Know-How Exchange : Strategy

most of the European Countries foreign affairs have websites where you can find Embassy contacts. There you will probably be taken to a Comercial contact that can open that opportunity for you.

Try www.icex.es or www..icep.pt for spain and portugal, for instance.

Trade shows in Europe are also a way to get to the possible people.

Some good stuff here. Antonio - do you have any understanding of what to expect from these Embassy teams? In other words, what will they want and need from me? What should I expect from them?

It is a good suggestion, I just not sure what to expect.

As a German/European I feel/think I should have a first answer to this question - especially as strategic marketing is also my profession as a marketing consultant.

Without writing a book:
If you enter the expression 'Central Europe' into Google you will see a. o. a map which starts with Germany in the West and ends with Moldova on the right.

Most of these countries belong to the European Union (EU), consisting of 27 markets today: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, UK - which count up altogether to abt. 500 million inhabitants.

The European Union is still in its expansian stage, although I do not expect more countries to be added soon. We first should reach some stage of 'harmonization' until this goes on.

We have to have in mind that most of these countries have their own languages (even if they are in most cases able to communicate in English and partly even German), their own history and of course their very specific mentality. Find some hints please at https://www.internationales-marketingkonzept.de/en/ with regard to exhibitions, chambers of trade, rep-organisations (if available) travel information and more - where I concentrate, however, only on countries which I visited myself several times each.

If we add to this the 'Eastern European' part we find through WIKIPEDIA for example most of the countries to be the same as for 'Central' plus Russia and its former satellite states, like Ukraine, and so on - and of course without Germany, AUstria, etc.

Looking to the answers before I find some with links to relevant websites where one can find names of distributors (partly competitors) as well as those to public assistance (embassies and so).

I do no know how active such Americann official organisations are, however, from my personal experience with German ones I would simply guess they cannot have such 'marketing knowledge' about all the different industries they are asked for.

The Internet of course is a good source, however, it has its problems. Please refer in this context to my article 'Wanted ..." at https://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Georg_Michael_Richter

To become successful in these markets I would suggest to define the strategic goals, do the necessary analyses, define some of the potential contacts to possibly work with and then sit into the airplane and visit the countries each for about a week (the smaller ones) and discuss all mmatters and targets on the spot with the contacts found. For the lareger countries, like Germany, Poland and others it might be worthwhile to spend a longer time.

I hope this hels and ... please ask more specifically if need be.

Have you tried the US Dept of Commerce as a starting point?
They are usually really eager to help prospective exporters as this means job growth in the US creating foreign currency inflows and reducing the trade deficit.

Try www.buyusa.gov

Good luck.

ChrisB

Hi.

Usually what embassies ask from you is essentially data in order to qualify the opportunity. Is it a co-operation project? a joint venture? do you need a local partner? in what sector?

If you want, you can e-mail me with further info so I can provide you with names and phone numbers.

Regards,
Antonio