"Accelera con Amazon" arrives with ICE, MIP Politecnico di Milano, Confapi and Netcomm
In Italy, sales through e-commerce are growing but continue to represent only a small part of overall purchases. Based on the analysis of the B2C Netcomm eCommerce Observatory - School of Management Politecnico di Milano, the incidence of the value of online sales on total retail sales has grown from 6% to 8% in 2020. Small and medium-sized enterprises Italians have a gap to fill when compared to their European cousins. Only a third of them are digitized and only one in seven (of those with more than 10 employees) have a significant online presence. Far behind other European nations, Italy ranks 25th among the 28 Member States of the European Union in the 2020 edition of the DESI Digital Economy and Society Index.
There are over 14 thousand Italian small and medium-sized enterprises that sell on Amazon. In 2019 they recorded overseas sales of more than 500 million euros and created more than 25,000 jobs in Italy. In the period from 1 June 2019 to 31 May 2020, the Italian sales partners recorded sales for an average of over 75 thousand euros each, and sold more than 60 million products in the Amazon stores. Francois Saugier, Amazon's VP Seller Services in Europe, said: “Business support is at the heart of everything we do. In 2019, Amazon invested over € 2.2 billion in logistics, tools, services, programs and people to help them reach their full potential. ”
The program offers online learning and consulting tools for those who wish to start a new online business or accelerate an existing one. In addition, the initiative offers dedicated modules on how to create an effective brand image and implement marketing and social media strategies, tools for developing business models and courses on how to create the most effective team from a human resources point of view.
Participating companies will also benefit from an online learning hub created with MIP Politecnico di Milano which includes a series of free online modules and courses that small and medium-sized enterprises can attend regardless of the level of digitization and knowledge . SMEs will receive training on a wide range of topics such as commercial strategy, financing, marketing and internationalization. The courses will be held by lecturers from the School of Management of the Politecnico di Milano and e-commerce experts, as well as Amazon experts and will provide students with a community-based learning method.
In addition, Boot camp intensive, with MIP Politecnico di Milano that has designed a one-week virtual intensive course to offer 500 startups and small businesses a tailor-made path to develop their digital skills to sell online. But also webinars organized with the local offices of Confapi for the promotion of digitization courses offered by the program and video content created by the ICE Agency, to provide training content on electronic commerce and business internationalization. Furthermore, a webinar path created by Netcomm to understand how digital is transforming the global market scenario and to support SMEs in defining the digital initiatives that they can undertake in both the BTB and BTC fields.
It is worth remembering that "First Steps in the Cloud Amazon Web Services (AWS)" incorporates a series of free online appointments in Italian, designed for Small and Medium Enterprises, with the aim of helping to innovate with the AWS cloud and fully exploit its potential of the Italian AWS Region, through tutorials and practical demonstrations held by AWS experts.
