When managers of Edelman Europe met for an affiliate meeting in Barcelona, Spain, late last year, one question kept on creeping into the conversation: when are we going to open
up shop in Poland?
"Enough clients were saying it to us so it got to a point where we felt we had to make a move," says Barbara Kwiecien, who ran one of Poland's top 10 PR agencies for the past
three years and is now in charge of Edelman Poland (Warsaw), which opened for business earlier this month.
Nearly 15 years after the collapse of communism, PR is starting to flourish in the former Eastern bloc countries, with, as Edelman's new footprint indicates, Poland leading the
way. The reasons should be plain to any PR manager with an eye on emerging markets: considered an economic success story among the Central and Eastern European economies, Poland's
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2004 grew 5.6 %, one of the highest growth rates of any European Union member.
What's more, Poland is the largest consumer market of the ten nations that joined the European Union May 1, with a population of around 38 million people.
Edelman Poland, which is currently working on the Chiquita and Amgen accounts, among others, has 12 full-time employees specializing in corporate reputation and consumer
marketing; it's the agency's first office within one of the 10 new member states in the European Union.
There are many factors for PR execs to consider when their companies enter East European markets, not least among them that "pay for play" is still practiced in many areas,
although it's not nearly as pronounced as it was several years ago. And while media relations in the West centers on developing "professional" relationships with members of the
press, in former Eastern bloc countries there's more emphasis placed on cultivating the "personal" before PR reps go into pitch mode. Another crucial element: you need to work
with homegrown talent on the ground from the get-go to help you get acclimated to the market. (For other tips, see sidebar.)
Two new chapters of http://www.worldwlt.org -- an online business community of more than 30,000 people and 80 chapters throughout the world -- recently launched
in Poland (PolskaWIT) and Russia (RusWIT). RusWIT is run by PR execs from DataArt Inc., a software outsourcing company headquartered in New York with a development center in St.
Petersburg, Russia.
"There is a tremendous amount of word-of-mouth [in these countries] so you need to create events that will facilitate that," says Vica Vinogradova, VP of corporate
communications at DataArt. "PR really needs to take a look at the whole region because you have all industries there," including automotive, manufacturing, retail, and they need
help communicating their messages.
Asked how susceptible former Eastern bloc countries are for PR services, Kim Nyberg, Chairman-CEO of Hill & Knowlton Central-Eastern and Northern Europe (Helsinki,
Finland), said in an e-mail exchange: "They believe more strongly in the power of PR than we in Western countries do. However, their perception of PR is much narrower. It is
either media relations or public affairs. Public affairs meaning in this context, more lobbying than issues management." He added: "It is quite common to try direct influencing of
political decision-makers. Other aspects of PR are in reasonably low demand. Growth potential is big if you compare to present levels."
Like Poland, Russia is also ripe for PR services. "As Russia opens up to the world marketplace, the biggest demand is for open and transparent operations. That's the phrase you
hear again and again and again," says Jim Heatherington, director of membership affairs for the U.S.-Russia Business Council (Washington, D.C.), a nonprofit trade association that
promotes commercial ties between U.S. and Russian companies and currently has 300 members, ranging from Cisco Systems Inc. to Ernst & Young to MetLife. "Communicating
strategically is just as important as the business operation."
Paul Nathanson, senior VP of The PBN Company (Washington, D.C.), which was one of the first U.S. PR agencies to open an office in Moscow (in 1990), says: "PR managers need to
understand that they can do business in Russia, and they can do the right way."
A PBN survey conducted last year of 175 of Russia's most important companies found that 7 out of 10 CEOs acknowledge that reputation management is essential to achieving their
company's strategic business objectives while 9 out of 10 believe that reputation management should be one of the main functions of the CEO. "The infrastructure is developing, and
this is a big area for PR," Nathanson says, adding that there are about 200 PR agencies currently in Russia. "Companies in Russia don't want to be known as 'Russian' companies but
international firms."
CONTACTS: Jim Heatherington, 202.739.9190, [email protected]; Barbara Kwiecien, [email protected]; Paul Nathanson, 202.466.6210, [email protected];
Vica Vinogradova, 212.378.4180 x14, [email protected]