Secure enough budget | Have a budget alignment meeting among your finance team and stakeholders to assess the most probable, licensing, onboarding, and integration costs. |
Create a realistic monthly budget | Entry level accounting products usually cost $40 per user per month, with most firms dedicating $100 per user per month or less. Use this to benchmark pricing. |
Compare pricing tiers side-by-side | Check what’s included in the plans on offer. Remember: some features may only be accessible in higher tiers. |
Check for user limits and scalability | Look for plans that support your current team size and that contain room to grow with you. |
Watch for hidden costs | Ask vendors about onboarding and training costs and overage charges. |
Improve stakeholder communication | Set a log of shared decisions to track vendor feedback, demo notes and actions. |
Engage a diverse group of stakeholders | Include members of your IT, accounting, operation and other possible end users. |
Perform a needs assessment | Identify your company’s financial goals and main pain points, then have key stakeholders assess function and non-function requirements based on workflows and compliance needs. |
Perform a security review | Create a checklist of required security standards you’ll need (e.g. encryption or SOC 2 audit) to meet compliant standards such as GDPR, SOX or GLBA. This can be included on your RFP or sent to vendors. |
Perform a vendor risk assessment | Use a simple matrix to evaluate each vendor’s financial stability, support responsiveness, and compliance. |
Revise the vendor selection process | Consider options outside your initial assessment and use trusted sources accountants use to choose products such as review sites, expert advice or user reviews. |
Start with a free trial or freemium plan | Use this to test the interface, features, integrations and general ease of use before signing a contract. |
Consider reviews from smaller companies | Check at least 10 reviews from businesses that are the same size as yours to understand applicable pros and cons. |