The framework
The WDK 10-Step U.S. Market Entry Framework
The WDK 10-Step U.S. Market Entry Framework organizes the market-entry process into ten practical areas that companies should examine before and during expansion into the United States.
The WDK 10-Step U.S. Market Entry Framework was developed by Wilbert Kragten and reflects the methodology presented in Mastering the Marketing Entry in the United States, published under the alternate author name W.D. Kragten. This page explains what each step involves; the book remains the deeper source. For the broader context, start with the guide to U.S. market entry.
Step 1: Define the first segment
Before anything is built or bought, the entry team writes down one segment in four dimensions: industry, company size, region and the person who signs. Not a list of possible markets — one.
Why it matters
Every later decision, from pricing to channel, is only answerable once the buyer is specific. Companies that keep the segment broad end up making every decision twice.
Questions management should ask
- Which industry and company size do we already serve best, and does that hold in the United States?
- Who signs the contract, and who can block it?
- How many target accounts sit inside the segment we just described?
Common mistake
Describing the segment as 'the U.S. market' or 'mid-market companies in North America' — broad enough to defend in a board meeting, too broad to act on.
Step 2: Rewrite the value proposition
The proposition is written again from scratch for the American buyer: the outcome first, the mechanism second, in the vocabulary the buyer already uses.
Why it matters
Positioning is the centre of the book, and from a market-entry perspective it is where most stalled entries begin. Heritage-led, understated, technology-first messaging that reassures a European buyer can leave an American buyer to do the translation work.
Questions management should ask
- What outcome does the buyer get, stated in their words rather than ours?
- Which claim can we defend with a number?
- What are we asking the buyer to stop doing?
Common mistake
Translating the European website and assuming the argument survives the language change.
Step 3: Map the competitive set
The competitive set is drawn from the buyer's point of view: direct competitors, substitutes, internal build options, and the very common decision to change nothing.
Why it matters
In the WDK framework, a practical assumption to test is that the American category is more crowded and more clearly defined than the equivalent at home. Buyers compare against what they already know, not against your category definition.
Questions management should ask
- Which three alternatives appear on the buyer's shortlist alongside us?
- What does the category expect as standard, and what would be read as missing?
- Why would a buyer reasonably decide to do nothing?
Common mistake
Benchmarking against the competitors that matter in the home market rather than the ones the American buyer names.
Step 4: Run research with real U.S. buyers
Primary research with buyers in the chosen segment — conversations, not surveys — testing the rewritten proposition, the competitive framing and the price.
Why it matters
Assumption is the most expensive input in a market entry. Twenty conversations cost less than a month of paid media and change more.
Questions management should ask
- Which of our beliefs about the American buyer are evidence and which are assumption?
- Have we tested the proposition with people who could actually buy it?
- What would we need to hear to abandon the current plan?
Common mistake
Running research after the launch budget has already been committed.
Step 5: Choose a beachhead
One region is chosen for the first period of entry, based on where the segment's customers, talent, capital and partners already cluster.
Why it matters
The United States is not one market. A national launch on a European budget produces a thin presence everywhere and a strong presence nowhere.
Questions management should ask
- Where do our target accounts concentrate?
- Can we hire our third, fifth and tenth employee there?
- What is the total cost of being present there for three years?
Common mistake
Choosing the best-known city rather than the one where the first ten relationships are easiest to build.
Step 6: Set U.S. pricing from scratch
Pricing is rebuilt against American willingness to pay, competitor price points, channel margin and the cost of selling in the United States.
Why it matters
A converted price carries the assumptions of another market: different salary levels, different discount norms, different expectations about what is included.
Questions management should ask
- What do buyers in this segment currently pay for the alternative?
- What margin does the channel need to carry us?
- Does the price still work once U.S. customer-acquisition cost is included?
Common mistake
Treating pricing as a currency conversion rather than a positioning decision.
Step 7: Choose one repeatable channel
One channel — direct sales, partner, distributor, marketplace or demand generation — is chosen and funded to the level where a fair test is possible.
Why it matters
Entry budgets spread across four channels rarely produce enough signal in any of them to tell what works.
Questions management should ask
- Which channel reaches our segment most directly?
- What does a fair test of that channel cost?
- Who owns it, full time?
Common mistake
Hiring one U.S. salesperson, calling it a channel, and expecting a proposition that has never been tested to carry them.
Step 8: Build U.S. proof
Deliberate work to secure the first U.S. customers who can be named, quoted and referenced — treated as a launch objective, not a by-product.
Why it matters
In Wilbert Kragten's experience working across international markets, buyers look for peers they recognise, and a modest U.S. reference often does more work than an impressive European one. Test this in your own category.
Questions management should ask
- Which early customers would we most want to name?
- What are we prepared to offer in exchange for a reference?
- Is a named reference part of the first-year plan or an afterthought?
Common mistake
Leading with European logos the American buyer has never heard of.
Step 9: Clear legal and compliance groundwork
The regulatory groundwork is mapped early: corporate entity, tax registration, employment arrangements, product labelling, data handling and any industry-specific requirements. Requirements vary by industry, state and business model, and specialist advice belongs here.
Why it matters
Compliance discovered late does not just delay a launch; it can force changes to the product, the packaging or the commercial model after spend is committed.
Questions management should ask
- Which requirements apply to our industry, our states and our business model?
- Who is accountable for each one, and by when?
- What is the lead time on the slowest item?
Common mistake
Treating compliance as paperwork that can be handled in the final weeks before launch.
Step 10: Define what 'working' looks like
Explicit criteria and review points are set before launch, together with the decisions that follow from missing them.
Why it matters
Without agreed criteria, a slow start is argued about rather than acted on, and budget continues to flow towards an unvalidated plan.
Questions management should ask
- What must be true at 90, 180 and 365 days?
- What will we stop if it is not?
- Who decides, and on what evidence?
Common mistake
Scaling on optimism because no one agreed what a failing quarter would look like.
10 Questions to Ask Before Entering the U.S. Market
- 01
Can we name the first thousand American customers we intend to win, and what they have in common?
- 02
Would an American buyer who has never heard of us understand what we do and why it matters in one sentence?
- 03
Who are we actually being compared with in the United States, and on what criteria?
- 04
What evidence, from American buyers, supports the plan we are about to fund?
- 05
Which single region are we committing to first, and what makes it the right one for our category?
- 06
Is our U.S. price defensible against the alternatives our buyers already pay for?
- 07
Which channel are we betting on, and have we funded it well enough to learn from it?
- 08
Which American customer will vouch for us twelve months from now?
- 09
Do we know every requirement that could delay our launch, and its lead time?
- 10
What result at ninety days would make us change course, and have we agreed it in writing?
The framework behind the book
These ten steps are the working structure of Mastering the Marketing Entry in the United States, which develops each one with site-selection guidance, research tools, cheat sheets and the legal groundwork of a U.S. launch. This page explains the shape of the method; the book is where the detail, examples and decision aids live.