I recently gave a presentation to communications professionals in Australia and New Zealand about something we’ve spent a lot of time working on at Duo: how international businesses successfully land and build their profile in the UK.
There is a particular challenge for Australian and New Zealand businesses.
The UK feels familiar. We speak the same language, there are strong cultural and business links, and many of the conventions of doing business appear similar.
But familiar doesn’t mean the same.
In fact, that familiarity can make the UK deceptively difficult to enter. It is easy to assume that a proposition, message or story that has worked successfully at home will translate neatly into the UK market. Often, it won’t.
An attractive – but crowded – market
There are good reasons why businesses continue to choose the UK.
It remains one of the world’s largest economies, with a sophisticated B2B and consumer market, globally influential media and investors, and deep sector clusters extending well beyond London.
There is also still significant international investment coming into the country. More than 1,000 foreign direct investment projects landed in the UK in 2025/26, creating almost 70,000 new jobs. The North West alone attracted 115 projects and 5,254 jobs – the highest totals outside London.
But it is a mature and highly competitive market. Simply announcing that you have arrived rarely gives journalists, customers or other stakeholders much reason to take notice.
Localisation is more than translation
One of the central points I made in the presentation was that localisation is strategy, not translation.
Changing a few words on a website isn’t enough.
For communications, that means looking again at the context around your proposition, the terminology you use, the evidence supporting it and the issues that matter to your UK audiences.
UK journalists and other influencers are generally less interested in the fact that a company is successful somewhere else than businesses sometimes expect.
“We’re launching in the UK” immediately prompts another question: why does that matter here?
Being a market leader overseas is valuable evidence, but UK customers, data, partnerships and investment will usually make a much stronger story. Likewise, claiming that a product is innovative carries far more weight when there is a measurable outcome or a genuine problem it solves.
We’ve seen good market-entry strategies build those ingredients deliberately.
The examples I shared included AgriWebb spending months testing its product with UK farmers and building local integrations before pushing its profile; SafetyCulture (now Mitti) combining UK investment with local data, customers and executives on the ground; and Lorikeet using events, video, social and partnered activities alongside traditional PR.
Build credibility before chasing coverage
There are a few principles I think travel particularly well for any international business looking at the UK:
- Start with UK relevance. International success is evidence, but it isn’t automatically the UK story.
- Bring proof. Customers, investment, partnerships, proprietary data and measurable outcomes make communications significantly stronger.
- Build credibility before fame. The right specialist or trade publication can be considerably more valuable than chasing a national media title simply because the name is better known.
- Start before you launch. The strongest market-entry campaigns begin while the proposition, narrative and evidence can still be shaped – not once everything has been signed off.
That last point is perhaps the biggest lesson.
Ideally, communications planning starts at least two months before a formal market entry: listening to the market, auditing competitors and media, testing the proposition, finding gaps in the evidence and developing the UK narrative before building towards launch.
It also doesn’t mean throwing away the expertise that sits at HQ. For native English language speaking businesses in particular, the best approach is usually a joined-up one: the home team retaining brand knowledge, executive relationships and global context, combined with local expertise in UK media, messaging, stakeholders and market dynamics.
The UK can be an excellent launchpad for international growth. But entering the UK is also not the same as entering “Europe”. No European country market should be treated as a copy-and-paste exercise.
Come with proof. Localise properly. Invest before you launch. And build credibility before you chase coverage.
At Duo, we work with international businesses entering and growing in the UK, combining senior strategic communications advice with the local knowledge and connections needed to make that move successfully.
Dan Sheridan, Founder and MD, Duo Consulting
Image credit: moerschy on Pixalbay
