- Tell us about yourself (background, diplomas, programme, specialisations, etc.).
Erick Gommeaux, class of 2011, specialised in International Business Management.
I spent 4 years at the company where I did my internship. Four fascinating years that gave me the opportunity to learn about, perfect and master media purchasing and bartering (the exchange of merchandise), a highly specific activity!
We work in France but mostly internationally for major luxury brands and independent firms.
I left that company to set up Adintime in 2015.
-Tell us about your company (product, market, target, team, originality, etc.).
Product
Adintime is a platform that allows you to find, compare, choose, negotiate, and purchase advertising campaigns in the printed and digital media, with automatic digital monitoring.
We’ve developed an algorithm to match the advertiser’s marketing target with the right media sources.
We work for French and international media outlets, both in B2B and B2C.
We also offer support – from the media brief to the final purchase – for clients looking for more general communication strategies, regardless of the medium (digital, social networks, billboards, press, cinema, etc.).
Market:
Market size in France: €2.5 billion net (amount of advertising space purchased in printed press in 2015)
Size of world’s 10 leading markets: €50 billion net.
Target:
Any company that advertises in the printed press (B2B and B2C) in France and internationally, or which wants to develop a communication strategy on their target markets or in stores. These include major firms, SMEs and local shops.
We also target media and PR agencies that purchase advertising space in the printed press on behalf of their clients.
Team:
Initially there were three of us who combined key skills to make the project succeed:
I offered media and commercial expertise
Technical expertise from our CTO, Pierre-Marie
Expertise in digital marketing and growth hacking (Christopher)
We are planning to recruit a few people at the beginning of next year to expedite the deployment of our solution.
- What are your prospects for growth?
Our growth prospects are strong.
The ease of use and automatization of our solution mean we can plan for international deployment in the near future.
The market is moving towards the digitalisation of the press media purchasing process. Adintime comes at an opportune moment with a well thought out and developed solution to accompany the market through this shift.
- Can you explain briefly how your project came about?
Over a Karmeliet!
Jokes aside, I found that I was wasting a lot of time when negotiating and purchasing advertising campaigns in the press for my clients, whether in France or overseas.
I regularly travelled to the United States, within Europe and to the Middle East or Asia, and realised that media purchasing in the press was done in the same way across the world, i.e. in a very traditional way. Given that all of the processes associated with media purchasing in other types of media were being automated via platforms, I felt it was time to offer an alternative and provide digital purchasing for press advertising.
I thought about a way to digitalise and automate the industry, which is worth more than €2 billion in France but continues to operate using purchasing processes that need to be modernised and digitalised.
The objective of digitalisation is to facilitate the work of buyers and sellers by adding greater fluidity to their transactions through increased visibility to the media present on the platform, whether on the domestic or international markets.
- What is your initial assessment of this entrepreneurial adventure?
It’s been great! When I left my job to devote myself fully to this project, I had excellent knowledge of my work as media director, so I used that expertise to set up Adintime.
It’s one thing to understand a profession, but you need many other skills for this kind of challenge. Setting up a company and successfully playing on financial, technological, marketing and human factors to develop it is another matter. It’s a different profession, one that needs to be learned but is fascinating.
- Have you ever benefited from the EDHEC Alumni network?
Yes, through this wonderful publicity you’re giving me!
I also work with a few EDHEC graduates I met at events which I attended shortly after setting up the company.
- What advice do you have for young entrepreneurs
Share your idea, talk about your project, get relevant feedback, test your idea and above all validate it with initial sales or agreements to purchase.
If you can manage that and your first clients are happy, then go for it.
- What’s next for Adintime?
We have just developed and launched a new solution which we are currently testing on our clients. We have already begun working on a second fundraising campaign to roll out the service in France and start developing internationally.
- What are your expectations from the community of EDHEC BBA graduates?
A network is often essential to start out and develop your business. I am made aware of that every day as I work on the development of Adintime.
Any graduate who works in marketing (in-house marketing manager/head of communication) or media agencies, or who knows someone in their network who does, is a potential driver of growth for Adintime and someone we would be delighted to talk to.
And, naturally, any other alumni who would like to chat more generally about entrepreneurship or discuss their own entrepreneurial projects!
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