Designing Successful

International Go-To-Market Strategies

Issue 1

Long value chains.

Authors
Hans Peter Bech, MA (Econ.), Group CEO at TBK Consult.

Whitepaper from TBK Consult

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Targeted audience

This white paper is written for the CEO and the board of
directors of software companies, which are already working
internationally or are about to embark on an international
endeavor.
The white paper is addressing software companies with long
and comprehensive value chains. This includes companies with
solutions which require a considerable amount of sales effort,
customization, consulting, implementation support and on-going
support. For software companies in this category the software
itself is typically less than 50% of total project and customer
lifetime value.

Abstract

This white paper is describing some of the challenges associated

with international market penetration for software companies
with long value chains. Further it gives two real life examples
of how companies have overcome these challenges using very
different approaches.
Company XYZ changed from a channel based approach to
internationalization through acquisitions. Company ABC chose
an international joint venture strategy to compensate for lack of
staff and funds.

Acknowledgements

I wish to thank Haim Oren from TBK Israel for encouraging

me to write this whitepaper and to Steen Alexander of
ValueMaker for his valuable support during the editorial
process.
English proof reading: Michael Cain of Lammas, Esbjerg,
Denmark, www.lammas.dk

www.tbkconsult.com

Design and lay-out: Flier Disainistuudio, Tallinn, Estonia,

www.flier.ee

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Introduction

The challenges and solutions discussed in this white paper are

primarily relevant to your situation if you can identify with most
of the following characteristics:
You are well established in your domestic market with
several blue chip reference clients and/or a considerable1
market share.
You have staff and funds available for international market
penetration.
You have defined, described and verified your customer value
proposition and there is a clear and quantifiable return on
investment associated with implementing your solution.
You have have defined, documented and verified the sales
process for your solution.
Your sales tools in terms of customer case stories, solution
white papers, product factsheets and a targeted web site are
all in place.
It is possible to activate the need for your product through a
proactive sales effort.
Your deals in this type of value chain are seldom lower than
EUR 150.000 with annual recurring revenue of 15-25%.
If one or more of the items mentioned above are missing, we
suggest you develop these before making any advances on
territories outside your domestic market.

Basic
terminology

Entering a new market goes through three main stages:

www.tbkconsult.com

Boot Strapping

2.

Bridgehead

3.

Expansion

the phase where you get the first 3-5 clients

where you establish a local presence to enforce your

position and grow to 10-15 clients

where you scale your operation to go for market

dominance

Software companies with a small market share in their domestic

market should not consider international activities. Investment in
domestic market penetration will yield a much higher return on
investment. If a software company is facing difficulties in winning
market share locally it is very unlikely that they will be more successful
internationally.
1

1.

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Considerations of a strategic nature in this whitepaper are made

following the definitions know from the Balanced Scorecard
theory2. According to Balanced Scorecard a strategy (Customer
Value Proposition) will always be a combination of 3 main
elements:

Customer Intimacy
The Customer Intimacy
strategy defines a need to be
close to the individual client
and be responsive to his
specific needs

Operational Excellence
The Operational Excellence
strategy defines a need to
provide products and services
at a very competitive price,
typically accompanied by a
volume approach

Product Leadership
The Product Leadership strategy
defines a need to be perceived as
providing features and functions
no one else is offering typically at a
premium price

A Balanced Scorecard customer value proposition is illustrated

by a pie chart showing the weight of each strategy element.

Figure 1:
Value Proposition Sample

The customer value proposition illustrated in Fig. 1 could be

a Microsoft/SAP VAR3 with an ERP4 solution for at vertical
market or an ISV5 with a high priced enterprise solution.
Purchase decisions for enterprise solutions are strategic
nature. Enterprises only make such decisions every 5-10 years.
Enterprises do not favor technology leaders; they prefer proven
technology and established vendors6. Thus software companies
There are numerous sources to information on Balanced Scorecard.
A Google search gives 1,6 million hits! You can start with this independent description: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balanced_scorecard
3
Value Added Reseller
4
Enterprise Resource Planning
5
Independent Software Vendor
6
For a solid argumentation please see Crossing the Chasm by
Geoffrey A. Moore (2002 edition)

www.tbkconsult.com

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

operating in such markets must be close to the individual clients,

build references which look alike, provide vertical functionality
and integration capabilities to existing applications. Price is not
the most important issue in such business cases.
The Balanced Scorecard theory operates with a set of critical
success factors associated with each of the three value elements.
These critical success factors are very different for each value
element.
Balanced Scorecard further defines 4 management perspectives
subdivided into 10 management fields. The importance of each
field is dictated by the customer value proposition and the
associated critical success factors.7
When you understand and accept the Balanced Scorecard
paradigms, you will also understand and accept that a strategy
must have a dominating value element, you simply cannot be
equally good at all three (but you certainly can be equally bad at
all three!)8.

The business
challenges

The main challenges in a business scenario with long and

comprehensive value chains are:

A. The long learning curve

Whether you are setting up your own operation in
a new territory or you are building a channel of
independent resellers, the time and resources required
for generating the first reference customers will be
substantial. We call this the long learning curve

B. Fractional Revenue
Only a fraction of the project revenue may flow back
to you. The major portions will reside with the sales
and implementation operation taking responsibility
for selling and delivering the project.
TBK Consult uses a strategy review tool called ValuePerform. This
tool adds a fifth management perspective measuring the execution
power of the management team. The definition of the 5 management
perspectives as well as the critical success factors are listed in Appendix
A and Appendix B.
8
A value proposition with equal focus on the three vale elements is per
definition unfocused.

www.tbkconsult.com

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

A.

The long
learning curve

Purchasing

The long learning curve apply to the selling side as well as the
purchasing side. Let's start by looking at the purchasing side.
We are assuming that the purchase process was started by you.
By presenting how you have been able to generate substantial
benefits for other clients, the current potential client is interested
in learning more (although we must assume that he is also
skeptical).
The questions the decision makers at the potential clients will
ask themselves (and maybe you) are:
Is ABC Company really capable of delivering the value they
promise?
Should we reallocate resources to pursue this potential
project at the expense of other projects?
Will my situation be similar to the other clients Company
ABC has helped?
How much support can I expect if things dont run as smooth
as expected?
Will it hurt my position if this project fails?
What do I risk by doing nothing?
Even though the value proposition may be extremely promising
and the benefits substantial and even quantifiable the decision
making process will take time and require several meetings and
maybe also require reference visits and a test/pilot project.

The sales process

The sales process is the structured way of organizing you efforts

so that you can accommodate the customers purchase process
successfully in the shortest time possible securing a happy
customer.

www.tbkconsult.com

It is not within the scope of this white paper to address the

issues associated with driving a sales process. Numerous books
are written on this subject9. It is however crucial to stress that
selling to a potential client outside your domestic market adds
additional complexity and resistance, which we will address in
this white paper.
From previous sales situations in your domestic market you
will know the questions the customers needs answered and the
kind of proof he will require in the various stages of the decision
Eg. The New Solution Selling, Keith M. Eades, McGraw-Hill and Jill
Konrath: Selling to BIG companies, Dearborn 2006
9

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

making process. You also know which skills you need to allocate
to make the process move forward and conclude the project with
a positive outcome.

The additional challenge

Selling into a new geographic territory add additional challenges

to the sales process. These are some of the most common issues:
There may be legal or local market requirements that you
solution do not meet10.
You may need to operate in the local language and make all
your sales tools available in local language.
You may need staff that speak and write the local
language.
Your potential customers may be extra cautious because you
have no presence and references in the local territory.
A strong competitor may already be dominating your market
in the new territory, making market entry very difficult.
Your company is completely unknown in the new territory.
Your current references are completely unknown in the new
territory.
The distance to your new market adds additional travel
expenses and consumes additional time per activity in the
sales process.
The local people you may engage to help you are inexperienced
with your solution, your company and your references.

B.

Fractional
Revenue

Let's assume that the price of the solution you sell consists of 50%
software licenses and 50% consulting. In order to compensate
your sales organization you decide to award the first 5 sales
cases they close with 50% on the net license value11. Let's assume
that you decide to give your first 5 customers a 25% reduction in
the license price as compensation for being first and for acting as
future references.
The revenue you receive from the first 5 deals in the new territory
is then 18,75% of what you normally get when selling a similar
solution in your current territory.
This white paper is not dealing with issues related to the localization
of the software. For some solutions this may not be an issue or a
language issue only, but for other solutions substantial localization
may be required.
11
The sales organization may be an agent or a reseller who cover the
sales cost and are remunerated only when a deal is completed. If the
sales organization is a subsidiary you will have the fixed cost even if
deals are not completed.

www.tbkconsult.com

10

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

In addition you most likely will have to allocate more resources

to the sales process and you must expect a longer sales cycle
compared to your home market situation.
This is the real life scenario for almost all software companies
penetrating a new territory.

Approaches to deal
with the challenges

In the long value chain scenario, we firmly believe that the most
effective approach to entering a new territory is making at least
the first 3-5 deals by yourself!12

Winning new territory with solutions which

are already widely available in the territory
by local suppliers may an uphill battle. You
must provide substantial additional value
to make up for the risk of engaging with a
foreigner.

Irrespective of your strategic go-to-market

approach, we believe the fastest and most
effective boot strapping strategy is a direct
one.
For this recommendation to stand we must
assume that your value proposition is very
attractive and well documented and that
you do not face severe local competition.

If your solution can be matched by competitive solutions already

available and established in the new market you basically only
have two options for market entry:
1. Invest massively in market penetration and be patient
2. Enter the market through acquisitions or joint ventures

This doesnt mean that an indirect model will not work. There may
be situations where you can find a Value Added Reseller of Systems
Integrator which is prepared to co-invest in market penetration
especially if you already have one or more qualified leads to work on.
The general experience however shows that indirect sales models do not
work in cases with long value chains. It turns out that many companies
have difficulties combining a direct sales approach on the domestic
market with an indirect sales approach on export markets.

www.tbkconsult.com

12

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Case Study 1: XYZ Company

Company profile

XYZ Company is a value added reseller of SAP and Microsoft

Dynamics AX/NAV. XYZ also have own proprietary IP
based solutions, but it is not the ambition to market these
internationally. XYZ holds a dominating position in several
vertical markets domestically and have been working on
expansion into new territories for many years.
XYZ Company was founded in the 1970ies and has a staff of
close to 1.000.

The situation

So far the international expansion strategy had been indirect

convincing resellers of Microsoft Dynamics AX/NAV abroad
to include the solutions from XYZ Company in their portfolio.
However, this approach never generated very much revenue and
as the costs of sales associated with supporting the Microsoft
Dynamics partners were high the activity never became
profitable. Compared to the core business XYZ Company clearly
suffered from the fractional revenue problem mentioned above.

The analysis

A new CEO revisited the situation and came to the following

conclusion:

www.tbkconsult.com

XYZ Company is a successful Value Added Reseller of

vertical solutions based on SAP, Microsoft Dynamics AX/
NAV and our own IP. Our success is a combination of vertical
market insight/understanding and solutions tailored to
the individual vertical market and the client. We are client
centric much more than we are product centric. Selling our
software products to other VARs doesnt match our core
strategy and will always be an alien appendix.
The analysis concluded that XYZ Company was neither a
product leader nor a low cost provider. The position in the
current markets was established through many years of market
penetration combined with several acquisitions of smaller
competitors. The customer value proposition was a combination
of Customer Intimacy and Product Leadership in vertical
functionality. Revenue growth was sustained by constantly
adding new features to the existing solution portfolio maintaining
a growing revenue stream from the current client base. Winning

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

new ERP13 customers is always tough14, but the vertical focus

and increasing market shares in the vertical segments made XYZ
Company the low risk choice15 for many new customers in the
domestic market. A competitive edge of XYZ Company was also
the substantial vertical competence domain knowledge, which
their consultants could demonstrate and use in the dialog with
potential clients. Building such domain knowledge takes time
and/or requires recruitment of staff with domain experience.

The Solution

The strategy review process concluded that the only viable

approach to entering new territories was through acquisition of
successful local players in these markets. Company XYZ decided
that remaining customer centric was of strategic importance.
It was less important if the customers were all running on the
same product platform and it was not a key issue which of the
product platforms would be the dominating in the future.16
Although the company XYZ is a 1.000 people operation they dont
operate their own M&A function. By using external consultants
they use a two step process when entering a new market.

www.tbkconsult.com

Market Assessment

2.

M&A

A fast scanning of the market using a fixed format

assessment template
Provision of a long list of acquisition candidates

Local M&A company is engaged to manage the

acquisition process

Enterprise Resource Planning is the term coverings all solutions

based on SAP and Microsoft Dynamics.
14
An enterprise is typically in the market for a new ERP solution every
5-10 years.
15
When enterprises are making substantial investment decisions in
fields where they have little insight there is a strong tendency to choose
the option with the lowest perceived risk. Very few companies have staff
who can comprehend the quality of and the difference between various
ERP software packages and the quality of the implementation partners
available.
16
It was certainly an issue to assess which of the platform providers
(SAP or Microsoft) would be most successful in providing support for
a certain vertical market. The Market Assessment therefore always
included this element before executing the M&A.
13

10

1.

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Conclusion

Making acquisitions successful is a challenge in itself. It

is beyond the scope of this white paper to address these
issues. There is sufficient literature covering this field.17
However, having and living an acquisition strategy where
you perform 3-5 acquisitions per year, improves your ability
to master the art.
Company XYZ has defined market share by number of
customers or share of revenue in a vertical segment.
Whether these customers are running their ERP solutions
on identical platforms is less important. In the long run
Company XYZ can provide migration paths for their client
and thus keep them as customer and can offer identical
peripheral solutions and services to all clients irrespective
of platform.

Figure 2:
Typical Value Added Reseller Strategy

The conflict the Company XYZ was faced with, when

trying to sell solutions through an independent network
of resellers is typical. The fundamental reason for the
inefficiency is a conflict of strategy.
If you are a solutions oriented Value Added Reseller with
a vertical market focus your strategy will be customer
centric, with a small portion of Product Leadership and
Operational Excellence18.

www.tbkconsult.com

If you are a platform provider (ISV) to Value Added

Resellers you will have a very different strategy profile.
You are no longer close to the customers, but need to focus
on the requirements of the Value Added Reseller and to be
successful your strategy must be like illustrated in Fig. 3.
Just Google making acquisitions work and you will get 64 million
hits!
18
A VAR with solutions addressing the low end market with standard
solutions will most likely have a much higher Operational Excellence
focus at the expense of lower Product Leadership and Customer
Intimacy.
17

11

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Figure 2:
Typical ISV value proposition

The differences in strategy required serving clients in a

vertical market and serving Value Added Resellers explains
why so many software companies fail in implementing an
indirect sales approach.
The Critical Success Factors are different, and the more
successful you are as a VAR the more likely it is that you
will be a poor ISV. ISV/Product Leadership stresses product
development, time-to-market, functionality and an image
as Premium Product. VAR/Customer Intimacy stresses
customer service, customer guidance, relationships and a
Trusted Brand image.
The skill set required to talk directly to customers are very
different from the skill set required to talk to VARs, who
then talk to the customers.

www.tbkconsult.com

Managing both approaches under the same roof proves to

be very difficult to all Value Added Resellers.

12

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Case study 2: ABC Company

Company profile

Company ABC is offering a combination of a software tool and

consulting services which can save their clients between 5-10%
of their IT server capacity needs per year compared to their
current mode of operation. The return of investment is less than
6 months and several current clients will testify that they have
made substantial savings by using the services of Company
ABC.
The solution price point is EUR 1 mill and up.
Potential clients are large enterprises with substantial IT
installations and organizations especially enterprises which are
primarily based on information processing (banking, insurance,
telco etc.)
Company ABC is 20 years old and has a staff of 10 people.

The Situation

The company had for many years tried to set up international

market penetration through agents and resellers, but had not
sold a single license through any of these channels.
3 years ago Company ABC contracted with an external
consultant to rework the international go-to-market strategy.
After an initial strategy review it was decided to put the
international activities on hold. It was decided to build a
professional sales capability locally and to refine the sales
strategy for the domestic market first. Full focus was put on
winning more business with current clients and winning new
clients in the domestic market. Further effort was invested in
understanding and documenting the customer value proposition
beyond the technical features of the software and services
provided.

www.tbkconsult.com

During the period, where all effort was focused on the domestic
market,
several
international
opportunities
presented
themselves. However new attempts taking advantage of these
opportunities to sell solutions in new territories also failed!

13

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

The Analysis

The external consultant started to interview current clients

at the executive level to find out why they used the Company
ABC tools and what they had achieved by doing so. During
these interviews it became clear that the clients were not fully
conscious about the value that Company ABC actually provided.
It also became clear that Company ABC could sell much more to
the clients if they changed some of their approaches.
By working with the clients to identify and quantify the benefits
substantial tangible and measurable benefits were identified.
The clients (at the executive C-level) were eager to help complete
the assessments and to explore if further benefits could be
derived from using the tools and competence of Company ABC.

The analysis also indicated that Company

ABC hardly had any external competitors.
Promises of cost savings or process
Resistance to apply the tools and services
optimization seldom motives non-executives
primarily came from internal sources at the
to act. Sales messages based on financial or
clients. Some clients had internal developed
process improvement must be addressed to
solutions which were fiercely defended by
the executive level.
the staff, who perceived their position in
the company tied to the continuation of
these activities. Resistance also came from
technical staff, who didn't like the idea that an external party
could identify savings and optimizations which they themselves
could not. In general it became clear that the clients technical
staff was not motivated by optimization opportunities or cost
savings. Finally Company ABC found that some clients, who
had outsourced their IT operation, believed that the outsourcing
partner would take care of IT optimization.

The Objectives

Based on the findings from these interviews and the testimonials

from the existing clients it was decided to develop a completely
new value proposition and go-to-market strategy.

www.tbkconsult.com

Selling at a lower level on technical capabilities had proven slow

and unsuccessful. Selling business value to technical staff had
also been unsuccessful.
However working with the clients C-level executives identifying
business value had proved to be extremely successful. However,
selling to C-level executives requires a different skill set and

14

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

a different type of sales person, than is the case with a more

technical approach.
Thus, the main objective of the new strategy was to sell "proven"
value to enterprise clients using a C-level entry point. Further
it was decided to break up the sales process in smaller portions
which could be decided much faster by the client and to base any
sales activity on data from each individual client.

The Solution

Changing the value proposition required a rewrite of all

sales documentation and the development of a new web site.
Additionally the way sales was undertaken also went through a
complete redesign introducing a 3 step process:

1.

Health Check

2.

Proof of Value

3.

Full Scale Implementation

Very little effort by client

Some effort by client

Full support from client

Finally, with the contact point for new leads being a C-level
position person, new sales material and sales pitches were
develop to match the tone and concerns of this type of roles.
Training sessions were conducted in "selling to the C-level".
Company ABC also decided to offer clients a performance based
payment scheme as an alternative to the traditional cost based
pricing approach with paying for licenses, maintenance, support
and consulting.

www.tbkconsult.com

Health Check

15

The Health Check is an analysis, which Company ABC can

perform on data delivered by the potential client. Providing this
data is a minor effort on the clients' behalf and doesn't require
any investment over and above the time used to dump the data,
send it to Company ABC and participate in the workshop where
the results are presented. Based on this data Company ABC can
perform analysis which will indicate if a potential optimization

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

and thus saving is possible. It is absolute imperative that the

Health Check is supported by a power sponsor.

Proof of Value

Proof of Value is an implementation of the Company ABC tools

at the client site and running real time monitoring in a certain
period, making some of the changes recommended in the Health
Check AND where Company ABC will be paid a percentage of
the savings. In many cases the clients decided to jump the Proof
of Value and simply acquire the tools and services at list price,
because that was more favorable than paying the performance
based fees.

Full Scale Implementation

Full scale implementation is the phase where the client is using

Company ABC tools and services on a daily basis.
As opposed to earlier, full scale implementation includes
periodical reviews where consultants from Company ABC
perform capacity auditing and recommend additional actions to
optimize and save investment in additional application licenses
and server hardware.

The Strategy

With hardly any external competition and a very promising

value proposition, Company ABC decided on an aggressive
growth plan including the penetration of international markets.
The company decided for a direct approach with no resellers
or distributors in between, but to build a brand and capability
to serve clients all over the world through local organizations
controlled by the company.
Being short on equity the company decided to identify local joint
venture partners who were prepared to co-invest in building a
presence in new territories.

www.tbkconsult.com

The strategy was to implement the new value proposition and

go-to-market strategy in the domestic market with current
resources and start penetrating the neighbor territories through
new joint venture partners, with sales and technical support
from current resources.
The joint venture partners would initially operate as sales
agents. As soon as a base of 2-3 customers were in place the
agent agreement would be replaced with a subsidiary, where

16

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

the agent would hold 49% and Company ABC 51%. A pull option
would secure Company ABC the right to purchase all remaining
shares and secure the agent a very favorable capitalization of the
value created.

Activities

The strategy proved very successful in the domestic market,

where several new clients were added to the reference list with
much shorter sales cycles than previously. Sales cycles were not
quite as short as hoped for and managing internal resistance
from the clients technical staff was still an issue which required
energy and time.
Finding and making joint venture partners abroad perform
proved to be a real challenge. In spite of the new value proposition
and the new go-to-market approach sales cycles in new territories
were still 9-12 months. Finding joint venture partners who were
prepared and able to allocate all their time to building up a
pipeline and manage the sales process without being paid until
signed client orders were closed, was very difficult.
Through the personal network of the management consultant
a joint venture partner was identified in a neighboring country.
The joint venture partner was already acquainted with the
potential client base and had access to power sponsors in most
enterprises in the territory. Within 9 months the first contract
was signed with a new client in the territory and a significant
pipeline of projects was in place for closing in the 4th quarter
and in the following year.

Conclusion

Company ABC yet has to prove that the GTM strategy is

scalable and that they can find the joint venture partners
required to boot strap a new market. Using traditional
recruitment agencies is considered an opportunity and will
be tried in the near future.

www.tbkconsult.com

Company ABC benefits from having only 1 strategy to

maintain irrespective of which market they enter.
The company has recognized a need to be very close to the
individual customer. They therefore only recruit people who
are already acquainted with the customer base and who are
capable of communicating value at the executive C-level.

17

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

With little competition and a complex domain area they

can afford to put less attention on product development.
However they recognize a need for productizing, product
planning and roadmap management as their installed
base continues to grow. The lack of competition and the
extremely attractive return on investment which the
solution delivers, does not call for focus on Operational
Excellence. However, the cash requirements for building
up new markets are driving a focus on how to optimize the
go-to-market investments.

www.tbkconsult.com

Figure 4:
ABC Company Value Proposition

18

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Hans Peter Bech

Hans Peter Bech has more than 25 years of experience with
international sales & marketing of ITC products, services and
solutions. Hans Peters core competencies are:
Enterprise B2B business process software solutions, ERP/
ERM/CRM solutions and software engineering (bespoke
development).
Go-to-market
strategy/program
development
and
implementation, including reference client recruitment,
recruitment of reseller and distributor channels and setting
up new subsidiaries.
Extensive experience with and personal network in
Scandinavia, Eastern and Western Europe, Russia, North
America, Australasia and South Africa.
From 1998 to 2001 Hans Peter lived in Stuttgart, Germany
responsible for building the partner channel for Damgaard/
Navision (later acquired by Microsoft) in Germany, Austria and
Switzerland.
Hans Peter speaks Danish, English and German.
Hans Peter holds a M.A. in macroeconomics and political science
from the University of Copenhagen.

www.tbkconsult.com

As a sales person Hans Peter qualified more than 15 times for

100% Clubs, Summit Conferences, Million $ Clubs and Top
Performer events.

19

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Appendix A:
ValuePerform operates with 15 management fields divided into 5 Perspectives. 4 of these perspectives
are known from the Balance Scorecard. The fifth perspective is added by ValuePerform to measure
the ability to execute. The 15 management fields are:

The Financial Perspective

Capital base:

Cash flow and Earnings

The Learning/Growth Perspective

Organization Capital:

Satisfaction, Values and Team spirit

Information Capital:

IT, Knowledge sharing and External cooperation

Human Capital:

Recruitment, Retention and Development

The Internal Perspective

Innovation:

Product development and Process development

Customer management:

Attraction, Retention and Dependence

Operation:

Capacity, Flow and Flexibility

Regulatory and Environment:

Security and Ethics

The Customer Perspective

Product/Service:

Competitive parameters and Customer value

proposition

Relationships:

Customers relations, Customer loyalty

Image:

Knowledge and Recommendations

www.tbkconsult.com

The Management Perspective

20

Objectives:

Planning and Focus

Strategy:

Mission and Business plan

Action:

Resourcefulness and Achievement of objectives

People:

Management composition, Leadership development

and Leadership experience and cooperation

Designing Successful International Go-To-Market Strategies

Appendix B
Critical Success Factors areas according to Balanced Scorecard

Assuming Product leadership

The internal process area Innovation is critical, consequently
focus is on the following areas:
Idea generation
Product development
Continuous introduction of new products
Joint ventures / Partnerships
In terms of the Customer Perspective Product/Service attributes,
areas of critical importance are:
Time-to-market
Functionality/Performance
As a brand the company should pursue a reputation as a
Premium product

Assuming Operational Excellence

The internal process area Operation is critical, consequently
focus is on the following areas:
Supply chain management
Operational cost efficiency:
Cost reduction
Quality improvement and
Production time reductions
Capacity management
In terms of the Customer Perspective Product/Service attributes,
areas of critical importance are:
Price/quality
Time
Range
As a brand the company is appealing to the Smart shopper

Assuming Customer Intimacy

www.tbkconsult.com

The Internal Perspective dimension Customer Management is

critical, consequently focus is on the following areas:
Solution Development
Customer Service
Customer relationship management
Customer guidance
In terms of the Customer Perspective, the Relationship
dimensions of critical importance are:
Customer Relations
Customer Loyality
As a brand a company should pursue reputation as a trusted
brand.

21

TBK-WIPA-001