This is part 5 of a series on choosing a Customer Reference Management Solution.

You’ve completed the demonstrations and hands-on evaluations of your finalists. This is usually where procurement gets involved and where the potential exists for business needs to be trumped by purchasing process and requirements.

A Better RFP
In the most formal of situations procurement will introduce an RFP previously used for 100 other purchases, tweak it just a little and send out to those of us on the short list. This is often a disheartening process for vendors. The questions asked are almost never the same questions our business contacts have asked or still need answers to. In some cases the questions are about a different solution. In our case, we’ve seen RFPs full of questions that assume we’re an on-premise application versus the hosted/SaaS solution we are. It can be an awfully unproductive use of everyone’s time.

Our advice? Don’t cede complete control of this stage to your procurement group. Be sure to educate them on your needs and the nature of the solution. Review the RFP with them to be sure it’s spot-on and captures what you need.

References for the Reference Company
Well, of course you need to check references for the reference management system provider. We’re all in the business so we know the basic questions to ask. But here are a few different tacks to take:

• How are the people, the quality of the people, behind the day to day service?
• Are they customer-centric?
• How flexible have you found the system to be?
• How long does it take to get changes made?
• How easy is it to get data out of the system?
• What, if any, unexpected charges have you experienced?
• How has the stability of the system been?
• How often do you encounter bugs?
• How quickly are they addressed, relative to impact on your program?
• Have you ever had a major issue that required escalation? How was it handled?
• Would you choose them again knowing what you know?

One of the toughest things to assess is reputation, the ethics of a provider. Do they consistently do the right thing? It’s so important because bells and whistles only get you so far. To get to the heart of this issue, you need a larger data set. Fortunately there are more resources since the founding of the Customer Reference Forum back in 2004. As a result there are annual events, online forums and even regional meetings. Dive right in and ask around. This is a very generous, sharing group of people.

The Holy Grail of References
Reference managers do change companies and inherit different systems. If you have an opportunity to speak with someone who has used each of the systems on your vendor shortlist then you have hit gold! These people have “lived” with multiple systems and have the perspective to draw comparisons.

To recap:

1. References with experience using a single vendor – good
2. A single vendor reference + a solid hands-on evaluation – great
3. All of the above + a reference with experience using the systems from your finalists – priceless

The Final Act
After the selection is complete, be nice to all the vendors who jumped through hoops to get you what you needed. It’s a small community and you’ll likely see vendor representatives again, maybe even want to switch to them in the future. Whenever I personally have to call the 2nd and 3rd place vendors after a purchase decision for my company I first thank them, then tell them where they fell short, and remain mindful that I may need them in the future.

Best wishes for a successful vendor selection!

Checkout the complete Choosing a System podcast series.