Selling SaaS in the Nordics - what to know
Are you a UK, US or global B2B SaaS company looking to expand into the Nordics? Or a sales leader taking on that market? Here are my top tips and things to be aware of when selling SaaS to the Nordics.
Each country is different
It would be an easy mistake to just bulk all five countries (Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Finland, Iceland) into one. But they differ both culturally and language wise. If you did want to do a “bulking” exercise, you may find the most similarities between the three Scandi countries.
Most companies tend to focus on Sweden initially, as it is the largest market. But where your company will be most successful certainly depends on your product and the local competition. Sometimes it may be easier to niche down on winning business in Norway, Denmark or Finland (Iceland is so small that I’m yet to work in a company who had any kind of active strategy for it at all!).
Language skills of your sales reps
People across the Nordics are generally happy to purchase SaaS in English, and most professionals have an excellent, close to native, grasp of the language. For Enterprise tools, it would certainly be almost the norm that at least part of the supplier team wouldn’t have local language skills.
It does however definitely help having a sales rep who can communicate in the local language. This would be especially true for Finland but even in the other countries it will boost your win rates, and help book more first meetings too.
So what language skill should you go for?
A Swede or Norwegian will be able to communicate across both those countries, and with some difficulty, make themselves understood in Denmark. So that tends to be your go to. Finnish would be more niche, but if you can offer it, it’s certainly a great way to really dig deep into that market and the same goes for Danish.
Language skills of CS
To boost win rates, it may also be important to have local Nordic language skills in your Customer Success team. Especially if your SaaS product is one that requires training and onboarding for wider parts of the business.
If this is not available, your prospects may worry about the quality of ongoing service and support. Because even if the person you are selling to speaks English perfectly, this may not be the case for the wider workforce, especially if you are dealing with non-tech businesses in for example manufacturing, retail or hospitality.
If your product doesn’t require onboarding of wider teams, or is a self-service type of solution, you will probably be fine with offering general support in English.
Relationships matter, but in a different way
You want to keep the customer / supplier relationship casual, friendly and low-key. Anything that comes across as “too salesy” would be a big no-no across all these markets.
Now the issue is that your bar of what counts as “salesy” might be different from your prospects if you’re used to selling into other markets. In my experience, US reps would therefore struggle selling into the Nordics, a UK rep would likely do better and a local rep would be the best. This is not so much to do with the language skills as mentioned above but more due to the cultural differences.
In line with this, there are also certain “1%ers” that may not go down as well in the Nordics, like sending gifts.
Decisions are made in group
These are very non-hierarchical and democratic countries and this impacts how decisions are made in the workplace.
Sign off is typically required from lots of different parties. This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be focusing your efforts on executive stakeholders, but it does mean that you shouldn’t treat the exec any differently from your core champion, as both their opinions will likely be of quite equal weight.
People are also generally more risk-averse than in the UK or the US, and don’t want to make the wrong call on their own so make sure you know everyone involved in the process. Due to this, your deal cycle length may be a bit longer than elsewhere.
Be aware of local competition
There are likely quite a few local competitors doing what you do. Their biggest benefit is that they can do lots of in-person meetings, have a strong network and they would obviously have tailored their messaging and product in a way that suits their home market.
Being local is not always a benefit though, and this is especially true for Enterprise tools. Being global and having a more diverse customer base can actually be used to your advantage. Make sure to be aware of any local competitors and in what areas their product is stronger and weaker than yours.
Deal sizes may be smaller
Smaller markets, smaller companies, smaller ACV. Make sure to adjust your local reps targets accordingly.
There are of course exceptions to this and in certain industries, you may find that like-for-like companies have healthier budgets than elsewhere, so do your research on this.
It totally shuts down in the summer
Don’t expect to do much business during the summer, people value their 4-6 weeks off and they won’t be responding to emails, under any circumstances really.
The auto replies will be on from around Midsummer time (late June) until early to mid August. Summer holidays in the Nordics tend to come earlier, so at least the benefit is that come August when the rest of Europe is out, the Nordics are generally ready to speak again.
Sales methodology can be tricky
Do have a go at using your BANT and other top of funnel methodology, however I have always found that it is more difficult to do this in the Nordics.
The Finns and Danes may be a bit more open and to the point, but especially the Swedes may not respond very well to anything that resembles an interrogation.
Even straightforward questions like what other solutions they are looking at or what their decision criteria are may be difficult to get an answer to. Again, just a cultural consequence of not wanting to accidentally say too much without involvement from others in the team.
Local references matter a lot
Your Nordic prospects will be most interested in speaking with existing customers in their country. A Finn would probably rather speak with someone in Denmark than in the US, but they would still always prefer speaking with someone else in Finland.
Due to the size of these markets, selling will be a lot easier once you have a couple reference customers signed up. Even better, in my experience you can easily create a trickle effect with a few customers who then refer you to others.
These are very small and tight knit countries. For example, I’ve always had a lot of success selling into the Norwegian market using very little marketing or active outreach, as the network effect is really strong there. Once word gets out that there is a new solution that is adding value, you can generate more business in the same industry just from word of mouth.
Unfortunately, the same of course goes in the opposite direction. If a competitor of yours is winning a lot of business in a specific vertical, your prospects will be very aware of this and you will have to fight much harder to win any new logos. Companies are not necessarily too keen on going against the stream and trying something new.
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I hope this article has been helpful if you are a UK, US or global B2B business or revenue leader thinking about entering the Nordics.
My name is Stina Karkkainen and I help SaaS businesses sell more. If you’d like some input and ideas about your operations in the Nordic region, help getting started or support for your reps, feel free to book me in for a chat here.
