In an increasingly globalized world, it's never been easier for small businesses to reach new markets. So why do so many US entrepreneurs shun international sales to keep things ticking along at home? We’re going to take a look at the realities of going global and how the rewards can offset the risk.

From shipping internationally by accident to answering customer queries with Google Translate, we ask the entrepreneurs how they went about global expansion – and why it can take time for this strategy to become profitable.

So is it about time you translated your website into Spanish? Or should you just stick with sales to Canada?

“I think it’s time we went global.” How many times have you heard that cliché in a movie? It seems like a tall order but the barriers to taking on the world are nowhere near insurmountable as they once were. The internet has blurred international boundaries and the technology to reach customers in the four corners of the globe – yes, really laying on the clichés here – is accessible to even the smallest business.

Of course, world domination has never been an easy or straightforward goal...

The world is your oyster

But do you really need to go international? After all, many businesses are happy with catering to local or domestic demand, and doing very well out of it. But when the world comes knocking on your door, you might have to reconsider your stance. Paul Pallas, CEO of hardware supplier SWISCO had to do that when orders from Japan started coming in.

“In the beginning, when we started selling internationally, it wasn't on purpose. Anybody in the world can reach our website and we started receiving orders from – or not even receiving orders, requests from – around the world, to order from us. Honestly, I'm not sure why it makes sense for some of these really far countries to order from us, but they do. So my guess is just that there is a need for these items, and there's not suppliers out there.”

Paul isn’t the only entrepreneur who found that international reach came about purely just by being on the web. “We were never just domestic because we didn't know how to set it up properly… and our website was just open up to everyone,” says Casey Kelley, the brains behind Blended Designs – a company making backpacks featuring people of color as characters. To be fair though, Casey’s vision is something that will have a positive impact on the international stage.

“Our mission is to empower children and to empower students. In the US, there are constant negative images of people of color. So if a child is growing up consistently seeing these negative images, then what does that do to their psyche? So how do we change some of the messaging? And that is something that we want, period. It's not unique to the United States. We know that people throughout the world deal with some of the biases that come with being a person of color. So we are open to that and we don't want to limit our message.”

But where will you start?

It’s a big old world out there – and yes, another cliché – but for any business looking to expand internationally, choosing which countries you sell to comes with a whole raft of secondary and tertiary considerations. One of those is the technical limitations of your site – while Paul’s presence on the web was enough to pull in the orders, fulfilling them was another matter. “We had a customer from Japan that wanted to order from us, but our website didn't have any other countries other than Canada and the United States in the checkout form.” After discovering that shipping to Japan was actually quite straightforward with the right partner on board, it emboldened them to open up to other countries. “We started adding new countries almost every month. And now we probably ship to a good amount of the countries in the world.”

Ebun Olaloye had a clear idea of the ideal target markets for his soccer wear brand, Live Breathe Futbol: the UK and Europe, the heartlands for, as Pelé called it, ‘The Beautiful Game.’ “We thought at the time, okay, England is the home of football. To have a warehouse in England would be great. This kind of offer out there would be great."

And that’s an important consideration. With the company being based in the US, even Britain’s passionate appetite for football can turn to hunger pains if they’re faced with three-week shipping times. “For me it's important that we're on the ground there,” continues Ebun, “because I want that experience that you would get if you live in California and order from LBF – you get your order in two to three days. I want that customer in England to have that same experience.”

Oh. Canada.

But maybe, just maybe, there’s somewhere closer to hand? Somewhere where shipping is less likely to be a problem? Canada is an obvious choice for any US business looking to dip its toes into international waters. But local doesn’t necessarily mean similar – or simple.

Nested Bean, a company that makes weighted sleepwear for infants, found just that. “In Canada, initially we were selling through another entity,” says founder Manasi Gangan. “The problems occurred where the end customer was a few degrees away from us and the sales were controlled and limited by what the other entity could do. But the main reason was that the brand itself was not as known in Canada, as it may have been in the United States.”

Even though Canada shares many similarities with the US in terms of culture, geography and (to an extent) language, it still required a different and measured approach. “It takes time and patience and lots and lots of data and lots of making mistakes. It has its logistics challenges which are far different than the United States because the country is just populated differently: thinly populated population concentration in certain pockets makes logistics very difficult.”

Parlez-vous e-commerce?

Canada is of course a bilingual nation, but most businesses can get away with operating in English – ditto when targeting the UK. But for many of the countries in the world, language becomes a vital consideration. “You have to have bilingual or trilingual packaging just for regulatory reasons,” reminds Manasi.

With SWISCO moving to a new e-commerce platform, Paul is seeing it as an opportunity to hammer down the international side of things, linguistically speaking. “One of our goals is to start a new website that is going to be in Spanish. And this Hispanic website is going to test the waters for us, to see how we do in Spanish speaking countries. And from there, we're going to, if it's successful, which I'm expecting it to be, we'll move on to other languages.”

Of course, having the website translated into another language is important, but so is having customer service that can operate in that language. “Once in a while, we will use Google translate to translate a few different email inquiries we get in different languages and that's been working okay,” says Paul. But technology can’t help as much with the cultural aspects of dealing with other nations. An idiom that works well in one language might make no sense in another, or even be offensive. And there’s much more to culture than just language.

“Our message still resonates with people regardless of where they are,” says Casey. “One thing that we've had a lot of conversations around is we've had people say, can you make Hispanic characters? Can you make other different nationalities and ethnicities? And I think what people forget is that, you know, there isn't a "Hispanic" character that we could make because Mexican is very different than Puerto Rican, it's very different from Brazilian… there's so many different versions and none of them look alike.”

International challenges

Casey raises an interesting point about the challenges of international selling: they’re not always the obvious ones. Ebun, for example, faced a few obstacles when it came to positioning his marketing for Europe and the UK – which as he said earlier, should have been straightforward territories to sell to.

“It was very naive, and we just thought, okay, we have a brand that's established and if we expand to the UK, it's going to be great. We really underestimated the challenge ahead of rebuilding a successful business in a different part of the world. I'm not in the UK on a day-to-day basis, we don't really have anyone marketing in the UK.”

And as Paul found out, the inevitable taxes, surcharges and duties that move in lockstep with international shipping can quickly get out of hand if something goes wrong. “We messed up an order – we sent someone the wrong items. So we reshipped the order, but didn't understand that we needed to make it obvious to customs that this was a no-charge order. And the customer got charged duties and taxes again.”

It’s clear that international selling is a tough proposition, and it isn’t for everyone. But – to end on yet another cliché – it’s a case of weighing up the pros and cons. “There's a chance to get more customers in a new place and really grow your business,” says Ebun, but, “Don't do it if you're not ready, if you don't have the resources to fully commit to doing it to the standard that you're currently doing it here in the States or wherever you're based out of.”

As to where those resources might be found, Ebun – a soccer strategist to the core – plays his cards close to his heart. “If you don't have the resources, still think about it but think about how you get the resources to be able to do it successfully. That would be my advice.”