🇧🇬 Preslav Bobev: It’s Time to Stop Seeing the Balkans as Separate E-commerce Markets
As part of our Brand Ambassador Interview Series ahead of the 9th Regional E-commerce Conference, we spoke with Preslav Bobev, Managing Partner at IMG CONNECT and our Brand Ambassador for Bulgaria.
In this interview, Preslav shares why he believes the Balkans should no longer be viewed as separate e-commerce markets, how AI is transforming the way consumers discover and buy products, and why customer experience, trust, and human connection will remain the biggest competitive advantages in the years ahead. He also talks about the role of AI in business, cross-border growth opportunities, and what he’s looking forward to at this year’s conference in Skopje.
1. What is one e-commerce trend that you believe will significantly shape the industry over the next 12 months?
In my opinion we will see significant shift in the way AI is used in e-commerce. Now lot of it is used by the seller to create content to navigate the customer’s choice of products.
Very soon AI will be increasingly used by the customers to navigate and help their buying process. The way customers search, discover, compare and choose a product will be influenced by various AI tools. E-commerce businesses should go back and use more organic content, which surely is more appreciated and valued by customers and instead invest in AI tools that will generate more product data, personalization and customer experience as well as create trust.
2. What is one thing businesses should stop doing in e-commerce – and one thing they should start doing immediately?
The business shall start exploring and learning the way a customer buying journey unfolds from the very beginning. Leave AI for the business processes where it can really help and try to collect real human data and feedback in the old-fashioned way if needed. Lot of e-commerce businesses are focusing on traffic, but what good does it make if you have thousands of visitors to your site who use it only to compare price and quality and buy from your competitors. The focus shall fall on conversion and quality of customer experience. A good customer is one who buys from your site at the very first visit. But then he/she may not return. The best customer is the one you create from the first contact and impression on your site, through the buying and check out processes.
This customer will return and probably bring in more buyers. Now e-commerce businesses seem to think that AI will give them the answer and solution for everything, but in my opinion, those relying only on and investing too much in AI will be the first to fall out of the market.
3. What is the biggest opportunity for e-commerce businesses in the Balkans right now?
The consumer base in the Balkans is growing and getting more digital. That’s a fact and I will probably repeat what everyone in the business will tell you – the e-commerce sector shall stop looking at the Balkan countries as separate markets, but rather one common market with so many cultural, social and other similarities. If we sell particular product well in Greece, then there is no reason for it not to sell just as good in Bulgaria and North Macedonia.
Yet there are still so many e-commerce businesses that are locked in their own markets of origin and are waiting for someone else to show them how to cross the border.
For example, customers in Greece like to use Visa for online payments, while those in my country Bulgaria are very comfortable with providers like Stripe. Same for delivery service providers or locker boxes like Box Now or DPD. E-commerce businesses who can quickly survey and synchronize their services to the customer habits and preferences in each market will be the big winners.
4. How is AI changing the way you work, and what is one AI tool or use case you believe every e-commerce professional should know about?
Like probably every other business using AI, we have drastically reduced the time from an idea to call to action. Apart from all common tasks for which we use AI for, lately we use it more to analyze various business options and scenarios. That`s really helpful and gives a view and option, which we easily would miss out, so I think that AI will develop more and more in terms of predicting business risk and creating “go to market” strategies.
Lot of businesses also in the e-commerce industry are thinking that AI will help them replace human workforce aka reduce operational cost.
Most e-commerce businesses started using it as sales and customer support assistants and that’s working well in most cases, though in my opinion it is still not replacing humans the way we expect it. I am a customer of my own age and social status, and I simply can’t adapt to talking to an AI chatbot when I need help with my order etc. So, e-commerce businesses shall not explicitly rely on AI and just replace people with it, but rather to make people in their organization more productive and useful.
5. If you could give one piece of advice to a business that wants to grow in e-commerce, what would it be?
I will probably sound like an old school man, which I am indeed, but to me this new AI excitement and golden age in which we are living now will be something temporary. I simply can’t imagine AI replacing the human perception for taste, preference, customer support and communication. An AI tool may suggest to me 10 different colors, but it will be my simple human taste who will choose which one to buy. In my opinion e-commerce businesses should think twice before investing bluntly in technology and advertisement content created by AI etc. As a business owner I am still trying to put myself in the shoes of my customers. How do they feel when they browse my products on the web. The colors we use, the layout, the shrifts and all else. Does it make them comfortable or else? What makes them buy, what makes them hesitate and most of all, what will make them come back as a customer? E-commerce is still about people making choice to buy your product, so give yourself time to stop, think for a while and be the customer and not only the seller.
6. What are you most looking forward to about the upcoming 9th Regional E-commerce Conference, and what would you say to people who are considering attending?
Unfortunately, unforeseen last-minute circumstances prevented me from attending last year, so I am twice as excited to be in Skopje for the 9th Regional E-commerce Conference this year. I have been in the event business for over 20 years, and I have attended and produced conferences in approx. 100 countries around the world.
Yet, never in North Macedonia and Skopje, which is quite a shame considering how close we are to each other.
I am most eager to meet fellow industry people, but mostly by attending and meeting each other, I think that we build bridges between us as businesspeople living in the Balkans. In my opinion in a world where bridges are so easily demolished by people who are out of our reach and influence, we are the people who can use what we do best – business and build twice more bridges as well as create relationships that will connect us on all levels.