Going global! That’s pretty much the dream of any startup founders when planning on their startups. The dream that has been achieved by Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and everyone else in Silicon Valley. It’s a common thing to think globally, but don’t forget that to go global, you need to plant your roots locally first.

I’m pretty sure we all watched “The Social Network” so we all know that Facebook started in a dorm room targeting Harvard students. It grew to target more universities and then only after that, it went public and achieved nationwide recognition. The process it takes when going global is by doing it one step at a time. Facebook did not start as a global company, it started as an exclusive Harvard-only social network and it grew one step at a time.

Let’s look at another site: Groupon. Groupon started by Andrew Mason in November 2008. The first city that got stormed by Groupon was Chicago. They hit jackpot in that city and then expanded to Boston, New York and Toronto. They grew enormously in 2 years with 35 million users in North and South America, Europe, and Asia by buying local Groupon-like startups across the globe. Yes, they became a massive force globally, but they started all that in one city: Chicago.

Continue reading [Simply Business] Go Local, Screw Global →