You've spent a great amount of time finding your contacts on the Internet. You've starting participating in the places they are. You're ready to take on the world now. Stop. Without a thorough understanding of the following concept, you can potentially lose your client base.

*Everyone in the fields that you want to make contact with WILL NOT do business in the same manner as you do, PARTICULARLY if they are not from your own country.

What does this mean? It means that the little things that you do every day, could potentially cause you to lose your online contacts. It means that you need to learn a whole lot more about customs and traditions before expecting to build strong, solid relationships. It means you may make a mistake or two, but you need to be prepared to go through a tremendous learning curve.

True life story. I'm borrowing from a popular current trend here in the US when I write about this story. The countries involved are Mars and Venus. (Here in the US, those are men and women, but in my story, they are actually persons from different countries).

Mars joins an e-mail list that is composed of mostly business professionals from Venus, but are a great potential client base. On Venus, things are done differently than on Mars, even though both countries speak the same language. Mars reads the list for a while (months, in fact).

After months, Mars begins to post informational posts to the lists- resource tips and business development information gleaned from various Internet sources. Keep in mind, this particular information was not specifically ASKED for, but in the spirit of sharing, Mars thinks this is a good thing to do- after all, sharing is good. AND Mars has been sharing the same information on OTHER e-mail lists and hearing how valuable it has been to people from THOSE countries (Like Saturn).

Venus becomes upset. First, because 7 posts arrive from Mars in one day. All different, but still *7* posts!. Then Venus is upset with the content of the posts. Does Mars think that Venus does not KNOW this information, or worse yet, does not know where to find it? And who said Venus NEEDED this information, anyway? What a totally Un-Venetian thing to do!

The rest, as they say, is history. In this example, there is proof that doing the same thing in the same way WILL NOT necessarily get you the same results. The main variable here, is the fact that the two participants were from two different countries with two different cultures. Both styles work in their homeland but will they work on an International basis? That remains to be seen.

Help With Understanding Other Cultures

To aid you in understanding the various cultures YOUR client base may be composed of, the following is suggested:

1. Check out the following International Links:

   International Marketing Resources-
   http://www.profnet.org/intermar.html

   Culture Page Index-
   http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Forum/8363/

   The Web Of Culture-
   http://www.worldculture.com/index.html

   International Recommended Readings-
   http://www.inc.com/international/recommended_readings

2. Befriend someone who is a native in the area you are looking to expand. Ask questions and LISTEN to what the answers are. Find out how your actions would be perceived by natives of that culture.
3. Expect to make mistakes as you learn about each culture. Plan on varying YOUR style and methods to accommodate your potential client base.
4. Help those of other cultures understand YOURS. If asked, offer advice and suggestions on how YOU would have handled the same thing in your culture. What path would you have taken to the get to the same place THEY want to go?

Working on the Internet exposes us all to the world. We need to learn more about that world to be effective and productive. We still cannot say that EVERYONE from Mars acts the same way, and so does EVERYONE from Venus. But STYLES that are common in each culture often come through as inappropriate for other cultures. Don't lose your client base because of YOUR style.

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Nancy Roebke, is the Executive Director Profnet, Inc., a professional business leads generation corporation. We bring business professionals together in a non-competitive environment to help each other make more money. Visit her site at http://www.profnet.org