The Macedonia2025 second IT/BPO workshop was very informative and productive.  Alex Pantic the CEO of Kinetiq Solutions and our keynote speaker, did a great job in summarizing the benefits of PR and marketing for the Macedonian IT companies. He also pinpointed great tips of doing business with US companies. We also thank Emil Matevski for joining us over Skype. We were also pleased to hear a few success stories of collaboration between team members initiated as a result of our first meeting and to we are also happy to welcome new team members.

Here is a brief overview of the keynote address provided by Alex Pantic:

“The event was a fantastic opportunity for Macedonian businesses to congregate, compare and contrast their experiences when working with clients abroad. We, as an enterprise operating in the US market with Macedonian programmers and designers, presented our point of view on the challenges that Macedonian companies are confronted with whilst interacting with North American clients in a business setting.

Macedonia’s  international image, the lack of professionalism of many businesses here, and poor English skills are some of the top concerns for Macedonian companies trying to get business overseas. We stressed that Macedonia should be positioning itself as a high-quality, medium-cost rather than a low-cost destination for IT work to begin with. However, due to poor presentation and business etiquette coupled with inadequate company web pages and digital advertising, the predominant impression is that Macedonian companies are very unprofessional and American clients simply will not work with them at regular prices. Another related trend which hurts the image of the rest of the sector is the high number of IT companies in Macedonia doing low-quality work at the moment at strikingly low prices. Having more interns than permanent employees is not a healthy business method.

Unfortunately, these business errors have contributed to compromising the image of Macedonian businesses. Therefore, the best way for a Macedonian company to successfully position itself in foreign markets is as a Western-Macedonian partnership with western values and business standards. We also highly encouraged our counterparts in Macedonia to find a local salesperson in order to sell their products or services more effectively.

Additionally, Macedonian businesses need to realise the importance of having an appropriate system of priorities which in the West is quite different–status symbols are completely secondary, and what truly matters is quality of service and professionalism. Spending a lot of resources on offices, assistants, accountants, vehicles, clothes and so on will not impress your American counterparts. Instead, if you wish to succeed in the US market, you should be investing in your employees, marketing, public relations, and modernising your business instead of flashy status symbols. Business owners must realise that every market is different and approaching the North American market with Macedonian business practices will not yield success.”

Macedonia2025 welcomes all IT/BPO companies to join our collaboration team and to work jointly on expanding their business globally.