Genuine International Interest in Your Business?
More and more companies in Deventer and surrounding areas are actively engaging in exports, which is fantastic. Over the past few years, the Overijssel province has supported this growth by providing E-commerce Assessment vouchers. Companies that participated in these assessments have since enhanced their digital channels to improve communication with their international customers.
How to Identify Genuine International Interest?
How can you determine if there’s genuine interest from abroad? How do you know if there are opportunities for your business in international markets? The simplest way to assess this is by examining your Google Analytics data, which shows the countries your visitors come from.
Understanding Your Analytics
Let’s look at an example: Consider a Dutch-language website for a local event. You wouldn’t expect significant international interest, yet the analytics might show visitors from numerous countries.
However, upon more in-depth investigation, you might notice that visitors from countries like Cape Verde, China, India, and Turkey stay for less than 2 seconds and immediately leave (100% bounce rate). This typically indicates bot traffic. If you don’t exclude this data, your site might appear more international than it actually is. It’s crucial to analyse these metrics carefully before drawing conclusions.
Evaluating Export Opportunities
If your website is available in English and receives genuine traffic from various countries, you can investigate which markets offer the most potential for your business.
How to Analyse Country-Specific Data
When you identify an interesting market, examine the behaviour of visitors from that country:
1. Create a filter in Analytics to measure only the behaviour of visitors from your target country
2. Focus solely on metrics relevant to your question: “Is this country worth investing in for exports?”
Key Metrics to Consider
Look at important page metrics such as:
– Homepage visits
– Product page views
– Contact page engagement
– Time spent on site
– Conversion rates
Case Study: North American Market
For example, on an English-language website, filtering for North American traffic might show significant engagement with:
– Homepage
– Product overview pages
– Contact pages
This pattern could indicate export opportunities, warranting further market research to improve your position in North America. You might already have received enquiries or sales. When digital signals are positive, it’s worth conducting more profound market research to identify specific opportunities for your business.
Next Steps
Want to learn more about export opportunities? Visit the Deventer Trade Office or schedule a consultation with us.