ANALYTICS FOR GRAIN TRADERS
Reached Break-even in 3 months
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ABOUT CLIENT
Asap Agri is an independent analytical agency specializing in agricultural commodity markets—grain, oilseeds, processing, freight, especially in the Black Sea and Mediterranean regions. Provides daily and weekly reports (PDF) with market overviews, CPT/FOB/CIF prices, balances, harvest forecasts, and transport and freight market behavior. Services include: different subscription levels (standard, premium, exclusive), customized reports on request, and personal consultations with analysts.
GOAL
Achieve break-even and sustainable profitability of the ASAP Agri analytical product through its commercial success in the international market, attracting a global audience of traders and specialists, and changing attitudes toward analytics, from being perceived as free to being recognised as worth paying for.
RESULTS
After implementing the marketing strategy, ASAP Agri reached profitability within three months, acquired over 31 new clients (70% annual subscriptions, 30% monthly), and expanded its reach through two-week trial subscriptions.
An international presence was established, attracting clients from Europe, Egypt, Tunisia, Turkey, Brazil, and India, including major corporations.
Additionally, by analyzing market needs and user behavior, I saved the company significant resources by avoiding unnecessary investments in digital platforms or apps, focusing only on initiatives that truly added value to the analytics.
Imagine a product nobody believed in around one year —analytics that were seen as free, delivered only as PDFs, without modern UX design, and apps on mobile phones. While most competitors look like digital platforms, customizable dashboards, filters by markets, weather, balances, freight, and the ability to tailor analytics to individual trading preferences — we didn’t have those capabilities. We simply couldn’t afford to build such a platform we had nothing like that—just a simple PDF.
Our goal was clear: to make ASAP Agri profitable, sustainable, and internationally recognized. We didn’t just want to compete; we wanted to create a resource traders couldn’t ignore.
Key challenges
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Lack of financial resources to create a full-fledged digital platform with a modern interface and convenient usability; analytics could only be provided in PDF format, which lagged far behind market standards.
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The target audience's distrust of the agency as a provider of high-quality and professional analytical data.
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Strong competition from established players with an international reputation.
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The need to create value for several types of clients: traders, analysts, agricultural production specialists, international brokers, and the company's internal brokers.
KEY INSIGHTS
The main issue was not the format, but the visual presentation and user experience. Through market research and trader interviews using the jobs-to-be-done method, we identified gaps in design, content, and competitive positioning. To address this, we conducted a 60-question survey focused on design, content, competitors, and audience segmentation.
The research showed that traders were comfortable with PDFs and often preferred them to mobile apps or complex platforms. Since most market information is consumed through messaging apps like WhatsApp and Telegram, PDFs fit naturally into their daily workflow.
Using a design-first approach, we redesigned the visual identity and analytics presentation without changing the format. This made the content clearer, better structured, and more visually appealing, increasing readability, engagement, and trust.
As a result, we defined the optimal way to present analytics to traders, including the best content structure, publishing frequency, and timing. We identified which information is essential, which is secondary, and which insights are premium and cannot be shared for free. The final UX and visual design fully match trader expectations and make the analytics easy to read and use.
"We have our own people in the region"
One critical insight was the importance of double-checking decisions.
We highlighted our unique strength: direct access to verified local contacts—something global analytics providers couldn’t offer. We have our own people on the ground in the region.
Our target audience became traders: independent traders, traders in large global companies, and procurement specialists for major corporations. Our analytics were designed for anyone who needs to verify information and double-check decisions before acting.
Most trading companies understand this well. When traders make a deal, they often become believers—confident it will succeed and generate millions. Trading can resemble poker: even after losing once or twice, traders often persist, sometimes causing losses to the company. Leadership may reassign projects when traders become emotionally biased.
This is where double-checking is critical. Traders feel the pressure acutely, knowing they must verify assumptions and seek external confirmation. They operate like high-stakes players—24/7—where emotions, risk, and money are always intertwined.
When millions of dollars are at stake, traders are willing to purchase large volumes of analytical data simply to make the right decisions. For them, purchasing analytics isn't a problem—there's no real competition between analytics providers. What matters is whether a particular analytics source is truly useful and whether it's worth engaging with, given the vast amount of information available in the market.
Traders also maintain personal contacts in their regions to verify information. For them, a resource like ASAP Agri, which provides access to hundreds of such local contacts in a single region, offers a unique opportunity to consider even the smallest details and nuances in real time, giving them additional confidence in their decisions.
Reason to believe
Our “reason to believe” is based on the fact that ASAP Agri was founded by specialists from Atria Brokers. Atria Brokers represents a network of more than 40 brokers in the European region of the Black Sea and Mediterranean, each with extensive local contacts, agents, and direct market access. This network strengthened our ability to obtain detailed and timely market data and accelerated the delivery of quotations.
At the same time, I proposed that ASAP Agri be deliberately positioned as an independent analytical agency. This was done to ensure that market participants could trust that ASAP Agri’s analytical data has never been adjusted in the interests of Atria Brokers or any other party. This independence guarantees that our data remains objective, impartial, and focused solely on providing real value to traders.
Marketing Strategy
Target audience
Traders who buy a lot of analytics to test themselves before making a serious decision
Position statement
For market experts and traders working in the Black Sea and Mediterranean regions who demand verified, insider-level intelligence to cross-check and deepen their analysis, ASAP AGRI is the analytical subscription that delivers real-time, on-the-ground insights from an exclusive network of local brokers and traders — because as the analytics from the biggest brokerage company we have direct access to trusted sources across key markets, ensuring depth, accuracy, and an advantage unavailable from mainstream analytics.
WE DON’T COMPETE ON THE MARKET — WE CREATED AN ADDITIONAL RESOURCE
Before turning to us, traders had already done extensive analytical work—reviewing Reuters, The Telegraph, global agencies, and their own internal reports. Even after consulting their contacts in the regions, they couldn’t be fully confident in all the information.
ASAP Agri was never meant to replace this analysis. Our analytics served a different purpose: the final double-check, focusing on nuances and details at the regional level—insights from people on the ground who know what is happening in real time.
This was our core value: not more data, not louder opinions, but trusted local insight that helps traders verify reality and make better decisions when millions are at stake.
Collaboration with other analytics providers was more important than competition, because traders are willing to buy multiple analytics subscriptions if each of them adds value. Moreover, by collaborating with major analytics providers, we actually strengthened our global presence. Together, we co-created conferences and spoke at the largest global grain conferences worldwide.
We significantly strengthened our PR presence. We spoke at the largest global conferences, serving as both speakers and facilitators. We were also featured in international publications such as Reuters and Bloomberg, presenting ourselves as experts, which further enhanced the reputation and credibility of our analytics.
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Christina Seriabriakova, CEO ASAP AGRI
During first three month after the launch, we were completely focused on creating content. We cared deeply about quality and meaning, but sales and marketing were never our focus—and as a result, our audience growth was slow and unstable.
Working with Anastasia Zaria became a turning point for us. She helped us see the bigger picture and build a clear, thoughtful strategy where content and sales finally started working together. That synergy gave us the push we had been missing.
In just three months after launching the new strategy, we broke even and began turning a profit. Our audience started growing faster, and everything we communicated finally felt aligned with our brand’s values and goals.
The research Anastasia conducted—surveys, in-depth interviews, and deep market analysis—opened our eyes to insights we had never thought before. Anastasia is incredibly talented, and her work continues to inspire and impress us