Author name: Bill Kenney

Market-Entry, Return on Investment

Developing Strategic Focus

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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

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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?

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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?

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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!

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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

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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

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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.

Market-Entry, Participant Tips, SelectUSA

SelectUSA Pro Tips – Part 2 of 3

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There is only 1-month to go until SelectUSA 2022 and it’s not too soon to start your preparation. 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 developing your preparation. Next month, in part 3, we’ll tackle participation. Check out part 1 on “strategy”, here. These same rules can be applied to participating in any event. Preparation Now that you’ve established your goals and have a plan it is critical to prepare. Like practice for an athlete or musician, preparation assures positive results. The top 3 items related to preparation are: Set appointments: Set as many pre-event and event appointments with target individuals as makes sense with the goals that you’ve set. Pre-event appointments allow you to cover many of the preliminaries so that your appointments at the event can be 2nd level and much more productive. Develop your value proposition and self-introduction: Your ability to convert meetings into opportunities will largely depend on how well you communicate. Any audience that you speak with be they customers, investors, EDOs, or partners will want to know succinctly what you do, what you need, and what’s in it for them. Keeping this initial statement to 30-seconds or less is ideal. The goal is to create interest and a conversation. One-page overview and business cards: A one-page overview of your company, your expansion goals, and your needs creates tangibility and clarity for any audience you will meet with. This document also allows your audience to take notes and more easily remember and share your details with others on their team. Business cards have a similar effect and can communicate a great deal simply and affordably. 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.

Market-Entry, Participant Tips, SelectUSA

SelectUSA Pro Tips – Part 1 of 3

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There are only 2-months to go until SelectUSA 2022 and it’s not too soon to start your preparation. 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. Over the coming 2-months, we’ll share our pro tips for getting the most out of SelectUSA 2022 as a participant. Today’s installment will focus on developing your strategy. Next month we’ll dive into preparation and in June we’ll tackle participation. These same rules can be applied to participating in any event. Strategy Like the rudder on a ship, an effective strategy guides our effort and assures that we arrive at the desired destination and outcome. The top 3 items related to strategy are: Set your goals: Identify your top 3 U.S. expansion priorities. What are your imminent U.S. milestones? What gaps do you have in accomplishing those milestones? Identify your leverage: Identify the resources that can help you resolve your gaps and accomplish your top milestones. What resources at and through SelectUSA can help you with your top priorities? Who could help you brainstorm potential resources? Who’s network can you leverage to make the appropriate connections? Create your plan: How will you connect to these resources prior to SelectUSA? Who can introduce you to these people? The goal is to have as many pre-SelectUSA meetings with target resources as you can. This allows you to have next-level meetings and make meaningful progress toward your U.S. expansion priorities at the event itself. 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.

Exhibitor Tips, Market-Entry

SelectUSA 2022 Preparation: A Visit with John Bourdeaux, AdvanceCT

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Link to podcast found HERE Transcript to podcast found below: Bill : Hi and welcome to the belly to belly podcast and today our focus is the preparation for select USA 2022 And we’re joined by are with John Bordeaux from advanced CT. Hey, welcome John. John : Thank you so much. I’m glad to be here with you. Bill : Fantastic so, you know AdvanceCT does so, so much amazing work and our audience are all international companies that are there either have already created a presence in the US and are looking to expand that or are companies that are looking to enter the US and obviously that’s a lot of the work you all do to help those companies come into Connecticut. Could you take just a couple minutes and tell us about advanced CT and the service you provide for companies that are looking to enter Connecticut? John : Sure. AdvanceCT is a private organization. We’re a nonprofit we partner with the state of Connecticut to help companies that are interested in investing in the state of Connecticut have an easier job of doing. So we’re facilitating inward investment whether that’s coming from another state or particularly from overseas or foreign direct investment. We help companies in the state of Connecticut as well are looking to expand here. So once companies have come and made an investment, they also are we’re in relationship with them on a continual basis to help them figure out the best way to expand and grow here. And what we like to say is we offer a concierge level service. Every company has a unique need when they’re coming and making an investment here in the state of Connecticut. And we like to see exactly what those are and pair companies up with the resources that they need. Sometimes we have those resources we help with site selection. We help with helping folks navigate the permitting and the state of Connecticut’s different departments. We do all those things. And then we also are trying to help folks figure out even innocuous and small questions like hey, you know, what’s this town like? Or if I’m interested in, you know, building relationship with University of Connecticut or Yale, who should I be talking to? We facilitate all those conversations out of those relationships. And we’re helping those companies come here to do interesting things. Get engaged in our ecosystem. One of the great things about Connecticut is we’re a small state. So we’re about 3.6 million people, and we all know each other. And we want everyone in Connecticut wants everyone else to be successful. And so whereas in some in some jurisdictions at some places you’re sort of 6, 7, 8, 9 steps away from somebody here in Connecticut, you’re maybe one or two jumps away from talking to the person that you need to talk to you in order to get the help you need or the leverage that you need, or the relationship you need for your business to be successful. So our job is to help facilitate those those connections and understand what each business’s unique set of needs are, so that we can, as I said, provide that white glove service, and we’ve done everything from you’ll help people find the right site, to helping companies talk to the Department of Transportation to understand trucking tonnage on our highways and bridges, to helping folks figure out, you know, what the permitting is for a particular area of the state, introducing them to the mayors of towns, you name it, we’re here to do it. We’re here to help. Bill : Sounds like an incredible amount of facilitation. Your team must be really good listeners to sort of diagnose what companies need and help make those connections John : We do and what the one of the great things about our team in advance CT is that we’ve got a lot of subject area experts. So Advanced Manufacturing Technology, life sciences, renewable energy, offshore wind, and more. And so we have people in our organization who have extensive experience in those in those industries. So not only are we good listeners, but we also know the right questions to ask. We also understand what it’s like to be a life sciences company coming from overseas coming from Europe, for example, and setting up a shop here we understand a lot of the questions and can anticipate a lot of them because some of the people on our team have actually done that in their professional careers. So we’re able to provide those services in a way that I think is a uniquely help. Bill : Cool. So let’s talk about Select USA itself for a minute and you know, some have called it the Super Bowl of US market entry or the World Cup of US market entry and you know, I guess why does advanced CTE participate? What is it about the event that’s particularly valuable for you? John : Well, I’m a World Cup guy, as I know, most of the rest of the world is too so I’m gonna go with the World Cup of events. You’re basically what we see. A Select USA is it’s it’s the focal point. It’s a focal point gathering of everybody who cares about making investment and in the US, and that’s the companies. It is the government officials, its partners. It’s the people who care about sustainable economic growth and in Connecticut, we care very deeply about the success of our of our of our companies. And one of the things that we take great pride in is the fact that, you know, the companies that do come here and are working at that apex of the knowledge economy are succeeding in incredible ways. We know a lot of great ideas are happening all over the world. And we know that this sort of entry point this

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