Thrive in Global Markets

In the new episode of Conquer New Markets, Levent is joined by Richard Brooks, CEO of UK-based language service provider, K International. Richard talks about how he started off his career as well as his wide experience in localization and sales.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Sales is something we all do on a day-to-day basis and it's up to us to free it from the negative connotation it has and understand that nothing happens without sales.

Even if you have the best product or service, it's not possible to grow your business with a poor sales strategy.

To be able to carry your business abroad, you need to learn the culture, traditions, politics and lifestyle of the target culture and apply it to your business strategy through sales.

BEST MOMENTS

“The best salespeople are those who are genuine, authentic, and know about the topic.”

"We are all trying to get the governments to take sales more seriously and the world to take sales more seriously and part of that is through SMAa, which is the smallest part involved."

"You can take a great product abroad but if you don't get the culture aligned correctly, at best it's funny and at worst it's offensive to the target culture."

"Digitally speaking, companies have no excuse not to be international from day one. If you look at some of the large, billion-dollar companies such as Facebook or Google, you'll see that they are international right off the bat. Partly because they can be, because their service can be delivered digitally. But partly because they've embraced localization."

ABOUT THE HOST

Levent Yildizgoren, the author of 'Good Business in any Language', is an award-winning entrepreneur, localisation professional and a PRINCE2 qualified project manager. 

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leventyildizgoren/  

Twitter: https://twitter.com/yildizgoren  

IG: https://www.instagram.com/levent.yildizgoren/

ABOUT THE GUEST

Richard Brooks is the CEO of UK based Language Service Provider, K International. Having spent 25 years+ in the language industry he also holds an executive board member position for the European Language Industry Association and is a former executive board member for the Association of Language Companies. 

Richard completed his triple-accredited MBA at Cranfield School of Management majoring in economics and finance. Now a popular conference speaker and executive educator he has developed numerous international programs and written several. He is a fellow of the Institute of Sales Professionals where he is helping to shape the ISP’s policy towards small and medium-sized enterprises.

In addition, Richard is an active investor, non-exec director and business coach for the localization industry. Through this work, he has helped several entrepreneurs create winning strategies, develop their senior teams and unlock value in their companies.

CONTACT METHOD

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/K.International/ 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/k-international-language-translation-services/ 

Personal Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/richardbrooks/ 

Website: https://www.k-international.com/ 

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Visit TTC website: https://ttcwetranslate.com/  

PR can put your product or service in front of a huge number of consumers. In this episode of Conquer New Markets, Levant is joined by Sarah Kauter the CEO of awarn-winning PR and marketing agency VerriBerri. Join the conversation as Sarah discusses the importance of PR and branding, why it’s essential to build trust with your consumers and why building a respectful brand message can help you grow internationally.

In the new and insightful episode of Conquer New Markets, Levent is joined by James Church, COO and co-founder of the UK's leading pitch specialist, Robot Mascot. In this episode, James talks about how to become an 'investable entrepreneur' and what it actually means. Breaking the subject step by step, the author of the Amazon bestseller takes the audience on a journey to understand the mindset of investors. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

It can be quite different to pitch in a domestic market than it is to pitch in an international market. It's really important to understand your audience.

Investors can have their own preferences as well. Some investors like to invest only in physical products while others may prefer to invest in services. It's really important for businesses to make sure that their ambitions are aligned with that of the investors.

If you are looking to create a business with a big scale that employs 50+ people and plans to go overseas, working with investors is one of the best options for you to be able to reach the goals you've set in a reasonable time.

Having a timezone-based model can create a huge difference in your business strategy. Especially if you are operating in the service industry, working with a timezone-based approach rather than a country-based one can give you so much scope.

BEST MOMENTS

“The main thing about pitching is to understand where your clients are pitching at for their investors. Let's take a business in UAE that could be pitching at the local market, the European market or the US market. The thing is, in terms of investors, there is a massive cultural difference to undertsand."

“There is no right or wrong, it's about what makes the most strategic sense for your business.”

"Going global is easier than ever - whether you are a software business or someone with a physical product. Even if you initially have a physical shopfront, you can easily create a digital one and then the whole world is your oyster."

ABOUT THE HOST

Levent Yildizgoren, the author of 'Good Business in any Language', is an award-winning entrepreneur, localisation professional and a PRINCE2 qualified project manager. 

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leventyildizgoren/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/yildizgoren  

IG: https://www.instagram.com/levent.yildizgoren/

ABOUT THE GUEST

James Church is the co-founder and COO of Robot Mascot, the UK's leading pitch agency whose clients are 30x more likely to raise investment. He is the author of the best-selling book “Investable Entrepreneur”, where he shares his unique methodology for convincing investors.

James has been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur Magazine, on numerous industry blogs and podcasts, run mentoring sessions at Tech Hun, Google Campus and Runway East, and deliver mastermind sessions for Design Museum, The Chartered Institute of Marketing and the University of East Anglia.

CONTACT METHOD

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/robotmascot/ 

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/robot-mascot/ 

Personal Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamescchurch/ 

Website: www.robotmascot.co.uk

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Visit TTC website: https://ttcwetranslate.com/  

Purchase James's book 'Investable Entrepreneur' on Amazon today: https://www.amazon.com/Investable-Entrepreneur-convince-investors-business/dp/1781334900 

How to present yourself as investible. Join an insightful episode of Conquer New Markets as Levant is joined by James Church, COO and co-founder of the UK's leading pitch specialist, Robot Mascot. Their clients are 30 times more likely to raise investment. They are the trusted pitch partner to Crowdcube, Seedrs and SeedLegals. James has helped hundreds of entrepreneurs position their investment opportunity to investors, been featured in Entrepreneur magazine and ran mentoring sessions at Tech Hub, Google Campus, Runway East and the University of East Anglia. Learn more at www.robotmascot.co.uk

In the new episode of the ‘Conquer New Markets’ podcast, Levent is joined by Mike Korba, the Chief Commercial Officer and Co-founder of User.com and marketing automation expert. Join Levent and Mike as they discuss how the use of CRMs have changed over the past years, how important marketing is for any company’s business strategy, what MACH and CDP are and how it can help your marketing strategy in the long run, the importance of human touch in marketing and how to balance it with your automation and what awaits us in 2022 in terms of marketing.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Marketing activities are usually undervalued by most companies but it’s the first point of contact with your clients and the most important point of a successful business strategy.

CRM has turned into a huge marketing tool in the past couple of years while it was widely used by salespeople and was used for supporting people to have a relationship with current customers only a few years ago. So, any company that wants to take a step further with its marketing should start making the best use of its CRM system.

Whether it’s email marketing, a Facebook group or targeted advertisement, a direct connection with the potential client is one of the most important points of a marketing strategy.

BEST MOMENTS

“It’s very important to have a direct connection between me, as a company, and my potential client.”

“Every company should have two main goals; first is marketing and the second is innovation.”

“Human touch is extremely important. Of course, we all work with companies but we don’t buy from companies, we buy from people.”

VALUABLE RESOURCES

Visit TTC website: https://ttcwetranslate.com/ 

ABOUT THE HOST

Levent Yildizgoren, the author of 'Good Business in any Language', is an award-winning entrepreneur, localisation professional and a PRINCE2 qualified project manager. 

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leventyildizgoren/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/yildizgoren  

IG: https://www.instagram.com/levent.yildizgoren/

ABOUT THE GUEST

Mike Korba is the Chief Commercial Officer and Co-founder at User.com, marketing automation expert, internet enthusiast and theoretician, e-marketing practitioner and lecturer on biggest Polish universities. He has been working in the marketing industry for over 19 years. He knows both the prospect of working in an advertising agency and the specificity of working in the marketing department. Mike understands what it means to "do marketing with limited resources" and he was a speaker at many conferences, including Websummit, SaaStock, Infoshare.

CONTACT METHOD

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/usercomofficial

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/user-com/

Personal Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michalkorba/

Website: https://user.com/en/

PR can put your product or service in front of a huge number of consumers. In this episode of Conquer New Markets, Levent is joined by Sarah Kauter, the CEO of award-winning PR and marketing agency, VerriBerri. Join the conversation as Sarah discusses the importance of PR and branding, why it’s essential to build trust with your consumers and why building a respectful brand message can help you grow internationally.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• PR is a great growth tool because you can get featured in articles, on TV and in magazines and newspapers, and there are so many opportunities. With PR you can really expand the number of eyes on your product or service because you’re borrowing the reach of large publications with huge readerships.
• When expanding into international markets it’s important to translate your product or service into the native language because it makes a difference to the trust between the brand and the end-user. It shows you care about the user experience. 
• There's no right or wrong when expanding globally, it’s just important that your brand is accepting of everybody regardless of who they are. And that's important, no matter what you're selling because it’s all about the people you're talking to so you need to make sure you reflect your values in your message and speak to what your consumers want to achieve because ultimately it's all going to come back to return on investment and the money that they're going to make. 
• COVID has shown everybody that a consumer market can have highs. It can have lows, but business to business services and products tend to be relatively solid.

BEST MOMENTS
“PR is the best way forward for larger companies because they pay more attention to marketing than smaller businesses”

“Larger businesses appreciate that they can't do everything in-house and they don't have the expertise for everything so that’s where specialised agencies come in.”

“When branding internationally you've got to take into consideration what is culturally acceptable in different places”

“90% of people will believe what’s put forward in front of them, but it’s still important to back up your marketing materials with research.”

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leventyildizgoren/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/yildizgoren

IG: https://www.instagram.com/levent.yildizgoren/

ABOUT THE HOST

Levent Yildizgoren, author of 'Good Business in any Language', is an award-winning entrepreneur, localisation professional and a PRINCE2 qualified project manager. 

ABOUT THE GUEST

Sarah Kauter is the CEO of multi-award-winning marketing agency VerriBerri Digital. A PR and design agency, helping businesses across the UK and USA to grow their brand. VerriBerri boasts a vast array of connections due to over eleven years in the industry. Sarah has won awards such as "Entrepreneur of the year" in 2018 and "Business Person of the year" in 2020.

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-kauter-a28a3b1b/

Website: ​​https://www.verriberri.co.uk/ 

The bigger the network, the stronger the network effects. Join an insightful episode of Conquer New Markets as Levent is joined by Saasha Celestial-One, the chief operating officer and co-founder of OLIO. Together they discuss international growth, creating supply and demand in new markets and why it’s important to start a mission-driven business. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• To launch into new markets you have to have very strong organic activity. Select test markets and a hypothesis to launch into them by generating some demand.
• To grow internationally you need to get the supply and to get the supply you need to identify the demand. Next, you need to get in the press, form partnerships, get the volunteers, get the local business partners and get everything in one place.
• The talent acquisition market right now for most companies is hard but we've found, people really want to work for a company that has an authentic purpose, authentic mission and that does something meaningful. New entrepreneurs should always look to start a business they’re passionate about and is mission-driven.
• The bigger the network, the stronger the network effects. If we have a large and engaged user base, there are lots of different ways to commercialise. It's really important if you want to scale and you're going to need capital to scale as a social enterprise that your social and your commercial.

BEST MOMENTS
“To grow you have to be incredibly lean and incredibly resourceful.”

“Nearly 10 million people in this country struggle to feed themselves on a daily basis and a lot of them have smartphones and  a roof over their head, but that doesn't mean that they have a food budget or household budget.”

“It’s amazing for a social enterprise to grow internationally because you're developing a good cause.”

“We had to have faith that the demand would come.”

VALUABLE RESOURCES

https://olioex.com/

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leventyildizgoren/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/yildizgoren

IG: https://www.instagram.com/levent.yildizgoren/

ABOUT THE HOST

Levent Yildizgoren, the author of 'Good Business in any Language', is an award-winning entrepreneur, localisation professional and a PRINCE2 qualified project manager. 

ABOUT THE GUEST

Saasha is the Co-Founder & COO of OLIO, a free app that harnesses the power of mobile technology and the sharing economy to provide a revolutionary new solution to the problem of food waste. OLIO does this by connecting neighbours with each other, and with local businesses so that surplus food can be shared, not thrown away. Launched in the UK in January 2016 and made available globally in October 2016, OLIO has 3.3m users, supported by 65,000 volunteers promoting OLIO in their local communities. Collectively, OLIOers have successfully shared 15m portions of food with each other. Prior to founding OLIO, Saasha spent 13 years in finance, strategy and business development roles at Morgan Stanley, McKinsey & American Express, and also founded My Creche, London's first PAYG provider offering flexible childcare for busy parents. Saasha has an MBA from Stanford and an undergraduate degree in Economics from the University of Chicago. She was named one of the UK's 'coolest female founders' by Business Insider, is the mother to 8-year-old Nolan, and the proud daughter of hippy entrepreneurs.

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/saasha-celestial-one-929390/ 

Website: ​​https://olioex.com/ 

Listen in to an action-packed episode of Conquer New Markets as Levent is joined by international sales and marketing consultant Kathryn Read. Together, they dive into international growth and the tools and tactics needed to expand into emerging markets.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Going global for international growth is rewarding for most companies and when you look at the statistics from the US commercial service, US companies who export are likely to be 17% more profitable than companies who stay domestically. Within Europe, it's normal and quite easy to expand internationally.
• A big mistake companies often make is they lack self-awareness about their own motivation and about the company. They haven't experienced the journey of growth and therefore expansion can be quite risky because sometimes companies then expand on the basis of a whim. The first mistake is self-awareness the second mistake is a real laser-sharp strategic focus.
• Profitably into China is a different matter to selling into China and having a good turnover in China. Companies often underestimate the complexity of doing business, how sophisticated the consumer is, and how advanced the market is.
• Companies have to decide how success looks for them in an overseas market. Examples of this can be looking to increase revenue or aiming to take the pressure off your domestic market by applying pressure on a competitor in an overseas market or you may be looking to extend the product life of your service which is maybe no longer relevant in your home market, but you might find it is somewhere else in the world where the market is less advanced.

BEST MOMENTS
“For most medium and smaller sized companies looking to expand internationally, they need to be looking for a sales partner.“

“Everyone's global journey is different. Each client is unique and so some of them need more support on one part and some of them need more support on different aspects of their business.”

“For smaller countries, there's a motivation to expand internationally.”

“The biggest markets in literal terms and maybe not the best markets to enter into.”

“Sometimes you need to look at expansion with a blue ocean approach and if you’re inexperienced and don't want to make product modifications right away look at established markets as a shop window.”

VALUABLE RESOURCES

https://kathrynread.com/international-clarity

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leventyildizgoren/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/yildizgoren

IG: https://www.instagram.com/leventyildizgoren/

ABOUT THE HOST

Levent Yildizgoren, the author of 'Good Business in any Language', is an award-winning entrepreneur, localisation professional and a PRINCE2 qualified project manager.

ABOUT THE GUEST

Kathryn Read is an international sales and marketing consultant with over 20 years of experience in developing niche products in emerging markets. She helps SME companies breakthrough international barriers and create successful entrepreneurs in a thriving global marketplace.

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathrynread/
Website: ​​https://kathrynread.com | https://uniconsult-wick.com

Without motivation, nothing gets done. Levent is joined by business coach, mentor and founder The Reluctant Leader training academy, Mark Terrell. Discover the power behind relationship motivators, how to motivation division affects your vision and why learning how to be a leader and a motivator and not just a business owner is key to success.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Motivation is a key to success because if we lose sight of what motivates us then ultimately our business is not going to work. Motivating yourself and your team is essential, whether you're expanding, growing or just surviving. Without motivation, nothing gets done.
• The reluctance comes into business when you start a company. In the beginning, you have a passion for solving a problem but a reluctance to lead and manage, to motivate others and to be in a position of being noticed. It’s important to identify what it is that’s preventing us from stepping up and leading.
• The motivation division is thinking about what we want to achieve. Firstly you have to set a direction for your company. Secondly, think about how we want to do it using your skills, knowledge and values. Lastly, is why? Asking yourself why you’re on this direction and identify what’s motivating you to keep going.
• There are three relationship motivators. The Defender, which is around security and stability, The Friend, which covers the belonging feeling you get when you’re part of a team and The Star, which is about recognition and being noticed. Then there’s three achievement motivators, money, influence and responsibility and expertise.

BEST MOMENTS

“The biggest mistake business owners make is that they lose sight of their thoughts for growth or that they never really had a vision.”

“I think you've got to have a clear vision for your business everyone's got to know the part they play in allowing that vision to come to fruition.”

“I've seen companies getting de-motivated because they don’t have shared division in place across the whole management team.”

“When you think about leadership and motivation, motivation has got to be at least 50% of leadership.”

VALUABLE RESOURCES

https://www.thereluctantleader.academy/quick-start-guide

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/leventyildizgoren/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/yildizgoren

IG: https://www.instagram.com/leventyildizgoren/

ABOUT THE HOST

Levent Yildizgoren, author of 'Good Business in any Language', is an award winning entrepreneur, localisation professional and a PRINCE2 qualified project manager.

ABOUT THE GUEST

Mark Terrell is a coach, mentor, author and founder of The Reluctant Leader training academy designed to help Business Owners and Directors create businesses that sets you free. Mark helps business owners to keep their energy levels high by focusing on their motivations and goals.

CONTACT METHOD

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markterrellreluctantleader/
Website: ​​https://www.thereluctantleader.academy

Abi is the acting managing director of TTC wetranslate Ltd and has been working with the company for over 20 years. In this episode, Abi and Levent discuss how much a translation project should cost you.

In this episode you will learn Abi and Levent's insights on;

• How much is too much for a translation,
• What factors affect the cost of a translation project, and;
• Whether or not expensive equals quality.

Join Abi and Levent to learn everything localisation from quotation of a project to delivery!