ITS A PEOPLE GAME MARKETING: PART 2

Attention must be given to understanding the environment in which your customers, existing or prospective, are working;

the pressures they are under; their personal interests, backgrounds and aspirations. The position of their company in its field, market strength, etc. is also important knowledge when renegotiating contracts.

There is however a word of caution. In many countries a Data Protection Act – or its equivalent – seeks to protect individuals’ personal information from release into the public domain. Keeping notes on contacts is not recommended. Instead compile internal visit reports in a manner which makes accidental onward transmission difficult if not impossible. These become a file of internal documentation, private to the company and under the ownership of the company – not the individual in the marketing department. These reports will contain snippets of information such as “family man with two boys at x school’, or ‘avid supporter of y team. The ideal is to compile a record of meetings, avoid gaffs, and ensure that new members of the marketing department are able to build on previous knowledge.

Successful port marketeers are those with a comprehensive range of contacts accessible on personal terms. These people gain respect, an important asset of any company. Another way of gaining respect is through education. The port which encourages marketing staff to be members of professional bodies such as the Institute of Chartered Shipbrokers, The Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, and/or marketing institutes, or that sends its staff on tailored port management courses, will quickly find that it has a more professional approach than one which does not. This policy wins business through improved levels of service and fewer mistakes. As noted earlier, knowledge earns money, ignorance loses it.

Consider opportunities offered by the fresh assessment of traffics and alternative utilisation of current facilities. Look at the potential for cost cutting, improving efficiency, developing new business on the back of existing activity, exploiting a competitor’s weakness, strengthening your position, and satisfying local pressures. As stated in Part 1, new traffic comes from three sources: expansion of existing business; business won from a competitor; and new business created by your port. The first and the third should be constantly in mind. The second is a danger area. If the traffic is mobile it came to your port for short-term gain. It will equally quickly leave when a competitor drops his rates – leaving you with a hole in your revenue budget and a temptation to retain or regain the traffic by dropping your rates further. This is a very slippery slope indeed. Convert this traffic to the third category.

BE AWARE OF ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES Many see environmental pressures as a tax or restriction on development and current operations yet significant political and commercial gains can be won from intelligent attention to the environmental lobby. Leading the way is cheaper than rushing to catch up. An environmental audit of the port and its individual operations repays careful analysis. Good PR is difficult to come by but good environmental PR has added value. Ports in developing nations may feel that this is a luxury they would prefer to avoid just now, but the mistake of ignoring environmental issues today will wreak a terrible vengeance in the future.

ESTABLISH A PORT COMMUNITY List the services provided in the whole port area by the port company and third party providers. Assess these third parties’ hopes and fears, strengths and weaknesses, and their individual value to you as a port operator. Do they generate business in the port – e. g. a ship repair yard bringing in vessels purely for repair? Do they provide essential services which directly affect your performance as a port – e. g. tugs and pilots, or hauliers? Do you have regular dialogue with them, joint marketing initiatives, an understanding of how you can assist them to improve their business?

Ports which address these issues gain immediate benefit, the Port of London being a prime example. Ports which have ignored their community, particularly since being privatised, have a legacy of lost opportunity and reduced profitability to live with. Think about how outsiders see your port: cargo owners will view a port as a single entity: they will not be concerned about which company does what, but they will note that Port A handles their goods for x units of money more cheaply or more reliably than Port y. A fragmented community and a port with tenants working in competitive ports is worse than a lost opportunity, it can be a cancer which will bite deep into the bottom line. Build a cohesive and supportive port community and watch business volumes, profitability, efficiency and public support improve.

DEVELOP A STRATEGY Such a basic tenet that many readers will be turned off! BUT there is more to it than a one-off completion of an exercise learned on a course given by an eloquent marketing guru. Marketing strategy is an ongoing duty based on developing the advantages of the port shown up in the foregoing, addressing the weaknesses, and assessing the competition.

Pinching business off a nearby port may be temporarily satisfying but it is a recipe for later remorse as the business, once dislodged will move again and again. Much more difficult, but in the longer term much more rewarding, is the creation of new business from the knowledge gained in conducting thorough trade assessments. Here the challenge is to devise an environment for business new to your port which cannot be easily copied by a competitor. This is achieved through the innovative maximising of the advantages of your port in a particular customer’s terms. More than “give him what he wants” this is “create a proposal which takes the customer forward to a position he could not have dreamed of”. The trick is to give the potential customer a blank sheet of paper and ask him to write out in double spacing, one side only, what he would expect from a port in Utopia. Take this, convert to your terms, and see how many of the points can be met. Work on it until almost every issue has been satisfied. Redraft the proposal into the original terms and see how it will look to your customer, other port users, competitors, and your finance department. Finalise it, dress it up and win the traffic.

Other variations on the ‘expand existing or create new business’ themes are joint venture investments involving the port and either port community players and/or major port customers. Innovation, flair, synergy, transparency and trust are the key attributes of successful joint ventures. Joint ventures obviously bind parties, and hopefully business, into the port and grow a stability and certainty which encourages further business growth. Development of stable business is the marketing guru’s strategy, but how you do it in real life is up to you. Establish a pride in your port, joint ventures, a quality culture, and the marketing strategy will bring success.

AGENTS HAVE KNOWLEDGE AND CONTACTS Port agents are often maligned as operators who benefit from others’ investment without investing in anything themselves. Sadly this is sometimes the case. However a good port agent is a powerful marketing force, and if properly encouraged becomes an essential and respected player in the port community. The agent has knowledge, contacts and an independence which are of considerable benefit to the port management if they know how to tap into the resource.

An good agent will add value, and is likely to bring significant business to the port when he can see benefits for his customer and himself.

Develop working practices which give the agent benefits unobtainable elsewhere. Advantageous office rentals in port buildings are nice but integrating port working systems with agents’ documentary systems is better. Working together provides economies, better service and unique advantages to all parties involved. In short, it breeds success.

The most thorough discipline you can adopt soon becomes the easiest to maintain – and the most productive. A monthly review meeting, agenda drawn from the headings above, plus “any new ideas”, if properly logged and thoroughly acted upon, will quickly have a positive effect on the organisation, port community and most importantly, on your customers.

No benefit is gained without effort. Rigorous attention to the foregoing will show positive results in all ports, no matter their size.

Ignore the message at your peril – you do not know who else has been reading this!