A significant part of breaking into a foreign market is local knowledge. As affiliates, we operate in our own local markets instinctively because we are part of the culture and society, but the requirements of other countries — what is acceptable and will sell — can vary hugely. Success depends on gaining an understanding of lifestyles, values, attitudes and aspirations and it is not simply a matter of market maturity, though this plays a major part. Finding niches where goods and services are needed and where the competition is not overly sophisticated can be highly rewarding.

There are often significant commonalities, but also variations for each national group. Oscar Wilde famously described the British and Americans as two nations divided by a common language. Although English has become the default language of commerce in many countries, this being just one of the by-products of the global Internet phenomenon, every region and country has its own subtle linguistic nuances, and each will be a viable market only if product or service features and benefits are adapted and presented specifically to suit the local needs. Take for example, the attitudinal variations occurring in different regions of the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand even though English is ostensibly the common language.

When considering building an affiliate presence in other territories, unless you have your own in-depth knowledge of the culture concerned, it may be beneficial to use a professional service physically located within the target market to tune your site content and product offerings for local consumption.

Doing the research.
Fortunately, there are also plenty of resources online for checking market trends across most categories and countries. As suggested above, the research needs to extend beyond the statistics to embrace product penetration levels and the social aspects. So much depends on the chosen category. What may be a fully developed online market in one region may be a niche or entirely fresh opportunity in another. Who are the major brands and recognised merchants? Are there enough of them and can they deliver in your chosen market? Beyond this, there may be subtle factors that enhance or weaken the appeal of any item. Colour, design, descriptive words for example, may have a huge bearing on how a product is perceived, quite apart from how you communicate the benefits. There are indeed some very amusing cases where marketers have got it dramatically wrong. Examples include a UK food manufacturer that spent £6 million on a campaign to launch its new ‘Bundh’ sauces, not realising that the name sounded just like the Punjabi word for “arse.” Clairol tried to introduce its “Mist Stick” curling iron into the German market only to find out that “mist” is German slang for manure. Need we say more about the importance of knowing the local nuances?

Hosting and related considerations
Assuming that you now have a grasp on the right products and services to offer; that the right merchants exist and the relationships have been established, you now need to consider domains and hosting.

Thinking that the ISP and hosting service that works so well in your own country is suitable for foreign marketing can be a mistake, even when the service claims to be a global player. Most hosting companies within each local market will offer supporting services with attractive rates and terms for foreign clients. Their location within the catchment area will also be advantageous as the closer they are to the target market, the better experience customers will have. Perhaps more importantly, the search engines are extremely sensitive to hosting / IP location. All IP addresses are associated with physical geographical locations: if you host a domain targeted at South Africa in the UK, even if you correctly choose a .za top level domain (see below), you may fall foul of an “IP / TLD mis-match” with the result that your rankings in the in-country results for South Africa become that much harder to achieve. The best hosting firms will give some level of personal service in the form of advice to affiliates, not the least of which is guidance about the selection of suitable domain names.

Top level domains
The selection of the correct top level domain (TLD) is vital: .za for South Africa; .com.au for Australia and so forth. The search engines are, again, highly sensitive to this and the right choices will help rather than hinder your SEO efforts. Do recognise that in many countries you must have some form of local presence in order to legally own a domain name. However, before you jump on a plane to open an office in Queensland, you should be able to find specialist firms (or indeed hosts) in those regions that may own the domain on your behalf and allow you to use it through some form of lease or rental agreement — but make sure that the contract is structured to ensure that YOU benefit from your SEO benefits in the long term rather than the legal domain owner!

In-market links
As with SEO endeavours in your home market, links are vital in achieving decent rankings, with the search engines again being sensitive to the geo-location of your link partners. Indeed it wasn’t so long ago that MSN used that as the MAIN determinant of a site’s location and thus ranking for in-country results! Whilst linking may be less competitive in less mature markets, it is important to focus on gaining links primarily from partners with the relevant TLDs. That said, you should also be aware that in some jurisdictions, link building emails will fall foul of local legislation. Australia is a good example: there, ANY unsolicited email is against ACMA regulations and exposes the sender to fines of up to AUS $220,000 per day! In these cases, it is sometimes necessary to either engage the services of locally-based firms who understand the market or to target “geography-independent” link partners with .com, .net, .biz TLDs and so forth – but you are likely to need far more of them to achieve the desired effect.

Although there is clearly a good deal to consider in entering a new market, the rewards are there for the taking. With the maturity of the UK affiliate market, we have some of the best content and SEO affiliates on the planet. Those skills should see you well placed to succeed and to take early market share in a number of global markets with serious long term potential. As with everything else, it is a matter of understanding the prevailing local conditions and playing them to best advantage.

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