I work in pre-sales in cybersecurity. I want to just throw out some advice if you are buying software. I will have a few of these over time, so these are just a few items off the top of my head. This will help you have a good experience in your buying.
- Have a real project. This seems obvious, but I regularly talk to folks that tell me they want to have demos and do POCs and then don't have any real project or budget. This is infuriating for the seller team, but more importantly, it's a waste of your time. Make sure you have a real project.
- If you decide to POC a product, have success criteria for what you're going to actually test. This is the simplest way to make sure you're capturing real value from the product and comparing different vendors in the market.
- RFIs are only marginally useful. Understand that sales teams are incentivized to say yes to everything in an RFI up front, with the expectation of clarifying capabilities as you go along.
- Make sure you understand what you really want out of a product. There are a lot of cool features in products, but if, on the other end, it doesn't solve the real business problem you have, you're just wasting money.
- This is selfish for me, but don't be a jerk to the sales teams. I get it; we can be persistent and annoying in trying to get you to talk to just us, but once we're in the process of working with you on a deal, understand we're human and we didn't build the product. No product is perfect. I talk to lovely people all the time, but occasionally there are some dudes out there that have a real axe to grind. I'll put on a happy face because I want to get paid, but know that it only makes life harder and can cost you discounts on the backside if you're a real jerk.
- Have a real project. This seems obvious, but I regularly talk to folks that tell me they want to have demos and do POCs and then don't have any real project or budget. This is infuriating for the seller team, but more importantly, it's a waste of your time. Make sure you have a real project.
- If you decide to POC a product, have success criteria for what you're going to actually test. This is the simplest way to make sure you're capturing real value from the product and comparing different vendors in the market.
- RFIs are only marginally useful. Understand that sales teams are incentivized to say yes to everything in an RFI up front, with the expectation of clarifying capabilities as you go along.
- Make sure you understand what you really want out of a product. There are a lot of cool features in products, but if, on the other end, it doesn't solve the real business problem you have, you're just wasting money.
- This is selfish for me, but don't be a jerk to the sales teams. I get it; we can be persistent and annoying in trying to get you to talk to just us, but once we're in the process of working with you on a deal, understand we're human and we didn't build the product. No product is perfect. I talk to lovely people all the time, but occasionally there are some dudes out there that have a real axe to grind. I'll put on a happy face because I want to get paid, but know that it only makes life harder and can cost you discounts on the backside if you're a real jerk.