Export Products’ Destinations
Posted on August 7th, 2009
To identify the foreign markets that offer the best potential for a product to be exported, a research about the market is necessary. Firms that are just new to the exporting industries should consider the demographic and physical environment as well as the political, social, and cultural environment of the targeted market. The market accessibility, the economic factors and the potential of your product are the other things to be paid attention to in venturing into export. A firm will be able to foresee the demand for products or services that you offer and how well your product will perform in targeted market if a thorough market factor assessment is conducted. The market factor assessment must be conducted on up to ten countries which have potential export opportunities to be able to determine two or three possible foreign markets.
The following will help you identify the appropriate locations to export your products:
- Check if there is a need for the product in the target market
- Determine the general level of acceptance of your target market towards imported products
- Determine the overall population of each country taking into consideration growth and trends of density
- Categorize the adequate age groups that you are targeting
- Determine the population located in the different area such as suburban, rural and urban areas
- Check if your product could be affected by the climatic and weather variations in the area
- Consider the distance of shipment from the point of origin to different target countries
- Determine the average age and the quality of transportation and infrastructures of telecommunications
- Check if the local distribution networks are adequate
- Verify if the system of government is conducive for conducting a business
- Find out the degree of government involvement in private business transactions
- Verify the attitude of the government towards foreign product importations
- Determine the stability of the political system of the target country
- Determine the target country’s commitment to promoting a higher level of imports and exports
- Find out the GNP of each target market and each country’s balance of payment
- Determine the target country’s percentage of import to export ratio
- Determine the target country’s regulations on exchange rate and its variations on inflation rate
- Find out the target country’s per capita income and if its levels of income are increasing
- Determine the discretionary income percentage that can be spent on the goods of consumers
- The percentage of the population which belongs to the middle class should be identified
- Determine the degree of similarity between the target market and the home market
- Fid out if transformation and or adoption of products or services are needed to suit the requirements of the market
- Determine each country’s legal aspect on the distributor agreements
- Find out the requirements on documentations and other import regulations
- Determine if the market is available to foreigners. There are market which appear to be free and open but is closed to foreigners
- Find out the laws regarding intellectual property protection that would affect your products and services
- Determine the tax rate on repatriated profits and if the laws on tax are fair to foreign investors
- Determine the number of foreign competitors in the market and the country of origin of the competitors
