Software Stack Audits

01

Start with what's actually on the card

Software spend piles up quietly. A tool bought for one project. Seats for people who left. Two products doing the same job because two departments solved it separately. An annual renewal nobody's questioned in three years.

We'll start with the statement, not the sales pitch. Every subscription, what it costs, who has a seat, when anyone last logged in.

Annual contracts get flagged with their renewal date. The window before a tool auto-renews for another year is your only real chance to cut it, and it's easy to miss.

02

Where the money usually is

It's three places, almost every time. Seats assigned to people who don't need them. Two tools doing one job because nobody consolidated. A plan tier bought for a feature the team never turned on.

None of that needs new software to fix. It needs somebody to sit down with the invoices and ask uncomfortable questions, which is exactly the job nobody inside the business has time for.

There's a fourth place that's harder to see. Tools bought to solve a problem that a process change already solved, still running because cancelling them was never anybody's job.

03

What your industry actually runs on

Once the waste is out, the question becomes what's missing. That's where the research matters. The best tool for a fifteen-person construction firm isn't the best tool for a law office, and neither one is whatever ranks first on a review site.

We look at what comparable operations in your industry run, what integrates with what you already have, and what your team will realistically adopt. A tool nobody uses costs more than no tool at all.

Adoption is weighted heavily here. The better product on paper loses to the one your team will actually open, every time, and we'd rather recommend the second one than be right on a spreadsheet.

04

Recommendations you can act on without us

You get the findings either way. Current spend, what to cut, what to consolidate, what to add and why, with the numbers behind each call.

If you want us to implement it, we'll do it. If you'd rather hand it to your team and run it yourself, the report's written so you can. We don't make the recommendation depend on hiring us for the next phase.

05

What you actually get

A written findings document, not a call where we tell you things you'll forget. Every tool you pay for, what it costs annually, who holds a seat, and when they last logged in.

Then the recommendations, each with the number behind it. Cut this and save that. Consolidate these two. Keep this one even though it looks expensive, and here's why.

It's written so your team can act on it without us. That's deliberate. A report that only works if you hire the author isn't a report, it's a sales document.

06

What the first few weeks look like

We start with the card statement and the admin panels. Every subscription, every seat, every renewal date. Most owners have never seen this in one place, and the list on its own usually gets a reaction.

Then we talk to the people using the tools, because the invoice tells you what you bought and only the team tells you what they actually open. The gap between those two is where most of the money is.

Industry research comes last. Once we know what you have and what you actually need, we look at what comparable operations run and what would survive contact with your team.

07

How this gets scoped and priced

Fixed scope, quoted on the first call, based on how many tools are in play and how many people we need to talk to.

The audit is priced to stand alone. If the findings say implement it yourself, that's a fine outcome and the engagement is finished. We'd rather be the firm that saved you a subscription than the one that sold you three.

08

When this isn't the right call

If you're running three tools and know exactly what each one does, there's nothing here worth paying for. This earns its keep somewhere north of ten or twelve subscriptions, or when nobody can say what a line item on the statement is for.

And if you already know the tool you need and just want it set up, that's an implementation, not an audit. Say so and we'll quote that instead.