Ask HN: How to market software to Dubai, Qatar, etc? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: How to market software to Dubai, Qatar, etc?

10 pointstajen5 comments

Hi HackerNews,

I have some online & download software for B2B. It's spreadsheets and it's for intranets. I exist since 2 years, I make about 300 sales per year, total about $60k. 50% in US, 10% UK, 10% Germany, and the rest spread across the world with ranges from $10 to $7000.

One thing that I don't make is sales in UAE, Qatar and Singapore. I would assume they have a lot of offices, teams, money and IT, so there should be more probability of selling to such booming areas than to Philippines or Chile.

Has any of you succeeded to market your software to such countries? Is it cultural or regulations? Do they sometimes trust 1-man shops or SAAS products? It could simply be the absence of translation in Arabic, or it could be that my statistics aren't significant at 300 sales per year.

We know, for example, Japan would require dedicated marketing because of the specificities that patio11 points out [1].

[1] http://www.kalzumeus.com/2014/11/07/doing-business-in-japan/

In my experience Middle East requires Arabic support. Without this sales will be limited. Otherwise ME (also African countries) is a good market and often forgotten/avoided by companies.

While I'm not a specialist in ME marketing, what works I've done focusing there I've found it a generally open market (Iran excluded). Advertising tends to be fairly cheap though in my experience lower conversion rates offset much of the advertising cheapness.

And yes Japan is a minefield of cultural issues and often an unwillingness to do business without local representation. Korea also but not to the same extent as Japan. Also Vietnam can be a problem if your business gets attention. You may find it banned until payments to the right people are paid.

Software guy from Egypt working at a Dubai based Bitcoin startup here.

We've also struggled at marketing our products in the MENA region. Mainly because tech penetration is really slow, and it's hard to raise awareness, specially that our product is Bitcoin related, which is even new to most of the world. We've also had lots of issues with regulations, since we're playing with money here.

In our case, what we've found so far is this:

* social media ads doesn't work great in here * best way to find our customers are through conferences. * we need to make a huge effort in raising awareness before even marketing our product

I don't think Arabic translation would be the issue, unless it's really really bad :)

I have a online mobile school management app cum website .it include all facilities like the inter connection between studrnt teachers and parents and also have online fees payment ,discussion center , online exams , etc Search Quoryz.com Mob +971565920694

A link might help analyse any potential issues. Do you advertise you're a one man show? Do you mention support?

I would be interested to hear a little more about what it is if you don't mind.

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