Incentives to export for Australian export market ventures

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact that various incentives to export have on the export marketing performance of Australian export market ventures. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on an empirical investigation of firms involved in exporting to foreign countries from Australia. The sample of firms came from a wide cross section of industries. The list of firms comprising the sample is provided by a state government department. Findings – The paper indicates that the export marketing performance of Australian export market ventures is positively influenced by the export incentive of the chance to diversify into new markets. Research limitations/implications – From a methodological perspective, a potential concern may be that the measures are all self‐reported. Consequently, the relationships tested may be susceptible to the influence of common method variance. Practical implications – The importance of diversifying into new markets is identified. Management should consider taking international expansion opportunities because a pre‐occupation with the domestic market can make local firms vulnerable to other growth‐oriented foreign firms and economies of scale via increased productive capacity can assist in reducing the costs of production thereby enabling firms to be more competitive in the global market as well as in the firm's own domestic market. Originality/value – A major contribution of this paper is that it validates a measure for examining the different incentives to export. Furthermore, it examines the relationship between incentives to export and export marketing performance identifying the chance to diversify into new markets as the key predictor of export marketing performance.