{"id":1340,"date":"2017-01-26T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-01-26T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/?post_type=blog&p=1340"},"modified":"2017-01-26T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-01-26T00:00:00","slug":"is-your-technology-company-primed-for-online-global-growth","status":"publish","type":"blog","link":"https:\/\/www.motionpoint.com\/blog\/is-your-technology-company-primed-for-online-global-growth\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Your Technology Company Primed for Online Global Growth?"},"template":"","blog_categories":[5,15],"resource_categories":[27,37,30,24,35,33,26,21,23,19,32,22,17,18],"targeted_localized_audience":[],"document_categories":[],"class_list":["post-1340","blog","type-blog","status-publish","hentry","blog_categories-international-business-strategies","blog_categories-website-translation","resource_categories-industry-b2b-manufacturing","resource_categories-content-type-blog-post","resource_categories-business-goal","resource_categories-role-business-strategist","resource_categories-content-type","resource_categories-business-goal-global-expansion","resource_categories-industry","resource_categories-topic-international-marketing","resource_categories-role-marketer","resource_categories-topic-motionpoint","resource_categories-business-goal-optimize-performance","resource_categories-role","resource_categories-topic","resource_categories-topic-website-translation"],"acf":{"blog_short_description":"Tech companies face fewer challenges than other industries when expanding globally. Learn why in our report.","news_inline_styles":"","blog_video_id":"","article_body":"

It\u2019s a great time to be a technology company. These days, it\u2019s easier than ever to serve consumers around the world in ways that are low risk, and high reward. Global demand for digital services and products are at an all-time high, too.<\/p>\n

The truth is, technology companies are uniquely primed to expand into international markets, thanks to global demand for their products, an ever-growing number of e-commerce solutions that accommodate international currencies and payment platforms, and digital delivery methods.<\/p>\n

\u201cTech companies often sidestep so many of the challenges other industries face when expanding overseas,\u201d explains Victoria Bloyer, an Online Strategist for MotionPoint\u2019s Global Growth team. \u201cCompare them to retailers. They rarely have to worry about delivery dates, shipping costs, or handling returns. Also, since they\u2019re mostly B2B\u2014and businesses big enough to need their services have internationally-accepted major credit cards\u2014supporting local payment options isn\u2019t an issue.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Tech companies often sidestep so many of the challenges other industries face when expanding overseas.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The overseas opportunity burns brightly for savvy tech companies. As we recently reported<\/a>, the number of middle-class consumers is surging worldwide. This is especially so in emerging markets, where Internet, mobile, and technology adoption rates are skyrocketing. Infrastructures are improving. Disposable income among these consumers is rising, too. <\/p>\n

Some tech companies are killing it with their expansion plans. Take Netflix, which famously expanded into 130 new markets in a single day<\/i> last January<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Indeed, businesses know global expansion is where it\u2019s at. In 2016, nearly 50% of U.S. companies<\/a> expected their profits from international transactions to increase during the year. That\u2019s a sizable leap from the 39% from the year before. Further, nearly 90% believed international expansion was a must-have for long-term growth. About 70% believed emerging markets was where the greatest opportunity would be found. (They\u2019re right. More on that in a moment.)<\/p>\n

It\u2019s undeniable that the \u201cworld is shrinking with more companies expanding their product and services to a global market,\u201d as one Forbes<\/i> contributor<\/a> wrote. So when should your tech company expand globally?<\/p>\n

Expansion-Worthy Ingredients<\/h2>\n

One Accel executive<\/a>, who\u2019s helped tech companies like Dropbox expand into new markets (and who\u2019s collaborated with international execs at Google, Facebook, LinkedIn and Uber), suggests that when \u201c25% or more of your business is coming from international markets, it\u2019s time to scale outside your home country.\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve offered plenty of advice in past blog posts about how to identify ideal global markets<\/a>, and have provided a smart (and risk-averse) methodology<\/a> for entering and serving them. We\u2019ll also soon debut our annual Trendbook report, in which we identify this year\u2019s Top 30 global online markets and key trends businesses must adapt to in 2017.<\/p>\n

Those posts are worth reading, though the \u201cshort version\u201d takeaway is essentially: choose markets where consumers are already engaging with your primary-market website. Ideally, these markets have robust Internet adoption, business-friendly policies, and solutions to accommodate locally-preferred payments and (if needed) fulfillment.<\/p>\n

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Choose markets where consumers are already engaging with your primary-market website.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Take special note of emerging markets with supercharged mobile adoption rates. Take China. In 2013 and 2014, the country saw a surge in U.S. tech companies expanding to serve its consumers\u2014businesses such as LinkedIn and Uber took great strides to engage Chinese consumers, using smartphones as the perfect channel of engagement. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn the PC Internet era, none of the U.S. Internet companies succeeded in China,\u201d noted a Business Insider<\/i> contributor<\/a>, \u201cbut the opportunity arises again in the mobile Internet era. \u2026 China\u2019s tremendous market size is the biggest draw for these U.S. tech companies. Most have become \u2018mobile first\u2019 and now need to also become \u2018China-first.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve found these markets to be particularly expansion-worthy for technology companies:<\/p>\n