Mastering cloud sales at UpCloud

Our Sales Lead and Senior Account Executive Jannika Jokinen landed in sales almost by accident. Growing up with entrepreneurial parents, she was always immersed in a sales-driven environment, even tagging along to her parents’ workplaces as a kid. It turns out, this early exposure stuck. Despite studying marketing management and initially envisioning a career as a project manager, sales simply “took over.” She quickly realized, “This is actually fun!”

Why UpCloud was calling

Jannika wanted to shift her career towards strategic sales. Where SaaS sales can often be very transactional – “there’s a specific product, a price for it, and off you go.” However, selling an infrastructure as a service is a completely different ballgame. “This is so business-critical for companies,” Jannika emphasizes. It demands a much deeper technical understanding, plus a solid grasp of the overall business.

The industry itself was also a big draw. Having spent a long time in IT, including at Microsoft,  Jannika had been observing the cloud sector from the sidelines. There aren’t that many so technically focused and successful national companies like UpCloud in Finland. It’s a source of pride that UpCloud originates from here!

What’s truly exciting is the ability to win cases where a new customer migrates from an AWS, for example, to our environment after learning about UpCloud. UpCloud partnership becomes part of the client’s overall cloud strategy. It’s arguably cool that we’re able to complement or compete with the world’s biggest tech firms!

From new leads to key accounts

When Jannika first joined UpCloud, her focus was primarily on new customer acquisition. However, right from the start, she was given a lot of freedom and support. “These people really believed in me and my ideas,” she explains, leading to continuous increases in responsibility and significant successes. UpCloud saw Jannika’s potential and empowered her to go “full speed.”

It didn’t take long for Jannika to start turning strategic insights into sales. While new customers are still part of her job, a large portion now involves key accounts, and helping them on a business strategy level, actually to grow their business. This, in addition to internal initiatives keeps Jannika’s day to day busy yet fulfilling.

Deep dives and trust-building

A lot of Jannika’s days revolve around customers, involving deep strategic discussions as well as some outbound prospecting. She participates in initial technical conversations with potential clients and also collaborates internally with UpCloud’s marketing team, developing new materials and refining our communication.

It’s incredibly rewarding to reach a stage with a customer where mutual trust is built, allowing open, honest discussions. The collaboration with customers is a two-way street. A prime example is UpCloud’s partnership with Telia, which challenges UpCloud to continuously innovate.

“We help them implement their strategy and ensure their customers receive the best possible service.”

Jannika Jokinen

The ever-evolving tech landscape: value over volume

What excites Jannika right now is the current tech landscape! The past year has seen a significant shift in mentality where previously, companies bought services somewhat casually. Now, tech isn’t bought just for the sake of buying; the demands are much higher.

Unnecessary spending is cut, and there’s a careful consideration of the true value of a purchased service and what every euro delivers. Global turmoils have also influenced how people think about tech, adding pressure to deliver value, not just technology. Questions like “We do it this way today, but is it still smart in 5 years?” are asked more and more.

Many companies are contemplating the implications of their data residing in overseas data centers, especially with increased security threats and potential infrastructure sabotage. There’s a growing consideration for security, and domestic and European solutions are becoming more popular.

Furthermore, companies have become more cost-aware. Technology services were often bought without much thought to the price, but now there’s an awakening to potentially massive bills, such as data transfer costs, which can also be far more substantial than initially imagined.

“One might not even realize how expensive these services may be when they add up. A company could discover they are spending 10,000 euros a month tied up in a service that isn’t even really needed.”

Jannika Jokinen

UpCloud’s culture: open, trusting, and fun

While always interested in tech, Jannika has been pleasantly surprised by how deeply she’s delved into the technical side at UpCloud. She’s also seen the concrete business value that UpCloud’s tools enable for companies. Jannika engages in highly technical, value-generating discussions with technical people. “It’s fun to notice that I can understand what developers are discussing together!”

Jannika appreciates UpCloud’s very open culture where people are trusted and given responsibility, with opportunities to work on new things, with feedback given and taken in good spirit.

Crucially, at UpCloud, there’s no need to be afraid. Jannika explains that in many other companies, you constantly have to be on guard, wondering what’s next. If someone approaches you for a chat or asks about your work at other employers, it often signals criticism or surveillance. Here, “it’s genuinely someone else interested in what you’re doing, wanting to gain insight to do their job better.” People’s intentions are always fundamentally positive. “Nobody asks questions to grill or spy on you.” Instead, they encourage sparring and engaging in interesting, in-depth discussions, wanting to help.

Challenge the perception of sales as a necessary evil, Jannika want’s to highlight that sales roles are far broader than commonly thought, encompassing strategic client work, project management, and more. She offers encouragement to those who might feel self-conscious about working in sales, thinking, “I’m just a seller.” In reality, “few people can wear 10 different hats and do what sales work demands. No one in this job is ‘just a seller,’ they are true professionals!”