Non-US Companies
Eclicktick Helps You Create A Successful Launch in the US At Lower Cost
Eclicktick Corporation provides sales and business development improvement, distribution, strategic consulting and interim management services to companies. Our team has particular expertise with high tech firms, e.g. Internet, software and hardware companies but we have also worked with consulting firms, financial services, automotive parts, government organizations, incubators, venture capital firms, hospital equipment vendors, telecom, pharmaceuticals and many other industries.
Areas of particular technology expertise include software, telecom and next generation networks, VoIP telephony, advanced telephony and wireless services.
Eclicktick has had particular success in working with companies in shorten sales cycles through marketing and pricing changes, and developing white papers and business cases to demonstrate total value of opportunity (TVO), total cost of ownership (TCO) and ROI.
We have particular expertise with helping small and medium sized companies improve their sales, shorten their sales cycles, improve their value proposition and with their product launch and distribution in the US. We have worked with over 50 startups, American, Canadian, Korean and Japanese and advised companies from many other countries.
Some foreign companies launching in the US will find that working with Eclicktick staff will be faster, more cost effective and will product faster revenues that the traditional approach of sending your own management to the US. We can provide a full product launch and distribution capability in the US market.
Launching in the US is a risky business. Most foreign firms fails. They fail for a number of predictable reasons:
inadequate management and execution expertisea failure to segment the large and fiercely competitive US market
inadequate market research, typically leading to lack of knowledge about what customers will write checks for quickly
an inferior value proposition
a slow product launch due to the learning curve of transplanted management team.
Eclicktick can help you avoid these mistakes, stage your investment in the US and accelerate the development of clients and positive cash flow.
Mission
Eclicktick Corporation helps foreign and domestic companies to be successful in the North American market. Our focus is upon helping firms determine the size of opportunity for their product in the US and providing distribution support for companies with high potential products and adequate funds for a successful launch.
Because we have worked with more than 50 startups, we can help you avoid the mistakes that practically every startup makes coming to the US.
As Assessment of Eclicktick and its Founder
Dr. Daniel Lee, President of KIPA, the Korean IT Promotion Agency in Seoul has described the founder of Eclicktick, Alistair Davidson as follows:
"Alistair Davidson is one of a few excellent international business strategists and analysts for [the] Information Technology (IT) industry. ... He is an exceptionally talented person especially in the field of IT industry, ... very knowledgeable about IT business and technology. I was also very impressed by his superb and bright ideas and strategies on the marketing and sales. ... I am being reported many times that [IPARK] tenant companies were very satisfied with his advice and consulting. ...I am very confident that Mr. Davidson can play an important role in globalizing firms in Silicon Valley by utilizing his internaitonal business skills and experience obtained from working for many American, Canadian and Korean companies during previous years."
Young Park, Director of IPARK Silicon Valley assessed Eclicktick's founder as follows:
"Alistair's career in software and high tech startups spans more than 20 years and he is undoubtedly one fo the most experienced and knowledgeable executives I have worked with in the field. His breadth and depth of knowledge in the software industry in evident through his published workds (books, Riding the Tiger, and Turn Around!). ...
Alistair's expertise in managing and leading companies is strongest in his ability for business strategy in growing or rescuing companies in any situation - whether it is with companies with unfinished products, unsound business models or poor management - Alistair is able to step in, analyze the problems, formulate a strategy, and facilitate the implementation to turn companies around."
Eclicktick Corporation Services
Market assessment and competitor analysis
Launch planning
Product management and localization
Inside sales and telesupport services to North American clients and prospects
Direct sales force or commissioned sales force hiring and management
Arranging office space and services for selected international companies that have gone through a formal process of market evaluation and launch planning.
Fund raising assistance for international companies with world class, leading edge technology.
Introduction - The Good News
Silicon Valley or the San Francisco Bay Area, as it is known by its local inhabitants, represents a major concentration of hardware, component, software and Internet companies. Its population is the best educated of any city in the US. Any international company with a world-class focus needs to have a presence here.
And the Bay Area is physically beautiful, with wonderful scenery, culture and restaurants.
The Bad News
The Bay Area is one of the most expensive places in the United States to do business. Housing and rental prices are exceptionally high. Labor costs are higher than anywhere else in the US. Traffic commutes are often long and arduous. Bridges are to be avoided at all costs. And we have earthquakes.
How We Can Help
The first and most important decision for you is: “Should I come to the US and establish a presence here?”
For most international companies, the answer is likely to be “No.” Unless you have sufficient resources to finance a presence in the US, you will most likely be wasting your money. Visits, use of the Internet, e-mail and purchased research will provide you with a lower cost and more effective way of understanding trends in the US market.
Before you come to the US, we recommend that you first do a market assessment. While consulting is more expensive in the US than Korea, a good market assessment can save you money. Many of our clients spend $1M or more on setting up a presence in the US, only to discover that launching and becoming a success in the US is beyond their resources.
Recommendation: Budget for around $25-100,000 for a market assessment. We can either provide staff or hire local consultants on your behalf.
Launch Planning
Launching the North American market is quite different from launching in Korea. There are five major differences:
The North American market is geographically huge.
The level of competition is probably 200X greater than in the home market.
The cost of launching a product is very high.
The cost of supporting a product is very high, even if you choose to use distributors.
Most international managers do not have the expertise or language skills for a successful and fast US launch.
Our services include developing a launch plan to ensure the maximum chance of success in the US market. We will use a mix of our own staff and outside sub-contractors with expertise in your industry.
Recommendation: Budget around $50-100,000 for launch planning. This will include development of a plan, discussions with potential distributors, with some original market research on your prospects. If you use Eclicktick for product management, this fee can be covered in the other fees.
Product Management
Eclicktick Corporation can act as your US product/market managers. We will hire and manage experienced US product managers for the launch and marketing of your product. Development of localized marketing materials, web site, public relations, training materials, telemarketing scripts, support training, sales training.
Launching in the US is not enough. You also have to learn from the US, from customers, prospects and competitors. These learnings have to be fed back to the product development group in Korea. So we can also manage a bilingual technical sales engineer or product management coordinator who will work with both the home market developers and also the US market managers.
Launch Recommendation For A Generic Software Product:
The following launch figures are for well funded product launch in the US. However, don't be put off if your launch budget is too low, our approach to the market is phased. First, market assessment. Second, development of launch plan. Third, distribution and sales strategy.
A typical budget for e.g. a software product might run as follows:
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Budget
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Assumptions
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Translation
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$50-75,000
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Manuals, web site, sales literature
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Literature development
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$50,000
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Brochure, white papers, corporate information, management biographies, customer stories.
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Web site development
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$50-100,000
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Content and programming
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Product management
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$200,000 per year
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A full time experience product manager with US launch experience
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Technical product management with home market head office
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$150,000 per year
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A bilingual technically oriented product manager for liaising with the home office.
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Development of training materials for sales staff, distributors, tele-support and telesales staff
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$50,000
|
A very cost effective way of leveraging a budget.
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Training
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$25,000-50,000
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Actual delivery of training.
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Public relations
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$100,000-250,000
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An inexpensive way of advertising.
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Advertising
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$500,000-$5,000,000
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A widely variable number. It would be higher for a consumer launch.
|
Tradeshows
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$100,000
|
Tradeshows are not always a good idea. We assume two tradeshows in this figure.
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Travel
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$100,000
|
The US is big. Travel is expensive.
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Miscellaneous
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$100,000
|
Unidentified
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Management fee
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$75,000
|
The equivalent of a VP Marketing reviewing the product manager work. Roughly 5% of budget.
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Total
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$1,650,000-$6,525,000
|
|
Low Budget Launches
Inside Sales, Telemarketing and Telesupport Services.
Many foreign companies setting up in the US are using the wrong sales approaches for the American market. Because of the size and cost of doing business in the US, the use of technology for marketing, sales and support is critical to reducing the cost of doing business in the US. IPARK Silicon Valley will set up both a customer relationship management (CRM) capability to support and sell your product or service. We have software that will allow us to model your business and predict the cost of telesales activities, customer support and technical support.
By using ASP (application services provider) based CRM services, our costs are actually much lower than setting up your own operation. We recently modeled a software business and came up with the following example costs for a $35,000 average sale.
Telesales/support fully loaded costs
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Cost
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Cost per closed sale using telesales
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$3,000
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Support call
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$35
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Technical support call
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$175
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Recommendation: Work with us to model your US business. Our fee for modeling your telephone sales and support activities typically runs in the $5,000 range. However, it does depend upon the complexity of your business and the number of different scenarios you wish to model. We can also incorporate direct and indirect sales activities into the model for a full picture of your sales costs.
Direct Sales Force Hiring and Management
The normal approach for Korean firms is to send over a manager to sell into the North American market. We find that this is not as useful as working with experienced North American sales staff. There are three choices available to you:
We can set you up with commissioned sales representatives who are only paid based upon sales.
We can hire your own dedicated sales force. It will typically be paid on the basis of a salary and bonus.
We can develop a shared sales force for more than one Korean company. The advantage of this approach is a reduced cost to each individual company and the ability to cover a greater area of the North American market at low cost.
A good sales representative in North America is typically to cost around $80,000 per year base salary with a bonus that takes him up to $150,000 if he achieves his quota. Expenses and other benefits will add another $50,000. Ideally, you would like your sales representative to be earning $200-250,000 year and be exceeding his quota. “Super-star” sales people in some industries are earning $350-450,000. Sales people need to be managed and supported and Eclicktick will provide such service.
Recommendation: Budget at around $250,000 per sales person in the first year if you are going it alone. If you are paying less, then you will not obtain the sales you are looking for. This figure includes the cost of recruiting the sales person (typically around $30,000).
Office Space and Services
We can arrange to set up office space, customer relationship management software, telemarketing software for your organization.
Fund Raising Assistance
Most foreign companies will find it easier to raise money in their home than in the US. The exceptions are those companies with leading edge technology.
If you have leading edge technology, the management team at Eclicktick Corporation can help package your business plan for maximum appeal and in the case of companies that have passed through the market assessment and launch planning services of Eclicktick Corporation, we will assist you in your presentations to US venture capital firms.
Costs for this service will vary and we typically expect equity in the company. We will only provide fund raising assistance for firms that have gone through our phased process of marketing and competitive assessment, launch planning, distribution and sales planning.
Our Staff
Our partners typically average 20 years plus of business experience with track records in finance, marketing, sales, business development, strategy and technology. Graduates of well known business and undergraduate schools such as Harvard, Stanford and Berkeley, our management team has published internationally - writing books and articles on strategy, technology, technology strategy, performance measurement, product launch strategy, best practices in software development.
Other Resources
White papers on launching in the US are available at www.eclicktick.com . A free e-book on starting, growing and turning around your software or Internet business is also available on the web site.