A World-class Agency Specializing in broadcast and Technology-driven Markets

CIOTIMES interviewed Fiorenza Mella

 

As a specialist in B2B communications marketing for technology-centred markets, Fiorenza Mella, Founder, and CEO, of Xpresso Communications, aims at creating intelligible communications by making detail-heavy products accessible to non-technical decision makers. There are two central tenants to that. The first is maintaining a benefits-driven approach to what they write: focusing not just on what a product does, but on why it matters.

The second is humanizing the content they deliver. In markets where technology is becoming increasingly abstracted and often with little tangible differentiation, they try to remember one thing: people do business with people. This means that the foundational aspects of trust and goodwill still sit at the heart of all transactions. It means that openness, authenticity, and humour aren’t elements to be stamped out of communications but instead drawn into them.

It also means leveraging creativity to maximise the creation of value – value not only for their clients but for their audience. Nobody enjoys being marketed ‘at’; it represents an imposition on their time and mental energy. But people do value being entertained, informed, educated – and most of all – having their needs met. These are things that represent value to customers. And if a company can provide value in their communications, the same time as communicating their own values of integrity, reliability, trust and capability, then customers are likely to feel more inclined to develop a lasting and meaningful relationship with them. It’s that which Xpresso bases its communications philosophy upon.

 

Brewing Fresh Ideas

Xpresso is a communications firm that specializes in broadcast and technology-driven markets.

Representing technology firms across the globe, they have won awards for their provision of integrated communications strategies, creating original content that dynamically balances both long-form and short- form approaches – including traditional PR, articles and white papers, social media, direct emails, blogs, industry leadership thought pieces, newsletters, videos, graphics, brochures and advertising copy.

 

More than this though, Fiorenza and her team provide consultation to ensure the delivery of a strategic integrated campaign that’s precisely tailored to the needs of their client. By combining their extensive industry knowledge with their ability to quickly synthesize information, they can forge relationships with clients and understand their technologies and needs with a next-to-no learning curve. That same industry experience also ensures that they can help companies to connect with the entities they need to help them; be that editors, journalists, industry bodies or potential customers.

 

One of Xpresso’s key innovations was the fact that they were one of the first agencies to start offering blogs within technology-driven markets.

“Whilst developing connections within the Trade Press was foundational to their initial success – and something I particularly valued because I believed in meaningful connection and personal relationships – I could sense a change in the winds. There was an increasing amount of pay-to-play and content gatekeeping in the major publications, which went against our idea of marketing as a process of democratising knowledge and providing meaningful information that supports informed decision-making,” shares Fiorenza.

 

They focused on the development of a coordinated marketing strategy that aimed to re-address those shifting power dynamics, removing the obstacles created by third parties and creating a more direct line of communication between Xpresso’s clients and their audiences. A balanced mix of strategies made for a more dynamic, flexible and far-reaching approach that yielded real results.

 

Putting in her Heart and Soul

Fiorenza believes that her path towards marketing started when she was five and fascinated with languages. As she grew, she became acutely aware of the power that words had; not to control, but to shape thought and behaviour.

She says, “Language had a weight to it – materiality. I took on any writing opportunity I could – experimenting with the understanding I was starting to develop about language. And of course, I’ve come to understand now how readily apparent that intersection of language, thought and behaviour is in the marketing world.”

 

 

A degree in Communications Sciences and Foreign Languages confronted her with a career choice: Would she teach languages? Before she could finalize her answer, life and a friend presented her with an opportunity to help translate a technical manual. That was an entirely unknown domain to her as an avid but largely traditional lover of literature. Excited by the challenge but anxious that it might be a realm entirely outside of her cognitive capability, she asked if it would be possible to see, feel and touch the technology she was supposed to write about.

She recalls, “I entered a demo room surrounded by LEDs and I think I probably felt like an astronaut sitting in a real shuttle for the first time, after finishing their theoretical studies and simulations. I fell in love with the unknown: a moment of ‘fatal attraction’. That was the start of my career in broadcast technology.

Tempted initially by the familiarity of the academic world, I instead decided to throw caution to the wind and launch into an applied role. I was given three months to learn how to use three systems and to be able to give a demo for each of them. Not yet fully aware of what I was getting myself into, I had to place a bet on myself – a bet that I had the determination, drive and aptitude to make it work. It was a bet I won. Helped immensely by a friend who gave me a crash course in the basics of engineering, I was soon repairing hardware, installing it and training on it. I’d been bitten by the bug; technology was in my veins.”

 

But of course, language was still in her heart. Her decision to move to The Netherlands came with opportunities to start introducing her instinctual, theoretical and practical knowledge of language into the world of technology. With no established paradigm of digital marketing or social media back then, she was feeling around in the dark; experimenting, innovating, and constantly learning. And it is these evolutionary and revolutionary cycles that have brought her to where she is today: founder of a now 10-year-old, award-winning communications company.

 

Encouraging Creativity at Xpresso

Creativity, drive, a passion for language and adaptability are the attributes Fiorenza seeks in her team; and the way to secure that is to create an environment of trust, flexibility, mutual respect, genuine friendship, empowerment and variety. She has always been clear that the conventions of an office are unnecessary and outdated and embraced the ‘digital nomad’ model decades ago. She believes that giving her employees the space to live in their own manner, pursue their own passions and organize their own time will all come back to her in the form of reliability, loyalty and quality of output.

Fiorenza describes Xpresso’s structure as horizontal; everybody knows they are free to voice opinions, ideas and counterpoints. “We shoulder responsibility equally because the responsibility is to one another as people, not just as colleagues. We know we can depend on one another. And by granting creative space in the projects I assign, I let the polymath nature of my employees – which is a hallmark of every one of them – shine through. They bring dynamic and unusual perspectives to their work, creating perceptive metaphors, drawing wide parallels and delivering unique insights,” she says.

 

Fiorenza also supports diversity and inclusion by seeing people through to their manifest and hidden talents. She abhors stereotypes; people to her are not a set of attributes but human beings with values that deserve intrinsic respect. She believes that every person she meets has a quality or lesson that has the potential to enrich her both professionally and personally, and for that, she carries constant gratitude and respect. “From a practical viewpoint, the inherent flexibility of our remote work structure accommodates all kinds of people seeking to live according to a ‘non-traditional’ paradigm; whatever that might mean to them – be it working single mothers, people facing personal challenges, or simply those who want the time and space to pursue their own unique projects,” she explains.

 

In the years to come

Fiorenza and her colleagues will look to invest time in education while exploring data mining and AI generative content to support research and digital data reports – particularly driving the consultancy dimension of what Xpresso does. Other plans will be unveiled in the coming years.

“Our overarching content philosophy is likely to remain stable precisely because it is, by its nature, inherently flexible. Our core idea – that quality and creativity are the paramount considerations for content in all its expressions – will prevail. Publishing and content delivery may see future change, but these are mere practical elements that we can easily adapt to,” she concludes.