August 4, 2025 • 33 mins
In this insightful episode, we dive deep into the Australian SaaS market with Alex Wilson, author of a new paper for SaaS companies looking to expand into Australia. Alex shares his journey from London to Australia, highlighting the unique "barbell effect" of the Australian market, where 95% of companies are SMBs, while a small oligopoly of 5,000-6,000 enterprises drive 60% of SaaS revenue.
Learn about different sales motions for market entry, the importance of localization (especially regarding data sovereignty ), and why Australia is often a more accessible entry point into APAC compared to other regions. Discover the critical need for long-term commitment and local expertise , as Australia is a highly relationship-driven market where burning bridges can be detrimental.
Whether you're an international SaaS leader eyeing APAC or an Australian startup, this episode provides invaluable intelligence to define your go-to-market strategy.
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Connect with James
➡︎ https://www.linkedin.com/in/jbergl/
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Host & Guest
➡︎ James Bergl (The Gentle Giant)
➡︎ Alex WilsonÂ
Videographers/Editors: Romain Pondard/Klippable
➡︎ https://www.linkedin.com/in/romain-pondard
➡︎ https://www.klippable.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I think 95% of Aussie companies are SMB.
You've then got a kind of bigoligopoly of enterprise whales
who are dominating mining,financial services, government
healthcare obviously Do youremember how many enterprise
businesses there are inAustralia?
5,000 to 6,000.
You know, 60% of the revenuethat was coming into the SaaS
(00:23):
market was coming from thoseenterprises Fewer businesses
versus SMB but they are actuallypaying their fair share when it
comes to actually winning oneor two of them.
Let's try and pour a bit of gason the fire here.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
I think it's really valid because Alex super
grateful that you joined You'vejust written an incredible paper
for us which really aims atSaaS companies that are thinking
of coming into australia.
I also think that a lot of thecontent is incredibly relevant
for australian sas, startupscale-up businesses, because the
amount of intel that you've gotaround the, the types of
(00:57):
customers, the volume ofcustomers in this market, I
think can really help to definego-to-market.
But before we crack into that,just I'd love to get to a quick
introduction from yourself andkind of who you are, your
background and um yeah sure whatexcited you about kind of
working with us initially?
Speaker 1 (01:13):
yeah sure, so I am pretty new to Australia.
I started my career mainly inLondon.
Um, I had a lot of kind ofinitially early stage startups
doing a lot of kind of first goto market sales rep,
partnerships, person on theground and kind of eventually
went further and further upmarket.
(01:33):
So did a bunch of work withcompanies like the Financial
Times, a couple of soft bankportcos and most recently my
last perm role was with Pad withpaddle, where I was leading a
lot of the new product launches,new market launches, and
decided to have a bit of alifestyle change moved over to
australia finally kind of didwhat I said I was going to do
(01:56):
when I was 21 and andinterestingly I fell into a lot
of kind of consulting work, Ithink because I've experienced a
lot of markets traditionally US, uk, europe, israel even
managed to, I think, build up abit of a playbook of how to
actually properly assess amarket, launch into it when
(02:19):
you're first customers, and sofell into projects with a lot of
folks who were looking to moveinto Australia for the first
time I think we met via DavidCorbin was it yeah?
At JOSIS in the Commons onGeorge Street and I think we
kind of got chatting.
You said you were looking tokind of put more insight out
(02:42):
there and I think it wasprobably aligning with the times
where I was really deep into alot of research of helping folks
come into Australia and yeah,it was a pretty interesting,
eye-opening research, to kind ofput my academic hat on, speak
to a lot of operators and tryand get some of their insights
and hopefully get a decentproduct which adds a bit of
(03:03):
value to folks who are thinkingabout it or wanting to get a
better understanding of, I guess, their home market.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
Well, we had 250 organic downloads within the
first couple of weeks, so Ithink that speaks to the volume
of the interest in it and thefeedback was generally really
positive and I learned somethingand I rely on some of the data
when I'm having conversations aswell, so I'm really really
happy with how it came out.
But I wanted to take anopportunity to share some of the
findings on this show for SASleaders, operators, whether
(03:34):
you're in Australia, whetheryou're international, thinking
about this market and when I saythis market, apac is, we're
here in Australia, but APAC isis much broader market Singapore
, singapore is often the theother side of the coin in terms
of do I go to singapore,australia?
So, um, you know, divingstraight in, you know you spent
quite a lot of time researching,interviewing, what would you
(03:56):
say?
The top, um, you know thehighlights of the paper were in
terms of um, yeah, looking, thatwould be relevant for SaaS
companies coming to Australia.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Yeah, I mean, I think firstly, starting at the data
that I dived right intoheadfirst, I was really
surprised to, I think, what wetermed the barbell effect of the
market, the fact that you'vegot, I think, 95% of Aussie
companies, I I think 98.
In some studies I saw um aresmb.
(04:30):
You've then got a kind of bigoligopoly of enterprise whales
who are dominating mining,financial services, government
health care.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Obviously, when you say big, are you talking about
volume or value?
Speaker 1 (04:43):
oh, yeah, number of number of uh headcounts yeah,
okay, size of business, um,typically revenue, uh, depending
on how you're kind of weighingit, um, yeah, by by size, by
enterprise, I kind of meant moreum headcount uh could be
revenue.
Uh, so the the kind of bigbehemoths, you know the con
(05:06):
banks of the world, governmentorganisations, the kind of big
whales where if you win one ofthose logos, you're kind of set
in the market.
I think what was prettyinteresting when we then looked
at the mid market, there was apretty small number of companies
, which is kind of surprisingwhen you think about Australia
(05:28):
having a bunch of successstories, especially in, you know
, the SaaS and tech space.
You know everyone's heard ofCanva, atlassian, airwallex, and
you kind of think there's anawful lot of folks who are
probably sitting within thespace and segment just below
that, um, but there's a bigdearth, um.
(05:49):
I think we kind of got outthere and started asking folks
like, why is there this gap?
I think there's probably twointeresting reasons.
I think one of it is structurala lot of vcs in australia
aren't writing big enough checksto take those kind of growth
seed stage series A businessesand propel them into series B,
(06:12):
series C, which would kind ofwarrant a mid-market stamp, I
think another interesting thingcould be a bit of culture.
You know you've got an awfullot of folks who are potentially
looking for more lifestylebusiness.
Um, they're potentially gettingbought out before they ever
even get into that stage,whether it's domestically or
(06:34):
overseas, um.
So, yeah, I think a prettyinteresting consideration that
folks need to make when they'reconsidering australia is if
we're selling heavily intomid-market that's our sweet spot
is australia the right marketfor?
And just to clarify what, whatare you calling mid-market?
Um, mid-market I think wedefined as anything from 200
(06:56):
employees up to a thousand.
Okay, um, some companiesobviously start considering like
revenue and things like that,but that's kind of our main
approach.
Yeah, yeah, interesting.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
It's.
I thought about this a lot aswell, and my my perspective,
coming from a different angle onthis topic as well, is a couple
of things.
One is Australia is arelatively new country, so we
were founded in 1788 around then, from from memory.
It's also an enormous mass, um,so it's the same size as north
(07:28):
america, with less than a tenthof the population and everyone
lives on the seawater, soeveryone lives all all the way
around the country.
Yeah, what that means from a abusiness perspective is there's
going to be lots of smallpockets dotted all around the
country of small businesses, andit's actually um, there isn't
the, the population in aparticular city to warrant
(07:48):
necessarily having a full, um,yeah, mid-market sales team or
mid-market organization all thetime as well.
So I think there's somethingthere as well.
It doesn't have the legacy,like you know, the, the
traditional countries likeamerica or some european ones
that have, like these, had beengoing for many years and
generations, um, so there'ssomething in it.
But, to your point, the um, the, the clear piece of observation
(08:12):
is there isn't, there aren'tthat many companies in that
sector?
so yeah, if you're looking to tobet big on on australia
mid-market, then um yeah, youeither need to focus elsewhere
or or define a different idealcustomer profile to go after
yeah for sure, yeah, awesome.
With regards to sales motion,there's multiple different
(08:38):
approaches for launching into anew region.
With your experience, what doyou see?
Some common ones in otherregions and what do you believe
is the most appropriate one forsomeone considering um this
region?
Speaker 1 (08:55):
definitely no one fits um fits all approach.
Um, I think we had a multitudeof different motions from a ton
of different operators that wespoke to.
Angus at Mondaycom, who'sobviously a sort of partnerships
leader, had some reallyinteresting things to say about.
If you're going for a kind ofpartner led motion, it's a great
(09:17):
way to dip your toe in thewater, get that presence without
necessarily having to reallyinvest in team operations, even
office space.
Get one or two really strongpartners who can propel your
brand.
You can kind of piggyback offthe, the social proof that that
company, whether it's aws orgoogle or maybe even someone
(09:39):
smaller who kind of have a verybig footprint in a very niche
community or potentially, youknow we're seeing an awful lot
of folks who are taking theconventional sales-led approach
right.
Potentially they're beingpulled into market.
Ie, they've got one or twocustomers who have come inbound
(10:00):
to the sales team in London orSan Francisco or wherever it
will be, have obviously assessedthe product and said, yeah, we
don't care that you guys don'thave any support staff in
Australia.
We have a real need for yoursolution for the particular
problem that we've got.
I think that's what we see alot of, the kind of smaller,
(10:23):
earlier stage companies cominginto Australia from by seeing
signals in the market and saying, guys, there's a bit of a trend
here, one or two maybe there'sa bit of an anomaly, but if
we've got five inbounds fromSydney and Melbourne, maybe
we've got a product market fithere without much effort.
Let's try and pour a bit of gason the fire here.
(10:45):
I think alternatively, you know,we spoke to the likes of Matt
Loop, who's you know now leadingefforts at Rippling and has
been at Slack previously.
I think they had a much morestrategic approach where they
thought APAC's next on our list,the board's asking for it.
There's a huge market of, youknow, billions of people over
there.
We need to find a way ofvalidating that that market
(11:13):
works.
And I think what was a realcommon thread when we spoke to a
bunch of people right wasAustralia.
If you're coming from, you know, san Francisco or New York or
London or Tel Aviv even in somecases, is culturally way easier
to come and land and test outthat market versus, you know,
jumping into hong kong or tokyoor, in some circumstances, even
(11:35):
singapore.
Um and yeah, to to kind of loopback to the approach that
they're using for that obviouslyclassic two or three account
execs, couple of SDRs, maybeeven a country manager, who are
saying, look, let's try andspend three years making a good
go at this.
(11:57):
I think we heard from both MattLoop and Chris Sharp of Pax8,
who was saying, you know, a yearto set things up, a year to
make money and a year toactually step it up a level.
And so I think folks who are,yes, being experimental, trying
to prove a hypothesis of doesthis sales motion or does this
(12:17):
product-led motion orpartner-led motion work, but
investing in the market andrealizing they need to spend one
, spend one, two, three years toactually give a good go of it,
rather than saying, ah, didn'twork, after six months, let's go
back yeah, yeah, I know,particularly in the asean
countries they are really putoff if you launch a business
(12:38):
into region and then a yearlater you pull out, and so many
north american vendors have gota habit of doing that they don't
see the revenue and they pullout.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
It's really hard to make a second first impression.
Yeah, if you've done that once,I want to touch on the piece
you mentioned about thesimilarities in culture and
business and English language aswell and kind of pull that
towards localization, and thatwas something that Matt talked
about, chris talked about it aswell and kind of pull that
towards localization, and thatwas something that Matt talked
about.
(13:06):
Chris talked about it as well,and I think it's really valid,
because when you're looking atinternational expansion, talking
to the market in their termsrequires a level of nuance and
finesse.
But if you've got the samelanguage in your code of the
software as an example, but ifyou've got the same language in
your code of the software as anexample, or from a reporting
(13:27):
compliance perspective, it'sgoing to be a lot easier to
launch.
What did you discover around?
Where does it make sense tolocalize versus maybe hold off
in a software product as you gointernationally?
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Yeah, good question.
I think, first and foremost, ifyou've got a product which
someone, like rippling, has,where there is a regulatory
involvement, or you know theyneed to localize um payroll,
because that is how the aussiegovernment or the state I don't
know anything about payroll, soI'm probably misspeaking here.
Sorry, matt, but there's needsthere around.
(14:06):
You know localizing because itis absolute table stakes for a
product to even operate legallywithin a market.
Obviously that is always goingto be the first requirement, um,
I think, uh, who's the chapfrom um, one of the chaps that
you brought in, who was from?
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Andrew Fiss yeah, from Sonder.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Yes, andrew Fiss at Sonder.
He was saying that datasovereignty was actually big for
them and it can cost you andadd like six months potentially
to an enterprise deal cycle.
If you've not got that in placebefore you start those sales
conversations, everything's kindof ready to go.
They love the product, they'vemaybe even trialed it in a.
Before you start those salesconversations, everything's kind
of ready to go.
They love the product, they'vemaybe even trialed it in a
(14:49):
sandbox environment, it's great.
And then it gets to thecompliance team or procurement
team and oh, you haven't tickedthe box of data sovereignty.
So yeah, that's obviously kindof a key localization thing.
That I think isn't particularlysexy but maybe is a big kind of
thing to consider.
Think isn't particularly sexybut maybe is a big kind of thing
to consider.
Um, I remember matt sayingsomething really interesting
(15:10):
about how the, the localizationof team, was actually very
important.
I think when they first startedthey had a product manager who
was working out of new york whomatt said you know, super, the
reason why he was chosen forthis project was because he was
one of the top PMs there, butbecause he wasn't in market
(15:31):
speaking to customers day in,day out and also probably had
that lack of local knowledgeabout, I'm sure, what isn't
maybe the most entertaining oftopics of Aussie payroll
compliance.
Some of the things whichpossibly should have been done
super early on in their launchinto australia actually didn't
(15:52):
happen until 12 months, 18months later, which again cost
them progress and probably wipeda bit of their um, a bit of
their town as a result of thatand when you have a conversation
on on aipac, a lot of you knowwhen we international firms they
think APAC, they think massivepopulations, one of the biggest
populations on earth.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
But the reality is that APAC is not a single region
, it's multiple regions.
And we've got within the ASEANregion, you've got Singapore,
malaysia, thailand, hong Kong,philippines, indonesia region.
You've got singapore, malaysia,thailand, hong kong,
philippines, indonesia.
Um, each one of them is is itgot its own local currency?
It's got its own local language, it's got its own local nuances
(16:35):
, compliance regulations, etc.
The amount of work that isrequired to successfully go in
and execute in one of thosemarkets, just one alone, is
substantial.
So my counsel when speaking tothese companies is like think
about where your lowest hangingfruit is from an APAC
perspective.
And the reality is anEnglish-speaking country that's
(16:57):
culturally aligned to NorthAmerica, europe.
English-speaking and an economythat is strong, that has got a
culture of giving it a go aswell, means that australia often
is the the right landing spot.
There are times where it makesmore sense to go to singapore,
(17:17):
though.
Yeah, and what would you say?
Um, if you were tocompartmentalize, you know, I
would sway you to singapore oraustralia.
Um, what are those, um, thosefilters that you would put in
place and say, actually I thinkthis is probably the time where
you should explore singapore?
Yeah, really good question.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Singapore's super interesting, I think, because on
the surface level you can seeall of the big global companies
who have got offices there andyou think, great, let's go and
target singapore because we wina couple of these logos.
You know we've just won appleor google or whatever the the
(17:57):
company is, but actually there'sonly 20 people in the office.
So if you're selling by seatsand the US or the European
offices aren't interested inyour product, then it's not
actually an enterprise scalp,it's an enterprise logo but not
actually an enterprise paycheck,right?
Um, I think Singapore isdefinitely strong in certain
(18:25):
segments.
You're seeing a lot of the ainative companies open ai
anthropic 11 labs who are kindof planting their flag in
singapore first, which iscounter to how some of the more
conventional sas companies ofsalesforce slack have done
things in the past.
I'd probably owe that more tothe regulatory landscape that
(18:47):
they have in Singapore.
They've done a lot of work tomake the regulatory side of an
AI company landing in Singaporevery easy for them.
Australia hasn't reallycommitted to any sort of policy
on this just yet.
(19:08):
I wonder whether or not the factthat we're in election year in
Australia at the moment folksare thinking well, there's no
point in setting up an officeand then Albanese or Dutton
turning around to us and saying,hey, actually we are going to
put these rules in place right.
So maybe that's part of it.
I think where Singapore isprobably quite strong is where
you are fully aware that youneed to rapidly expand into
(19:32):
multiple markets like vietnam,like thailand.
If that is the case, you know,let's say, you've got a very
homogenous product which doesn'tneed tons of localization.
Possibly it's even aproduct-led growth motion
whereby you just need localsupport operations, marketing
folks who can base themselvesout of singapore, but not
(19:53):
necessarily sales and solutionsteams who are going to have to
speak vietnamese or thai on akind of deal by deal basis.
I think that then makes a bitmore sense.
I think if you do have a kindof classic sales led motion,
you're wanting to get goodlearnings from one market before
(20:14):
potentially moving into thenext market, and the next market
after that australia does kindof make a bit more sense and
that's all really interestingand all really valid.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
Something else I've I've layered on top of that as
well as is the the cell?
Is it an enterprise cell or isit an sme cell?
And there's a lot more largeenterprises in asia than there
are in this region and theeconomics of a deal may make
sense to invest in localizationin a couple of countries to grab
that land or that market share.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Completely.
What I'd probably add as wellis, if you're trying to do an
SMB play in Indonesia, let's say, or Malaysia, the digital
footprint typically of some ofthese SMBs in these kind of less
economically developedcountries is probably lower than
if you are trying to sell toyou know, let's say, australian
(21:14):
nail tech salons, as an example.
A lot of them will have theirown kind of digital footprint.
Or, let's say, an accountant isprobably a better option in
Australia.
Or let's say, an accountant isprobably a better option in
Australia.
Very difficult for you tocreate a repeatable outbound
motion trying to find your nicheaccountant.
(21:34):
Who's one person and their sonin a remote part of Indonesia
versus someone in ruralAustralia, as an example.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
So yeah, I think it depends on.
Do you remember how manyenterprise businesses there are
in Australia?
Speaker 1 (21:51):
I think 5,000 to 6,000 um.
But I think what was mostinteresting was, you know, 60
percent of the revenue that wascoming um the SaaS market was
coming from those enterprises.
So, yes, naturally fewerbusinesses versus SMB, but they
(22:14):
are actually paying their fairshare when it comes to actually
winning one or two of them.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
And when you've worked with and consulted and
interviewed a lot of theseoperators, have you noticed a
common thread around success,like if there was the top one,
two, three things that must bein place in order for you to
launch your business effectivelyin this region?
Um, did anything surface?
Speaker 1 (22:36):
I think what we were talking about earlier the, the
commitment to market.
Um, australia is a veryrelationship driven market.
I was super surprised comingfrom london into australia where
I thought it was a very similarculture but actually kind of
far more collegiate,relationship driven.
(22:57):
Everyone seems to know everyone.
I think someone said to me theother day like you can't really
be an arsehole in working intech in australia, um, because
if, if one person hears about it, everybody hears about it and
it's very easy to burn bridgesand and kind of ruin your
chances at the market if, ifkind of word spreads um, and so
(23:18):
I think folks who have doneexceptionally well uh, have
really invested in getting outin market, demonstrating that
they've got investment.
Some folks are starting to takemuch more of a community-driven
play, like, if you look atNotion recently, I've noticed
that they've had a lot of energyin building a community brand,
(23:41):
spending time in market,building relationships in the
startup ecosystem, sponsoringevents, and I think that
actually is a really strongnotification to the market that
you know we are here to stay.
Yes, we were born in the us orborn in europe, but actually
we've got your guys backs andwe've got your um, uh, kind of
(24:03):
thinking about what you guyswanted to do um and I want to
touch on um founding teams yeah,um, you mentioned, heavily
reliant on relationships umthere's different types of from
what I've seen go-to-marketmotions, and you talked about
some of this in the paper aswell.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
What are some of those um different approaches?
Speaker 1 (24:24):
and what is the right one for a different scenario
yeah, I mean, I think what wasdefinitely a common thread, um,
in terms of who's been mostsuccessful, the, the need for
having a founding team in marketwho have experienced the market
is definitely key.
I think think the best onesblend local expertise with
(24:47):
probably some transplants fromother offices who know the
product, know the sales playsand can also embed some of the
culture from HQ or some of thelarger offices into what is a
small team, which I think iscritically important, especially
if you look at country managerstypically get a gig, bring over
(25:08):
their kind of star sales talentand very quickly it's very easy
for you to have a completelydifferent company culture,
especially given the fact thatyou're, in some cases, 10, 12
hours away in terms of time zoneand start maybe building a
culture which isn't quite whatHQ wants to have or is right for
(25:30):
the company or the product.
So I think having that blend oflocal operators and expertise,
as well as even if it's sixmonths or 12 months that folks
are over here for that is, Ithink, a really important thing
in terms of general structure.
Um, I mean, you, you deal withthat kind of day in, day out.
What's your kind of take onthat?
Speaker 2 (25:50):
where I think about it.
They're going to be um asales-led approach, where you
have a player coach that comesin and he effectively will um
will be a hands-on seller andget his hands dirty, and then
he'll build a small team aroundhim and what I I've seen
successful and I've done myselfa number of times is you've got
a pod, you've got a couple ofsales reps, you've got a
(26:11):
pre-sales person, so a technicalresource, you've got one or two
SDRs and maybe a success personas well, so that pod of four to
five covers all bases.
So that's one approach.
The other one is where you hirea regional business operator
that is effectively going tobuild the entire structure, both
front office and back office,locally as well.
(26:31):
I'm an advocate for it doesdepend on your investment, your
capacity and your, I guess, thestage of business that you're at
.
But you're getting the rightteam in place early on and I
think it's critically importantthat you've got that.
First hire is someone that,like you said, has got
(26:52):
experience in in the market,potentially some relationships
as well, but is is going to behands-on, they've got to be
selling, they've got to be theones that are driving a lot of
that initial momentum.
So that's that's my experience,um, and and what I've seen seem
be successful, particularly atsome of the earlier stages um,
you know, yeah, series, series b, c, d.
(27:13):
Yeah, um, as opposed to some ofthe later stages that have
potentially got some deeperpockets to.
Yeah, to invest the interestingfull team.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
Yeah and I think also um, investment from execs and
founders coming over here, evenif it's once a month, once a
quarter, depending on how faraway they are, obviously um is
super important, I think, notjust for signaling to customers
or prospects that actually, yeah, this is a big core market for
(27:40):
for the company, um, but also toto give them a kind of first
viewpoint on what are customerssaying, what are the product
requirements.
Because if, if you've got alarge scale up and you know this
is a a bit of a venture bet toto validate the australian
market, maybe the country leadsgetting what one, two hours a
(28:03):
week max with some of theseexecs or co-founders, and so I
think giving the opportunity forfolks to actually truly learn
what a customer's saying, whatare the needs and what are the
kind of quirks of the market,yeah, will pay off the dividends
.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Right, alex, I want to dive straight in.
One of the key takeaways of thepaper that you wrote about,
which is got a lot of peopletalking about it, is this
barbell effect.
Tell what is the barbell effectand what does it mean for
technology companies.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Yeah, it was super surprising.
So, the way we kind of look atthe barbell effect, you've got,
I guess, on the left white plate, the SMB market.
So 95, 97% of companies inAustralia are SMB.
95, 97% of companies inAustralia are SMB.
On the kind of right sideyou've got enterprise, where you
know one or two key players pervertical, these big whales who
(28:54):
are dominating, I think, 60% ofrevenue into SaaS businesses.
And then, surprisingly, in themiddle you've got a very kind of
narrow, thin um segment ofmid-market companies, um, and
mid-market is what?
Speaker 2 (29:09):
200 to 200 or a thousand.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
Yeah, exactly, um, I think, not a, not a massive
market whereby, uh, you can havelots of mid-market companies uh
funding these sorts of things.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
I think so cause and effect.
How does that barbell storyimpact a technology SaaS
business that is thinking aboutcoming to Australia?
Speaker 1 (29:31):
I think if folks are doing their due diligence, doing
their homework and looking atthe data, if you are in your
home market, selling intomid-market and that is a real
scalable, repeatable process,there are probably better
markets out there than Australiato go after.
There's probably some outliers.
Some people listening to thismight be thinking no, you're
(29:53):
wrong, we're doing amazinglywell, but nine times out of ten,
most folks are going tostruggle if they go after a
mid-market approach here.
If you are selling into smb oryou're after one or two key
government accounts or big banks, great australia is probably a
good approach, and there's alsoa really interesting fact
(30:15):
because, although some of theaccounts are very large in size,
everybody knows each other andso if you win one or two, you
can be propelled to kind ofsnowball, to fit.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, super interesting, super, super
interesting.
All right, next question youspent weeks going through this
research and I'm incrediblygrateful because so many people
have got so much value from it.
And, for those listening, thewhite paper is available to
download for free as well.
What were your key two to threetakeaways that were a, an aha
(30:47):
moment, a surprise, or justreaffirm what you thought coming
into the research project?
Speaker 1 (30:52):
yeah, I.
I think, firstly, australia isvery relationship driven.
Okay, um, if you're trying toenter the market from a remote
outbound sdr team out of lond,it's going to be very difficult.
You need to be in market.
I think that leads prettyclosely to you need to show
folks that you are invested here.
(31:13):
You're here for the long haul.
Lots of operators that we spoketo spoke about the need to see
this as a three year experiment.
You know, one year to setthings up, one year to set
things up, one year to makemoney, one year to make things
go to the next level.
Um, folks can definitely spotwhen you are here just for six
(31:34):
months as part of a kind ofboard level project.
Um, and three key thing islocal expertise.
Yes, bring people over from HQ,try and get that culture coming
across to a new office and anew workforce.
But you really need to heavilyinvest in getting folks in the
(31:54):
team who have the contacts, knowthe nuances of the market and
probably have a lot of thoserelationships already and you're
going to really speed up yourtime to revenue and winning a
larger part of the market, evenif you've got the best products
in the world.
Relationships really do matterhere and I think that's a big
bit of advice.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Yeah, I completely agree, and we've seen that a lot
with some of our internationalclients is they lean on us
because we've got therelationships with the people.
That have got the relationshipsas well, and it is incredibly
important.
Um, it takes the guesswork, ittakes the risk out of it as well
.
So great points, alex, thankyou so much.
I've really enjoyed theconversation incredibly, um
valuable, and the white paperagain is available for anyone
(32:37):
that wishes to read more aboutthis.
Um.
Just in closing, one finalquestion.
If we're speaking to anyinternational SaaS companies,
whether they're in North America, europe, israel that are
thinking about APAC, what wouldbe your final tip or counsel as
they consider their launch intothe APAC region?
Speaker 1 (32:55):
Yeah, it completely depends on company, obviously,
but I think number one make surethat there's a big enough
market to go after.
Make sure you're doing thehomework to understand what
those customers actually need,probably different to your home
market.
To make sure there's exactbuy-in.
Lots of folks are seeing thisas a hobby rather than as a
full-time project to invest timeinto the market.
(33:17):
And I think three, get localexpertise, people who've got the
relationships and understandthe quirks of the market awesome
, great, great tips.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Thank you again.
And yeah, anyone's interested,reach out to Alex.
And if they are interested inreaching you, how can they?
Linkedin is normally best.
Okay, yeah, perfect.
I think 95% of Aussie companies are SMB.
You've then got a kind of bigoligopoly of enterprise whales
who are dominating mining,financial services, government
healthcare obviously Do youremember how many enterprise
businesses there are inAustralia?
5,000 to 6,000.
You know, 60% of the revenuethat was coming into the SaaS
(00:23):
market was coming from thoseenterprises Fewer businesses
versus SMB but they are actuallypaying their fair share when it
comes to actually winning oneor two of them.
Let's try and pour a bit of gason the fire here.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
I think it's really valid because Alex super
grateful that you joined You'vejust written an incredible paper
for us which really aims atSaaS companies that are thinking
of coming into australia.
I also think that a lot of thecontent is incredibly relevant
for australian sas, startupscale-up businesses, because the
amount of intel that you've gotaround the, the types of
(00:57):
customers, the volume ofcustomers in this market, I
think can really help to definego-to-market.
But before we crack into that,just I'd love to get to a quick
introduction from yourself andkind of who you are, your
background and um yeah sure whatexcited you about kind of
working with us initially?
Speaker 1 (01:13):
yeah sure, so I am pretty new to Australia.
I started my career mainly inLondon.
Um, I had a lot of kind ofinitially early stage startups
doing a lot of kind of first goto market sales rep,
partnerships, person on theground and kind of eventually
went further and further upmarket.
(01:33):
So did a bunch of work withcompanies like the Financial
Times, a couple of soft bankportcos and most recently my
last perm role was with Pad withpaddle, where I was leading a
lot of the new product launches,new market launches, and
decided to have a bit of alifestyle change moved over to
australia finally kind of didwhat I said I was going to do
(01:56):
when I was 21 and andinterestingly I fell into a lot
of kind of consulting work, Ithink because I've experienced a
lot of markets traditionally US, uk, europe, israel even
managed to, I think, build up abit of a playbook of how to
actually properly assess amarket, launch into it when
(02:19):
you're first customers, and sofell into projects with a lot of
folks who were looking to moveinto Australia for the first
time I think we met via DavidCorbin was it yeah?
At JOSIS in the Commons onGeorge Street and I think we
kind of got chatting.
You said you were looking tokind of put more insight out
(02:42):
there and I think it wasprobably aligning with the times
where I was really deep into alot of research of helping folks
come into Australia and yeah,it was a pretty interesting,
eye-opening research, to kind ofput my academic hat on, speak
to a lot of operators and tryand get some of their insights
and hopefully get a decentproduct which adds a bit of
(03:03):
value to folks who are thinkingabout it or wanting to get a
better understanding of, I guess, their home market.
Speaker 2 (03:09):
Well, we had 250 organic downloads within the
first couple of weeks, so Ithink that speaks to the volume
of the interest in it and thefeedback was generally really
positive and I learned somethingand I rely on some of the data
when I'm having conversations aswell, so I'm really really
happy with how it came out.
But I wanted to take anopportunity to share some of the
findings on this show for SASleaders, operators, whether
(03:34):
you're in Australia, whetheryou're international, thinking
about this market and when I saythis market, apac is, we're
here in Australia, but APAC isis much broader market Singapore
, singapore is often the theother side of the coin in terms
of do I go to singapore,australia?
So, um, you know, divingstraight in, you know you spent
quite a lot of time researching,interviewing, what would you
(03:56):
say?
The top, um, you know thehighlights of the paper were in
terms of um, yeah, looking, thatwould be relevant for SaaS
companies coming to Australia.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
Yeah, I mean, I think firstly, starting at the data
that I dived right intoheadfirst, I was really
surprised to, I think, what wetermed the barbell effect of the
market, the fact that you'vegot, I think, 95% of Aussie
companies, I I think 98.
In some studies I saw um aresmb.
(04:30):
You've then got a kind of bigoligopoly of enterprise whales
who are dominating mining,financial services, government
health care.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Obviously, when you say big, are you talking about
volume or value?
Speaker 1 (04:43):
oh, yeah, number of number of uh headcounts yeah,
okay, size of business, um,typically revenue, uh, depending
on how you're kind of weighingit, um, yeah, by by size, by
enterprise, I kind of meant moreum headcount uh could be
revenue.
Uh, so the the kind of bigbehemoths, you know the con
(05:06):
banks of the world, governmentorganisations, the kind of big
whales where if you win one ofthose logos, you're kind of set
in the market.
I think what was prettyinteresting when we then looked
at the mid market, there was apretty small number of companies
, which is kind of surprisingwhen you think about Australia
(05:28):
having a bunch of successstories, especially in, you know
, the SaaS and tech space.
You know everyone's heard ofCanva, atlassian, airwallex, and
you kind of think there's anawful lot of folks who are
probably sitting within thespace and segment just below
that, um, but there's a bigdearth, um.
(05:49):
I think we kind of got outthere and started asking folks
like, why is there this gap?
I think there's probably twointeresting reasons.
I think one of it is structurala lot of vcs in australia
aren't writing big enough checksto take those kind of growth
seed stage series A businessesand propel them into series B,
(06:12):
series C, which would kind ofwarrant a mid-market stamp, I
think another interesting thingcould be a bit of culture.
You know you've got an awfullot of folks who are potentially
looking for more lifestylebusiness.
Um, they're potentially gettingbought out before they ever
even get into that stage,whether it's domestically or
(06:34):
overseas, um.
So, yeah, I think a prettyinteresting consideration that
folks need to make when they'reconsidering australia is if
we're selling heavily intomid-market that's our sweet spot
is australia the right marketfor?
And just to clarify what, whatare you calling mid-market?
Um, mid-market I think wedefined as anything from 200
(06:56):
employees up to a thousand.
Okay, um, some companiesobviously start considering like
revenue and things like that,but that's kind of our main
approach.
Yeah, yeah, interesting.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
It's.
I thought about this a lot aswell, and my my perspective,
coming from a different angle onthis topic as well, is a couple
of things.
One is Australia is arelatively new country, so we
were founded in 1788 around then, from from memory.
It's also an enormous mass, um,so it's the same size as north
(07:28):
america, with less than a tenthof the population and everyone
lives on the seawater, soeveryone lives all all the way
around the country.
Yeah, what that means from a abusiness perspective is there's
going to be lots of smallpockets dotted all around the
country of small businesses, andit's actually um, there isn't
the, the population in aparticular city to warrant
(07:48):
necessarily having a full, um,yeah, mid-market sales team or
mid-market organization all thetime as well.
So I think there's somethingthere as well.
It doesn't have the legacy,like you know, the, the
traditional countries likeamerica or some european ones
that have, like these, had beengoing for many years and
generations, um, so there'ssomething in it.
But, to your point, the um, the, the clear piece of observation
(08:12):
is there isn't, there aren'tthat many companies in that
sector?
so yeah, if you're looking to tobet big on on australia
mid-market, then um yeah, youeither need to focus elsewhere
or or define a different idealcustomer profile to go after
yeah for sure, yeah, awesome.
With regards to sales motion,there's multiple different
(08:38):
approaches for launching into anew region.
With your experience, what doyou see?
Some common ones in otherregions and what do you believe
is the most appropriate one forsomeone considering um this
region?
Speaker 1 (08:55):
definitely no one fits um fits all approach.
Um, I think we had a multitudeof different motions from a ton
of different operators that wespoke to.
Angus at Mondaycom, who'sobviously a sort of partnerships
leader, had some reallyinteresting things to say about.
If you're going for a kind ofpartner led motion, it's a great
(09:17):
way to dip your toe in thewater, get that presence without
necessarily having to reallyinvest in team operations, even
office space.
Get one or two really strongpartners who can propel your
brand.
You can kind of piggyback offthe, the social proof that that
company, whether it's aws orgoogle or maybe even someone
(09:39):
smaller who kind of have a verybig footprint in a very niche
community or potentially, youknow we're seeing an awful lot
of folks who are taking theconventional sales-led approach
right.
Potentially they're beingpulled into market.
Ie, they've got one or twocustomers who have come inbound
(10:00):
to the sales team in London orSan Francisco or wherever it
will be, have obviously assessedthe product and said, yeah, we
don't care that you guys don'thave any support staff in
Australia.
We have a real need for yoursolution for the particular
problem that we've got.
I think that's what we see alot of, the kind of smaller,
(10:23):
earlier stage companies cominginto Australia from by seeing
signals in the market and saying, guys, there's a bit of a trend
here, one or two maybe there'sa bit of an anomaly, but if
we've got five inbounds fromSydney and Melbourne, maybe
we've got a product market fithere without much effort.
Let's try and pour a bit of gason the fire here.
(10:45):
I think alternatively, you know,we spoke to the likes of Matt
Loop, who's you know now leadingefforts at Rippling and has
been at Slack previously.
I think they had a much morestrategic approach where they
thought APAC's next on our list,the board's asking for it.
There's a huge market of, youknow, billions of people over
there.
We need to find a way ofvalidating that that market
(11:13):
works.
And I think what was a realcommon thread when we spoke to a
bunch of people right wasAustralia.
If you're coming from, you know, san Francisco or New York or
London or Tel Aviv even in somecases, is culturally way easier
to come and land and test outthat market versus, you know,
jumping into hong kong or tokyoor, in some circumstances, even
(11:35):
singapore.
Um and yeah, to to kind of loopback to the approach that
they're using for that obviouslyclassic two or three account
execs, couple of SDRs, maybeeven a country manager, who are
saying, look, let's try andspend three years making a good
go at this.
(11:57):
I think we heard from both MattLoop and Chris Sharp of Pax8,
who was saying, you know, a yearto set things up, a year to
make money and a year toactually step it up a level.
And so I think folks who are,yes, being experimental, trying
to prove a hypothesis of doesthis sales motion or does this
(12:17):
product-led motion orpartner-led motion work, but
investing in the market andrealizing they need to spend one
, spend one, two, three years toactually give a good go of it,
rather than saying, ah, didn'twork, after six months, let's go
back yeah, yeah, I know,particularly in the asean
countries they are really putoff if you launch a business
(12:38):
into region and then a yearlater you pull out, and so many
north american vendors have gota habit of doing that they don't
see the revenue and they pullout.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
It's really hard to make a second first impression.
Yeah, if you've done that once,I want to touch on the piece
you mentioned about thesimilarities in culture and
business and English language aswell and kind of pull that
towards localization, and thatwas something that Matt talked
about, chris talked about it aswell and kind of pull that
towards localization, and thatwas something that Matt talked
about.
(13:06):
Chris talked about it as well,and I think it's really valid,
because when you're looking atinternational expansion, talking
to the market in their termsrequires a level of nuance and
finesse.
But if you've got the samelanguage in your code of the
software as an example, but ifyou've got the same language in
your code of the software as anexample, or from a reporting
(13:27):
compliance perspective, it'sgoing to be a lot easier to
launch.
What did you discover around?
Where does it make sense tolocalize versus maybe hold off
in a software product as you gointernationally?
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Yeah, good question.
I think, first and foremost, ifyou've got a product which
someone, like rippling, has,where there is a regulatory
involvement, or you know theyneed to localize um payroll,
because that is how the aussiegovernment or the state I don't
know anything about payroll, soI'm probably misspeaking here.
Sorry, matt, but there's needsthere around.
(14:06):
You know localizing because itis absolute table stakes for a
product to even operate legallywithin a market.
Obviously that is always goingto be the first requirement, um,
I think, uh, who's the chapfrom um, one of the chaps that
you brought in, who was from?
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Andrew Fiss yeah, from Sonder.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Yes, andrew Fiss at Sonder.
He was saying that datasovereignty was actually big for
them and it can cost you andadd like six months potentially
to an enterprise deal cycle.
If you've not got that in placebefore you start those sales
conversations, everything's kindof ready to go.
They love the product, they'vemaybe even trialed it in a.
Before you start those salesconversations, everything's kind
of ready to go.
They love the product, they'vemaybe even trialed it in a
(14:49):
sandbox environment, it's great.
And then it gets to thecompliance team or procurement
team and oh, you haven't tickedthe box of data sovereignty.
So yeah, that's obviously kindof a key localization thing.
That I think isn't particularlysexy but maybe is a big kind of
thing to consider.
Think isn't particularly sexybut maybe is a big kind of thing
to consider.
Um, I remember matt sayingsomething really interesting
(15:10):
about how the, the localizationof team, was actually very
important.
I think when they first startedthey had a product manager who
was working out of new york whomatt said you know, super, the
reason why he was chosen forthis project was because he was
one of the top PMs there, butbecause he wasn't in market
(15:31):
speaking to customers day in,day out and also probably had
that lack of local knowledgeabout, I'm sure, what isn't
maybe the most entertaining oftopics of Aussie payroll
compliance.
Some of the things whichpossibly should have been done
super early on in their launchinto australia actually didn't
(15:52):
happen until 12 months, 18months later, which again cost
them progress and probably wipeda bit of their um, a bit of
their town as a result of thatand when you have a conversation
on on aipac, a lot of you knowwhen we international firms they
think APAC, they think massivepopulations, one of the biggest
populations on earth.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
But the reality is that APAC is not a single region
, it's multiple regions.
And we've got within the ASEANregion, you've got Singapore,
malaysia, thailand, hong Kong,philippines, indonesia region.
You've got singapore, malaysia,thailand, hong kong,
philippines, indonesia.
Um, each one of them is is itgot its own local currency?
It's got its own local language, it's got its own local nuances
(16:35):
, compliance regulations, etc.
The amount of work that isrequired to successfully go in
and execute in one of thosemarkets, just one alone, is
substantial.
So my counsel when speaking tothese companies is like think
about where your lowest hangingfruit is from an APAC
perspective.
And the reality is anEnglish-speaking country that's
(16:57):
culturally aligned to NorthAmerica, europe.
English-speaking and an economythat is strong, that has got a
culture of giving it a go aswell, means that australia often
is the the right landing spot.
There are times where it makesmore sense to go to singapore,
(17:17):
though.
Yeah, and what would you say?
Um, if you were tocompartmentalize, you know, I
would sway you to singapore oraustralia.
Um, what are those, um, thosefilters that you would put in
place and say, actually I thinkthis is probably the time where
you should explore singapore?
Yeah, really good question.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
Singapore's super interesting, I think, because on
the surface level you can seeall of the big global companies
who have got offices there andyou think, great, let's go and
target singapore because we wina couple of these logos.
You know we've just won appleor google or whatever the the
(17:57):
company is, but actually there'sonly 20 people in the office.
So if you're selling by seatsand the US or the European
offices aren't interested inyour product, then it's not
actually an enterprise scalp,it's an enterprise logo but not
actually an enterprise paycheck,right?
Um, I think Singapore isdefinitely strong in certain
(18:25):
segments.
You're seeing a lot of the ainative companies open ai
anthropic 11 labs who are kindof planting their flag in
singapore first, which iscounter to how some of the more
conventional sas companies ofsalesforce slack have done
things in the past.
I'd probably owe that more tothe regulatory landscape that
(18:47):
they have in Singapore.
They've done a lot of work tomake the regulatory side of an
AI company landing in Singaporevery easy for them.
Australia hasn't reallycommitted to any sort of policy
on this just yet.
(19:08):
I wonder whether or not the factthat we're in election year in
Australia at the moment folksare thinking well, there's no
point in setting up an officeand then Albanese or Dutton
turning around to us and saying,hey, actually we are going to
put these rules in place right.
So maybe that's part of it.
I think where Singapore isprobably quite strong is where
you are fully aware that youneed to rapidly expand into
(19:32):
multiple markets like vietnam,like thailand.
If that is the case, you know,let's say, you've got a very
homogenous product which doesn'tneed tons of localization.
Possibly it's even aproduct-led growth motion
whereby you just need localsupport operations, marketing
folks who can base themselvesout of singapore, but not
(19:53):
necessarily sales and solutionsteams who are going to have to
speak vietnamese or thai on akind of deal by deal basis.
I think that then makes a bitmore sense.
I think if you do have a kindof classic sales led motion,
you're wanting to get goodlearnings from one market before
(20:14):
potentially moving into thenext market, and the next market
after that australia does kindof make a bit more sense and
that's all really interestingand all really valid.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
Something else I've I've layered on top of that as
well as is the the cell?
Is it an enterprise cell or isit an sme cell?
And there's a lot more largeenterprises in asia than there
are in this region and theeconomics of a deal may make
sense to invest in localizationin a couple of countries to grab
that land or that market share.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Completely.
What I'd probably add as wellis, if you're trying to do an
SMB play in Indonesia, let's say, or Malaysia, the digital
footprint typically of some ofthese SMBs in these kind of less
economically developedcountries is probably lower than
if you are trying to sell toyou know, let's say, australian
(21:14):
nail tech salons, as an example.
A lot of them will have theirown kind of digital footprint.
Or, let's say, an accountant isprobably a better option in
Australia.
Or let's say, an accountant isprobably a better option in
Australia.
Very difficult for you tocreate a repeatable outbound
motion trying to find your nicheaccountant.
(21:34):
Who's one person and their sonin a remote part of Indonesia
versus someone in ruralAustralia, as an example.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
So yeah, I think it depends on.
Do you remember how manyenterprise businesses there are
in Australia?
Speaker 1 (21:51):
I think 5,000 to 6,000 um.
But I think what was mostinteresting was, you know, 60
percent of the revenue that wascoming um the SaaS market was
coming from those enterprises.
So, yes, naturally fewerbusinesses versus SMB, but they
(22:14):
are actually paying their fairshare when it comes to actually
winning one or two of them.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
And when you've worked with and consulted and
interviewed a lot of theseoperators, have you noticed a
common thread around success,like if there was the top one,
two, three things that must bein place in order for you to
launch your business effectivelyin this region?
Um, did anything surface?
Speaker 1 (22:36):
I think what we were talking about earlier the, the
commitment to market.
Um, australia is a veryrelationship driven market.
I was super surprised comingfrom london into australia where
I thought it was a very similarculture but actually kind of
far more collegiate,relationship driven.
(22:57):
Everyone seems to know everyone.
I think someone said to me theother day like you can't really
be an arsehole in working intech in australia, um, because
if, if one person hears about it, everybody hears about it and
it's very easy to burn bridgesand and kind of ruin your
chances at the market if, ifkind of word spreads um, and so
(23:18):
I think folks who have doneexceptionally well uh, have
really invested in getting outin market, demonstrating that
they've got investment.
Some folks are starting to takemuch more of a community-driven
play, like, if you look atNotion recently, I've noticed
that they've had a lot of energyin building a community brand,
(23:41):
spending time in market,building relationships in the
startup ecosystem, sponsoringevents, and I think that
actually is a really strongnotification to the market that
you know we are here to stay.
Yes, we were born in the us orborn in europe, but actually
we've got your guys backs andwe've got your um, uh, kind of
(24:03):
thinking about what you guyswanted to do um and I want to
touch on um founding teams yeah,um, you mentioned, heavily
reliant on relationships umthere's different types of from
what I've seen go-to-marketmotions, and you talked about
some of this in the paper aswell.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
What are some of those um different approaches?
Speaker 1 (24:24):
and what is the right one for a different scenario
yeah, I mean, I think what wasdefinitely a common thread, um,
in terms of who's been mostsuccessful, the, the need for
having a founding team in marketwho have experienced the market
is definitely key.
I think think the best onesblend local expertise with
(24:47):
probably some transplants fromother offices who know the
product, know the sales playsand can also embed some of the
culture from HQ or some of thelarger offices into what is a
small team, which I think iscritically important, especially
if you look at country managerstypically get a gig, bring over
(25:08):
their kind of star sales talentand very quickly it's very easy
for you to have a completelydifferent company culture,
especially given the fact thatyou're, in some cases, 10, 12
hours away in terms of time zoneand start maybe building a
culture which isn't quite whatHQ wants to have or is right for
(25:30):
the company or the product.
So I think having that blend oflocal operators and expertise,
as well as even if it's sixmonths or 12 months that folks
are over here for that is, Ithink, a really important thing
in terms of general structure.
Um, I mean, you, you deal withthat kind of day in, day out.
What's your kind of take onthat?
Speaker 2 (25:50):
where I think about it.
They're going to be um asales-led approach, where you
have a player coach that comesin and he effectively will um
will be a hands-on seller andget his hands dirty, and then
he'll build a small team aroundhim and what I I've seen
successful and I've done myselfa number of times is you've got
a pod, you've got a couple ofsales reps, you've got a
(26:11):
pre-sales person, so a technicalresource, you've got one or two
SDRs and maybe a success personas well, so that pod of four to
five covers all bases.
So that's one approach.
The other one is where you hirea regional business operator
that is effectively going tobuild the entire structure, both
front office and back office,locally as well.
(26:31):
I'm an advocate for it doesdepend on your investment, your
capacity and your, I guess, thestage of business that you're at
.
But you're getting the rightteam in place early on and I
think it's critically importantthat you've got that.
First hire is someone that,like you said, has got
(26:52):
experience in in the market,potentially some relationships
as well, but is is going to behands-on, they've got to be
selling, they've got to be theones that are driving a lot of
that initial momentum.
So that's that's my experience,um, and and what I've seen seem
be successful, particularly atsome of the earlier stages um,
you know, yeah, series, series b, c, d.
(27:13):
Yeah, um, as opposed to some ofthe later stages that have
potentially got some deeperpockets to.
Yeah, to invest the interestingfull team.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
Yeah and I think also um, investment from execs and
founders coming over here, evenif it's once a month, once a
quarter, depending on how faraway they are, obviously um is
super important, I think, notjust for signaling to customers
or prospects that actually, yeah, this is a big core market for
(27:40):
for the company, um, but also toto give them a kind of first
viewpoint on what are customerssaying, what are the product
requirements.
Because if, if you've got alarge scale up and you know this
is a a bit of a venture bet toto validate the australian
market, maybe the country leadsgetting what one, two hours a
(28:03):
week max with some of theseexecs or co-founders, and so I
think giving the opportunity forfolks to actually truly learn
what a customer's saying, whatare the needs and what are the
kind of quirks of the market,yeah, will pay off the dividends
.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Right, alex, I want to dive straight in.
One of the key takeaways of thepaper that you wrote about,
which is got a lot of peopletalking about it, is this
barbell effect.
Tell what is the barbell effectand what does it mean for
technology companies.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Yeah, it was super surprising.
So, the way we kind of look atthe barbell effect, you've got,
I guess, on the left white plate, the SMB market.
So 95, 97% of companies inAustralia are SMB.
95, 97% of companies inAustralia are SMB.
On the kind of right sideyou've got enterprise, where you
know one or two key players pervertical, these big whales who
(28:54):
are dominating, I think, 60% ofrevenue into SaaS businesses.
And then, surprisingly, in themiddle you've got a very kind of
narrow, thin um segment ofmid-market companies, um, and
mid-market is what?
Speaker 2 (29:09):
200 to 200 or a thousand.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
Yeah, exactly, um, I think, not a, not a massive
market whereby, uh, you can havelots of mid-market companies uh
funding these sorts of things.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
I think so cause and effect.
How does that barbell storyimpact a technology SaaS
business that is thinking aboutcoming to Australia?
Speaker 1 (29:31):
I think if folks are doing their due diligence, doing
their homework and looking atthe data, if you are in your
home market, selling intomid-market and that is a real
scalable, repeatable process,there are probably better
markets out there than Australiato go after.
There's probably some outliers.
Some people listening to thismight be thinking no, you're
(29:53):
wrong, we're doing amazinglywell, but nine times out of ten,
most folks are going tostruggle if they go after a
mid-market approach here.
If you are selling into smb oryou're after one or two key
government accounts or big banks, great australia is probably a
good approach, and there's alsoa really interesting fact
(30:15):
because, although some of theaccounts are very large in size,
everybody knows each other andso if you win one or two, you
can be propelled to kind ofsnowball, to fit.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, super interesting, super, super
interesting.
All right, next question youspent weeks going through this
research and I'm incrediblygrateful because so many people
have got so much value from it.
And, for those listening, thewhite paper is available to
download for free as well.
What were your key two to threetakeaways that were a, an aha
(30:47):
moment, a surprise, or justreaffirm what you thought coming
into the research project?
Speaker 1 (30:52):
yeah, I.
I think, firstly, australia isvery relationship driven.
Okay, um, if you're trying toenter the market from a remote
outbound sdr team out of lond,it's going to be very difficult.
You need to be in market.
I think that leads prettyclosely to you need to show
folks that you are invested here.
(31:13):
You're here for the long haul.
Lots of operators that we spoketo spoke about the need to see
this as a three year experiment.
You know, one year to setthings up, one year to set
things up, one year to makemoney, one year to make things
go to the next level.
Um, folks can definitely spotwhen you are here just for six
(31:34):
months as part of a kind ofboard level project.
Um, and three key thing islocal expertise.
Yes, bring people over from HQ,try and get that culture coming
across to a new office and anew workforce.
But you really need to heavilyinvest in getting folks in the
(31:54):
team who have the contacts, knowthe nuances of the market and
probably have a lot of thoserelationships already and you're
going to really speed up yourtime to revenue and winning a
larger part of the market, evenif you've got the best products
in the world.
Relationships really do matterhere and I think that's a big
bit of advice.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Yeah, I completely agree, and we've seen that a lot
with some of our internationalclients is they lean on us
because we've got therelationships with the people.
That have got the relationshipsas well, and it is incredibly
important.
Um, it takes the guesswork, ittakes the risk out of it as well
.
So great points, alex, thankyou so much.
I've really enjoyed theconversation incredibly, um
valuable, and the white paperagain is available for anyone
(32:37):
that wishes to read more aboutthis.
Um.
Just in closing, one finalquestion.
If we're speaking to anyinternational SaaS companies,
whether they're in North America, europe, israel that are
thinking about APAC, what wouldbe your final tip or counsel as
they consider their launch intothe APAC region?
Speaker 1 (32:55):
Yeah, it completely depends on company, obviously,
but I think number one make surethat there's a big enough
market to go after.
Make sure you're doing thehomework to understand what
those customers actually need,probably different to your home
market.
To make sure there's exactbuy-in.
Lots of folks are seeing thisas a hobby rather than as a
full-time project to invest timeinto the market.
(33:17):
And I think three, get localexpertise, people who've got the
relationships and understandthe quirks of the market awesome
, great, great tips.
Speaker 2 (33:24):
Thank you again.
And yeah, anyone's interested,reach out to Alex.
And if they are interested inreaching you, how can they?
Linkedin is normally best.
Okay, yeah, perfect.
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