As in previous posts, regulations/rules and
language, knowledge of market and customers of foreign market are often named
as key factors in going global yet difficult to overcome.
In reality, selling, distributing and
collecting money in doing business (something more operational) especially in
going global is a huge obstacle. This is vital in business yet sometimes
underestimated in planning phase.
You cannot say your business is successful
unless you managed to sell, distribute/provide to your customers and they pay
you, i.e. you receive money from them, not account receivable).
In making Japan market entry and doing
business in Japan, this may not be as critical as some other countries/regions
because Japanese people tend to keep their promise once made. Perhaps Japanese
companies and business professionals going global find this more difficult.
But still, when you are not so familiar
with the Japanese market, developing the total operational process and making
sure you manage the process and collect money from your customers in a way that
your cash flow is in good condition is not easy, especially when you cannot set
up an entity in Japan from the start etc.
A solution is setting up a Joint Venture
with a Japanese company but this is still too much a burden for many small
& mid-sized businesses. In that case, there are other possible solutions,
too.
This is one of the topics I have covered in
my two eBooks I wrote, which was published by StartiaLab, a leading Japanese eBook
publisher in November, 2015.
English version: 7 Things to Know to be Successful in Business in
Japan
Japanese version: 世界を相手に勝つための教科書 – グローバル社会で事業を拡大する7つの方法と8つの事例
