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What is your exposure to our line of business? |
Perhaps limited. We specialise in business solutions across
industries and geographies. When necessary, we hire experts
in our client's industry vertical. We have worked for
clients in the paper industry, industrial machinery, industrial
chemicals (sales generated: + USD 1 million), outboard
engine manufacture, resort development, racecourse design,
township construction, international banking, equipment
leasing, music industry (India's first mail order service
exclusively for music), export of merchandise and real
estate project management.
We see no reason to develop proprietary skills in client
domains. Our clients come to us for our expertise in helping
them to sell their products and services in unfamiliar
international markets, not for our in-depth knowledge
of their industry, which our clients would themselves
possess in abundance. |
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How do you avoid conflict of interest between clients? |
| As far as
we are concerned, there is no conflict of interest because
it is not we who make the purchase decision, but the clients
we introduce. Even so, for business development and representation,
we do not accept two clients in the same domain. For instance,
in the IT industry, we accept only one client in say,
the embedded technologies domain, only one in ERP, and
so on. |
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How do we police your implementation of the above policy? |
| You may check
with the prospective clients and associates we contact
on your behalf, and whose identity, contact coordinates
and feedback to your offer are all fully disclosed to
you, and in fact, typically comprise the deliverables
of our turn-key model. |
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What guarantees do you provide? |
| We
guarantee that we shall give our client the deliverables
specified in the time period agreed. What we do not and
cannot guarantee is that the prospective customers we
identify and contact for our client will actually buy
from the latter. The most that we can do is to present
and recommend our client's offer to prospective customers
and based on the feedback, advise our client on how to
suitably amend their offer if necessary to generate orders.
However we do not have any control over a prospective
customer's decision, and our clients should bear in mind
that at any given point of time, their offer is not likely
to be the only one under consideration by a prospective
customer. |
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How can we be sure that your efforts will bring us business? |
The short
answer is, you cannot. However, the pre-qualified meetings
that we arrange for our client with prospects is in itself
an indicator of potential business because senior European
managers do not agree to meet unless they have a prima
facie interest in doing business with the people they
meet.
Our USP is that we reduce by several multiples the time
and cost involved in bringing your products or services
to market in Europe. OMS is a facilitator and does not
claim to be able to even quantify let alone guarantee,
likely sales that may or may not result from its efforts
and introductions - that is for the client to assess.
In any case, the quantum of sales thereafter depends on
the efforts of the client and the follow-up, support and
product / service / price mix of the client, none of which
is in our control. Also, the extent of success depends
on how well the relationship is cultivated and maintained
between the client and the leads generated in Europe. |
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Can you reduce your fees? |
| We are quite
flexible in our business model and offer clients a choice
between different short-term, fixed price turn-key solutions;
or long term, ongoing services with a monthly retainer
offset in full against a percentage of pre-existing sales. |
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What are your typical deliverables? |
| Contact coordinates
of all the companies we contact on behalf of our client;
documentation of their response to our client's offer
with relevant details. Arranging and where necessary,
attending meetings with prospects on behalf of our client;
and follow up with all prospects till closure, wherein
they indicate their intent either or not to proceed with
our client. |
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What results can Indian companies expect? |
Companies
from India that are new to the Continent, may expect a
sales cycle that can extend to several months after the
first client meeting before, and if, any business materialises.
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Do you work on commission? |
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No. However, if the client already has customers and
we are mandated to monitor and augment the existing
business on a long term basis, our monthly retainer
can be adjusted against a percentage of the sales volume,
provided that such percentage amounts to more than the
retainer amount. This model ensures us a minimum income
on which to base our operations for the client while
allowing us to expand those operations with increased
sales, and also defines for our client the maximum outgo
on our account, on which they can plan their budgets. |
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Why do you not work on commission basis?
Why should we not go instead to those who do? |
It is not
possible to enter overseas markets on commission basis;
one needs to have an appropriate budget and strategy.
Fee-based specialist consultants can greatly enhance a
company's reach overseas and extend its position into
client conversations that might otherwise never have taken
place.
As for those who claim to find
projects abroad on commission basis, you have to ask yourself:
- Can they sustain their efforts.
- Would the end client opt for your agent's recommendation,
knowing that the agent works on commission and would
therefore promote the most expensive product.
- Can such individuals project your Company suitably.
- Can such agents provide you local corporate presence.
- Working on commission basis, would they not have
to simultaneously promote numerous clients even if
it means several of them may be offering similar services
or products.
- Will they have the time and resources to thoroughly
research, qualify, follow-up and report on prospective
customers / opportunities for each of their clients,
absent revenues to support such effort.
- Can they consistently provide leads and local support
over a period of time or is it more likely to happen
in fits and starts and wind up abruptly.
- How long will they continue promoting your solutions
in the absence of revenues - prospective end clients
will typically have a multitude of competing offers
from all over the world to choose from.
At the end of the day, will the money you 'save' by working
with commission agents to enter an overseas market compensate
for the time taken in generating results if at all they
are? In the meanwhile your competitors, both local and
global, would have got more entrenched. |
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Why not ourselves undertake our own business development rather
than pay
firms like yours? |
When it
comes to international market prospecting and entry, we
believe that the client best does it through local professionals
rather than in-house. There is risk where people located
far from the target market do the planning, because they
may not be fully familiar with that market. There is considerably
more risk when employees who may be new to the foreign
market implement such plans. Moreover, the time and costs
involved in frequently visiting the target market and
then locally posting employees from the Head Office can
be prohibitive.
On the other hand, we enable you to very affordably enter
the market immediately with the support of multiple offices
- 3 in Belgium and 1 in India staffed with local professionals,
thereby minimising your time-to-market and also providing
you with local presence and support. |
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