There’s a moment in every ambitious business’s journey where someone looks at a map and says, “We should be over there.” Maybe it’s a European market that looks ripe for the taking. Maybe it’s South East Asia, where the growth numbers are hard to ignore. Maybe it’s the USA, because that’s where the big money is. Whatever the target, the ambition is usually sound. The execution, more often than not, is where it falls apart.
I’ve spent the better part of 15 years taking brands into new markets. I’ve launched products across Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines and Malaysia simultaneously. I’ve led commercial teams spanning four continents. I’ve built go-to-market strategies for businesses entering Europe for the first time. And the single biggest lesson I’ve taken from all of it is this: the businesses that fail internationally almost always fail for the same reason. They assume what works at home will work somewhere else.
It won’t.
The copy-paste trap
It’s understandable. You’ve built something that works. You’ve got a product people want, a sales process that converts, a brand that resonates. The temptation is to lift that entire playbook and drop it into a new market with a few superficial tweaks. Translate the website, hire a local salesperson, maybe adjust the pricing and off you go.
I’ve watched businesses do exactly this and I’ve watched them burn through six figures before they even realise it’s not landing. The problem isn’t the product. The problem is the assumption that markets are interchangeable. They’re not. Every market has its own buying culture, its own regulatory landscape, its own competitive dynamics and its own expectations about how business relationships are built. Ignore any one of those and you’re fighting with one hand tied behind your back.
Relationships before revenue
When I led Big Mobile’s market entry across South East Asia, one of the first things I had to recalibrate was the timeline. In the UK, you can often move from first conversation to signed contract in a matter of weeks. In parts of South East Asia, that timeline stretches significantly, not because people are slow but because trust is built differently. Face-to-face meetings matter more. Relationship building isn’t a nice-to-have, it’s a prerequisite. If you try to skip that step and jump straight to the pitch, you’ll be met with polite interest and absolutely no commitment.
That’s not a flaw in the market. That’s the market telling you how it works. The businesses that succeed internationally are the ones that listen to that signal and adapt rather than pushing their own rhythm onto people who didn’t ask for it.
Regulation isn’t a box-ticking exercise
The other area where I see businesses come unstuck is regulation. It’s treated as a compliance afterthought when it should be a strategic consideration from day one. When you’re operating across multiple territories, the regulatory landscape touches everything: data privacy, employment law, advertising standards, trade compliance, tax obligations, sector-specific licensing. Get any of it wrong and you’re not just facing fines, you’re facing reputational damage in a market where you haven’t built enough goodwill to survive it.
At Zivelo, our kiosk and digital signage solutions sat at the intersection of technology, data handling and consumer interaction. The compliance requirements shifted dramatically depending on which country and which sector we were operating in. Healthcare in the US looked nothing like retail in Europe, which looked nothing like QSR in Asia. Understanding that complexity wasn’t optional. It was the foundation everything else was built on.
Start with the questions, not the answers
If I could give one piece of advice to any business thinking about international expansion, it would be this: go in with questions, not answers. Before you build a strategy, before you hire a team, before you set revenue targets, take the time to genuinely understand the market you’re entering. Talk to people on the ground. Understand how decisions are made. Learn what your competitors are doing and, more importantly, what your potential customers actually care about. Resist the urge to project your own assumptions onto a market you haven’t earned the right to understand yet.
The best international strategies I’ve built have always started with listening. Not with a deck. Not with a forecast. Just honest, curious listening. Everything else follows from there.
The payoff is worth the patience
None of this is meant to discourage anyone from expanding internationally. Quite the opposite. The opportunities are enormous, and the businesses that get it right unlock growth that simply isn’t available in a single market. But getting it right means respecting the process. It means being willing to slow down before you speed up, to invest in understanding before you invest in infrastructure, and to build a strategy that’s shaped by the market rather than imposed on it.
I’ve been lucky enough to do this across some incredible markets and with some brilliant businesses. The ones that succeeded all had one thing in common: they treated international expansion as a craft, not a checkbox. And that made all the difference.
If you’re considering taking your business into a new market and want to make sure you get it right, I’d love to hear from you. Drop me a message and let’s have a conversation.