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Businesses are increasingly relying on SaaS apps to lower costs and enhance security. While software asset management (SAM) tools have long helped organizations track and manage traditional software licenses, they fail to address the challenges that come with SaaS.
SAM tools lack the capability to effectively optimize SaaS spending, manage user licenses, and ensure compliance in the evolving cloud-based applications.
Comprehensive SaaS management requires a more specialized approach to truly harness the benefits of cloud software while mitigating associated risks. This article will show why SAM tools aren't the best and what you can do instead.
TL;DR
- SAM tools are designed for on-premises software and struggle with managing the complexities of SaaS applications, leading to inefficiencies and missed opportunities for optimization.
- SaaS management platforms (SMPs) like CloudEagle.ai provide comprehensive visibility, better control, and deeper insights into SaaS usage, enabling more effective license management, cost optimization, and security.
- SAM tools lack automation in key areas like license harvesting, user provisioning, and procurement workflows, which are critical for efficient SaaS management and cost savings.
- Dedicated SMPs offer integrated vendor and contract management, automated provisioning/deprovisioning, and real-time compliance monitoring, addressing gaps that SAM tools can't fill.
- Adopting an SMP like CloudEagle.ai enhances operational efficiency, reduces risks, and maximizes ROI on SaaS investments by providing a tailored solution for managing cloud-based applications.
Limitations of SAM Tools in SaaS Management
While they are valuable for providing surface-level usage insights on software licenses, SAM tools fall short in several critical areas of SaaS management due to limited integration capabilities. These limitations can greatly impact your organization's ability to optimize SaaS investments and control your SaaS portfolio.
1. Focus on On-Premises Software
SAM tools focus heavily on on-premises software, which poses challenges in the SaaS stack. These tools are typically best at tracking installed software and managing perpetual licenses.
However, they struggle to adapt to the subscription-based model of SaaS applications. As a result, you will find it difficult to accurately track and manage your SaaS subscriptions, potentially leading to overspending or underutilization of valuable resources.
2. Difficulty Keeping up With Constant Changes
The SaaS sector is incredibly dynamic, with new features, pricing models, and vendors coming in regularly. SAM tools, designed for more stable on-premises portfolios, often lack the agility to keep pace with these rapid changes.
As a result, you may miss out on opportunities to optimize your SaaS portfolio or fail to adapt to new pricing structures, resulting in unnecessary costs and inefficiencies.
3. Limited Visibility Into SaaS Usage
Another limitation is the lack of profound visibility into SaaS usage and consumption patterns. Unlike dedicated SaaS management platforms (SMPs) with extensive integration libraries, SAM tools typically have limited connections to SaaS applications.
This shortcoming means you can't access real-time, granular usage data down to the feature level. Without this detailed insight, you'll struggle to make informed decisions about license allocation, renewals, and cost optimization.
The limited integration capabilities of SAM tools with SaaS apps create additional challenges. These tools often can't directly integrate with your organization's vast array of SaaS applications.
As a result, you'll face difficulties in gathering data on usage, costs, and compliance across your entire SaaS portfolio.
The inability of SAM tools to provide deeper, actionable insights on license usage and advanced analytics for SaaS optimization is another shortcoming.
Without robust integration and analysis capabilities, you'll miss opportunities to rightsize licenses, identify redundant applications, and optimize your overall SaaS spend. This limitation can result in financial waste and reduced operational efficiency.
4. Security Concerns
The rapidly evolving nature of SaaS applications presents ongoing security challenges that SAM tools struggle to address.
SaaS providers frequently update their services, potentially introducing new security vulnerabilities or changing compliance requirements.
SAM tools are designed for more static softwares, which is why they lack the capability to continuously monitor and assess these security concerns. As a result, you may expose your organization to unnecessary risks and compliance violations.
Key Areas Where SAM Tools Fall Short
SAM underperform in many crucial areas that are essential for effective SaaS management. Let's see these key shortcomings in detail:
1. Automation
Automation is a major weakness of SAM tools. The digital landscape is so fast-paced, and you need solutions that can automate repetitive tasks and streamline processes.
Unfortunately, SAM tools lack the ability to automate. They struggle to automatically harvest licenses, leaving you to manually track and reclaim unused subscriptions.
These tools fall short in automating user provisioning, forcing your IT team to spend a lot of time on routine setup tasks.
SAM tools also fail to provide automated workflows for procurement and app access requests, which creates bottlenecks in your operations and slows down your business processes.
2. Contract and Renewal Management
Contract and renewal management poses a big challenge that SAM tools fail to address adequately.
SaaS contracts often involve complex pricing structures, tiered subscriptions, and varied renewal terms. SAM tools lack the sophisticated features needed to track these intricacies effectively.
As a result, you may miss opportunities to renew contracts on time and optimize pricing or fail to renegotiate favorable terms during renewals.
Without proper contract management, you risk overspending on unnecessary licenses or facing unexpected cost increases when contracts auto-renew.
3. Vendor Management
Vendor management is another area where SAM tools fall short. In the SaaS sector, you likely deal with numerous vendors, each with their specific offerings and relationship dynamics.
SAM tools typically lack features to help you manage these multiple vendor relationships effectively. They don't provide centralized platforms for storing vendor information, tracking communication history, or managing negotiation processes.
Consequently, you may struggle to leverage your buying power across different vendors or miss out on potential discounts and favorable terms.
4. Procurement
Procurement processes also suffer from the limitations of SAM tools. These tools lack integrated workflows to streamline and automate the procurement of new SaaS applications or the renewal of existing subscriptions.
Without automated approval processes and centralized purchasing systems, you face increased risks of duplicate purchases, non-compliant software acquisitions, and missed renewal deadlines.
Without workflows, procurement teams must chase stakeholders for approvals instead of focusing on their tasks, impacting their productivity.
5. Onboarding/Offboarding
Onboarding and offboarding is another gap in SAM tool capabilities. When new employees join your organization or existing ones leave or change roles, you need to quickly provision or deprovision their access to various SaaS applications.
SAM tools lack the ability to automate these processes, forcing your IT teams to manually handle user account creation, permission settings, and access revocations.
This manual approach consumes valuable time and increases the risk of security breaches due to overlooked access points or delayed account deactivations.
6. Real-Time Compliance and Security Monitoring
Real-time compliance and security monitoring are critical areas where SAM tools fall woefully short.
The regulatory sector is rapidly evolving, and new threats are coming out daily. So, you need tools that provide continuous insights into your SaaS portfolio's compliance and security status.
SAM tools typically lack the capability to monitor real-time data access patterns, identify potential security vulnerabilities, or alert you to compliance violations across your SaaS applications.
Without these features, you may expose your organization to significant legal, financial, and reputational risks.
Why a Dedicated SaaS Management Solution is Necessary
As your organization's SaaS portfolio grows, you need more than just basic SAM tools to effectively manage your cloud-based applications.
Dedicated SMPs like CloudEagle.ai have the features to address the challenges that come with SaaS management. Let's see why they are necessary:
Comprehensive Visibility and Control
One of the primary advantages you get with dedicated SaaS management platforms is comprehensive visibility and control.
CloudEagle.ai, for instance, boasts an extensive integration library of over 500 applications. This wide-ranging compatibility lets you get complete visibility into your entire SaaS stack.
Unlike traditional SAM tools, CloudEagle.ai provides deeper usage data, drilling down to the feature level of each application. For example, you can track the number of meeting books and the meeting durations on Zoom using CloudEagle.ai.
This insight helps you make informed decisions about license allocation and application utilization. The platform also offers actionable insights to help you identify opportunities for optimization and cost-saving measures.
Integrated Vendor and Contract Management
Integrated vendor and contract management capabilities set SMPs apart from basic SAM tools. SMPs like CloudEagle.ai help centralize all your vendor information and contract details in one place.
This centralization streamlines your ability to track renewal dates, renew on time, and effectively manage relationships with multiple SaaS vendors.
The platform's AI-powered contract management feature automatically extracts key metadata from contracts, saving you time and reducing the risk of manual errors.
CloudEagle.ai's vendor research module allows you to compare features, read reviews, and connect with industry peers, empowering you to make informed decisions when selecting new vendors or renegotiating existing contracts.
Cost Optimization
Cost optimization is another critical area where SMPs excel. CloudEagle.ai helps you identify unused, duplicate, and redundant applications and licenses, keeping your SaaS spend optimized.
The platform's spend optimization feature provides usage insights that allow you to eliminate low-usage apps and reduce unnecessary costs.
For example, CloudEagle.ai helped Falkonry achieve a 50% reduction in SaaS spending by providing crucial data points for vendor negotiations and identifying optimization opportunities.
Procurement and Renewal Management
You also benefit from procurement and renewal management from dedicated SaaS management solutions.
CloudEagle.ai offers no-code procurement workflows that streamline the entire purchasing process. These workflows automate notifications to relevant stakeholders via Slack and email, ensuring transparency and reducing delays.
Additionally, the platform's renewal workflows start up to 90 days in advance, giving you ample time to assess your needs, negotiate terms, and avoid costly auto-renewals.
The Slack integration further enhances these processes, allowing you to raise purchase requests, approve or deny app access, and manage renewals directly within your communication platform.
License Management and License Harvesting
License management and harvesting are other areas where SMPs like CloudEagle.ai shine.
The platform's license reclamation workflows automatically identify underutilized licenses, allowing you to deprovision users and reallocate licenses efficiently.
A prime example of this is RingCentral's experience with CloudEagle.ai. The company deprovisioned 932 users from underutilized Salesforce licenses, saving $1.2 million and 1,562 hours annually in SaaS management time.
This case study demonstrates the powerful impact of automated license harvesting on both cost savings and operational efficiency.
Automated Provisioning and Deprovisioning
Automated provisioning and deprovisioning capabilities further distinguish SMPs from traditional SAM tools.
CloudEagle.ai offers auto-provisioning workflows that grant new employees access to relevant applications based on their roles and departments. This automation ensures that new hires can be productive from day one without waiting for manual access approvals.
Conversely, the platform's deprovisioning workflows automatically revoke access when an employee leaves the organization or remains inactive for a specified period.
These features save time for your IT team and enhance security by preventing unauthorized access to sensitive data.
Compliance and Detailed Reports
Compliance and detailed reporting features round out the advantages of dedicated SaaS management solutions.
CloudEagle.ai helps you verify the compliance certifications of all your SaaS apps, mitigating risks associated with data privacy and security regulations.
The platform also offers 37 custom spend reports for in-depth financial analysis, allowing you to effectively track and forecast expenses and streamline SaaS budgeting for your organization.
Conclusion
Traditional SAM tools fall short in managing the complex SaaS portfolio. They lack the comprehensive visibility, automation, and specialized features needed to optimize your SaaS stack effectively.
A dedicated SaaS management solution like CloudEagle.ai offers superior control over your SaaS applications, from cost optimization to license management and compliance.
If you adopt a dedicated SaaS management platform like CloudEagle.ai, you can streamline operations, reduce risks, and maximize ROI on your SaaS investments.
Don't let your SaaS stack spiral out of control. Take charge of your SaaS applications today. Book a demo with CloudEagle.ai and see how you will transform your SaaS management strategy for better efficiency and substantial cost savings.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is the purpose of the SAM tool?
SAM tools primarily manage on-premises software licenses, track installations, and ensure compliance. They help organizations optimize software usage and reduce licensing costs for traditional software.
2. Why is SaaS management important?
SaaS management is crucial because it helps control costs, enhance security, ensure compliance, and optimize the usage of cloud-based applications. It provides visibility into your entire SaaS portfolio, preventing shadow IT and redundant subscriptions.
3. Can a SaaS management tool do the work of the SAM tool?
Yes, advanced SaaS Management Platforms (SMPs) like CloudEagle.ai can perform SAM functions and offer additional features tailored for cloud-based software management.
4. Can SAM tools be used with SMPs?
While possible, it's more efficient to use a comprehensive SMP. These platforms integrate SAM functionalities with specialized SaaS management features, providing a unified solution for all your software management needs.
