size and the serviceable obtainable market??

Understanding your market is a crucial part of any business plan, allowing you to know how many customers you can reach and how much revenue you can generate. This will enable you to make more concrete plans and secure a budget and buy-in from key stakeholders.

Top-down market sizing is one of the two main methods we can use to calculate the serviceable obtainable market. In this article, we’ll look at what top-down market sizing involves, how you can use it in your business, and the strengths and weaknesses of this approach.

What is top-down market sizing?

When we calculate our serviceable obtainable market, there are two main ways to approach the calculation: top-down and bottom-up.

Top-down market sizing starts by looking at the current market as a whole, taking a macro view of all the potential customers and revenue. This is called total addressable market, or TAM. TAM is the entire market opportunity if no competition exists. Serviceable Available Market or SAM represents the portion of the TAM that a company’s products and services can serve. Lastly, the serviceable obtainable market, sometimes called share of market or SOM, is the piece of the SAM that can be realistically captured and served by your brand or product.
Bottom-up market sizing, on the other hand, is where you start with your product and the basic units of your business and work out how to scale them. Where can your products be sold, how much for, and how much of the current market could you command? You start small and build up to the result.

How to use top-down market sizing

To use top-down market sizing accurately, you should start with a macro view of your market and work towards a micro perspective.

The first step is to look at industry size estimates to find your product’s largest possible market size. Then, reduce it to a segment you can realistically target and calculate how many potential customers are in that segment.

For example, if you’re selling a payment management system for hair salons in the US, you’d start by calculating the total number of hair salons in the US. Then, reduce that to a smaller segment. You might remove salons with insufficient customers to justify a payment system. Finally, find out which salons you have already sold to or are already serviced by your competitors and are unlikely to buy from you, and so on, to narrow the total market and find your serviceable obtainable market.

Here are some tips for doing this process as effectively as possible:

Use reliable data sources. Some of the data that can help you calculate your market size is available for free or at low cost and can be obtained from analysts like Gartner and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. This can be supported by primary research to give you a rich picture of the market. Spend time analyzing multiple reliable sources to come up with an estimate.
Be consistent and clear in your approach. Make sure your calculations are well-documented and rely on the same data.
Ask lots of questions throughout the process. Who are our customers? Where are they located? Is the market growing? Aim to get as complete and accurate a picture of your market as possible.

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The top-down and bottom-up approaches — which one is best?

So, which approach is better? The reality is that each method has its pros and cons. What works exceptionally well for one business might not work well for yours, and vice versa. Let’s take a look at the advantages and drawbacks of each method.

Top-down market sizing: the pros

It tends to be faster than a bottom-up approach. Gathering existing data to estimate your market size is relatively simple, making it the best option to get a quick estimate of the serviceable obtainable market, which you can supplement with primary data later to reach a more accurate forecast.
It works well for big, established markets with plenty of data and existing analysis.

Top-down market sizing: the cons

It doesn’t work well for new, smaller markets and disruptive products. If there’s a chance your product could have a disruptive effect on its market, this could significantly affect the serviceable obtainable market and render your top-down analysis largely meaningless.
The initial research relies on general information collected by others, so the data is vague to your business and situation. It’s a good general guide but needs to be supported by primary research specific to your particular market for greater accuracy.

Bottom-up market sizing: the pros

It’s tailored to your specific circumstances and uses your data
It’s beneficial for new markets and markets where your product will likely make a significant, disruptive impact.
It results in better forecasting and more accurate data on a more granular level, helping you better understand how your individual projects will make an impact.

Bottom-up market sizing: the cons

It can take longer and require more resources than a top-down approach, as a bottom-down approach requires much more in-depth analysis of your business.
It tends to assume there will be more customers than there actually will. This is important to look out for.
Any errors you make early on at the micro-level become compounded as you work up to the macro level. It’s vital to ensure you’re doing everything correctly, or these mistakes and misunderstandings will carry through your entire analysis.

Ultimately, using both models in your market sizing can be useful. If they both agree, you can assume you have a reasonably accurate market size estimate. The approach you opt for will also depend on the type of business you’re building and the product you’re selling.

Regardless of your approach, it’s important to do it right. At Kadence, we have many years of experience helping businesses with their market research and in sizing the market, and we can help you do the same. To find out more, get in touch.

Since the onset of the pandemic we’ve been working with Bloomberg to understand the priorities, actions and attitudes of business decision makers across APAC. Take a look at the infographic for the key insights from our latest wave including:

69% of companies foresee adopting a hybrid model post-pandemic with a mix of in-office and work-from-home
Yet of the surveyed companies only 4% will no longer keep a physical office
The pandemic has placed greater attention on sustainability with 67% believing that COVID-19 has increased the importance of green / environment protection