Interacting with the yachting audience: a digital and human approach

I founded Marinescence in 2007. Officially.
But the adventure began a year earlier. Unofficially. 

Freshly arrived in Antibes, passionate about recruitment and seafaring professions, I noticed that the job market in the yachting industry was experiencing an unprecedented boom in France. The most beautiful yachts in the world moor on the Côte d’Azur. From Saint-Tropez to Monaco, the excitement is growing every year.

On board these boats are employees from all over the world: the United Kingdom, the United States, South Africa, the Philippines… but very few French.
Some research makes me understand that there is no French-speaking recruitment agency, and that the market is hammered between a few historical Anglo-Saxon players.

My curiosity and encounters (lots of encounters!) allow me to identify the stakes of such an adventure: if I take the plunge, my good will and my network of friends willing to work 15 hours a day will not be enough to help me get behind the scenes of this industry and to make a place for myself among all these historical players.

You have to infiltrate the system and catch everybody off guard when the time comes.

So I become a sailor, and I apply for every day-work offer that comes my way.
In one season, I sometimes have 2 to 3 jobs a day, and I sail more than 30 boats. On each boat, I create a special bond with the captain and crew members. I centralise all their contact details and personal information in an Excel file.

At the end of the season, my spreadsheet counts 35 captains and more than 250 crew members.

I invest in a website, and send the link to all these people. Captains are informed that they can now rely on a French agency to find the staff they are looking for, crew members now have a French-speaking ear to their career plans.

13 years later, almost all of these crew members have gone on to become captains or chief stewardesses, and have become Marinescence clients. They in turn request our services to identify young people who stand out from the crowd. Those who are ready to meet the unique demands of our industry.

This story is important because it illustrates what we have always believed in at Marinescence: to succeed and above all grow in yachting, we must rely on 2 fundamental pillars: human encounters, and digital tools (which allow us to process the flow).

Today, Marinescence works for more than 6,000 yachts, and gathers a database of more than 30,000 crew members with whom our consultants interact on a daily basis through a custom-developed technological platform.

And we claim that :

• Behind every person can hide a talent;
• Behind every encounter can lie a collaboration;
• Every person who comes to our offices is entitled to a personalized welcome;
• We must listen, advise, accompany and follow the members of our network throughout their career and whatever the income derived from this collaboration, so as to never break the trust they place in our company;
• The unprecedented flow of information that circulates within the company is only valuable if all the data is centralized, and coupled with a tool for interaction with each individual who makes up the network.