Bill Kenney, Author at MEET

The 3 Truths of Gaining U.S. Sales Traction

Bill Kenney / December 13, 2023

Have you ever gleaned lessons that you’d rather not relearn? These invaluable insights often come at the expense of trials and tribulations, leaving indelible marks that shape our future endeavors. The same is true for most companies as they learn how to get US sales traction. With over a decade of experience aiding international B2B and B2G companies in gaining traction and scaling operations in the U.S., we’ve distilled three core truths. These revelations stem from witnessing companies grappling with these lessons firsthand. The toll of failure ranged from significant financial setbacks to personal upheavals, including health struggles and even marital strains. By embracing these truths, you’ll pave a smoother path toward validating product-market fit, fostering traction, and achieving scalability within the U.S. market. Customer Density is Critical for US Sales Traction Securing a sale is no small feat, especially in a new market. The inaugural sale invariably proves the most arduous, entailing a labyrinthine journey fraught with many potholes and hazards. In the U.S., establishing trust amidst unfamiliarity—be it with your brand, customer base, or market successes—poses a formidable challenge to conversion. The path to easing subsequent sales lies in proximity. To achieve this the second customer shares a strong linkage or industry alignment with the first. This proximity capitalizes on insights gleaned from the initial sale. This leverages knowledge of customer pain points, relevant use cases, and implementation hurdles to expedite and enhance subsequent transactions. Beyond bolstering sales efficiency, prioritizing customer density streamlines onboarding, service delivery, and ongoing maintenance—a holistic approach pivotal to sustainable growth. Founder-Driven Sales A common pitfall for companies venturing into the U.S. market is entrusting initial sales efforts to local representatives. This approach often backfires due to several reasons: Lack of Foundation: Local representatives commence with zero customer anecdotes, institutional insights, or adeptness in articulating your tailored solutions to target buyers. High Turnover: U.S. sales representatives, if met with initial challenges, swiftly move on to other prospects, amplifying turnover costs. Dependency Challenges: New market entry necessitates robust support from various departments at the home office, a rapport difficult for local reps to establish. Founder-driven sales circumvent these hurdles, offering a higher likelihood of success during the nascent stages of U.S. expansion. Founders bring unparalleled historical context and narrative depth, fostering connections and they navigate organizational support structures with ease. The founder’s initial presence in the U.S., albeit minimal, gradually escalates alongside demand, persisting until a repeatable sales process emerges—typically spanning 12 to 24 months. Agile Marketing Communications Upon entering the U.S. market, companies often overestimate their grasp of customer acquisition strategies. This overconfidence manifests in rigid promotional materials, similar to casting a fishing line without considering bait or fishing grounds. Similar to planning a fishing trip, your U.S. market strategy should address three key questions: What’s the Target Fish? Where’s the Best Fishing Spot? Which Bait to Use? Adopting an agile marketing approach empowers local teams to iteratively refine marketing assets, swiftly adapting to evolving market dynamics. This nimble methodology minimizes both time and cost investments, which are crucial for establishing traction, and then identifying and scaling a sustainable sales system. By embracing the principles of customer density, founder-driven sales, and agile marketing communications, your journey into the U.S. market can be marked by strategic finesse rather than repeated trials. May these insights serve as a beacon, guiding your business through the intricacies of market entry and positioning it for enduring success in the competitive landscape of the United States. How to Get US Sales Traction Resources Learn about our Intelligent Trade Show System MEET’s Belly2Belly Podcasts About MEET helps international B2B & B2G companies gain traction and scale in the U.S. through trade shows, events, and strategic connections. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Exhibitor Tips, Market-Entry, Return on Investment, Workshops and Webinars

MEET’s Intelligent Trade Show & Event System

Bill Kenney / October 4, 2023

In our more than 12 years of helping international companies scale in the U.S., we have seen the many challenges that these companies experience when they try to productively participate in U.S. trade shows & events. The U.S. market is large and highly competitive. The trade show and event landscape is abundant and complex. And U.S. buyers have specific needs and expectations. All of this makes leveraging U.S. trade shows and events particularly challenging. The top critical fail points that we see in companies trying to expand in the U.S. include They select the wrong trade shows and events to participate in They negotiate on emotion and anecdotal information rather than fact Their teams are not well prepared, directed, or empowered to leverage the opportunity They do not have a reliable method to measure and continually improve results To solve this we developed The MEET Intelligent Trade Show & Event System (video). This system is built on a series of analytic tools. TRADE SHOW EVALUATOR (video) helps you choose the best and most efficient trade shows and events for you to participate in based on your target buyer persona and expansion stage. TRADE SHOW NEGOTIATOR (video) reveals the best path to negotiate with each trade show organizer. You will be able to quantitatively value each trade show and help the organizer become an ally in your success. TRADE SHOW COOKBOOK (video) helps you identify the specific value drivers for each trade show and event to properly prepare, direct, and activate your team to engage and enroll targets effectively. Each individual will have specific performance goals pre-, during, and post-event. TRADE SHOW ROI CALCULATOR (video) helps you not only measure the result of each trade show and event against specific value drivers but also gives you a basis for accurate hypothesis testing, rate and option negotiation, and continuous performance improvement If this sounds interesting to you, please tune in. We’re going to have a few more sessions that go into the details of each tool. We’re excited about the evolution of these tools and think that they will have a great impact on your business. We certainly would appreciate any thoughts, questions, or feedback that you have. We’ll see you all again very soon. About MEET helps international B2B & B2G companies gain traction and scale in the U.S. through trade shows, events, and strategic connections. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Workshops and Webinars

Successful U.S. Market Entry with David Rose from US Expansion Partners

Bill Kenney / August 4, 2023

Watch on YouTube Listen on Spotify hi and welcome to the next episode of belly to belly and today we’re here to talk about U.S expansion and who better to talk about U.S expansion with than the head of U.S expansion Partners David Rose welcome David hi Bill thanks for having me on the podcast today oh it’s it’s great to be with you and you know where our audience are companies that are expanding into the US that’s who we’re really talking to here and so you know I’d I’d love you know we’re going to get into a conversation about sort of best practices but before we do that if you wouldn’t mind just taking a moment to tell just talk a little bit about your work and how you help companies and that obviously gives your any comments you make good context so if you would mind telling us a little bit more yeah so my background I’ve been in in Tech here in the U.S my whole career I started my career with an HR tech company um not an undergraduate and had a unique opportunity to do a startup inside of that company uh started a new business line and we grew to 150 million in Revenue in less than two years years bought a 400 million dollar publicly Trading Company and it’s grown into a five billion dollar line of business so that was my first start up inside a Fortune 500 company and it’s kind of all I’ve done ever since so I’ve done five venture-backed startups I’m a three-time CEO so I’ve been doing Tech startups in the US for for many years now and I have learned a lot about what to do and what not to do and I just um more than anything else like a lot of things that are coincidental was contacted by a company who was looking for help with expanding to the US and I had just moved from CEO to chairman of a company I had some open cycles and I thought well I sure like you guys I know how to do that why don’t I just take that on as a project to help not realizing it’s a much bigger problem that seems unsolved in the market than I had planned on so here we go we’re going to start a business to solve for this that’s fantastic so you know we wanted we want to talk about you know sort of get to Best Practices but before we do maybe talking a little bit about you know as you look at companies coming into the U.S what are the big things that they get challenged by is there as they’re looking to expand here uh that’s a great question and that’s a huge answer so I’ll try and make it as as um because there’s a lot of pitfalls and I think one of the big ones that has to do with um with employees which are going to be your biggest cost when you come to the U.S and I think there’s a couple so I always think about expanding to the U.S in in three or three stages so you have basically an entity formation you have to create a company you have to make it operationally ready you don’t have accounting and Banking and HR and those kind of things in places and then you start thinking about go to market so I think a lot of times the first P First Step a companies make is they’re just going to come in and want to hire someone without really thinking about how do you create an entity how do you how do you have it operationally ready so you can pay bills and make payroll and those kind of things and then what role usually go to market strategies the first step a lot of times people say is I’m ready to hire and I think that’s a kind of step four so a lot of times people get ahead of themselves and kind of jump right to that step and if you do the other three kind of previous to that I think you’ll find a lot more success and then the other thing around people I see people doing very quickly is they’re going to want to hire a senior executive in the U.S so they’re going to hire I want to hire a U.S CEO I mean that was a conversation I had with my first clients we want to hire a U.S CEO and it makes a lot of sense on paper but what you realize is if you go after someone in the U.S who has a really great CV and great deep experience right and so maybe they’ve worked and maybe you’re a tech company and maybe this company this person you’re looking at for your CEO has worked at a great brand like striper figma or Microsoft or Google what you don’t realize is just because they’ve had a great career in the U.S doesn’t mean they know anything about starting a business in the U.S in fact most people who are a senior executive at Microsoft or Google probably have no idea how payroll works or HR works or Insurance works or even how go to market works or how to look for product Market fit signals because all that’s been done for them before so they’re probably a great scaling executive but probably not so great at a startup executive that makes sense so yeah really talking about the the timing of uh personnel and making sure that you have the right people at the right stage of of the process it sounds like a a really massive uh challenge that a lot of companies deal with for sure and I think another really important step is a lot of companies um make the mistake of because

Market-Entry, Return on Investment

Developing Strategic Focus

Bill Kenney / July 6, 2023

The hardest part of building an effective strategic focus is having a specific and clear target outcome. The best outcomes are like a destination that you would drive or travel to. When you do this well your vision and focus transcends the organization aligning your team in action and purpose. The more geographically distributed your team and operations are the more important to have a clear and omnipresent strategic focus. Can you imagine leaving your house without a destination? Most likely not. That clarity of destination allows us to plan, follow a route, and to assure that we’re on course. Think about all of the “turn-by-turn” information that you have at your fingertips once you choose a destination in your car. Airplane pilots and ship captains submit flight and route plans before leaving port to assure safety and that desired destinations are reached. Steps to a strategic focus Identify the desired outcome(s)…these should be specific, measurable, and time bound Create an inventory of assets and resources…people, capital, machines, technology, IP, partners, etc… Develop a plan that best utilizes the assets and resources to most efficiently and effectively accomplish the desired outcome(s) by the target date(s) Identify your key success indicators and create system to track results and periodically adjust tactics About MEET (meetroi.com) helps international B2B companies gain traction and scale in the U.S. through trade shows, events, and strategic connections. MEET’s processes help its clients ramp up sales quickly and maintain a steady stream of high-quality prospects going forward. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Career Opportunities

Freelance Research & Event Logistics Associate

Bill Kenney / March 19, 2023

Position This is an independent contractor position. This position is responsible for completing ongoing business tradeshow research and events logistics projects potentially across several clients. The ideal person is a detail-oriented, curious, and forward-thinking team player with the ability to turn event, market, and competitor data into insightful strategy maps. Once a strategy is set, continuously track identified segments to capture periodic opportunities as they present. This role also includes industry and competitive intelligence research. As well as outreach activities to secure event logistics for exhibitor participation and hosted hospitality venue identification. The role requires effective communication to MEET, the ability to manage multiple projects, and to create tracking processes where appropriate. Yup, that means building the airplane while you’re flying it! Position Responsibilities Collaborate closely with MEET management to identify & align on research needs Prioritize event research and logistics work based on client objectives, resources, & deadlines Manage timelines and milestones Communicate clearly and in an effective manner with MEET Assess multiple layers of identified data, prioritize on relevance to remove unnecessary inputs, and present a cohesive recommendation based on discovered insights Manage client reporting and communication needs, with a focus on providing well-thought-out insights and analyses Prioritize ad-hoc data requests and troubleshoot implications for our internal team members Utilize all the appropriate MEET and customer software and systems Establish best practices for improving our research and logistic management processes Key Attributes 1-2 years of work experience in business research, event logistics, or relevant experience Ability to conduct critical analysis, identify key insights, and manage priorities Proficiency in spreadsheet use (bonus points for Google Sheets experience) Strong, proactive communication skills Responsible for documenting standards and best practices methods Proactive and self-motivated Entrepreneurial, enthusiastic, and client-focused Excellent problem-solving skills High level of accuracy and attention to detail Self-directed, time management Ability to multitask, prioritize and perform as needed under tight deadlines Start Date: Immediate Work Location: Anywhere Hours per week: Flexible Compensation: TBD based on experience and productivity Company Overview MEET helps international B2B companies gain traction and scale in the U.S. through trade shows, events, and strategic connections. We change outcomes by helping clients engage and enroll high-quality prospects in-person. Our focus is on continually improving each client’s event participation ROI. MEET is a results-based organization. We collaborate to set realistic expectations and milestones around projects and you manage your schedule to achieve them. How to apply: Contact Kelly Kenney at kelly@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 490-9550. Include your resume or recent project work list, references related to business research and/or logistics work, and your current availability.

Exhibitor Tips, Market-Entry, Participant Tips

Are Your Leadership Team and Key Personnel Ready?

Bill Kenney / February 1, 2023

Today we’re here to tackle another question about the successful expansion of your business to the U.S. Are your leadership team and key personnel ready for your U.S. expansion? This issue is another significant potential pothole in your U.S. expansion journey. Get it wrong and you’ll have greater turnover, internal dysfunction, and poor results. What we see happen with our clients reveals that there are three basic questions you want to ask Is someone from the management team ready to commit a significant amount of time in the U.S. market? In some cases that may start off as a few weeks. Maybe three to four weeks a quarter. In other cases, it’ll be someone moving right into the market. Either way, there should be significant blocks of time where there is a leader from the team ready to spend time in the market to build intelligence, to build relationships, and to build the team. It doesn’t happen without that institutional knowledge from someone from the home team who is committed. Is the leadership team ready to commit to covering the duties and responsibilities of the person who is now in the U.S. market or primarily focusing on the U.S. market? Is the rest of the team ready to cover those responsibilities full-time or has the person been replaced in those duties so you can take those off their plate? The U.S. is going to take all of their attention. It’s just like nurturing a young baby. The U.S. is going to have lots of needs and opportunities and it will be up all hours of the day and night. Is each department and team within the home office ready and committed to support the new market? The U.S. market has mission-critical startup demands just like they would have in the home market. Websites, marketing materials, social media, trade show banners and booths, and all of the marketing communications elements need to get created and iterated quickly. We see this phenomenon with every company entering the U.S. Where the U.S. team is not at the water cooler every day and they’re not in the social events, so it’s very natural that they don’t get the attention. The challenge in particular to the U.S. market is it’s very normal that within 3-years of entry that the U.S. business is larger than the rest of the business everywhere else in the world. This imbalance in need, authority, and resources between the new U.S. and home office can create a real fail point if not anticipated and addressed early. It is critical to engage your team to assure that you and your organization are prepared and committed to the U.S. expansion. Your collective investment of time, passion, and capital requires success. About MEET (meetroi.com) helps international B2B companies gain traction and scale in the U.S. through trade shows, events, and strategic connections. MEET’s processes help its clients ramp up sales quickly and maintain a steady stream of high-quality prospects going forward. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Market-Entry, Workshops and Webinars

Why Are You Expanding Internationally?

Bill Kenney / October 4, 2022

One place where internationalizing companies get tripped up is not being clear about the purpose of the international expansion. If you can’t answer or don’t have an answer to the question, “why are you expanding internationally?” then it’s probably something you need to step back and answer. Think about all of the reasons why you might expand. Your reasons for expanding should be fully in line with what your goals are as an organization. Answer, “what do you want to accomplish and by when?” As you can understand and articulate your organizational goals, lining up your international expansion to those goals is paramount for an efficient and successful expansion. Ultimately, all of our businesses are operating on limited resources the top of which are time, people, and capital. It is critical then that we use those precious resources to our best advantage. So, think about the goals that you have and how will expanding internationally helps accomplish those goals. Conversely, it is also important to consider how will international expansion potentially puts those goals at risk. Being aware of the potential challenges and risks will enable you to realize and manifest the best decision-making and strategies. These top reasons for expanding internationally should help you begin the process. You will likely think of others and add them to the list. Expand service to existing customers. Expanding to satisfy current customer demand is far and away the safest and most reliable reason to expand. Having ready customers and profit streams pulling you into a new market better assures financial stability and success. Potential to increase revenue and profits. Going to new markets where there are more and/or higher-margin customers can be a great reason to expand. Entry into new markets. There is a learning curve when you enter any new market. Starting sooner can potentially get you further ahead faster. Expand customer base. Whether it’s a land grab or incrementally growing your customer base taking market share is a mid and long-term play. Diversification through expansion. Besides growing revenue and profits, diversifying your markets can also help stabilize the business long-term by hedging individual market variability. Access to additional talent. New markets bring significant opportunities to add new team members with advanced skills, competencies, and experiences. Building a strong global team of “A players” is the hallmark of every great company. Gain competitive advantage. Outflanking the competition in new markets can create additional competitive and market share opportunities. Enhance and improve company reputation. Larger customers can be attracted as your global footprint increases. Reference customers in new geographies and industry verticals accelerate growth as these examples build market trust. Create economic and operational efficiencies. Done right, the expansion of your organization will create operational efficiencies as costs are spread over more customers and revenues. About MEET (meetroi.com) helps international B2B companies gain traction and scale in the U.S. through trade shows, events, and strategic connections. MEET’s processes help its clients ramp up sales quickly and maintain a steady stream of high-quality prospects going forward. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Exhibitor Tips, Participant Tips, Workshops and Webinars

5 Reasons You Need to Start Carrying Business Cards Today!

Bill Kenney / August 31, 2022

As we all re-enter going to trade shows and events post-COVID, we’re seeing an incredible number of people, as many as 80%, no longer carrying business cards. By not sharing business cards, trade show participants are significantly limiting their ability to make valuable connections and losing lots of opportunities. If for some reason you’ve stopped printing, carrying, and sharing business cards we suggest you change course immediately! I’ll give you a quick story. I was at a trade show a couple of weeks ago. As I was meeting people I was giving them my business card. The first person I met said that they don’t have a business card but they have a QR code. When I scanned their QR code it sent me to their LinkedIn profile. The next person I met said the same thing, “I don’t have a business card but I have a QR code”. Their QR code sent me to their website. The next person I met with their QR code sent me to their email address. The next person their QR code sent me to their Whatsapp. In each case, I was getting sent to different places. The next person their QR code sent me to their profile on the trade show app. Now, I know it all sounds great that we are saving trees. The problem is as somebody who loves to follow up and wants to help connect you to value people and resources I can’t find you the next day. Having all of these different platforms that people are linking their QR codes to has created incredible confusion and complication when meeting people at events. Not to mention that none of them support easy note-taking, event association, scoring, transferability, etc. If you don’t help the people you meet have all their contact info in one place and ultimately their preferred place, you will likely not hear from them again. This isn’t because they don’t want to follow up. It’s because you’ve made it impossible for them to find you and if they can by some miracle find or remember you they won’t remember the context and priority actions. Given that there is not one online standard contact information exchange platform and that these disparate tools, including all event apps, spread the contacts you meet at events across a myriad of different platforms you need to recommit to carrying and sharing business cards as the only reliable option for professionals to exchange contact information. Here are our 5 key reasons why you need to carry and pass business cards at every event: An affirmative exchange of your contact information is solid. You don’t have to worry about technology. You don’t have to worry about anything at all other than handing your card to somebody. As you’ll see in the next four that that handoff does quite a bit to empower action from the people you meet. It’s your branding. This is actually an opportunity to hand your logo to someone and they’ll accept it. You’ve spent thousands and thousands of dollars to build your brand yet you somehow resist handing it over to people. If somebody is willing to accept your brand give it to them. Give them two! Give them ten! They can give it to their friends! Giving a business card enables note-taking which empowers future action. You’re going to meet people who think of something or someone that they can connect you to. Without their easy ability to take notes that information gets lost. If you’re sharing a QR code with your LinkedIn or all these different other platforms it’s both impossible to find you the next day and very difficult to catalog actions. Maybe you’re looking for investment. Maybe you’re looking for customers. Maybe you’re looking for a key employee. None of that stuff can be written down or cataloged easily without a tangible business card and therefore it’s not actionable. Empowers speedy connection to key internal resources. You make it easy for the person you meet to hand your contact info with notes to the more appropriate person in their team for follow-up. The person you meet from an organization at events isn’t always your best company contact. When you pass an analog business card you remove the friction and allow the quick transfer of your contact information with notes to the right internal resource. This empowers fast and accurate follow-up. Empowers real-time connection to key external resources. It’s not unusual to meet good matches and connections for people you meet at events while you’re still on site as these are places where like-minded people gather. Having these opportunities in real-time makes it even more important to have contact information and notes easily accessible. Nothing is easier than having someone’s business card in your pocket and handing it to or allowing a target resource or powerful connection to take a photo of that new contact’s card. As you continue to reduce and eliminate friction in exchanging contact information at events, you’ll make more and better connections. Using business cards will make it consistently easier for the person you meet to take favorable action on your behalf and you for them. If someone will accept your brand image hand it to them every time! Hand them 2 cards. Hand them 10 cards! Watch or listen to the podcast: Youtube Spotify About MEET (meetroi.com) helps international B2B companies gain traction and scale in the U.S. through trade shows, events, and strategic connections. MEET’s processes help its clients ramp up sales quickly and maintain a steady stream of high-quality prospects going forward. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Exhibitor Tips, Participant Tips, Return on Investment, SelectUSA

The 5 Rules of U.S. Trade Show Follow-Up

Bill Kenney / August 4, 2022

Do you want to stand out? Do you want to begin building credibility and trust? Do you want to convert your trade show participation into new revenue? If you answered YES to any of these, then you need to master follow-up in the U.S. Failure to have meaningful and timely follow-up will neutralize even the best trade show strategy and execution. We are always astounded to see how poorly most people and companies are at follow-up. Here are the 5 rules that we find to be most critical regarding follow-up. Use them to realize the potential energy that your marketing and sales efforts creates. Immediate: Like fresh produce at the market, new contacts spoil if they are not actioned quickly. Your timely follow-up communicates your interest and intent. Trust is built as your reliability is experienced. Personal: Demonstrating that you’re a good listener by reflecting back on their top interests or needs, builds connection and opens the door for additional conversation. Be professional and respectful always. Ask: Every communication must have a purpose or next step that is revealed by the ask. This could be a request to meet, a reminder to send some promised information, or a nudge to introduce a key stakeholder. Give: Knowledge and relationships are built over time. In the first follow-up share a piece of company collateral or content that relates to your audience’s goal or concern. With each additional communication, show that your expertise is aligned with their needs. Persistent: Thoughtful and persistent follow-up is critical. Make sure to always communicate a relevant valid business reason for the next step that you are proposing. Valid business reasons must be expressed from the customer’s point of view. Let them know, “what’s in it for them”. Your follow-up should align with how you want to be perceived. If you are empathic, eager, and passionate then let that be reflected in your words and actions. About MEET (meetroi.com) helps international B2B growth companies soft-land and scale in the U.S. through trade shows and events. MEET’s processes help its clients ramp up sales quickly and maintain a steady stream of high-quality prospects going forward. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Participant Tips, SelectUSA

SelectUSA Pro Tips – Part 3 of 3

Bill Kenney / June 6, 2022

There are a little over 2-weeks to go until SelectUSA 2022 and the last elements of your preparation should be coming together. As some have described it, this is the “World Cup” for U.S. market entry. Hundreds of support resources from the federal government, every state, many regions, business investors, and service providers will be on hand to help accelerate your successful U.S. market entry and expansion. We are sharing our pro tips for getting the most out of SelectUSA 2022 as a participant. Today’s installment will focus on successful participation. Follow these links to review Part 1 – Strategy and Part 2 – Preparation. These same rules can be applied to participating in any event. Participation Now that you’ve established your goals, defined your targets, developed a plan, and clarified your communication it is time to participate. This is just like buying a gym membership and consulting your personal trainer. The next step is to of course get into the gym and do the work. The top 3 items related to participation are: Divide and conquer: One of the biggest errors that event participants make is to work an event as a group. At SelectUSA you will make more high-value relationships by dividing and conquering. When team members work the event independently you will not only multiply the number of high-value contacts made but you will also showcase the quality and commitment of your team. Empower your team to be productive and effective independently. Engage: Be present at the event. Remove as many distractions as is possible so that you maximize the number of meetings and interactions with your target prospects, investors, multipliers, centers of influence, etc. SelectUSA is a short sprint. The conference has many components and lots of before and after-hours opportunities. You can’t do it all, so make sure what you do you do well. Follow-up: In the U.S. follow-up is quick, professional, and direct. Pre-write your post-SelectUSA base follow-up text so that your notes can be sent out promptly. The most advanced at follow-up will send their notes out on the same day as meeting contacts. Another motivator is that on 1 July many Americans will break for the 4th of July holiday. Follow-up not done quickly is almost guaranteed to get a slow response if at all. About MEET (meetroi.com) helps international B2B growth companies soft-land and scale in the U.S. through trade shows and events. MEET’s processes help its clients ramp up sales quickly and maintain a steady stream of high-quality prospects going forward. Contact Bill Kenney for a no-obligation conversation: bill@meetroi.com or +1 (860) 573-4821.

Author name: Bill Kenney