What was your journey until taking on this role in the company?
I studied communication with a specialization in advertising techniques at the university of Trieste, after which I started working as a graphic designer in an agency in Udine. I later worked for a B2B company in the fashion sector and then moved into the automotive sector and continued my professional career in a small local B2B company in the furniture sector. Subsequently, I joined Unilin where I deal with everything that falls under the umbrella of marketing, therefore both online and offline, together with a colleague who takes care of the creative part. I supervise the sales points from sampling to product displays, I coordinate the communication of the agents in the area and I am responsible for defining strategy and budget. We are going through a transition period because the company is moving from purely B2B communication towards a B2B2C strategy to address both retailers and the final consumer.
What do you think about social media in the B2B market segment?
I think it depends a lot on the type of sector and the country, certainly for our sector careful and targeted planning on social media can make the difference.
Which social network is more suitable for your reality and which is less?
The most suitable social network for Unilin's commercial purpose is certainly Facebook because it directly presents the product line that arrives on the market, also because it is on this platform that our main target resides. While Instagram is the most in line for the type of communication we want to do even if for us it is less effective in terms of commercial conversion. Clearly at an institutional level the platform that represents us most is Linkedin while Tik Tok is the one least suited to our business model because on this social network the target is not directly interested in what we propose.
The data shows that having a low number of followers damages the brand image, what do you think?
At a local level we actually have very small numbers but of a certain quality, but I confirm that having an important fan base gives a certain light to the brand and facilitates various internal and external corporate transitions. In general, for Unilin what matters is the real value of those who listen to the brand when it communicates, so quality is worth much more than quantity. We are not currently taking specific actions to increase our communities but we have active social investments to have a direct conversion to the site so that the end customer searches for a reseller directly. Since stores are the real point of conversion, we focus a lot on the in-store aspect also because the product needs to be seen and touched before being purchased.
Have you ever collaborated with professionals regarding the social sphere?
All platforms are managed internally and the digital and content marketing part is followed and created by the central Belgian office. The contents are obviously remodeled with regards to the Italian language and the reference market for the "pay" part, while for the staff there is a whole series of contents that we have available in addition to the fact that we have the possibility of creating them internally. The only digital agency with which we collaborate concerns the part of the Unilin Italia website where synergies come together for updates and implementations. However, we are free to choose the professionals we need as long as this area of expertise is not already managed by the headquarters.
What are the future corporate communication projects?
A great challenge for Unilin between now and the next few years is to be able to increasingly integrate digital systems with the still physical importance of the point of sale. We need to make the path between physical and digital that the consumer undertakes increasingly fluid by implementing more of what can be found inside a store. There is already a simulator on the site that allows you to load the user's room and render the selected solution in terms of finishes and colours. Since this visual is exportable, in the sense that people can download it or send it via email, we have already taken a step towards the physical-digital union because consumers can come to the store directly with the sampled file to request a quote. The market now requires digitalisation in every process so we are also centrally studying new display systems to improve the in-store experience, such as QR codes on each sample and other solutions to make our spaces more interactive.