There might come a time in your life when you may need to transfer some money to a family member, friend, or employee overseas. Whatever the case may be, you might want to take a look at your options to see which method would be best, especially if you have never done this before. Today, we will take a look at a few tips for getting your money transferred abroad quickly, safely, and at the best rates.

There are walk in type money transfer centers, such as ones operated by Ria, and these centers handle most of the transfers from the US. This is typically done on a cash to cash sort of basis… meaning that you hand over the cash that you want to be sent, and it will be converted to whatever the currency is of the country that you are sending it to. Then, cash will be picked up by your intended recipient. In some countries, it might even be delivered to your recipient.

Knowing how to send money abroad means that you need to know about a few of the key components. These are:

• Affordability
• Reliability
• Safety and Security
• Knowledge and common sense

It is good to know how to send money to someone abroad and to receive it too. You might be traveling someday and have your wallet stolen and need to receive money from someone at home. You never know what can happen.

Exchange Rates

One of the best tips for when you need to send money abroad is to find the best rates of exchange. You need to know that banks are not generally the greatest places for good exchange rates, and this is especially true when it comes to transferring large amounts of money. Instead, you should look for alternate methods of transferring the money, like a money transfer service. To be safe, check with a few different providers of foreign money exchange and compare their rates. Then you will be able to choose the one that offers the best rate so that you will have the most gain on the transfer.

Fees

You will also need to know what the transfer fees are. These can be quietly tacked on to the transaction on both ends, from the sender and to the recipient. Look for services that will give you reasonable transfer fees when you need to send money overseas.

Safety and Security

If you happen to be using a money transfer company or a bank, make sure that you are secure and safe. Check and find out which body oversees and regulates the company. By doing this, you will be able to have the peace of mind that comes with knowing that your money, your intended recipient, and yourself are all safe. Ensure that you will easily be able to get in touch with the customer service team in the event that you need to and that you won’t be diverted to one of those large, automated, irritating call centers in some part of the world that is unreachable.

Why are You Sending Money Abroad?

There are any number of reasons to be sending money abroad. Some of them include but are not limited to things like:

• You or a family member might be relocating for employment purposes.
• You might be purchasing a property where you will spend your retirement.
• You might be sending money as a gift for a birthday or the holidays.
• You might have international suppliers and or customers for your business.
• There might be a family event such as a wedding.
• You might be or have a student in college who is living abroad.
• You might even work as a freelancer and need to send or receive funds for invoices.

When you choose a money transfer service provider that handles your type of transfers on a regular basis, you will be able to be confident that the money you send will arrive safely and that you will be getting the best deal.

The bottom line is this: if you need to send money abroad, or receive it, you need to check around to see who has the best rates of exchange coupled with the lowest fees to get the best deal.

Written by Jane Brown

As any millennial will tell you, there are far too many advantages of using the internet for business to ever consider running an operation without online capabilities. However, while many businesses are truly seeing some of the power that is internet technology, emails, and Facebook groups for marketing, not every company has started to see the light about opening up boundaries and barriers when it comes to connecting real resources across the internet. When it comes to tapping into the online world to conduct business, you can find real solutions in no time at all that wouldn't otherwise be in your backyard.

Finding New Suppliers

While you never want to put all of your eggs in one basket, and you do have to be conscious of who you do business with in any capacity, you also need to know that there is a humongous business landscape that exists outside of your county. Entrepreneur even states the countless ways you can go out and try to find new suppliers, and whether you want to make connections with a distributor, manufacturers, or even find new independent craftsmen, there are countless businesses right now who are looking for individuals and companies to sell to.

If you continue to reach out and find new companies you can work with all of the time, then you should be able to tap into some new efficiency. You might be lucky enough to improve your quality or decrease your prices, but if nothing else, you could minimize some of the levels of risk you bear by keeping all of your suppliers from right around your neck of the woods. That is exactly why smart companies are taking to time to find brand new sourcing options on a constant basis.

New Sales and Clients

The olden days of business meant cold calling was actually about walking into a random door and office and trying to secure business. You didn't even need to know what the company did, let alone who the contact person was. However, when you start to see the power of the internet and how it has replaced the use of picking up the telephone, it can completely make sense to understand why some of the hottest startup companies are all about helping current businesses to connect to other firms as well.

When you consider the different tools such as the power of corporate videocasting by Bluejeans, then you can see why current salespeople don't even need to walk through the door of a company any longer to make a contact and to secure a sale. No one said that they have to drop the cold calling and knocking on doors, but there is a great opportunity to make a contact and close a sale without ever physically seeing the person, especially because video conferencing allows you to see someone face to face even if they are on the other side of the world.

Hiring Remote Employees

Whether you want employees to physically relocate into your corporate environment or you want them to be able to work remotely, the ability to cast a wide net means your organization has a much better selection of possible employees when it comes time to replace or recruit new blood. The old way of seeking out potential candidates was to put an ad in a newspaper and hope that an excellent candidate came along at the right time. However, with top quality recruiting strategists aplenty and with the ability to target potential candidates from all over the world, any organization could wind up interviewing and hiring people from any state, country, or even continent.

The power of being able to cast a wide net to find employees isn’t the only benefit to remote workers. As Mashable states, there can be a chance to communicate more frequently with remote workers than you do with in-house employees. This is partly because you always want to be on the same page as they are, but it also means your communication with those workers could have a stronger quality as well. Throw in the fact that an online workforce full of remote workers means your company never sleeps and is always running around the clock, and it is a component of service that will help to get you even further ahead.

While the internet has continued to propel forward an entire generation of people, it has also catapulted businesses forward in a way that has never been seen before. Whichever method you prefer and whatever reason you start to embrace more of an online focus truly does not matter. However, as long as you are completely aware of all of the possibilities that can be had when it comes to conducting old fashioned operations online, you should truly start to see better results, larger margins, and less effort expended.

If you are the owner of a business that is just starting out, then you know the struggles of ensuring that you are making every single cent that comes out of your pocket will count. There are a ton of things you will have to shell out cash for, and one of these things may have to be the dreaded in-person meetings and conventions. The average cost of airfare these days is not exactly friendly on the wallet, pocket, or bank account, either. According to data outlined in an article by Airlines for America, the average cost for a domestic flight per passenger was around $363.98, excluding the reservation fee and bag fee. What more would you have to spend on an international flight these days, not to mention the need for decent board and lodging?

With that in mind, when should you bother booking a flight to another city, town, country, or even continent? When should you just convince the other person to talk about the subject over a nice cup of virtual coffee—that is, by starting up a video conference with you on a reliable web meeting software? In this article, we will give you a few reasons why you may want to hold off on buying any airfare and hotel room accommodations for certain discussions that you have to participate in.

Book a Flight for That Meet-Up If…

You Want to Have a Better Idea of How a Person Interacts with You.

An article written by Caroline McMillan for the website The Muse notes that there are often subtle body movements you make that could affect how other people see you as a person. You can easily look a person up and down and make your own assessments about their personality from head to toe if you were able to see them in person.

On the other hand, if you rely on a video call, then you will not be able to see the person’s entire body language from the waist down. In most online meetings, you only ever get to see a person from the shoulders up, depending on how they have decided to angle their camera. What if they are actually tapping their foot impatiently because they want you to stop talking already? What if they have their legs crossed because they really do not feel comfortable around you? What if they are actually just lounging around in their underwear because they cannot find any reason why they should take the extra effort of putting on some decent pair of pants? There is a lot that you will not get to see that could tell you volumes about a person’s attitude toward you, so sometimes, it can pay to shell out some cash, especially if you are going to try to seal the deal with a new client or a new business partner.

Do Not Get on a Plane If…

You Need a Really Quick Response to an Urgent Question That You Have

Do you need a super quick reply to a very urgent problem? In cases like this, it will be so much easier for you to relay your message via a quick live chat, a video call, or even by leaving somebody an e-mail if it really cannot be helped. Whether you are in a pinch or want to conduct these types of calls regularly, video conferencing in business can be done over reliable platforms such as BlueJeans. It is super easy to pick up and use, which means less time wasted on troubleshooting any errors.

Are you hoping to meet up to discuss some rather in-depth plans, instead of resolving a potential crisis? Even then, e-mail, chat, or even video calls can still do a better job than all the effort it would take to pack your bags and fly overseas. All you need to do is to make a note of what you absolutely have to tackle in your discussion, and then figure out an action plan by working together on a solution.

In Conclusion: Do You Want a Complete Picture or Do You Just Need a Speedy Response?

Though web conferencing software does allow you to see the other person, you will only get to see them from the waist up, which is sometimes not enough to give you a complete picture of how they are feeling about your conversation. For example, you will not be able to see if they are crossing their legs, which may imply that they are getting impatient or that they are closing themselves off from you. You will also not be able to see whether or not they bothered to put on a respectable pair of pants that day, either. For all that you know, they might actually be wearing their favorite pair of worn-out and cute pajamas.

Management at all levels takes a lot of research, skill, and experience. If you’re in a supervisory role, managing your employees isn’t as simple as telling people what to do or keeping policies in place like a dictator. This is especially true if you’re dealing with a field where you want staff to come up with innovative solutions and think outside the box. The line between routine tasks and innovation in IT, though, is unique. Unlike a creative field where your everyday task is to come up with new ideas, much of IT workload is keeping things steady and dealing with problems as they arise. On the other hand, if you’re not a free thinker who expounds upon the potential of technology, then the role you have as an IT engineer isn’t being fully utilized. This is why it’s necessary to take advantage of the right communication tools that can help you more effectively manage staff, as well as understanding how the human brain works in a team setting. Here are four management tips for IT professionals in today’s competitive workforce.

1. Balancing Thinking Inside and Outside the Box

The IT field attracts a variety of personalities, and making the most of talent is one of the most important parts of managing any staff. Although consistency in everyday operations is essential, you also might be preventing true brilliance from shining through. Baseline posits the view that one of the top roadblocks in getting IT professionals to be more innovative is because they end up wasting time with troubleshooting tasks. A good way to get around this is by streamlining work plans. Prioritize smoothing out wrinkles and unnecessary headaches for your employees who have the most potential to think outside the box and enjoy doing so, and hand over those tasks to staff who prefer to deal with nitpicky details. Usually, there’s a surprising balance of both personality types within a team. That doesn’t mean you should unload a bunch of thankless tasks onto someone who’s not an innovative thinker. Rather, make sure you’re matching each employee’s strength to an appropriate role.

2. Choosing the Right Communication Tools

One of the most important parts of managing, of course, is how you convey information. Since many IT companies these days inevitably deal with off-site workers, using video is a good idea. Blue Jeans video conferencing for IT is currently a popular solution, since it allows for clearer communication. This can also work well for getting everyone into the same virtual conference room to discuss current projects and resolve issues. Even if your staff is all on-site, using technology that goes beyond email and works more quickly will improve productivity and free up precious time for everyone involved.

3. Keeping or Breaking Traditional Managerial Methods

Tweak Your Biz states that one pro of having regular performance reviews is the ability to fairly and accurately quantify achievements and success rates. Rather than being vague in any criticism or praise you might have for an employee, sitting down and going over benchmarks that clearly translate to an evaluation not only provides the employee with a sense of structure, but also fairness. This can be most easily achieved with video conferencing, especially in an IT setting where technology is always at the fore of everyday dealings.

4. Reassessing and Building Your Supervisory Policies

As the workforce becomes more global, you may need to reassess how you manage your staff and what kinds of policies you expect to be able to keep intact or do away with. For example, if you’re going to be managing off-site workers that are geographically diverse, basing your human resources policies solely on face to face interactions isn’t wise. Instead, this is when it’s time to reassess your policies and how you expect to deploy work as well as assign tasks. This is especially important if you’re working with a team on a project, or you’re dealing with an IT staff member that’s providing off-site support to a single company. Whatever the situation might be for you, the basic idea is that you need to adapt to the times. Sit down and have a look at all your written material, such as job descriptions and policies regarding management tiers, and adjust accordingly.

Every field has a certain level of human resources policies that need to be adjusted as the world evolves. This is because communication methods change, and hiring processes also shift from time to time. In the case of the IT sector, most professionals are already ahead of the game in some ways since the entire basis of the field is utilizing technology and understands the ins and outs of its potential. However, applying that knowledge to your own staff is a bit different, but absolutely essential. Whether you’re planning on conducting annual employee reviews via video or altering your hiring manual, the bottom line is that you need to make sure that your current policies are up to snuff so you can efficiently manage today’s workforce.

Can a server improve your business?

Absolutely. It can reduce delays, increase uptime, enhance collaboration, cut costs, share resources, and boost productivity.

However, you may be wondering if a server makes your company more vulnerable. After all, if you store most of your data in one place, what happens if the server crashes? Won’t you lose all your data? Will it take weeks to get back on your feet?

These common fears are exaggerated. First of all, crashes are rare if you maintain your server. In addition, data loss is unlikely if are regularly backing up your data. Secondly, data recovery services are available from reliable providers. Server data recovery from Secure Data Recovery, for example, can help your company get back to business quickly in the event of a server crash.
Let's take a quick look at some frequently asked questions about servers to help you decide whether your business will benefit from one.

What is a server?

A dedicated host server is a complete solution. It will provide you all the essential services you need to run your business. Servers normally include applications for email, hosting, databases, storage, and safety.

In essence, then, a server is a master computer that can store your files and applications to share with your team.
How big does your company need to be to use a server?

Even if your company has only a few people, it will benefit from a server. You will know when you need a server if your overall level of employee productivity drops.

Here is how you know if your growing company is becoming increasingly inefficient:
Suppose you find that as your business grows, you need to share more files with your employees. Initially, you may simply email files back and forth. If the files are too big for email, then you would have to store them on a zip disk and manually carry them over to the person who needs them.

Besides sharing files, you may also need to share applications. Since these are stored on only one local hard drive, then you need to share computers, too. If, say, your finance application is on someone else’s computer, then you have to ask them to use their computer to look up your financial information.

At a certain point, all this sharing and collaboration can become cumbersome. It’s hard to be efficient if you have to carry zip disks over to share information with other employees. It’s also hard to be efficient if you have to interrupt people’s work to use their computer to access an application that isn’t stored on your own computer.

Getting a server and a network will change everything. You’ll have better workflow, collaboration, resource sharing, and security. Even maintenance can be handled remotely without somebody having to ask you to take a break while they update application on your computer.

How many companies use servers?

Most medium to large businesses consider a server indispensable. Imagine a company with 50 to 100 employees running around with zip disks to share their information. Imagine how things would slow down if employees had to share computers based on the applications installed on them. It would be chaos. Bigger companies take the idea of a server for granted. They can’t imagine functioning efficiently without one.

However, many small businesses don’t use servers. Doctors, lawyers, accountants and their small staff end up doing things the hard way. If they are functioning well, it is only because they are only emailing small files back and forth and have gone to the expense of buying many licenses of the same software to install on all their computers.

What do you need to consider when buying a server?

When buying a server, there are many things things to consider. Here are five of the most important:

Servers Make Work Easier

As an organization grows, a server is a way to centralize resources, share critical files, and become efficient and productive. Servers also provide a far greater level of overall security than scattering the information over different computers. Finally, servers make it easy to back up all your company’s data.

Written by Jane Brown

What is marketing? If you were to ask most business owners, they’d stay along the lines of things relating to advertising such as social media, blogs, videos, commercials, print ads, and more. While these are all valuable marketing sources, the realm of marketing does not stop there. Any good marketing professional will tell you that marketing encompasses everything relating to the sale of a product or service – from the design and implementation right down to the packaging and presentation.

Product packaging is a crucial part of the marketing process. It acts as a mini advertisement that each consumer will see on the products as they browse the storefront or receive the packages in the mail. As a result, every business owner should be looking at efficient ways to improve their product packaging to drive more sales. With companies like QuickLabel providing affordable labeling solutions for your packaged products, improving your product as a means of increasing sales should not be an issue.

How Packaging Influences Purchasing Decisions

There is essentially an emotional aspect to making any purchase. While there are many emotions that can drive a purchase decision, impulse happens to be at the top of the list. Since the packaging is often the first thing that customers see (in brick and mortar locations), what they see will spark certain emotions which can be key indicators of whether or not they’ll make the purchase. A well-designed package related to the company’s brand and consumer’s needs can increase the possibility that customers will be interested in making a purchase.

There have been studies conducted to determine exactly how the brain works when customers look at various packages. In general, the studies concluded that products that are inside attractive, vibrant, and relevant packaging cause brain activity to become more intense. Whereas packaging that is dull, plain, or irrelevant can cause negative reactions in the brain, thereby evoking negative emotions.

How to Improve Your Product Packaging

In order to determine where changes are needed it becomes important for you to look at your packaging through the eyes of your customers. When you look at the package your merchandise comes in, are you engaged, interested in making the purchase, neutral, or do you get a negative vibe? Getting the opinion of your customers or staff can help you to draw more effective solutions. Once you know where the issues lie, you can begin to make the necessary changes to improve packaging and your brand. Below are some tips:

There are tons of new marketing trends in China and across the globe that business owners can take advantage of. Remember, marketing goes well beyond the scope of flyers, social media, and blogs. Your product's packaging can make a significant difference in whether or not you make a sale. Therefore, evaluate your packaging and take the time to make the above mentioned improvements to help drive sales and increase brand reputation.

Written by Jane Brown

In the advanced world of information technology, being online every day is the in thing for both individual and businesses. Today, everyone wants to be on the web and aims to establish an online reputation. Especially, the small business owners who target to improve their market by being on the internet through their business website and therefore, targeting more audience and clients worldwide. To become visible on the web, it is important to host the website on one of the best dedicated servers. Depending upon the pick and need, web owner or user can host their business site either on shared hosting or dedicated server.

Dedicated host server provides the users the capability to handle the assembled web servers that are leased to them by a hosting business. With this type of web service package, the customer will characteristically have complete power over their hosting environment and have the choice of picking their own OS as well as other personalized security settings. Best dedicated servers are in charge of hardware and all other network administration problems.

Choosing the Best Dedicated Servers

A dedicated host server is a complete solution for web services that will normally include email, hosting, databases, storage, and safety. Companies that need high performance, consistency, privacy and full control of their business website and wants nothing to share any information with others should use a former server for their web hosting needs.

Best dedicated servers are expensive rented web hosts where the users tap the email server, the software and the online storage from a trusted host company. In this way, the whole web server is dedicated to the user on a rental basis. There several advantages linked with such high-end web service. First, these dedicated host servers offer one of a kind security requirements, hence, the clients or customers will not be worrying about information infraction. Second, it gives them good access to pick the OS (either the user-friendly Windows or Linux, the virus-free) as per business need.

Third, as per the requirement, one can get well-matched software of their pick together with the operating system chosen for the web host server. Aside from this, since you get dedicated hosted server, it is still completely yours and web resources are private and not shared with any other user or customer. To put it briefly, the dedicated web host server remains the fitting corporate email solution for bigger commercial industries and businesses.

In Conclusion

There is a huge numbers of companies that are involved in providing dedicated web server hosting solutions at affordable prices. While you are looking for one, it pays to check the different best dedicated servers factors, their prominent features and, of course, the price. To begin with, it is imperative to focus on the consistency factor.

You should assure that the dedicated host server you picked should be advanced, reliable and safe. As such, before investing on best dedicated servers, be sure of the fact the company is highly experienced and possess good market credibility so that, you can make the most of the web services that helps you launch a lucrative, successful and series business online.

The Internet has truly changed business and commerce as we know it. We’re playing in a truly global economy now, and that makes international teams a valuable asset for any business, large or small. The internet is also what makes it possible for such remote, “virtual” teams to exist, allowing everyone to connect and exchange information no matter how wide spread the team members. Of course, keeping a virtual team on task has a set of challenges all its own. Here are the vital tools and skills any online boss needs to keep their operation running smoothly.

The Right Tools for the Job

The first step in facilitating productivity and communication in any virtual team is ensuring that you have the right tools to get that job done. In a traditional workplace, communication is easy: it’s all in person, thanks to everybody being in the same location. Managing a far flung virtual team, however, the quality of your communication will often depend on the quality of your communication software.

With the advent of better networking tools and better internet speeds, video conferencing has exploded into prominence, surpassing voice conference calls as the number one way for teams to stay in touch.

In earlier days, setting up an in house video conferencing network was an expensive, time consuming, and glitch nightmare, requiring expensive equipment and an involved installation process. Fortunately, now every smartphone, tablet, and computer had a video camera and internet access, and video conferencing can be hosted entirely online.

Video conferencing services like Blue Jeans offer entirely cloud-hosted, browser based conferencing, which allows anyone to access a call from any device. Just send an email a link, and your employee or coworker can join the conversation with one click. Blue Jeans also offers localized services, so Singapore companies can get a huge savings on video conferencing equipment with Blue Jeans SG.

Etiquette, Adaptability, and Understanding

Managing remote workers is a challenge all on its own, but when you add in time differences and cultural boundaries, managing a multinational team can be a true tightrope walk. It takes thought, empathy, and tact to manage a multinational team, and any manager will make a few missteps along the way.

The key, according to Donna Flynn of the Harvard Business Review, is to make a point of acknowledging cultural differences and the potential for awkward moments early. It fosters a culture of openness and understanding, and helps ensure your team members feel comfortable speaking up if a boundary has been crossed.

Understanding can turn a cultural misstep into a good laugh for your team, instead of an awkward moment that goes unaddressed and festers into a larger problem.

Adaptability also plays a key role in collaborating across time zones. It may be tempting for a manager to go without sleep to keep everyone on the same page, but Harvard Business Review and Forbes Magazine both say it’s far more beneficial to get your sleep and share the load of late nights. Donna Flynn’s team rotates their meeting schedule so that no one is expected to attend a late night meeting: they’ll have one meeting night off every four months, when the team meeting falls in the middle of the night for their time zone.

Clarity and Communication

When your team isn’t guaranteed to see each other in person every day, keeping a clear set of goals and agendas becomes crucial. Harvard Business Review says to clarify, clarify, clarify: make sure everyone is aware of their tasks and the processes they need to follow to accomplish them, not just overall goals and their role in the team. Make sure you budget time in team meetings to cover details that you might otherwise just take “as it comes.” Simplify your instructions as much as possible so they can be easily delivered and understood without grinding a meeting to a halt.

Wade Foster of Zapier, a very successful remote management team, also recommends hiring people with good writing skills. With only occasional face to face team meetings via video conferencing, almost all communication will be written, so it’s vitally important that your team can exchange information efficiently via email.

This is another area where the right tech will go a long way towards keeping your team on track and running smoothly. Media sharing functions, like Blue Jean’s virtual whiteboard, make it easy to exchange photos, documents, and even video and audio media in process. They’re great for workshopping media that’s still being edited and developed, or for taking notes and minutes, leaving a permanent record for anyone who couldn’t attend the meeting to get caught up. Your team can also treat a virtual whiteboard as a chatroom, keeping each other updated about their progress, asking for help, and socializing and bonding.

A Few Final Words

Any effective team needs good communication, and virtual teams are no different. However, keeping communication up and productivity high in a virtual workspace takes a new set of skills…and a new set of technology to facilitate those skills. However, with the right software at your disposal and the right mindset and agenda, a virtual team could be the boost you need to get your business playing at the truly global scale.

By Staff Editor

A global presence is an achievement that most businesses dream of. Beyond the prestige of spreading beyond borders and the sheer mass of the market size, a worldwide firm boasts considerable economic durability that can be difficult to acquire in a single nation. Although most recessions have a worldwide impact, there are always countries that are more profoundly affected and countries that largely weather the storm.

But invading every continent is more than a simple matter of planting seeds from San Juan to Wellington and then hoping they succeed. Firms must be positioned to handle the results if they strike international gold. Asian manufacturing companies in particular have had great success over many decades in getting their products to consumers all over the world. Below are some of the things these companies have had to do to make those aspirations a reality.

Handling Logistics

When you are working through all 24 time zones and hemispheric differences in seasons, your company must be properly equipped to handle it. Throw in dozens of different customs law systems, transportation complexities, and language barriers and you're bordering on the impossible.

First and foremost in managing this Herculean task is utilizing an efficient fulfillment center to handle all the international requirements. This system will handle weather and clock issues, deal with shipping transactions electronically, and keep you in the good graces of your diverse customer base. Such facilities are typically located near airport hubs and other transportation centers, providing rapid movement of goods throughout the area.

Understanding Cultural Differences

There is a famous story of American aid workers who traveled to Africa in an attempt to help the impoverished people of the bush. The workers took along solar-powered ovens so that the women of the tribes could safely cook meals for their families. The problem: Due to the hot weather, the tribes' traditional cooking time was after dark. The ovens were useless.

For reasons like that, companies must educate themselves about their targeted markets. They must make sure that they don't bring in products that are not a good match culturally, linguistically, or religiously. It can be a very expensive mistake to arrive in a country with a product that goes against the beliefs or traditions of the people there.

Managing Money

As is frequently the case, a business decision comes down to money. Understanding exchange rates and currency markets is critical for any company that is entertaining the prospect of expanding abroad. Attempting to compete against domestically-produced goods when the exchange rates aren't in your favor is financial suicide. The need to avoid this pitfall makes it important to deal with shared currencies like the Euro as an early step in expansion. In this way, the market is unchanged from Portugal to Slovakia, and your company can complete transactions in the 19 Euro countries with implications from just one exchange rate. By beginning the foray into worldwide marketing with a conglomerate of nations bearing only one currency, you can learn other important lessons with at least the issue of exchange rates off the table.

Until you saturate the world with your product, you aren't achieving the largest possible market. Making the leap to a multinational and then a global corporation is impressive, but it is only successful when proper steps are taken.

Written by Jane Brown