Are you involved in the import/export trade?  Your focus might be on buying high quality, competitvely priced wholesale products but what if you’re an exporter or manufacturer looking to sell your goods in another country? How do you begin to find customers in far-away places you’re never likely to visit?

One obvious way is to use distributors. People who know how business works in these countries and already have contacts in place ready to buy your goods. They become, in effect, your sales force. Of course your profit per sale will be less but distributors take away the aggravation of finding direct customers.

Marketing Yourself

You can find distributors through a variety of methods, including in person, online, and through telephone or email communications.

Industry trade shows draw distributors, sometimes from other countries. By talking to them, you might hear about their competition abroad. You can also talk to fellow manufacturers or exporters of goods similar or complementary to yours. Particularly if their goods complement yours, both of your businesses might benefit from an arrangement where distributors sell your goods together.

B2B Portals

Online B2B portals offer a great way to meet many potential distributors at once, while saving time. You can list yourself in a well-known portal and attract interest in your products, or search for distributors who have listed themselves as looking for goods in your industry.

When you create your profile or post on a B2B portal, keep professionalism in mind. Fill out your company profile as completely as possible, to inspire confidence in possible distributors. They will be more likely to contact a business that has clearly stated the industry it operates in, a paragraph or two about its history, its customer base, and exciting new projects or products. Aim to generate interest in your company through your B2B profile.

International B2B trade has become increasingly easy in recent years. Take these basic steps to generate interest in your goods, and your business can benefit from finding international distributors!

Partner Leads

If you want to find distributors on Import-Export-Guide.com (or offer your services as a distributor) then the section you should be posting on is the Partner Leads section.

Here are a few current leads:
Sports Clothing Distributors Required (Member based in Pakistan)
Herbal Hair Oil Distributors Required (Member based in India)
Distributors for Diesel Forklift Trucks Needed (Member based in Belgium)

Read a full version of this article on the Guide Section: Find Distributors for your Goods Abroad

So the new Standard and Basic Membership system went live at the end of last month. Whew!!! It has been such a stressful time, so much to take care of!

Happily it went without a hitch and the number of Standard members is rising (more slowly than we would have hoped but we’ll give it time).

Just to recap on the differences, Standard members (they pay a small membership fee) can post up to 50 Sell Trade Leads, 50 Products, unlimited Buy Trade Leads and unlimited Partner Trade Leads, have an extended company profile including more contact details. They can also post Documents and appear higher in lists and search results. It all serves to make their company and products a lot more visible to Buyers and, we all hope, will help increase the volume of international trade these members enjoy.

For the time being Basic members can post 2 Sell Leads, 1 Partner Trade Lead, Unlimited Buy Trade Leads, 2 Products and a Company Profile. This subscription level is free and is really aimed at Buyers.

Those of you who are considering subscribing might be interested to know we’re running a promotion until the end of this month – 33% off the first quarter’s membership fees!

We’re looking forward to the introduction of subscriptions on the trade portal later on next month. Subscriptions will mean we’ll be able to offer members an improved service.

There are to be two categories of members – Basic and Standard.

Standard members, who will pay a fairly small subscription to use our services, will be able to post more trade leads and products than is possible at the moment and there will be a range of other features designed to improve the marketing of their companies and products.

Basic membership is free and is meant for people who haven’t used the site before and want to give it a try before committing and also for people who only want to submit ‘Buy’ trade leads. Basic members will have access to a limited range of the site’s facilities.

The latest changes are up and most of you will be pleased to be able to market your products at last. We know you’re limited to only 2 products at the moment but eventually more will be allowed on a subscription basis.

Both company profiles and products have to be approved before they go up (like Buy and Partner leads). This is to stop people spamming with inappropriate information. We should really extend this to Sell leads as well – hopefully if/when we get more staff.

It’s nice to see that most people are submitting images with their products – here’s an interesting one: Green Life Mud Crabs, submitted by liveseafoodpng who is based in Papua New Guinea.

Apparently Papua New Guinea is one of the most diverse countries on the planet with over 850 languages – the population is under 6,000,000!!!

The country’s exports include a variety of minerals (oil, gold, copper), timber, agricultural product (palm oil, yams, coffee, cocoa) and, as liveseafoodpng has shown, fish products. Machinery, chemicals and manufactured goods are amongst their main imports.

We’ve been working very hard over the past two month on a number of changes to the site, especially the trade portal.

Amongst other things, many people have requested better product marketing, product search and company search facilities as well. 

We’re happy to announce your wishes are about to be granted!

The product and company updates will be rolled out in the coming weeks – expect a little down time – with more new features to come. 

So watch this space!