“New and medium scale companies show a deficit in the fields of marketing and design”. This was one of the main remarks of the 1st Smart Business Forum, organized by the Athens University of Economics and Business and the www.knowhow.gr with the support of Communication Effect, who wrote down the following remarks:
- The scale of such enterprises restricts them from funding independent actions, able to improve their performance
- New and medium size enterprises have a very limited marketing culture
- There is a lack of institutions offering tools of collective marketing
- The Greek state does not support these enterprises. Often, the limited funding they may be able to receive from the Greek state never reaches them due to bureaucracy and mismanagement.
Therefore, new businesses express the following requests:
- Collaboration with academic institutions
- State support in such collaborations
- Collaboration with other relevant institutions, such as the Greek Institute of Communication
- Upgrading bodies and initiatives that promote design as an important element in the development of products and services within a company
Successful case studies and best practices in the field of marketing were presented in the 1st Smart Business Forum. Professor G. Doukidis, S. Lioukas, Eric Sonderquist and V. Trapezanoglou of Eurobank were among the speakers who presented the successful examples of the innovative companies UpStream, Days4u, PositiveEnergy and Doppler.