Selling to New Zealand government and councils

Public-sector deals are some of the best revenue a New Zealand tech company can win. They are large, they renew, and the reference travels - one council makes the next four much easier.

They also break more founders than any other segment, because everything that works in a fast commercial sale works against you here.

Start with how the money is shaped

The most common own goal I see is a pricing model that does not fit how the organisation is allowed to spend.

Capital and operating budgets are different pots, approved at different times, by different people, under different rules. A one-off capital purchase and an ongoing subscription are not two ways of paying for the same thing - they are two entirely separate approval routes.

Which one suits you varies by organisation, and you cannot guess it. Ask early and ask plainly: "Would this sit in your capital budget or your operating budget, and when is that set?" That one question has saved deals I have watched stall for a year.

And if you are moving a customer from one to the other, say so long before they need to budget for it. Councils in particular need warning a cycle ahead that a subscription is coming, or the answer is no by default rather than on merit.

Where the opportunities are visible

Public agencies list tender opportunities on GETS, the Government Electronic Tenders Service, and agencies work under the Government Procurement Rules. There are also all-of-government arrangements where a category has already been contracted centrally.

Two practical implications. First, if the category is already covered by a central arrangement, the route in may be through it rather than around it. Second, and less obviously, by the time something appears as a tender the specification has usually been shaped by whoever was talking to them six months earlier. Being the company that shaped it is worth more than being the company that responds well.

Verbal commitment is not a deal

You will hear enthusiastic yeses from people who mean them sincerely and cannot deliver them. That is not dishonesty. It is an organisation where the person who wants your product, the person who approves the spend, the person who runs procurement and the person who owns the risk are four different people.

Nobody in a public organisation gets promoted for buying your product. They do get blamed if it goes wrong.

So the question is never "do you want this?" It is "what has to be true for this to be signed, who has to agree, and what have you seen stop something like this before?" Ask that of your champion directly. Good champions answer it in detail, because they have watched it happen.

The blocker nobody warns you about

A large share of stalled public-sector deals are not stalled on your product, your price or your competitor. They are stalled because the organisation does not have a clear picture of its own current state.

I have watched deals sit at effectively agreed for months while the buyer worked out what they already had, who owned it, and what was in the existing contract. Nothing you say about your product moves that.

What moves it is helping them do the work. Map their current state with them. It feels like unpaid consulting, and it is the fastest way through, because you are removing the actual obstacle instead of pushing harder on the one you can see.

Answer the risk questions before they are asked

Security, data ownership and exit are not procurement box-ticking. They are the questions the person carrying the risk will ask, and being ready is a genuine advantage over a competitor who is not.

Have a plain-English answer ready for: where the data lives, who owns it, what happens to it if they stop paying, what happens if you are acquired or fail, and what your security posture actually is. If you do not yet have a formal certification, say so and say what you do have. A straight answer beats an evasive one every time.

Plan the timeline honestly

Cycles here run in quarters, not weeks, and they bend around budget rounds, elections and long-term plans. That is survivable if you have planned for it and fatal if you have staked your runway on a signature in six weeks.

Build the cash-flow assumption around the slow version. Then a fast one is a bonus rather than the plan.

So look at your best public-sector deal right now: do you know which budget it comes from, and when that budget is set?