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On 3-4 June 2010 in Kiev the 10^th International Business Forum “Direct Marketing Days in Ukraine» took place. During these two days more than 400 participants of the forum were discussing the issues of direct marketing, applying its instruments in various activities and boosting sales due to their application as the forum slogan was “Down with marketing – up with sales!”.

On the threshold of the forum…

Official opening of the forum took place on the 3 June, but on the eve of the event the participants have gathered at the Welcome-party. This first party of the forum is already a tradition. Manu guests of the forum have finally met each other after a year, that is why the main activity of the evening was the exchange of impressions and achievements of the past time. This is such a wonder that the people living in different countries who haven’t seen each other for a long time had a chance to meet each other exactly here, at the forum. And in the morning Direct Marketing Days in Ukraine were ready to welcome everybody…

Day one

“We have lots of information technology. We just don’t have any information” – stated Alastair Tempest, Director General at FEDMA (Federation of European Direct and Interactive Marketing; Belgium) at the beginning of his report. The more media the greater is sophistication, the harder it is to define something really worthy and convincing. But as soon as the necessary data is collected another problem comes around – database protection. There are several rules in the EU that regulate the data privacy:

1. always sign agreement when exchanging data or giving out data for processing
2. There are two recognized “model” contracts produced by the International Chamber of Commerce (and FEDMA). These are on

Final Approved Version of Alternative Standard Contractual Clauses for the Transfer of Personal Data from the EU to Third Countries (controller to controller transfers) 

But the new media bring the new data protection regulations. There are plans to approve the law regulating these issues in EU by the next year.

As the principal aim of this year’s forum was to give the participants an insight on how to boost their sales by means of DM instruments, each report was concerned on this very matter. Valentin Pertsiya, co-owner and CEO of Optimaza, general director of brand-innovation company BrandAid (Ukraine-Russia), in his speech dealt with the delusions of sales departments leaders about the sales capabilities of the in-house services. Do you think it is possible to find a sales manager who will sell anything and right away? Or your product is a unique one and the customers will line up even before in appears in the stores? Or someone beside you will create an effective sale system? Of course this is not about you. Are you sure? On practice, many heads of sales departments have delusions on this subject… Valentin gave 4 pieces of advice to remedy the situation:

1. do not sell everything to everyone
2. be consistent in your client servicing
3. teach your clients
4. show example by your personal result

Meanwhile, at the Live Cases at Call Center and CRM-Solutions conference Jacek Powalka, MBA, managing partner at Great Open House (Poland) was dancing cha-cha-cha and speaking of the loyalty programmes development. How much you need to spend to invite the customer to dance with you? – Jacek asked and added – Reward that can’t be bought is the most valued”. Discounts, points, cards – this is only a part of what can be used. The most important thing is – do not ignore your customer, or the customer will ignore your company…

Participants of the forum could get information not only at the speeches but also at the master classes. Tamara Skuratovskaya, trainer and consultant (Ukraine) was telling about different secrets of turning “no” into “yes”. Refuses and objections are not an excuse to say goodbye to the customer. Correct and well-organized work with undesired “no” will help to retain the customer. “Our challenge is to find the points of the company and customer contact – says Tamara – and this calls for the skill of mild bypassing of this very “no”. For instance, if at the meeting with the client you look into his eyes and he states the ultimative “You give me what I want or we are not anything to do together”, subconsciously you give up at this moment and the client realizes that. But! If you look away for a few seconds and continue your calm conversation then everything might resolve in your favour.

Robert Stahl, Sales Director at Emerson Polska (Poland), told “How to make each direct mailing campaign a success”. Among the principal mistakes during the direct-mailing campaign Robert noted the following:

1. rush
2. ignoring of all the necessary steps of a campaign
3. poor database

The essential mailing elements, according to Mr. Stahl, are the following:

1. interesting envelope
2. introduction letter
3. information about the product or service
4. sample or small gift
5. response element
6. “virus” element

Oleg Zeldin, Managing Partner at Alex Berg Contact-Center Consulting (Ukraine) spoke about “Structure of approach to contact centre operational optimization”. First of all it is necessary to understand the objectives of CC management. Oleg defined it as “providing the profit to the company by means of customers’ loyalty development through the access level control and improving the service quality with simultaneous optimization of contacts processing self-coast by rising the effectiveness and skillful resources planning”. In order to optimize/arrange the work it is essential to understand the CC management system structure. It is composed of drivers, instruments and aims.

Management system structure

During all the day the public shortlisted projects defense within the final stage of International Open Contest for the best DM project “Direct Hit 2010”. Out of seven possible categories 4 black belts in direct marketing were awarded and Grand prix went to Russia. The project called “Knocking on Heaven’s Door” by R&I Group was named the best. What is so unusual about it? NOMOS-Bank decided to engage new corporate customers (big businesses in Russia) in a daring and provocative way. In order to deliver a letter of an average manager personally to a VIP, 526 “Profile” magazines were published with the photo of a potential customer on the cover and a provocative title (for instance, “Andrey Velikanov. Grey Eminence in Nonferrous Metallurgy” page 36). And it worked! On the mentioned page there was a short personalized handwritten note where the bank informed of the aim of this magazine delivery. The response rate was 86% and 20% of the addressees became the customers of the NOMOS-Bank. Do you still doubt that the project is really the best?

Day two

On the 4 June the conference “Mail Order in Ukraine” started its work. Here the winners for the best catalogue cover 2010. Grand prix was awarded to Neckermann Ukraine for the catalogue “Spring‑Summer”. Украина за каталог «Весна-Лето». Perhaps no other conference this year was so “international” as this one. The representatives of 7 countries held their speeches here.

Within the conference there was a courier solutions exchange in which such companies as DPD, Nova Poshta, Rosan took part. During a month the companies had an opportunity to prepare a quotation to a virtual customer according to the received brief. However, the companies showed their schemes of order cost calculation, they could not finally name the final figure. Conclusion: the greatest disadvantage of the national postal operators is that they are not client-oriented.

The representatives of Ukraine, Russia and Belgium gathered at the round table “Way to Europe through personal data protection: forewarned is forearmed”. When it was planned by the organizers no one knew that on 1 June 2010 the Supreme Council of Ukraine will accept the Law of Ukraine “On Personal Data Protection”. This law has become the principal subject of DM industry experts discussion. The majority of questions concerned the registration of the existing personal databases (PDB), control of the specially authorized state organization (it is still unclear if it will be an existing authority or a new one) and penalties for the law infringement. According to the law registration is basically a notice on the PDB owner, its managers, aims of data processing, location of processing. Nevertheless, the authorized organization can refuse the registration… As follows from the definition of personal data, any company or entrepreneur has a PDB. Some companies (advertising business, call-centers, datacenters) their number will reach hundreds. And each of them will have to be registered. Despite the lots of questions that arose, all the participants agreed on the need of law in this sphere. But if this is the right version – the time will show.

Every year Direct Marketing Days in Ukraine are attended by lots of participants that seek for various results of the visit. Some of them want to get valuable knowledge, others want to get business contacts, and some want to represent themselves and their companies. Baurzhan Bayzhigitov, Director of Mailing Services Department, SC Kazpochta (Kazakhstan Republic) showed the possibilities of Kazpochta and prospects of mail order companies at their entry to the Kazakhstan Republic market. In order to assist the MO companies to enter the market the management of Kazpochta desided to create a working group on distance trade development in Kazakhstan. Among the main special features Baurzhan noted the following:

1. positive perception of DT companies
2. large distances
3. poor development of retailing
4. stable and rapid development of the country economy
5. well-developed and reliable postal network
6. mentality close to the European-type

First time this year the distance trade companies representatives were not only listeners but also speakers of the forum. Anastasiya Savchenko, Head of Internet Marketing Department, Telemedia,

(Ukraine) presented a short guidance on “How not to sell what you have” via internet. The basic moments of the guidance:

1. save on your website
2. place the unique content (that is far from being a reality)
3. hide your telephone number
4. write a non-personalized letter with wrong data
5. do not call your customer yourselves

But if the desire to sell is still strong, try to act quite the contrary way. And do not forget the website testing, usability improvement, its optimization, and this will work out!

The listeners of Drect Marketing: Instruments and Technologies conference started their day with two master classes. Daniil Gridin, Russian marketing antiguru, showed an effective B2B direct mailing to the forum participants. The secret is simple: the two powerful drives of B2B marketing = direct mail + case study (detailed description of the implemented project). No calls to the “cold contacts”. How does it work? Intrigue letter with an offer to send a letter, than a letter with case description and a suggestion to arrange a meeting and, finally, the meeting. Nuances: delivery, letter copywrite and its packaging.

Ian Moore, the Founder and Creative Director of Blue-Chip Marketing agency, author of a book “Does Your Marketing Sell?” (United Kingdom) together with the participants of the forum was looking for an answer to that question. It was quite easy to find if one uses NEW AIDA – the consumer behavior model developed by Ian, NEW AIDA. Having the already known consumer’s incentives (AIDA: attention, interest, desire, action) Ian added three more (NEW: navigation, ease, wording).

In order to keep all the Russian-speaking DM community informed, the forum organizers held the two-days twitter broadcasting. But it is not that easy to convey all the feelings and experience of the participants and speakers in the conference halls.

Organizing committee of Direct Marketing Days in Ukraine is sure that every single participant of the forum left with a stock of new business solutions, contacts, supply of drive and energy received at the event. We are sure that it will suffice for the whole coming year. Up to the 11^th forum.

Our contacts: (044) 490 9088, org@dmdays.com.ua. We are always on call!

Organizer: OS-Direct Marketing Group supported by Ukrainian Direct Marketing Association, Austrian Post and Zolotaya Amfora TM
Sponsorship support is provided by Integer UA, Univest Group, envelopes and packages factory Konvi
Official PR partner: Reklamaster.com
General marketing partner: MarketingMediaReview
General internet partner: META
General media partner: business weekly “Kontrakty”
General TV partner: Pervyi Delovoy
Business partner: “Companion” magazine
Strategy partner: “&Strategii magazine
Information partner: Advertising.ua
Partner: DHL Global Mail

More detail on: www.dmdays.com.ua