April 13, 2021
by Mara Calvello
What can G2 Track do for you?
Learn more about the challenges G2 Track can solve at your company with a free demo.
When it comes to your SaaS tech stack, there’s a lot to keep track of.
From keeping all of your contracts organized to ensuring all of your data is secure, it’s nearly impossible to do it all in a spreadsheet.
To stay informed regarding all of your SaaS applications, it’s in your best interest to give yourself some peace of mind that your organization is utilizing a SaaS system of record to do the heavy lifting for you.
If you’ve found your company experiencing the same SaaS challenges regularly, let G2 Track solve them for you.
A large company often has endless amounts of products and SaaS tools within its tech stack.
Without the visibility that comes with a SaaS management tool, it could be extremely difficult to know that your sales team and marketing team are using two different, but similar, project management tools.
Or maybe two teams are using two different expense management SaaS applications. Even though these two tools are different, they have similar functionality and features, which is where overlap comes into play. Meaning your company is paying for the same features and functionality – twice.
Additionally, SaaS tools are always going through updates regarding their features and functionality. What was once two different software solutions at the beginning of your fiscal year can look very similar, with the same user experience and delivery model at the end of the year, thanks to new developments and software improvements.
Whatever the case may be, it’s more common than you think to have overlapping SaaS products.
One of many benefits of using a SaaS management tool like G2 Track is it can identify any overlap in functionality between various software solutions. When you know where there’s feature or product overlap, it’s easy to pinpoint new ways to not only cut costs but trim out any unnecessary and overlapping tools, which can free up more of your company’s budget to be spent on tools your teams actually need.
By assessing these redundancies in software your company is experiencing, G2 Track provides clear and concise data needed to make smarter software decisions that are in the best interests of their company’s strategy, employees, budget, and customers.
G2 Track Review, Marcus W.
Another common challenge businesses of all shapes and sizes face from a large SaaS stack is shadow IT.
Shadow IT encompasses all of the information technology (IT) systems and software that your company uses and manages without the knowledge or approval of the IT department or relevant stakeholders. It can also refer to when a company and one of its employees have both purchased a software license, meaning the company is paying for the same tool twice.
Having an abundance of shadow IT comes with its own unique risks, including an increased likelihood of a data breach. This is because so many shadow IT apps usually have features centered around file sharing, file storage, and collaboration, which can result in a leak of sensitive data. Pair this with the fact that these applications aren’t backed up by systems the IT team manages, and tons of critical data are now within reach of hackers, resulting in substantial damage to your company.
of IT professionals reported that employees stored company data on unsanctioned cloud services.
Source: G2 Track data
In addition to a breach, shadow IT can also result in inefficient collaboration across departments, compliance concerns, redundant apps, and wasted budget spend.
When your IT department utilizes G2 Track, they’ll easily be able to uncover every app and tool that uses employee and company data, as well as flag apps that have yet to be provisioned.
This means that your company will have visibility into shadow IT before it becomes a problem too big to handle, as G2 Track can detect all software vendors, including ones that may have slipped under the radar. By eliminating potential security risks that stem from compromised shadow IT, G2 Track supports the business’ ability to increase efficiency, advocate for transparency, and strategically and securely move forward.
No matter your company’s size or industry, it’s important for the health of your business that you don’t overspend your annual budget. Planning out a yearly budget is high stakes and should be taken seriously as it can be detrimental to your company, brand, and employees if you overspend.
To get a handle on how much your company is spending on SaaS tools, you’ll need to know more about software spend optimization, which is the process of managing not only your spend on software, but your contracts, account usage, and compliance.
If your team is in the dark regarding how much of the overall budget is allotted to be spent on software, it’s only a matter of time until you’re in the red. Being ill-informed about your company’s software budget can also lead to:
When your company utilizes a tool like G2 Track, your company will have 360-degree visibility into budget and company spending.
It’s common for companies of all shapes and sizes to struggle with their SaaS budget, especially when it’s kept inside a spreadsheet. But there’s simply too much information to keep track of, especially when you consider the fact that spreadsheets are static without the ability to incorporate information dynamically and receive updates in real-time.
SaaS spend management tools like G2 Track help organizations streamline and optimize internal software spend, utilization, contracts, and compliance by seamlessly housing and visualizing your technology stack.
When everything is automated, it makes it possible for your company to spend less time managing SaaS spend and more time working towards company success. For start-ups, it allows you to put the little things on the backburner so that you can focus on hypergrowth and scale effectively. For enterprise companies, it tracks the complicated movements between departments, managers, and different offices.
As your SaaS stack grows, so will the number of software contracts you need to keep track of. Once a contract is signed and the software is successfully implemented, there are a lot of details to keep organized.
These details include:
And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Utilizing spreadsheet solutions that are often incomplete – and therefore ineffective – will only hurt your organization in the long run as they try to make strategic decisions to reach their goals.
The contract dashboard in G2 Track is designed to complete transparency surrounding contract details.
As a system of record, G2 Track showcases all important details and software-related contracts, subscriptions, and credit card purchases in one easy-to-navigate dashboard. Customers will receive notifications in real time so they can examine renewal and termination dates, total contract value, type of billing cycle, auto-renewal information, and other important details, so nothing ever goes missed.
of software contracts have an auto-renew clause and a notice period for cancellation between 30 and 90 days.
Source: G2 Track data
With the dashboard, it’s easy to see a breakdown of which contracts expire or renew each month, if it’s time to assign a new contract owner, how many active contracts are within your tech stack, and so much more. Never again will a software contract renew or expire without you knowing about it first.
Best of all, enterprise customers of G2 Track enjoy the convenience of the Contract Concierge. The concierge team allows customers to save time by entering details of future contracts into the G2 Track database for them.
G2 Track Review, Carla S.
When it comes to software utilization, how do you know your company is making the best decision for its own unique needs?
For instance, when a contract is set to renew, how will you make a decision regarding software seats? Do you currently have enough, too many, or too few? Going too far in either direction can result in overspending on seats. In addition, are the employees who do have a seat even using the software? How often are they logging in – and for how long?
Having your data stagnant in a spreadsheet will make it impossible to get your hands on these answers.
With a tool like G2 Track, customers can easily monitor, audit, and evaluate how their license utilization is fluctuating, providing a clear picture of how their company is utilizing the software they’re paying for.
In just a few clicks, stakeholders can see whether they’ve purchased too many or not enough seats in the license agreement for a particular software solution. When the contract is set to renew, they can use the data to rightsize the contract and come to a decision to keep, replace, or stop using the application altogether.
Also, it allows IT admins to better distribute seats that are going unused. They can easily see which employees have a seat, but aren’t using the software regularly enough, and then relocate it to an employee who will actually use it. With this data, instead of spending more of your budget for more seats, they can just be assigned in a smarter fashion.
Having accurate information surrounding how many licenses are paid, how many are free, how many are currently allocated, and how many are actively in use ensures your organization is getting the most out of its SaaS budget.
Data breaches, identity theft, phishing scams, to name a few, are all prevalent security concerns that we often hear or large companies experiencing because of a lack of security measures in place. Pair this with having multiple spreadsheets and contract databases floating around that just about any employee can access, and you’ve got a big security mess on your hands.
The SaaS tools your company uses house a ton of information, especially financial data. Because of this, it’s crucial that your organization utilize a SaaS management tool to keep sensitive information under lock and key at all times.
G2 Track offers customers total peace of mind, thanks to being committed to uncompromised data quality and SaaS security.
When you combine Amazon Web Services and the tight, proprietary security controls unique to G2 Track, you get a SaaS management tool that delivers IT, finance, and procurement professionals secure access to the information they need. G2 Track makes protecting customer data a top priority and utilizes real-only pathways through single sign-on software for the utmost peace of mind.
Plus, G2 Track provides customers with a central location to manage vendor security and compliance. With a comprehensive list of compliance regulations, assessments, and certifications needed, customers can stay one step ahead of any potential issues, as well as see which vendors don’t meet compliance standards.
Having this knowledge arms customers with the ability to protect themselves from costly fines, while knowing their private data or confidential customer information is kept secure at all times.
You know your organization has a never-ending list of SaaS tools within its tech stack. But how confident are you that your employees are using these apps?
You may know that your marketing team has purchased a certain SEO tool, but do you know if their utilization of the app is worth the cost? How can you be sure your company is getting its money’s worth in terms of employee and department use?
Without a SaaS management tool, you’ll be left wondering if the apps you’re spending money on truly help teams collaborate more effectively.
To avoid guessing how your apps are being used, and to promote alignment between departments, G2 Track houses a complete list of every app your company uses, which department owns the app, who’s logging in, and how often.
In this dashboard, customers can see in just a few clicks not only how much is being spent on a SaaS tool, but what the login activity looks like, the name of each employee logging in, when their last login was, how many logins an employee has a month, as well as data surrounding the contract owner and if there are any overlapping products.
Having immediate access to current and accurate data supports an unbiased, data-driven assessment of what fits and what doesn’t for the long-term – preventing inaccurate (yet passionately held) opinions from influencing the wrong decision.
When it comes to SaaS tools, no one likes surprises.
Whether it’s the overall company strategy, budget, or employee breakdown, some things are just good to know – like knowing the ins and outs of your total software footprint. Without having these insights, the decisions your company makes, for the short and the long term, could be wildly off base. As we turn more and more to the cloud for our tools, knowing the ins and outs of your total software footprint is more important than ever.
G2 Track makes it possible for finance, IT, and procurement teams to identify all software that is being purchased and licensed within their organization. Having this comprehensive data at your fingertips gives customers the ability to make smarter decisions and get organized regarding their technology strategy.
Having this information allows organizations of all sizes to better set up their budget and employees for long-term success.
G2 Track Review, Administrator in Financial Services
Who makes the software buying decisions at your company?
If it’s not with your employees, chances are good that you’re not making SaaS decisions with your team in mind. When this is the case, it’s difficult to foster an inclusive culture within your organization when choosing the right software.
You could be purchasing software that your employees don’t enjoy using, don’t need to get their daily responsibilities done, or one that overlaps with a different SaaS tool.
of purchased software products have a user satisfaction rating lower than 4 stars.
Source: G2 Track data
To know how your employees really feel about the SaaS solutions within your stack, there’s the employee sentiment hub within G2 Track.
When customers collect user sentiment data, the process includes asking employees or team members what software tools they believe are actually worth having, using, and paying for. One of the best ways to gather this kind of data is to send out an employee pulse survey.
These surveys make it easy for team members to share their feedback directly with stakeholders and decision-makers as a way to influence the tech stack within the organization. This provides customers the chance to not only grow company culture but also boost employee trust and keep communication about software solutions front and center so everyone is on the same page.
Once responses are back from employees, the pulse survey provides decision-makers with four possible outcomes.
When it comes to a SaaS management tool that solves all of your SaaS-related challenges, look no further than G2 Track.
If you’d like to learn more about what this comprehensive SaaS management tool can do for your business, request a demo to start optimizing your entire tech stack, software spend, contracts, and more.
Mara Calvello is a Content Marketing Manager at G2. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Elmhurst College (now Elmhurst University). Mara currently works on our G2 Tea newsletter, while also writing customer marketing content. She previously wrote content to support categories on artificial intelligence, natural language understanding (NLU), AI code generation, synthetic data, and more. In her spare time, she's out exploring with her rescue dog Zeke or enjoying a good book.
What can G2 Track do for you?
Learn more about the challenges G2 Track can solve at your company with a free demo.
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