Etjen is a new entrepreneur from Croatia, who wanted to find new possibilities for business development in various situations and social circumstances. He decided to become an entrepreneur and start his own business in Art sale. Etjen started planning for ReccoArt but found that he had no knowledge nor experience in business or sales. So when he found out about the opportunities that Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs offers, he decided to apply for help and further development of his skills, knowledge and passion for contributing to business world. He found Adrian, an entrepreneur from United kingdom, who wanted to mentor, and also share ideas with a young entrepreneur and was looking to provide a startup experience at the sharp end – for a young entrepreneur.
In United kingdom, Etjen worked on different projects with Adrian. He worked on benchmarking of the current sales and distribution platform for Gwlad Courney project with Sydney Aesthetics limited. He analysed the situation in involved projects, Benchmarking sales, marketing and business tools used by Adrian. Etjen also worked on establishing new business relations for both ReccoArt and Adrian’s projects, prospects analysis and plan fabricated how to reach potential clients. HE processed sales pipeline for Adrian’s project from beginning of the sales process to the contract signing. On the other hand, Adrian introduced Etjen in sales techniques which he will use in the further creation of new business relations.
The experience and knowledge that Etjen acquired during the exchange will help him in his future business. He learned how to develop marketing strategy that has been tested through several differentiated projects and will have an established presence in the local market enough to sustain itself. Adrian’s project turned from startup to spinoff due to a fantastic collaboration between team members inside the project. Even Etjen’s project was funded inside the group. The importance of a team work has been proven where supply chain was succesfully established and partnershiped with shipping company. Etjen has expedited all the plans for his business expansion into the targeted market. Regarding the cooperation with Gwlad Courtney and Sydney Aesthetics, Erasmus opened him a new door for his personal and professional development.
˝It is safe to say that without this program of Entrepreneurial exchange, my way would have been completely different and harder to achieve. Anyone who is planning to be an entrepreneur, I highly recommend to apply.˝, Etjen said.
„Etjen was Sydney’s first sales agent, where he worked under minimal supervision to help developing best practices in sales and sales support and our warm leads. He helped to win our first clients which helped us recruit more agents in the UK, Ireland, Italy and the Netherlands. We now have four “active agents (with potentially more) and have won our first business in the Netherlands with (touch wood) our first client in Italy too.“, Adrian said.
