Business Reflections Podcast Episode #22 - Building Partnerships: Internationally with Immersa Global

Episode Transcript

Meredith Matics: Welcome to Business Reflections with your host Meredith Matics, and we are here to reflect on the business topics that are affecting you today and how you can better run your business. I'm really excited to have Sheree Mitchell all the way from Portugal, CEO of Immersa Global with me today. Hi, Sheree. 

Sheree Mitchell: Hi, how are you?  

Meredith Matics: Good. This is exciting to have somebody so far away and just be able to communicate and connect via podcast.  

 Sheree Mitchell: Exactly. I love the internet.  

 Meredith Matics: Greatest invention ever. Let's dive right in. Tell me a little bit about your background and how you ended up at Immersa Global. 

Sheree Mitchell: Sure. Well, I'm originally from Florida, I'm from Miami and I've always been involved with international projects. Eventually I knew that there would come a day where I would be able to launch my own travel company. Fortunately that came a little sooner than what I expected. Portugal has always been one of my favorite countries and it's actually a really great country to visit. 

I eventually moved here and started the branch of Immersa Global for the European base. That's pretty much how I ended up in Portugal.  

Meredith Matics: Tell me what got you into starting Immersa Global.  

Sheree Mitchell: Sure. I have always been interested in international travel and international projects and immersive global came about as a combination of all of my previous experiences working in international education and also working on various projects that connected cities and the U.S. wIth different cities around the globe. It was the perfect convergence of all of my skills and experiences and passions in one. 

Meredith Matics: What is Immersa Global? Can you tell us a little bit about it?  

Sheree Mitchell: Immersa Global is a destination management company. Some people will know that as more of a upscale tour operator. 

The tour operator is more on the side of the service provider for traveling tourism, but when it's a full service destination management company, which is what we have fortunately grown into to be, we also offer concierge services for companies or even people who are looking to relocate to Portugal. 

Meredith Matics: Interesting. I didn't even know there was like a service like that. If you wanted to move to another country and have some assistance with that.  

Sheree Mitchell: Absolutely. In many cases it's needed. So if you're thinking about starting a company in another country, then you would want to have the local expertise and the connections and networks already in place before you move over, or as you're transitioning to start your base or your branch in a different country. 

That's one of the things that has really attracted me to do this type of work, because it was the experience that I needed and was able to have when I started working in Portugal. I had a local company provide those same services and support to me. 

Meredith Matics: What led you to Portugal of all places?  

Sheree Mitchell: Portugal is one of those magical countries that just really enchants you from the beginning or at least it did for me. It had a lot of the things that are important to me. High quality of living and much less expensive than my life in Miami back in the US. 

Also has amazing food and wine. Very nice peaceful locals and a gorgeous, gorgeous country. That's half the size of my state of Florida. You can travel literally from the Southern border to the Northern tip and less than seven hours. You get to have mountains and you see sea, and there's just a huge diversity of geography in between. 

Those were probably the most important reasons why I decided to make it my home.  

Meredith Matics: Wow, that sounds wonderful. I have not had the privilege of getting to travel to Portugal, so I'm going to have to live it through you because it sounds amazing. Your business and what we're going to talk about today is a little bit about partnerships because you've really had to rely and thrive on partnerships. 

Sheree Mitchell: Right absolutely. In this case, a destination management company is kind of like the the first connection for international companies or international visitors who are wanting to come to their destination country, but you rely on a whole host of partners. On the traveling tourism side, we had to create a network of vetted and trustworthy transportation and hotel partners, restaurant partners even tour guides and tour leaders. On the relocation side we've had to meet with immigration attorneys and bring them on board if they fit the profile. We've also had to find a real estate brokers and real estate agents that would be willing to work with the type of clients we normally attract.  

Meredith Matics: How did you go about creating these partnerships?  

Sheree Mitchell: It probably in the most organic way possible, literally just realizing what I needed to have. Some of those needs came about because clients were requesting certain projects that I couldn't handle or our team couldn't handle on our own. It was reaching out just saying this is what we're working on. We would love to be able to discuss this with you and see if you guys can offer the services that we cannot provide. 

For the most part our partners will come on and sort of a white label capacity. Immersa Global is still the company of record, if you will, for all of the transactions. We're the ones who interface directly with the client and we have this support as needed in the background. That's giving us the services that we can't normally provide.  

Meredith Matics: How do you preserve your image with using partnerships? Because I think a lot of small businesses get a little scared about having partnerships. 

Cause what if they do something shady or weird or... 

Sheree Mitchell: Yes, exactly. Those are very valid concerns. And I can probably say that there are things that I continue to think about as well as I'm meeting and potentially vetting a new partner. What we've decided to do to protect our interest and to start our partnership off on the right foot, if you will, is to lay everything on the table and say, this is what we'd like for this partnership to look like. If you are willing to work with us in this capacity then you know, let's move forward. We are very American in our approach. 

We do contract with our partners and they have an idea of what the expectations are with regards to can they reach out directly to our clients after working on a project with us or not? What would be the appropriate approach if they were approached by our clients for future projects. 

So those are just all of the ins and outs of, I think, dealing with the partnership. It's probably setting up how you'd like any type of partnership to go, be it professional or even personal and having a very clear and candid conversation in the beginning. And just saying, this is what our idea is. Are you guys on board?  

Meredith Matics: Yeah. Have you found that people are, or other companies are receptive to that and understand how important that is? Or do you feel that they have a lot of pushback and are no, but we want to be able to like talk to them on our own or whatnot.  

Sheree Mitchell: Yeah, that's a great question. What I've noticed and, when you're dealing with different cultures, it's a very delicate dance at times because you don't want to offend your potential partner, but at the same time you have an idea of how you want this to work. 

After many different experiences and having those experiences that didn't go so well and looking back and saying, okay, moving forward, we need to make sure that we have this under control. What I've noticed is that sometimes, and I'm very candid about this, my approach may come across a little too aggressive for certain cultures. 

And of course, when you meet with someone, you automatically present them with the contract saying, this is what our agreement is going to be moving forward. That doesn't always go so well. So. I've learned to temper that a bit and kind of just be as natural as possible while still saying for the interest of our company, as well as for our clients, this is we need to work. 

I know that might not be the typical way that you create partnerships here in Portugal. But since we are international entity working with international clients, I would appreciate if you would be open to that, discussing it with us.  

Meredith Matics: How is it working with multiple countries and being international? 

Sheree Mitchell: That's a really good question. You're always thinking about various different things at the same time. In my case I speak Portuguese. It's a learned language. That has facilitated a lot, but every now and then there may be a linguistic misstep, right? And you have to go back and correct that.  

Or, I've learned that here in Portugal, it's not appropriate for a female to go out to dinner with a potential male business partner, unless his wife or girlfriend with him. Whereas in the U.S., no problem. You just say, Hey, let's meet for dinner so we can continue you to discuss this and there's no issue, but I've run into some of those cultural differences, if you will, here.  

You just learn as you go and you also lean on your local network for help and support. What I'll do is I'll run some things by my friends, my local friends, business owners, as well, and say, Hey, how does this sound to you guys? 

Give me your Portuguese filter. Will this work? They're very honest with me and they'll say, yes or no.  

Meredith Matics: That's great. Going back to that, you mentioned that you learned as you went on so I assume that there's been some not so successful moments. How did you deal with that as a business owner? Because I think I'm thinking of our listeners and I think a lot of people, we have those moments and they're very discouraging. Like, Oh, maybe I can't do this. Or maybe international isn't for me ?  

Sheree Mitchell: Right. Yeah.  

Meredith Matics: How did you cope with those?  

Sheree Mitchell: Yeah, so in everything that I do, I definitely try to go back and say, where did this go wrong? Or was this just not a really good plan for this context to begin with? I'll dissect it and look for whatever did not work out well and see if there's a way to salvage that particular project or plan moving forward. Or perhaps, I just need to trash it and start a new. I've always been very comfortable in the international landscape if you will, even before Immersa Global started here in Portugal. 

I'm used to mispronouncing things or not even having the word in the native language to say. I think that once you grow that muscle or you strengthen that muscle of being able to deal with embarrassment publicly and socially, then it makes this particular endeavor a little bit easier to deal with. 

So, how is it dealing with things internationally? You're constantly thinking about so many different things at the same time, simple things such as currency exchanges, right? Our client base are all in the U.S. Our clients are all American.  Our services here in Portugal are paid out in euros to our partners. 

Sometimes that's an easy exchange when they're pretty much on par with them currency exchange rates, and then other times there's a really big difference in that. So that's one thing that you're constantly thinking about when you're creating proposals for clients or when you're talking to your potential service providers. 

Another thing is the language which I've mentioned and. Also understanding how your company is being perceived and its local context. So here in Portugal I'm a member of a lot of different professional and social clubs where I get to interact with people in completely different industries on a regular basis. 

I'm quick to pick their brains on, like how does this look to you? Like how is it perceived? Just to have a different vision of what it is that we're doing here and how it's seen to the locals.  

Meredith Matics: Yeah. Do you think that this has been the biggest challenge was starting an international company has been the language and the cultural barriers, or has there been like a logistical issue as well? 

Sheree Mitchell: Right. Before COVID, I would've said that maybe dealing with the currency exchanges and the language and the cultural barriers were probably the two largest obstacles that can present themselves when you're starting this type of business internationally. But I can tell you now that after, and you know, we're still in dealing with the pandemic and it's it has really hit the travel and tourism industry very hard. 

So now I can say that there is no immunity to certain challenges that would affect us, even if the Immersa Global were based in the U.S.. We would have had to deal with this as well, but definitely when you're dealing with different countries, different nationalities, different ways of governing, different laws and having to find how we're going to work this out, moving forward and how will this match for our clients and for our projects, that's probably been the biggest challenge. And for me, it's still ongoing as it probably is for all of my colleagues.  

Meredith Matics: It's hard enough to run a business in one location like, I'm in California. And thinking of like, okay, how do I comply with the California laws and the federal laws? That's hard enough, but then to move it to another country and to bring in a whole new set, I just can't even imagine the challenges that that would have brought up. 

Sheree Mitchell: Yes. It's been a very interesting experience, a very interesting journey as an entrepreneur, being able to manage this and that hopefully at some point we'll be able to have a very clear set of rules for everyone, our clients, for our service providers. Luckily, one thing I think is at least happening within our industry, the travel and tourism industry is that we will have more consistency amongst our safety and hygiene measures for hotels and for restaurants. 

There's a silver lining, I think even with the pandemic, but yes, it is very challenging. Our clients are from all the different States. Even within traveling tourism regulated within the U.S. you have slight differences here and there, but then we're going to have to meet their expectations when they come to Europe. 

So our European suppliers will be abiding by the European union's rules and the local countries, in this case Portugal's rules, and we're just going to have to find a way to bridge the gap if there are, from what our clients are expecting compared to what they're actually getting here on the ground when they travel. 

Meredith Matics: Yeah. What has been the biggest resource for being able to find continuity in the rules and regulations?  

Sheree Mitchell: Unfortunately there has not been. That's another topic that's being discussed specifically within traveling tourism, because this is the industry that really connects all the different industries all around the world in a way. It touches on a little of everything.  

Meredith Matics: So going back to your partnerships, what would you say to like another small business that is considering starting partnerships with other businesses, but wants to make sure that they set it up correctly. What do you think would be their first steps? 

Sheree Mitchell: Yeah. The contract was the first step because, I was born and raised in the U.S. and learned to do business in the U.S. and that's just what we do. However, as I mentioned, it came across a bit aggressively. I had to step back from presenting the contract so early in the conversation with a new partner. 

I think, any business, small business, that's considering partnering with someone the most important thing is knowing exactly what it is that you need from that potential partner and learning a little bit about them before you actually reach out and sit down and have a conversation with the decision maker on their end. 

Also considering putting it on a bit of a trial period and saying, I would love to test this out, to see if it works for us. Maybe we can try it for three months or four months or however long, a nice test period would be for whatever that industry or services is providing and then reevaluating it.  

Probably the most important thing is just having a very candid conversation at the very beginning so the expectations are very clear. It also gives you the opportunity to go back and review. It also gives you the opportunity to tell that potential partner, this didn't quite work out the way that I anticipated. I would love to reconsider this in the future. But for right now, I think that we're going to look for an alternative.  

As difficult as that may sound, it's not so harsh when the partner or potential partner has been prepped for it. 

That's the way that we've implemented it and it's worked fairly well because as I mentioned, you kind of have this built in exit if you need it versus going all in with a potential partner and then having to step back four or five months. 

We've had partnerships that we thought were solid and they were not able to provide a consistent service and we had to let them go.  

Meredith Matics: Yeah. Tell me about that. What do you do when your partner that you've grown trust in fails you?  

Sheree Mitchell: Yeah. It's never an easy conversation. 

And. You do try to look to remedy as much as possible because you also know the time that you'll have to spend. Especially if it's a small business, the CEO or the President, Founder is the main decision maker, the person who is having these conversations at this level. 

Thinking about the amount of time that you're going to have to invest, to find another partner to provide that service or product. You do everything possible to try to keep it going. But you know, if there comes a point where you realize it's just not working and this isn't in the best interest of the company or for our clients and you let it go. 

Meredith Matics: As you were talking, I was thinking about in other businesses or even in my own life when I've had to partner could I or should I have test run it on myself? And I hadn't really occurred to me to do that. I don't know why.  

Sheree Mitchell: Well, if you're getting really strong for those who might, there are people who've used this service, then perhaps you feel comfortable with the information or feedback you're getting that you don't need to test run. 

But in my case, and maybe this goes back to what we were discussing earlier about what is, what is it like dealing with international partners or starting an international company. Levels of support are defined so differently around the world. With the segment that we work with, I know that everyone who comes on board to partner with us, they have to provide our level of service or higher. 

Speaking to the testing, every single thing that we do, all of the different components that we add to our programs, be it this particular hotel experience or this box experience with this Michelin starred restaurant. I test them all first. The downside to that is it's very difficult to grow a company when you spend so much of your time in the field testing the products.  

The upside is obviously I can literally look our clients in the eye and say, I've eaten there. I've slept there. I've tested this. I know this hotel , you're going to enjoy it because I've actually slept in this room. That's the guarantee, for the quality of product that we offer and I don't know how to do it otherwise.  

Meredith Matics: Yeah. Some people might be like that's the benefit getting to test it all, but yes, it eats into your funds and your time. 

It takes a lot, but it does give you that hand-to-hand referral of like, yes, I know that so-and-so will treat you this way because that's how it was when I was there.  

Sheree Mitchell: It has been really great for our clients because they enjoy knowing that everything they're going to do has been kind of tested by someone else. But, the bit of a quote unquote downside to stunting our growth in a way, because there's so much time and resources spent in the field. 

Meredith Matics: Yeah. Well, these are really unique challenges and thank you so much Sheree for sharing them with us. As we close up here, I have two questions for you. And the first is what is a piece of advice that you've received that you'd like to share with another business owner? 

Sheree Mitchell: Wow. I've received so much advice. 

If it's just one, I would probably say the most important thing to know is what you're really strong at. And also having the humility to be able to outsource or delegate what you're not so strong at, but needs to get done to trust it partners or even people on your team.  

Meredith Matics: I think a lot of small business owners want to do it all, but realizing, do what you're good at and what you're not pass it along.  

Sheree Mitchell: Right. Exactly.  

Meredith Matics: And Sheree, where can our listeners find you on the internet and on social media?  

Sheree Mitchell: Sure. They can find me at Immersa Global and that's spelled I-M-M-E-R-S-A global.com. Also, Sheree Mitchell on LinkedIn.  

Meredith Matics: Well, thank you so much Sheree for coming on. I hope that you guys stay strong during the rest of this pandemic. I hope it ends soon. And I hope I will see you in Portugal someday.  

Sheree Mitchell: I hope so, too. If you ever come over, please contact me. I would love to take you out for a glass of wine. 

Meredith Matics: Yes. Glass of wine sounds so good right now.  

Business Reflections Closing: Please note that these are thoughts and opinions alone. For tax advice, please see your CPA or tax advisor, tax professional for business advice and legal entities. Please see your local business, lawyer, or attorney for advice. And if you'd like to reach out to us for any topics or questions about. Any subject, any episode you can reach us podcast@maticsbilling.com. That's podcast@maticsbilling.com.    

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