Considering entry into the world marketplace can be daunting but the US Government has made significant efforts to assist entrepreneurs in exporting their products abroad. I don’t know if you’ve been keeping up with news of the National Export Initiative which is intended to double US exports in five years (debate here and here) but there is a site specifically targeted to help you. Export.gov via its sister site Buy USA (US Dept. of Commerce) has an array of videos, tools and downloads to do just that. In fact, this entry was inspired by an email from export.gov with a link to download their new export guide Preparing Your Business for Global E-Commerce (pdf). Launched simultaneously is a webinar ($40) on the same topic. I read most of the guide (76 pgs) and am rather pleased. Other than that information is clear and concise, I didn’t find a single grammar, diction, syntax or punctuation error. Between you and me, I don’t think you’d need to attend the webinar if you read and follow up on the resources listed within the export guide. Further assistance is in the forum.

If you’re not really sure about all of this because exporting seems arduous, risky and confusing, consider viewing the four part video series on how to make international sales without leaving the U.S. . This is also covered in the guide (see pgs 35+ if you’re worried about getting paid). Exporting on a smaller scale is fairly painless, even I export. Perhaps 15% of my revenue comes from outside the US and I’ve only had problems exporting to one country I won’t mention (Amazon won’t ship to them either) because it is less a matter of delivery problems than it is that customers there seem to be uniformly (but not exclusively) peckish. Perhaps they could say the same about us but I hope not.

And speaking of peckish, the export.gov site has caused my browser to crash twice three times today. I removed all the export.gov links and replaced them with Buy USA urls because the latter site appears to be better behaved.