Export: A change of mentality

Today we talk about export as one of the opportunities that companies have to develop for expand their sales network, and nowadays almost all SMEs want to export, but the first requirement to export is a change of mind,  a new perspective to generate  an  internal  or external division of the company for exposrt.

This change of mind must be implemented at all levels of the organization. From the property to the productive bases of the organization.

This is how we should begin by describing this change of mentality by levels:

Company Owner or General Manager: In this export process, as well as, in quality systems, the owner must be extensively committed to the project, since the export will require a series of adaptations, organizational changes and product adaptations, which will involve additional initial investments and work for the owner and team members. Without this commitment, export projects tend to fail and possibly generate exports but without great importance or relevance in the medium-long term.

The owners and the commercial team must understand that international sales are not the same as in their proper countries, because in these sales we face different cultures, different methods of consumption, different buying habits. But this does not mean that our products or services can not fit in this area, on the contrary it will require more effort, but there will always be a niche market and, over time, it will generate great satisfaction in sales and profits.

 International commercial team: The commercial team must be qualified to be able to relate widely to different cultures, detect viable products for export, detect the right customers for our company and detect the main markets to which international sales should be directed.

This department is the one that will be more related to our future clients and the one that more dynamism, adaptation, flexibility and knowledge must acquire day to day to be able to transmit to the interior of the company as to the outside all the fundamental aspects of the strategy of sales and adaptation.

Quality and Production Equipment: These two departments must be fully trained to understand that the requirement to work with quality and produce with a margin of almost or equal to 0 is of great relevance in the export, since an error can generate high costs for the company or loss of customers that have cost so much time and labor acquire. It is here that the work of Management and commercial department must have a positive influence, motivating all to integrate to this process of change.