The site: https://www.youtube.com/@vlaicudr
The topic, Romanian commercial successes, like eMag, Bitdefender, and Altex. It’s not necessarily a site celebrating great inventors, but savvy business owners who have created successful brands in Romania.
Vlaicu Dragos tells us how eMag started when only 5% of Romanians had made purchases online. Apparently, when the founder told his idea for an online platform to his staff, they “laughed in his face.”
We hear about how this “100 percent client-oriented company” went from a simple idea to a multi-billion dollar business.
How did eMag really explode? The tech genius met the business genius, and then they got an idea of marketing genius. “If Americans can do a black friday, why not us?”
Aside: Well, why not have “Black Friday” on the traditional Black Friday? Black Friday became an expression in Romania, with no link to the actual date. Hey, Romania never had Abe Lincoln, so they didn’t have the American Thanksgiving, so they didn’t have that historic stock market crash… so the idea of Black Friday being the fourth Friday in November makes little sense here in Romania.
Anyway, after eMag’s lead, other retailers have Black Friday whenever they feel like it. We saw a “boxing day” sale in Cluj last Halloween. And why not? If you want to use English words to have a sale, so be it. Father’s Day is different all over the world, so why can’t Black Friday be? (It would be nice if it were on Friday…)
According to the video, eMag is the fourth most visited website in Romania, after Google, YouTube and Facebook. Naturally, it is the most popular online retailer in Romania.
We hear about how eMag met challenges from competitors in Asia. “eMag isn’t an online shop, it is a digital infrastructure for Romania.”
What are the lessons the video gives us from eMag?
- Timing isn’t everything, execution is.
- Create behavoirs, not just products
- Ecosystems beat stores
- Competitors force you to improve