This provides a forum to ease the angst generated by all-night noise at your resort vacation destination, for example. While customer complaints on web sites represent extreme cases, it does reinforce the point that customer service that falls short of excellent is not going to be tolerated on line. Disgruntled customers have as easy access to weapons for fighting back as marketers have for selling. While the Internet provides access to a global marketplace, it does not follow that merely translating your site into Amharic will result in a flood of orders from Ethiopia. Some important issues must be resolved so that the marketing strategy achieves the desired objective in the target foreign market.
Cultural differences become significant.
Icons and symbols that we take for granted in Europe or North America can be offensive in other cultures. The colour black has sinister associations in many countries. They must all be worked out in advance and in fine detail. Canadian companies with an interest in providing goods and services to other countries should register with Industry Canada. The department maintains a database of Canadian Companies capabilities .