The Stormont executive has a target of growing external sales by 33% over the next four years and by 80% by 2025.
The "trade accelerator plan" includes increased grants to visit trade shows.
Small and medium sized firms will also get accommodation and travel grants for market development trips to Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland.
Economy Minister Simon Hamilton said increasing exports was critical to "transforming Northern Ireland into a globally competitive economy".
The most recent trade figures show that manufacturing exports from Northern Ireland were up by 9.5% in the year ending June 2016.
External sales are all those sales made outside Northern Ireland, that is sales to Great Britain, the Republic of Ireland and anywhere else in the world.
Exports consist of all sales made outside the United Kingdom.
Pharmaceutical firms have performed particularly strongly with exports up by 84% or Â£527m.
However, the number of firms that are exporting has continued to drift downwards and are there now fewer than 1,000 exporting businesses in Northern Ireland.
The last executive fell significantly short of it export targets.
It aimed to grow manufacturing exports by 20% but growth was less than 6%.
Mr Hamilton said: "I want us to look at existing markets and new ones as huge opportunities for Northern Ireland.
"We are already doing exceptionally well at exporting our goods and services but I believe we can do even better."

Thanet Council began work two weeks ago at All Saints Church in Birchington but some stones have been left broken.
One resident, Janice Taylor, said it looked as if "hooligans and demolished the place".
Thanet Council admitted the work could be "upsetting" but said it was in line with national guidelines.
These are determined by the Ministry of Justice and its Burial and Cemeteries Advisory Group.
The work also has the approval of the vicar of Birchington, the Rev Done Witts, the authority said.
Ms Taylor said she was appalled by how the work had been left.
"It looks like an act of vandalism has occurred.
"It doesn't look as if the council has come in here to do work, it looks as if hooligans have come in and demolished the place."
Mr Witts said: "It's just that it looks untidy in the meantime until the council sorts it out."
The council said there were more than 100,000 memorials across cemeteries in Thanet, many of which were more than 100 years old.
It said the testing was being done to ensure the gravestones did not pose a danger to the public.
"The council appreciates the sensitivity of this work with every effort made to advise those affected," it said in a statement.
"It has produced a question and answer leaflet to guide plot owners through what could be a potentially upsetting time."
It also said a team at Thanet Crematorium were available to advise on "all aspects of the Memorial Stability Programme".

Sands Cymru, Drugaid Cymru and Dash, are launching an initiative on Wednesday to tackle the problem.
Sands Cymru chief executive Ifor Glyn said: "This is not a problem that's going to go away anytime soon."
Public Health Wales has previously noted a "substantial escalation" in use since 2010.
Sands said the blanket ban on legal highs, also known as new psychoactive substances (NPS) proposed by the Westminster government was not going to halt the spread.
Concerns about the substances include people not knowing what they contain, a lack of understanding about their effects and how strong they are.
Thaker Hafid, a father-of-three from Cardiff, died in February after taking a legal high that was five times stronger than heroin.
The project, being launched in Neath, Neath Port Talbot, will offer briefings across Wales with the aim of reaching more than 8,000 people by Christmas.
Public Health Wales has also warned about a potentially dangerous legal high currently in circulation.
A man was taken to hospital in north Wales on 15 June after taking MMB-CHMINACA (MDMD-CHMICA) which has been associated with six deaths across Europe since September 2014.
Northern Ireland companies selling to external markets are to be offered more financial support under a scheme announced by the economy minister.
[NEXT_CONCEPT]
A Kent council has been accused of leaving gravestones and memorials looking as if they have been vandalised after carrying out safety checks.
[NEXT_CONCEPT]
A campaign to tackle the use of so-called legal highs is beginning following concerns about increased use.