The UK is easily one of the most competitive markets in the world to break into. This is a well-off group of nations, with most buyers here being IT-literate. This means they look into your business before buying and do their own market analysis. They understand who you are before they hit ‘Buy Now’ – so you need to arrive in the UK confident that you can show the UK public you have something worthwhile to offer.
The main reason your business fails to break into the UK, though, could be due to the broadness of your scope. One of the first things I found when working with a market research agency in the UK was that my message was too broad and too generic. We were targeting everyone when, in reality, we should have been focusing on a smaller area.
For example, we sold products that were focused on dealing with irrigation in our landscapes. Targeting the sunkissed South Coast was a waste of money when we should have been focusing on the marshier parts of the north of the UK – especially Scotland.
You might find yourself in a similar predicament by getting some market research. The best thing you can do is get someone to look into where you might be best focused on targeting. I could turn my efforts around simply because we started looking in the ‘right places,’ so to speak.
This made a huge difference for me, and while my business didn’t take off, we built a small but steady customer list. It is better than having wasted marketing campaigns without return, so it is worth investing in market research.