I had an in-depth talk today with Martin Small, a professional English consultant and advisor, to discuss possible common interests and #Business4Ukraine's activities. Martin was also a long-time associate of the Kent Invicta Chamber of Commerce. The meeting appeared a good reality check for me on various aspects of business promotion. Following up to it, I made a number of personal conclusions as to how to better advance Ukrainian companies in England. These may sound basic for many, but who said that basics are unimportant?
1. 𝐃𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐝𝐲𝐧𝐚𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐦
Turns out that international media create a picture of Ukraine on fire and in bomb shelters tacitly implying that Ukrainian business is paralysed. I know that the worst news sells the best. Ukraine does suffer, but we also build new products and manufacture things every day. While the Western support is very important, without working Ukrainian economy we wouldn't go far. Many Ukrainian businesses are up, running and striving. It is our important task to demonstrate it while talking with Western businesses.
2. 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐯𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐞𝐱𝐚𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐟𝐮𝐥 𝐔𝐤𝐫𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐚𝐧 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬
Selling Ukrainian businesses to professional western public is challenging since their 'default vision' is that we are being attacked and bombed everywhere. Not true as well which is best confirmed by robust exports from resilient Ukrainian companies like Modern Expo , data from Ukrainian Association of Furniture Manufacturers , Rubizhne Hosiery Manufactory - to name just a few of those cases I encountered personally.
3. 𝐇𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐨 𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐚𝐥𝐬 𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐟𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐜𝐜𝐚𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧
Promotion of Ukrainian companies is possible. For that you should have proper promo materials and presentations. I know it sounds banal, but you do have to have them tailored for the occasion. While producing them, assume that somebody else will be presenting this file to your potential contacts and that person won't necessarily have all the breadth of information about your company and business (this is the worst-case assumption, of course, but a good one).
We agreed that Martin will further introduce me to some of his business connections that might be relevant for activities of Kharkiv Cluster for Engineering, Automation and Machine Building (Sergii Bilichenko). Martin, thanks for your time and candidness!
PS: thanks to those who reshared this post 🙏. Do contact me if you want to know more about cooperation with Ukrainian businesses or wish to support them with your products, services or pro bono expertise.
