2. DMCC - Innovation in Marketing or Sales Literature

DMCC - Innovation in Marketing or Sales Literature

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Company: DMCC, Dubai, UAE
Company Description: Headquartered in Dubai, DMCC is the world’s largest free-zone, and the leading trade hub for commodities. Through combination of free-zone status, commercial and residential property, top-tier commodities & financial services, DMCC has rapidly become the world’s No.1 free-zone (as ranked by Financial Times five years in a row), supporting over 60,000 employees from 17,000 companies and 170 countries.
Nomination Category: Publication Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Award for Innovation in Marketing or Sales Literature

Nomination Title: Increasing GDP Through Thought Leadership  - THE FUTURE OF TRADE

Provide the date on which this nominated publication was first publicly distributed:

DMCC‘s first Future of Trade publication was in 2016, its second launched this campaign (May-18) and this year (Mar-19) saw the updated review.

Provide an essay of up to 625 words describing the publication and the innovative aspect of the publication that you are nominating. In the essay, describe the genesis of the innovation, how it was developed and executed, and the results of the innovation to date.

Imagine being CEO of a company trading internationally in commodities like gold, silver or oil. One of your most important decisions is in which trading hub you centre your business; this vital strategic decision is far from simple and requires extensive research. This submission outlines an extremely ambitious integrated thought-leadership campaign, so successful its impact is measured in %GDP.

OBJECTIVES

DMCC is the world’s largest free-zone but faces growing competition both locally and internationally. Approximately 2,000 companies set-up in DMCC annually.

Despite competition, DMCC has a strategic objective to increase the number of companies bringing their business to DMCC’s free-zone (customers). This campaign’s target was 100.

This would also deliver Government objectives:

-Increase 2018/2019 investment in Dubai.
-Increase GDP.

Influencing decisions about where to centre a trading firm cannot be achieved with just advertising. The campaign had to be highly credible and informative, reaching the right people to:

-Educate on the global future of trade. (Aim: 1,000 report downloads FY18.)
-Cement DMCC’s authority on trade via appearances in respected publications/events.
-Continue improving benefit recognition of Dubai and DMCC brand.

STRATEGY

The approach entailed:

-Combining the largest collection of industry leaders to contribute to our ten-year thought-leadership outlook.
-Creating a global perspective, through content, contributors and audience.
-Focusing on the evolving digital dimension (Blockchain).
-An integrated campaign promoting the publication via digital, hard copy, events, media and speaking opportunities.

DMCC‘s first Future of Trade publication was in 2016, its second launched this campaign (May-18) and this year (Mar-19) saw the updated review.

EXECUTION

THE THOUGHT-LEADERSHIP PIECE

Centering the campaign was the 127-page ‘Future of Trade’ report, although launched May-18, the time of digestion meant impact July-18 onwards. Now, Mar-19 updated review released. Both entailed:

-Collective thinking - 250 global industry leaders, academics and experts.
-Quantitative research by The Centre for Economics and Business Research, and a global leading management consulting firm.
-Qualitative insights: IBM (Blockchain), Asia House (UK's Asia expertise centre).

ACHIEVEMENTS IN INNOVATION

This campaign was innovative in both aspects:

Thought-leadership content:
-The most in-depth, thoroughly researched global commodities trading literature ever.
-Combining traditional aspects with cutting-edge concepts (Blockchain) and trade evolution 10-year prospects.
-Creating new trade hub performance index.

Ongoing integrated communications:
-Global in scale, localised to markets.
-Newsjacking driving continuous downloads and lead generation.
-Continuous comms and updates.

PERFORMANCE

Since Jul-18 DMCC secured:

- 320,00 emails sent.
- 2.5M impressions.
- 48,000 Downloads including snapshot report.
- Sales leads converted to clients: 415 (target:100).
- Revenue: 6.6Million AED (year-one). Five-year estimate: 23.8Million AED.
- Net ROI: 347% (year-one), 1,253% (estimated five-year).

Impact on GDP

-This campaign contributed 10% of new DMCC customers in FY18.
-cDMCC increased contribution to Dubai’s GDP: 8.1% to 10.1% (vs. 2017). Two percentage GDP points.
- 10%x2%= +0.2% UAE’s GDP growth directly attributed to Future of Trade integrated thought-leadership campaign.

Consequently, this success is playing an instrumental role in driving foreign direct investment to Dubai and making DMCC the world’s fastest growing free-zone for trade.