Most vendors spend two or three years learning European banking the expensive way - fragmented markets, compliance gatekeepers, pilots that never convert. You have a good product. Often what's missing is the packaging, and knowing what the other side of the table is actually weighing.
The demo lands well. The economics are compelling. Then the conversation moves into a room you're not in, and the questions change.
Someone asks how it integrates with the ERP the client already runs. Someone asks who onboards the suppliers, and how long that takes. Someone remembers a platform that looked just as good and quietly went unused, not because it didn't work, but because the people doing the daily work never took it up.
None of that is in your deck, so none of it gets answered. The bank doesn't reject you. It just goes quiet.
That's a fair question, and a very answerable one, but it needs someone who has worked on that side to help you answer it convincingly.
Retained advisory built around the questions that decide whether you scale in Europe or spend another year in pilots.
Whether your solution addresses a problem operations teams actually have, and where it meets friction - the ERP, the approval chain, supplier onboarding, and the workarounds already in place.
"What stops someone using this on a Tuesday morning?"How a transaction banking team will assess you before you walk in. Which institutions genuinely fit your product, which have budget this cycle, and which will take nine months to say no.
"Is this bank a real prospect, or an expensive education?"How to present your solution in operational terms as well as financial ones, so it answers the CFO and the operations director in the same conversation. Usually the fastest thing to improve.
"Does this hold up in the room you're not in?"What comparable solutions are missing, how SEPA, PSD2, Basel III and trade facilitation standards affect your roadmap, and where the market is moving, from current conversations, not a report written last quarter.
"What's coming that isn't in the plan yet?"An ongoing relationship rather than a project. Closer to a strategic advisory or board role - a sounding board you can test something against before it becomes a roadmap commitment.
Worth establishing early, in both directions.
Ten years of operations, twenty-five in banking, and a seat on the bodies that set the standards.
Ongoing advisory support to expand into the US market, resulting in three new clients, alongside positioning the company in Europe as a leading player in its category.
Helped set up the supply chain finance proposition and the go-to-market strategy behind it - product framing, target segments and the narrative used with banks.
Bring the deal that stalled, or the bank you can't read. I'll tell you what I think is happening, and whether I'm the right person to help.
Schedule a 20-minute callI work with a small number of vendors at a time, so it's worth finding out early.