Interview with Oleksii Pryimak, Head of ANT Logistics - blog Cases, Traffic, Sales

Hello!

I’m Serhii Soloviov, and today we’re going to talk to Oleksii Pryimak, the Sales Director and co-founder of ANT-Logistics.

Today we will talk about the following:

what are the specifics of ANT-Logistics’ work;
what has changed in the work of the logistics company since the beginning of the full-scale war;
the most effective advertising channels in this area;
forecast for the year for Ukraine and the logistics sector.

— Could you please tell us about your company’s core service? What exactly do you know how to do best?

— Our company is developing a cloud-based TMS service that helps automate transport logistics. This service can be used by small companies, individual entrepreneurs, and large companies with their own vehicle fleet.

The cloud service allows customers to systematize and automate transport logistics. The service itself is divided into 4 main modules:

route planning;
recording the actual route, which creates a plan-fact analysis;
a mobile application for drivers, where they can communicate with customers and logisticians and perform certain tasks;
an analytics module where the client generates reports.

Our system reduces transportation logistics costs by an average of 20-25%. The logistician spends less time planning the route and doesn’t have to keep all the necessary information in mind. And, as a result, when everything is automated at this stage, the work of other business processes related to transport logistics improves.

Interview with Oleksii Pryimak, Head of ANT Logistics

For example, the head of Dolphi Ukraine said at a conference dedicated to Logistics

Day that they had increased sales by 50% using our system. We were pleasantly surprised by the effectiveness of our service.

We have a video of this speech on our channel, so I invite you to watch it.

— It’s a pleasure to talk to a business owner who brings such a significant benefit, especially at a time when businesses are trying to save money and find additional ways to increase profits. It turns out that we are colleagues in a sense. We also work to increase profits through marketing channels, and you achieve this through logistics. Business owners will have something to think about: sources of profit are not only advertising, but also such useful tools as TMS services.

Tell us, what has changed in the company’s operations since the start of the full-scale war?

— At first, everyone was shocked. But we were luckier than many Ukrainian businesses, because our service is cloud-based and our servers are located abroad. This allows us to work from anywhere in the world.

As for the changes in our company, in March, we stopped working with clients and partners from Russia. Our head of marketing Oleksandr went to defend the country. Some of our girls and their children left for Europe.

Speaking of business processes, there have been changes here as well. We now offer a free trial period to new clients, helping them to predict the profitability of cooperation with the service using examples. If necessary, we offer a discount.

In April, volunteer organizations started contacting us, and we provided them with free access to the system. After all, they had no experience in route planning, so the service helped them reduce costs.

We also got into the habit of systematically sending donations to the Armed Forces, volunteers, and charities.

Clients who found themselves in the occupied territory were able to leave. All their company data was saved in the cloud service, so they arrived in another territory and continued to work despite the loss of equipment.

By February 24, new companies that started using our service had more vehicles in their fleets than they do now.

— What about your customers’ routes? For example, when it comes to working within the country or traveling abroad.

— Our service is the optimization of last-mile routes. For example, it is necessary in the case of city delivery, when the client has 10 cars and 300 addresses, and it is necessary to plan the optimal route.

We received requests for planning international routes, so we added this functionality. Now customers can plan routes in Ukraine and Europe.

In mid-April, we also launched a heat map, which allowed customers to see whether roads and bridges were open or bombed and required a reroute. Our customers were delighted with this functionality, so we described its work in our blog.

— Are you going to enter the international market? For example, are you going to build routes through European cities or American cities?

— We are already present in other countries. Even before the outbreak of the full-scale war, we had clients from 14 countries, and this figure is still the same. After February 24, 2022, we acquired clients and a partner from Central America. Last year, we planned to enter the Polish market, so we translated the website into Polish and English, our employees started learning Polish, and planned trips to conferences and exhibitions. However, we had to change our strategy, so now we are looking for partners in other countries to actively move into the foreign market.

— What does the CEO do at ANT Logistics?

— Someone may be surprised by this approach, but we do not have a CEO. We have several co-owners in our business, among whom the areas of responsibility are distributed. That is, one co-owner is responsible for marketing strategy, advertising, and service recognition. The other is responsible for product development. I am responsible for sales and the financial part. We don’t have a separate CEO position.

— This is a very interesting scheme, where there are several co-owners, each of whom manages a separate area and is fully responsible for it. This allows us to pay enough attention to each area.

What are the three most important features of the corporate culture at ANT LOGISTICS?

— We are a family business. All our employees are either our relatives or longtime friends. That is why the most important human qualities for our team are honesty, sincerity, and teamwork. All employees can also offer their ideas or make comments. We listen to everyone and implement all good ideas. It means that each team member tries to make a significant contribution to the company’s life.

— Do you think clients feel this?

— Recently, a client called me to express his gratitude to one of our employees. He was impressed with the attitude: he could call at any time, he was provided with assistance, which allowed him to quickly implement our service.

This attitude of the team to their work helps them to be effective, and many customers notice it. For example, the COO of a company who we’ve been working with since 2015 told me about this. They have many branches, so the management paid special attention to the efficiency and ease of working with us. At first, he did not believe that we could implement the service in all branches in a month and a half. But we did it! We have many such reviews on our website and YouTube channel.

— Tell us about your famous clients (of course, those you can talk about).

— The most famous client is Raiffeisen bank. After the first year of cooperation, they shared their experience of implementing the service at a conference.

We can also mention the distributor STV Group, Bon Boisson, Fozzy, and AJAX in this list.

— What advertising channels do you use to attract new customers?

— The most effective channel for us is word of mouth. Of course, we also set up search advertising, but this channel is currently generating three times fewer leads. Advertising on social media has the lowest performance indicators.

We also participate in conferences, exhibitions, and forums. This increases brand awareness and brings new customers.

We write articles and publish them on logistics resources. Currently, we are updating the content for our website: we edit the partners’ page, write new cases and post video testimonials. These are the main advertising methods we use.

— What do you think the future holds for Ukraine in the coming year? How will it affect the logistics sector?

— Everything will be Ukraine 🙂 I believe we have already won the moral victory, and the only thing left to do is to liberate our territories. And it is the integrity of our territories that transport logistics depends on. The war has affected air delivery and sea transportation. This has led to an increase in the cost of goods for Ukrainians. Accordingly, the cost of goods may continue to rise. Therefore, the purchasing power of citizens will decrease.

This may also be influenced by the fact that today there are 4 times more candidates looking for jobs than vacancies. If companies are forced to reduce the number of goods they deliver, this will lead to a reduction in the number of logistics staff and drivers.

Therefore, we are waiting for the liberation of territories. I think that after that, everything will be fine in transport logistics, and air delivery and sea transportation will return. So, we are waiting for our final victory!