Alexey Giyazov was named the best marketing director in 2021 by the Russian Managers Association and the Kommersant newspaper, and was a finalist in 2020 and 2022.
Alexey Giyazov was born on 16 July 1988 in Saint Petersburg. In 2010, he graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy of Saint Petersburg State University. During his final years at university, from 2008–2010, he wrote articles for Forbes magazine.
In 2012, Giyazov received a second higher education qualification with the completion of a master’s degree in Media Management at HSE University. While there, he worked at VTB Bank, where he was responsible for managing the company’s image in the national media. In 2011, he was hired by Promsvyazbank as an innovation manager, after which he took responsibility for special projects. Giyazov launched Angry Cards, a co-branding project with the creators of Angry Birds, and the contactless prepaid Gorky Card, used to pay for entertainment services in Moscow’s Gorky Park.
Before moving to Alfa-Bank he worked for Sberbank, where he held managerial positions.
Alfa-Bank
In 2018, Giyazov was made Head of Marketing at Alfa-Bank. His role at the company was later expanded to Head of Marketing, Design and New Business, allowing him to build a wide-ranging subdivision including specialists in marketing, public relations, internal communications and philanthropy.
The Alfa Research Center, which studies customer experience, is also growing under his leadership. Its specialists identify and analyse the world’s leading UX and CX technologies, which include a neural network that reads users’ feelings, smart glasses, and action cameras with panoramic views. In order to analyse daily interactions between clients and the bank, the centre has recreated typical points of contact including a section of a street, an office space, a house and a metro train carriage.
Giyazov makes frequent use of buzzy advertising campaigns to promote the brand, with the involvement of high-profile media personalities. He has worked with TV presenters Vladimir Pozner and Ivan Urgant, and his video collaboration with the popular musical performer Morgenshtern drew a great deal of attention thanks both to its content and the fact that Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service deemed it to be in violation of the Federal Law on Advertising. In a continuation of the project with Morgenshtern, the performer was hired as youth director with the goal of attracting 100,000 new customers. A miniseries was filmed about his work, after which the singer parted ways with the company. According to Alfa-Bank CEO Vladimir Verkhoshinsky, 162,000 digital cards were issued during the campaign.
Also in 2021, after ending the project with Morgenshtern, Alfa-Bank purchased an integration in a music video created by young pop musician and blogger Danya Milokhin.
Another key element of Giyazov’s approach is his ability to bring in top professionals, such as the former editor-in-chief of Vedomosti Tatyana Lysova, who is responsible for content inside the application, the development of the Alfa Investments Telegram channel, training courses and new media. Another significant hire is Alexander Polivanov, who was the media director at sports.ru and is now responsible for all of the brand’s text content as editor-in-chief.
In 2021, sostav.ru named “Giyazovism” the word of the year in marketing. The term refers to unusual campaigns that generate widespread public engagement.
Alfa Chance
Since 2020, Giyazov has led the Alpha Chance charitable foundation, which supports promising students from higher educational institutions across Russia. The fund provides grants to third and fourth year university students, which they can invest in startups or the purchase of necessary equipment, along with opportunities to meet people working in the creative community and consultations with experts. The programme’s participants can intern at Alfa-Bank, with the best interns receiving job offers.
The foundation’s partners include HSE University, Chelyabinsk State University, Kazan Federal University and other higher educational institutions in Russia.
What? Where? When?
Since 2022, Giyazov has been participating in the intellectual game show What? Where? When?, representing the interests of the viewers responsible for submitting questions during moments of dispute. He is responsible for ensuring that all viewers who participate by submitting questions have an equal opportunity to receive a 100,000 ruble prize for defeating the show’s experts, and a 200,000 ruble prize for submitting the best question.
