Aconcagua Partners - 1 min read
Case Study | Market Research | Soft Landing
European fintech explores Brazilian market
Project details:
Year: 2021
Company: Norwegian startup
Industry/Sector: Marketplace, Fintech
Target: Brazilian market
1 min read
Background
From a dominant position, one of the equity crowdfunding platforms in Norway was looking for new avenues for growth. The platform was thriving in its domestic market, but the market size was relatively small in deal numbers and deal size. So the management team decided to explore market with larger critical mass. Back in 2017, the Securities and Exchange Commission of Brazil (CVM), enacted Instruction CMV 588, the cornerstone for the Brazilian Equity Crowdfunding market. In 2020, CMV conducted an open consultation to hear and learn from the existing players in the market.
Problems
First problem: fierce resistance from SEO experts. SEO advisors play an influential role in the digital marketing industry (more so in Europe than in LATAM), mainly because of the complexity of SEO practices these days, but also because of the time it takes to generate tangible results. When confronted with a new platform they haven't heard of (nor fully understand), these experts would first disbelieve the facts: our client generates results in a fraction of the time SEO alone does.
Second problem: stereotyping and cultural mismatch. This is something we encounter more often than you may think. In Northern Europe, Latin Americans come across as easy going people that don't take time seriously and often bend the rules. So, for digital marketing agencies, it is hard to trust a platform their SEO advisors don't understand and even harder if it comes from a Latin American entrepreneur.
Our intervention
This startup came to us seeking advice to register the company in the UK. We took them under our Soft Landing programme, created a vehicle in the UK, opened a bank account, provided basic fiduciary services and off they went to get customers in Europe. Fast forward 16 months, they had some traction in Southern Europe (Spain, Italy, etc.), but none in the UK. We suspected the second problem mentioned above was playing a role in Northern Europe, but we were confident in the competitive edge this company had, so we upgraded them to our Business Venture programme in 2019.
We cracked on with a bit of research to identify early adopters for this service. After some interaction with these potential early adopters we saw a pattern and the problems mentioned above became evident: this company wasn't inspiring trust in the UK target audience, the image they projected was their weakest point.
We worked closely with the founders to overhaul the market-entry strategy and fine tune pricing and the invoicing process. We did some further client segmentation and created new business models for the new segments. We took the basic sales collateral our Client had at the time and consulted a copywriter that helped us explain the way the platform worked and better articulate the message. We also worked with some designers to improve the visual of the colateral.
Towards the end of 2019, we identified, segmented and targeted hundreds of marketing agencies in London alone, and by Q1 2020 this company finally began to see the first signs of traction in the UK.
If you are a LATAM startup with a unique value proposition that wants to venture into the European market,
contact Aconcagua Partners. We are certain we can help you.
Case Study | Soft Landing | Business Ventures