E416: Debunking Myths About Selling in the EU with Melanie Shabangu

Mike and Melanie of AVASK talk about what sellers need to know before expanding their ecommerce businesses to Europe and other markets abroad.   Many sellers think that selling or expanding into the EU is a nightmare, what with the language barriers and different compliance requirements. I myself have done it in the past and found it quite difficult.   That being said, my guest today, Melanie Shabangu, will help me debunk common myths all of us might believe about selling in the EU, and she’ll explain exactly how to keep an ecommerce business profitable when expanding abroad.    Melanie is a tax expert and ecommerce accountant for AVASK, an accounting firm that specializes in helping ecommerce sellers expand their businesses into Europe, the UAE, and even Australia.    In this episode, I have the pleasure of picking her brain about what selling in the EU is like, especially for those who have little to no experience with it. We’ll be talking about myths that might be putting off a lot of US sellers from selling in the EU, VAT and other compliance requirements, and the overall economics of selling in markets abroad.   Timestamps:    Introduction - 0:00 Introduction to Melanie and AVASK Accounting - 1:35 Myths you might believe about selling in the EU - 2:35 The basic economics of selling in the EU - 4:46 How much it costs to translate an Amazon listing - 13:54 What is Value Added Tax? - 26:53 What your costs could look like with VAT - 27:56 Standard compliance requirements when expanding into European markets - 32:45   I want to thank Melanie for all the valuable stuff she shared today. I definitely wish I knew all of these before trying to sell abroad—I hope it motivated you to give it a shot as much as it did me.   If you want to learn more about what we discussed in this episode, shoot Melanie an email at [email protected] or contact their expansion team at [email protected].   On the topic of selling across borders, we’re running an exclusive giveaway for our friends in Canada. By answering our quick 2-minute survey over on ecomcrew.com/poll2021 you get a chance to win a full year’s worth of EcomCrew Premium membership absolutely free! This grants you access to all our courses, past webinars, and direct email support from Dave and myself. Good luck!   As always, please leave us a review over on iTunes if you haven’t already. Until the next one, happy selling and we’ll talk to you soon!