Look at the world’s largest technology companies; Microsoft, Facebook, Google, Tencent, Netmarble, Samsung, Apple, Netflix and many others. They all have a common characteristic: All of them have been initiated in their home countries and then sailed out to global markets.
There are many reasons for it to be so, but the most important one is that you can optimize a product better at your home. The creation of the product and stages for perfecting it after hitting the market can be realized more conveniently in the main market that the company operates. Employees and the customers may understand each other in convenience when they speak the same language, moreover they can quickly spot the problems and solve them.
In addition, the network effect has also great effect that it is impossible to be ignored. In your own market, you can reach the business partners you need, the top managers of the companies involved, or financial resources, more easily. It is much more likely to receive government support or receive voluntary support from the community.
We may also take a look at the internet and technology companies originated in Turkey. Yemeksepeti, Markafoni, Provus, Joygame, Peak Games, and many more companies have been successful firstly in Turkey, which were then expanded to the surrounding region or globally.
Entrepreneurs in Turkey, sometimes, fix their goals as to penetrate US, German or UK markets. I am really surprised by the entrepreneurs who are setting their goals to sailing the most expensive countries regarding user acquisition and super competitive environments that they haven’t even set foot once, without meeting with their local target audience, receiving any feedback and perfecting their products.
Personally, I’ve always been a manager looking at the bright side, and I recommend it to all my friends at work. Being an entrepreneur in Turkey comes with tremendous advantages and challenges. We should keep that in mind.
Turkey is a big market. Entrepreneurs in many countries cannot actualize their ideas and products because of the inadequacy of their own homes and spend much time, energy and money while trying to perfect their products in different markets.
In Turkey, however, you can develop various digital ideas, introduce them to your target audience economically and optimize them. Entrepreneurs often fall into a big mistake, believing that their ideas and the products they have developed are perfect. Even if everything is perfect, just a design mistake on the home screen or an overlooked error in the database can be critical to keep your business running, when you have reached high user counts. Today, even in the Internet industry, where profitability is not 20 percent, the losses that an imperfect product has may wipe out all the projected profits.
So my advice to entrepreneurs in Turkey is to use their “HOMETOWN” advantage. Deliver your digital products to a large audience in Turkey, reach the success of revenue generating in a market such as Turkey that is difficult to generate revenue on digital platforms, and then, sail out to the world more confidently, angled with firm steps.
One recommendation that you should keep in mind when you are heading globalization is that you focus on true information, not on fancy entrepreneurial stories you see in Hollywood movies. Instead of America, Saudi Arabia could be a much easier and more productive opening. Do not forget that Europe and America are not the Globe, they are just “West”, and there are huge markets like Japan and China when you open up to the world.
