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On the occasion of March 8, we interviewed Sílvia Meseguer , Export Specialist at Co.Mark . Sílvia has 17 years of experience in business internationalization, both as an export manager in private companies and working as a foreign trade consultant for government projects, particularly with ACCIÓ . Her career has led her to manage the team of export specialists at Co.Mark and she is a reference in the sector in Spain. Sílvia tells us what day-to-day life is like at Co.Mark, where more than 70% of the staff are women . What is your day to day like as a Part Time Export Manager? My day to day life is very dynamic. I have a portfolio of companies and I go in person half a day a week to each of them, where I have a specific workplace for myself. The rest of the week I monitor remotely. Every time I go in person to see my clients, I meet with the manager to discuss the strategy and ongoing contacts. I also interact with the rest of the company team for quality, marketing or sales issues. I carry out the entire sales process from the initial strategy with management, commercial contact and negotiation to the sale and delivery of the product. We also carry out product improvement or branding consulting tasks or any questions about payment methods, transportation, etc. that the company may need.
As a foreign trade consultancy we can support Phone Number List multiple aspects related to the export of a product or service. Another of my tasks is monitoring the initial and follow-up reports of all Export Specialists in Spain. How do you get sales? Sales come as a result of following the established strategy and a lot of work. Internationalizing a company is a process that requires a minimum of 3 years, although we find companies at different moments in their internationalization process. The key is to understand the product well and the other points of the marketing mix: the channel where we are going to sell it, the countries to work in, how the competition is acting and what the USP or Unique Selling Points of the company are, that is, those characteristics that make our product or service unique . Once established , we begin to contact potential clients and classify them as we contact them (we work with a sales funnel process ). With our calls we understand well who they buy from, what they need and we give them our best offer. We screen the contacts that are potential and our CRM is responsible for notifying us when we should call them again, establish a video conference, any face-to-face meetings that are necessary to meet, negotiate and end up selling.
Therefore, commercial management is optimized to the maximum thanks to our digital customer management platform . The first orders are usually trial orders, and it is essential to adapt in price and offer the best quality, which is implicit in the product, and the best service. What sectors have you worked with? I have worked with the most diverse sectors: from industrial (mechanized products, plastic injection), through machinery (dispensers), final product of the automotive, sports or cosmetics sector, to services (process improvement for industry 4.0). Do you think all companies can export? Any company can export if it has a product or service to offer and if the management is aligned with the strategy of internationalizing its company, understanding that it is an investment in the future and that the first years are a lot of work in this journey towards selling in countries other than the national one, with different languages and cultures. What advice would you give to a company starting to export? That it is a process that must be started with great enthusiasm, with full confidence in ourselves as foreign trade consultants and that the key to success is perseverance, weekly meetings to discuss the strategy and ongoing contacts. Great achievements are achieved with small steps. So the first sales are the ones that cost the most to achieve, but once you start and the customer is happy, they become loyal, their purchase volume increases and we continue looking for new contacts and a cycle continues.
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