Golden Rules for Exporters Podcast
Description
Vocal Characteristics
Language
EnglishVoice Age
Middle Aged (35-54)Accents
North American (Canadian-General) North American (General)Transcript
Note: Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and may contain errors.
Hi there. This is Scott Ferris, chief executive officer and lead Wrangler with the Saddle Up management company based in York Prince Edward Island. I've had a lot of opportunity to work with exporters from a variety of different backgrounds. And for most of the new exporters that I've helped in the years, I've come to realize they're sort of four golden rules that exporters need to know about, especially new exporters. The first is really you have to have it going on. And what I mean by that is that your company needs to be in business and soundly in business. You've got to be collecting your receivables. You're making your payables. Your production is okay. If you're a service company, you're able to provide the services you need to, uh, to your clients on time. You're not over promising. And under delivering your company is somewhat sound. If you've been operating in the domestic market and you've got some initial successes, that's a great starting point. If your company was created to go global from the get go, then that too, is fine. You just have to realize that, as I say, your business is sound and things are are working okay for you. The reason I say that is because exporting will present a number of new challenges to you. A number of new opportunities as well. Don't get me wrong, but also a number of new challenges. And you just need to be prepared for them if your business, if your business isn't sound now, starting out and going into global markets is not going to solve your problems. So start from a position of strength. Second rule. You've gotta have excess capacity, and I know this sounds like a very simplistic situation, but it's very, very true if you can't make mawr or you can't doom, or you simply cannot provide mawr product or service to new clients because you will find them when you go global. When you start to enter new markets internationally through exporting or through importing. If that is your side of the business, then you have to be able to satisfy those new customers. And like I say, if you can't make more or do more than you're in a real pickle and I'll give you an example of this, I work with a company. One time that that was a mushroom grower, and we took this particular company on a trade mission into New York City. And while we were on that mission, the mushroom grower found an opportunity to partner with a chain, a small chain of grocery stores in the New York state area. And through that partnership, the grocery chain in New York state wanted to buy 100% of the capacity of the mushroom grower. They worked out how much of a production the company, the mushroom grower, could produce, what their production schedules could be. They spoke through delivery schedules, and they came to an agreement and signed a contract. Well, of course, that left the mushroom grower in quite a situation, because when he came back to us and told us about the contract that he'd signed, our first question to him was, Well, how are you going to supply? Continue to supply your existing customers? And of course, he was in a quandary, said, Well, I know the contract, you know, he talked about 100% of my capacity, but he didn't really mean he didn't mean everything I make. Of course, when we looked at the contract, we very quickly realized Yes, actually, you are committed to selling 100% of your production capacity to that particular client. So again, if you can't make Mawr or you can't provide more services, you're going to be in a bad situation when you start to go into export markets and you do find new clients because you will. The third Golden rule goes like this. You've gotta have the commitment. I spoke to the fact that you're going to run into a number of new challenges and also a number of new wonderful opportunities. However, there are risks associated with this, and again, there's ways to mitigate those risks. But when you run into these challenges in risks, you have to have the commitment. You've got to prepare yourself to realize how you can mitigate risks and how you can overcome challenges, and that they will not get the better of you. There are tremendous opportunities in the world of exporting, but like I say, you just have to prepare yourself for the challenges in the risks that you're going to face and realize where you can get the help, overcome those challenges and mitigate those risks because there are a lot of partners along the way that can help you out. You're not the first company to go global and you won't be the last. There are others that have done it before you and you can learn from their successes. You can learn from their mistakes and you yourself can be better prepared. When you go global. You just have tohave the commitment. Now the final rule that I have for you is a very basic one. But nonetheless it's one that many companies don't prepare themselves for or when they they are in the situation of exporting and having to deal with new people in new places. They don't handle themselves well, here's the golden rule. People will do business with people they like. Now, what I mean by that is you shop where you shop, you go get your hair done, Your hair cut where you do because you like the people there. You bought your car from where you bought your car from, because you like the people there. You send your kids to certain schools, so on and so forth. People will do business with people they like, but you have to be prepared to adapt to cultural differences and be prepared toe work with people in different cultures. You yourself may have to make some adaptations. You yourself may have to recognize that you bring certain cultural baggage to various situations when it comes to exporting, and you have to be prepared to realize, you know, the customer may not always be right. But if you want to do business with them than there, always your customer and you need to make some certain adaptations to the way they do business. We all do this every day in different ways, shapes and forms. But we just have to recognize that when we go on the global stage, when we export or again, as I say, import, depending on your situation, you're going to run into different people in different situations, and you have to realize to do business with people. People will do business with people they like. This is Scott Ferris with the Saddle Up management company. Thanks so much for listening. I'm the chief executive officer and lead Wrangler here, welcoming you to check out my website a triple w dot saddle up management dot com for ways that I may be able to help your company with customer profiling, market intelligence and lead generation. Let's saddle up. We can make this happen.