Interview natalija sippo english

Interview in the magazine Ekonometar:

Natalija Puntevska, SIPPO Representative for Macedonia, Serbia and Albania

‘Assistance for Successful Export to Switzerland and EU’ The Swiss Import Promotion Programme SIPPO assists the small and medium size enterprises in export, facilitates the market access, connects the SMEs with the buyers and opens new business opportunities in EU and Switzerland

The Swiss Import Promotion Programme SIPPO is one of the mandates of the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs SECO, implemented by Switzerland Global Enterprise (S-GE). The program supports the export of the SMEs from selected partner countries, facilitating market access and opening up new business opportunities in Switzerland and the European Union. The Swiss Import Promotion Programme SIPPO provides Programme participants with detailed information on specific industry sectors, and conditions and requirements they should meet for entry into new markets (certificates, quality of the products, trade conditions). It offers advisory sessions in the areas of export marketing, quality assurance, organizes group trainings and individual coaching. SIPPO helps in establishing contacts with potential buyers at international trade fairs, trade missions or study tours.

Natalija Puntevska, SIPPO representative for Serbia, Macedonia and Albania, in the interview for Ekonometar says that in 2015 SIPPO has supported 18 companies in their participation at selected trade fairs in Western Europe. This and the other activities resulted in increase of export turnover of the participating companies of 9.35 mil CHF, and opening of new 229 jobs.

If we summarize in few words, we prepare the SMEs for export and connect them to the potential buyers.

SIPPO also connects importers from the European Union, Switzerland and other EFTA countries with suitable suppliers from selected partner countries. We started our activities in Serbia in 2004 with the objective to increase the export of the SMEs, their turnover and number of employees, as well as to improve the production according to international standards. The sectors we support are: fashion – production of garments, furniture, technical wood, industrial subcontracting, tourism and fish and seafood.

Each sector has its own specifics, and market and quality requirements that should be met for export. All these sectors present the potentials of the Serbian economy, says Natalija Puntevska for Ekonometar.

Application through the web site or by phone All information about the SIPPO program is available on the web site: www.s-ge.com/sippo. Companies that are interested in cooperation with SIPPO can apply through the web page and fill out the Apply Now form, or they can directly contact Natalija Puntevska by phone: +389 2 310 33 50 or by e-mail balkan.sippo.rep@s-ge.com.

What is most important for the entrepreneurs to know when they access a new market?

We cooperate with small and medium size enterprises that offer products and services of high quality according to international standards. Those companies are ready to export, but they do not have a highly developed network of clients in EU and Switzerland. The experience so far has shown that results can be achieved if there is financial commitment from the company for sustainable business, willingness and readiness of the company’s management and staff to do all the preparations to enter a new market, as well as to implement all necessary improvements.

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What do the Serbian SMEs miss to achive higher export to Switzerland and EU and what is the biggest obstacle for higher export?

Successful exporting is a complex process. Once a company has identified the product it wants to sell in export markets, it must explore market opportunities. This process involves a significant amount of market research. Then, it should develop a production strategy, prepare the goods for the target market, and determine the best strategy for getting the goods transported to its distributors. The main obstacles listed by the companies are often the inadequate access to the information for a specific sector and market, the complex process of market research, as well as how to access the potential buyers (the sales channels, how to find a client, etc.). We provide our support in the above mentioned areas and prepare the companies for export. In the market researches and publications we provide detailed information about export, Swiss and EU norms, regulation, standards, quality requirements, import, customs and customs regulation.

Specialized products are in demand The sector of industrial subcontracting includes metal, metal processing industry, part of the mechanical industry, electric, and electronics. Christian Bernet, SIPPO project manager for the industrial subcontracting sector, says that their main activity is the yearly participation at Hannover fair. ‘It is probably the best place in Europe for companies which have a competitive offer to enter the EU market.

Apart from trade fair participation, we also look for other ways of how to support companies to be better integrated into the supply chain of the European market. For example, we organize specific missions where potential suppliers meet interested buyers, i.e. buyer missions or selling missions’, explains Bernet for Ekonometar. He points that Serbia has an interesting potential in the metal sector for the European market. ‘If you talk specifically about Switzerland one should be aware that this market is small and best for niche products’. Christian Bernet advises the Serbian companies interested to export to Switzerland and EU that they should focus on increasing the quality of the products and the after sale service. ‘It is necessary the entrepreneurs to think about the digital presence on the market; a wellfunctioning website is an absolute must to attract new potential clients, says Bernet for Ekonometar.

What do you advise the Serbian entrepreneurs, how they can better prepare for the fairs and for establishing contacts with foreign partners?

Our program for trade fair participation is a three-year program, which means that the selected companies participate as exhibitors on the specific trade fair three years in a row. The service package provided by SIPPO includes exhibition booth at SIPPO pavilion (stand rental and stand construction), hotel accommodation for two representatives of the company, matchmaking services, marketing support, preparation workshop before the fair start. In the scope of the promotional activities we present the company profiles in the SIPPO exhibitor brochure, we do emailing to potential customers, other promotional activities as advertisements; we provide preparation support with information packages. The preparation for the fair starts about one year before the fairs takes place. During that period, we also help companies in selection of the samples, products that should be exhibited at the fair (they should match the target market), we provide information about the trends, we prepare the entrepreneurs for successful business communication and negotiation. We provide advices in regard to the transportation, as well. The SIPPO team supports the companies during the fair participation. After the third participation, the companies should continue to exhibit by themselves, which would mean that they have increased their export and the overall business, and this is one of the SIPPO objectives.

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In which topics are the Serbian entrepreneurs mostly interested on the trainings you organize?

How can they better prepare for export on your workshops?

On the trainings and workshops the entrepreneurs can learn about the conditions, need and demand of the western European markets, to define their USP, to prepare for the access to the foreign markets and trade fair participation, how to successfully present their company to the buyers, how to negotiate, etc.

We also focus on the role of the digital marketing and social media in the export. On these and similar topics, we organize every year a workshop on ‘Access the European Tourism Market’ for the companies and organizations involved in the tourism sector and promotion of Serbia as a destination.

What is the interest of the entrepreneurs from Serbia for trade fair participation and what are their results?

For the Serbian companies, we organize participation at about 6 fairs in Europe every year. In the fashion sector, we started last year with participation at the Premier Vision Manufacturing fair in Paris, with companies from Macedonia, Serbia and Albania. The plan for September this year is 4-5 companies from Serbia to exhibit at the fair.

In the industrial subcontracting sector, we support the exhibition of selected Serbian producers from the metal processing industry at the biggest industrial fair in Hannover. In cooperation with the Development Agency of Serbia (RAS), this year we also supported the companies that were part of the Serbian national pavilion and helped them in establishing contacts with the potential buyers.

In the technical wood sector, we are present at two fairs – Interzum in Cologne and ZOW in Bad Salzuflen in Germany. Every year, the Serbian furniture producers have the opportunity to exhibit with us on the IMM fair in Cologne. The companies from the fish processing sector participate on the SIPPO collective stand at the SEG fair in Brussels.

In 2014 we started with our activities in the tourism sector. We support the selected tour operators, travel agencies, hotels and other accommodation to participate at the Serbian national pavilion organized by the National Tourism Organization of Serbia (TOS) at the ITB fair in Berlin. Las year we supported four, and this year six companies – tour operators and hotels.

For the fairs the most important is the good preparation In the SIPPO Programme, individual consultants are engaged in the realization of the activities. One of them is Oliver Hanh, who prepares a list of potential customers for every company and provides advices on the best ways of cooperation. During the fair he uses the matchmaking process to open “doors” for the enterprises to start the relationship in a positive and meaningful way.

Oliver Hahn, owner of Hanh Consulting, says that in order to better prepare for participation in a fair most important is the companies to do the “homework” before the fair, to screen the exhibitor list for potential clients and research their need. Also it is of the upmost importance to bring the right people of your company to the fair. With those two key factors in mind enterprises are fully equipped to make better and meaningful contacts with their partners.

‘Our goal is to enable and increase export of Serbian enterprises to Europe. That does include the time after the fair. We analyze the activities done at the fair. Key to that are good records during the fair. That enables the meaningful follow up after the fair is finished. The follow up should be personal and already address the stated needs during the first contact. If someone can surprise the potential client with a possible solution the cooperation will move forward’, says Hanh.

The consultants help the companies to complete the business started at the fair, in regards to helping following up the contacts or enabling the business. But in a strictly contract way or negotiating: no, that is up to the enterprises themselves, underlines Oliver Hanh for Ekonometar.

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With which institutions in Serbia do you cooperate?

The strategy of the SIPPO Programme is to tackle some systemic constraints for exporting companies through a set of interventions specific to the needs of each sector. We aim to transfer the knowledge and experience related to export management and access to new markets to local business support organizations or service providers, which implement those interventions. With these changes, the initial target group of export oriented companies should profit and be able to achieve higher export performance, improve turnover, increase financial resources and investment capacities as well as create new jobs.

A sector brochure has been published, as well as a b2b online platform for the Serbian garment industry.

The platform is presenting more than 180 Serbian textile and garment producers and their services: http://serbianapparel.com/.

Research on export opportunities SIPPO organizes trainings on market research, using the tools and information available on the Internet, in cooperation with the Agency of Wood. The training is adjusted to the needs of the exporters of wood products, but the research can be done for any product. The training is based on the tools for market research developed by ITC (International Trade Center, Geneva), and other sources on Internet which are mainly free of charge. It consists of two two-day educational modules and follow-up advisory services which help the companies in the research of foreign markets and finding business partners abroad.

- The modules include the following: how to select the market with the highest potential for a certain product, research of that market, how the companies can find specific information about the selected product, what are the market trends, market requirements, contacts, prices. In the scope of the training, each company develops a plan of activity and research and based on that develops a strategy for access to the selected market. The skills gained at this training can be implemented for research of almost all markets in the world. In cooperation with the Regional Chamber of Commerce of Valjevo, we have developed a manual which is distributed to the participants at the end of the training, together with a certificate of participation, says Puntevska.

Our partner in the technical wood sector is the Agency of Wood. So far we have realized together a significant number of activities, trainings, buyer mission, and trade fair participation. Besides the training on the market research, we organized training on ‘Successful communication with customers in the export businesses. In September 2014, we organized a buyer mission in Serbia – a group of European buyers visited eight Serbian companies and explored on the sport the opportunities for cooperation.

Our partners in the tourism sector are the National Tourism Organization of Serbia (NTOS) and Private Sector Development Programme in South-West Serbia (PSD) implemented by the Regional Development Agency Zlatibor. In cooperation with PSD we provided training for several local tourism organizations for better presentation of their offer, with focus on the digital marketing. We also cooperate with the Serbian Chamber of Commerce, Vojvodina Metal Cluster, the fashion cluster FACTS and other organizations, said Natalija Puntevska in the interview for Ekonometar.

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