How should a startup expand a web-app to another country?
- posted by: Alejo Bernardin on 2014-09-16
- tagged:
business-plan, growth, website
- score: 1
Facebook began in Harvard, and then expanded to others universities, step by step, this was a master move from M.Zuckerberg.
In this context of expansion of a web-app, if I begin in a “X” country and my startup (web-app like google, trello, instagram) is successful:
How can I expand to others countries, in the sense of being effective in my entrance to the foreign society?
I’m thinking of expanding to other countries because in the same country is easier to communicate an idea, i.e., local radio, local newspaper, local webpages, local persons networks, etc.
Answer 912
Here’s a general idea using the concept of generic areas as opposed to whole countries. But first, let’s make some simple assumptions:
- All of the areas use the same language
- For each area you want to expand into, there will be a sizable number of people in your target market who know someone from an area that you are already active in
- Your target markets in each of the areas generally have similar interests
Okay, so given these, we can focus on actually getting your webapp out there:
- Try to choose areas where there is already a visible amount of interest. If there are no areas with interest yet, perhaps you need to better market your product in the area you are already deployed in.
- Prioritize deployment into new areas by interest level, target market size, and the “connectedness” of those new areas into areas where your product is already gaining traction.
- Make your product available for free, with additional options or features available with a subscription. For instance:
- Google Apps: free for individual users, paid plan allows businesses to manage all of their users and use their own domain. Paid plans also add additional features and space.
- Trello: basic features are available for free, additional features and data management is available with their paid plans.
- GitHub: free for all users, private repos cost $, enterprise deployments on their own infrastructure cost $$$.
- See if you can get your expansion mentioned in a local news/blog/aggregator site. Alternatively, if you are adding multiple areas at a time, see if you can get mentioned in a large tech media site (TechCrunch, Lifehacker, etc.) or popular news aggreagators (really just Slashdot and Hacker News).
- Consider just making your webapp available to all users everywhere from Day I. Whether this is a good idea or not depends on your actual app, but seriously think it through.
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