Social media, younger expats and an trend toward more individual buying power are a challenge for many relocation agencies. Marco Dilenge, regional marketing manager at Crown Worldwide Group, explains how their company targets young expats and what differs between European expatriates and Americans.

Marco, who contacts the relocation agency, companies or individual expats?

It depends. In the US for example, we are seeing an increasing trend in which individual expatriates will contact the relocation agency directly with a fixed budget provided by their company. Some companies have fixed contracts with our agency, so for every relocation process, the relocation manager will contact us, especially if the company is relocating more than a single employee.

Who do you target in your campaigns, companies or individual expats?

We target both. We run advertising campaigns to attract individual expats and ones to target HR professionals. In order to approach them, we use all kinds of online media, such as Google Adwords and specific expat sites. When targeting companies, we will mainly use client events, and global mobility and HR magazines.

After identifying the target audience for a certain marketing campaign, where do you find them?

Let’s take retirees for example. If we launch a new campaign for people in retirement, we would use different tools to reach them than we would use for young expats. For example, print media, lifestyle and traveling magazines that address a more wealthy and upper class society.

It’s all about positioning yourself to appeal to your desired target audience. Know who they are, know their interests and approach them in their natural environment.

Does the increasing number of young expats present a marketing challenge for a relocation agency?

Not necessarily. The requirements of the younger expatriate are indeed usually different than those of an expat with family. The young expat will generally need only accommodation, not international schools and family insurance packages.

We target young expats with our social media channels on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. We even have our own YouTube channel, so we are up to date and communicate interactively with our younger target audience. We see that younger expats are no less professional than older ones. In times of need, they will find the information they are looking for.

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Marco Dilenge earned a university degree in Business Administration in 1998. He has worked since then in various marketing related roles, such as corporate communications, account management and product management. In March 2007 he joined Crown Worldwide Group, where he currently works as a Marketing Manager for Continental Europe.