If your SaaS business has survived beyond the pandemic, you did something right. Either you reduced churn or got your renewals and renegotiations right. This article explores how SaaS contract management software is the next step in your digital transformation and how it helps you stay on top of renewals and renegotiations. It insulates you from the onslaught of changing market dynamics.
Read on.
What is SaaS contract management software?
SaaS contract management software is a cloud-based system that helps you create, approve, negotiate, organize, track, and agree contracts faster. Born in the era when SaaS was reborn, it boosts legal productivity, protects your data, and streamlines your contract admin efficiently.
Why is SaaS contract management software important?
Cloud Eagle reports that a typical organization of 500 employees has over 300 tools. This exacts hundreds of hours managing and renewing SaaS apps, detecting duplicates or overpaid apps, and identifying licenses that have not been used in the past month or quarter.
SaaS contracts, by nature, scope, and complexity, tend to sprawl as do their unique set of challenges. Here’s how they’re different from other contracts and why you need software to manage them.
1. Faster subscription renewals
Unlike one-time purchases, SaaS contracts involve recurring billings, dynamic user metrics, and evolving service levels. This increases in complexity as contract volumes increase. Contract management software helps you maintain a renewal calendar and streamlines recurring payments and other changing clauses accurately and punctually. You don’t have to wait for renewals to start saving and you no longer need to track vendor renewals or manage obligations in spreadsheets.
2. Better interdepartmental collaboration for approvals
Legal, sales, and finance teams must work together to get these contracts out the door, which requires collaboration. With software, jargon, decentralized teams, and wide approval committees, a CLM ensures nothing falls through the cracks. You can get a comprehensive view of all ongoing contacts in a single dashboard.
3. Faster sales cycles in volatile environments
With the market climate and user licenses evolving, terms of renewal and compliance tend to evolve. The software accelerates the sales cycle compliantly. Besides, features like AI redlining, automated clause detection, version control, and collaboration tools accelerate negotiation cycles, eliminating tedium and improving operational flexibility. They eliminate the need for paper trails.
4. Central streamlined secure management
The software integrates all contracts and contract information in one secure, unified workspace. This reduces the risk of data leaks, miscommunication, and errors while saving you time and administrative burden.
5. Better obligation & compliance management
With a comprehensive view of all your contract obligations, you can track all upcoming deadlines, identify compliance risks, and pre-emptively manage them ahead of schedule.
6. Avoid expensive auto-renewals
Never be caught unawares with auto-renewals again. Get alerts to take timely action to avoid unwanted service extensions or unnecessary overheads.
7. Unlock contract opportunities
The true potential of your contracts extends beyond the point of signature. Get insight into the entire contract portfolio and contract opportunities for potential savings and expansion.
8. Renegotiation prowess
With powerful contract intelligence in your arsenal, you can approach contract renewals with historical data and usage trends without unuseful context-switching and stronger bargaining power. Contract metrics can allow you to develop a better renegotiation plan to optimize contracts for improved financial management and operational flexibility.
HyperStart CLM is expressly built to address these pain points with automated renewal tracking, seamless collaboration, AI-redlining automation to close deals faster, a central secure repository, and an in-flight dashboard.
Best practices in SaaS contract management
Staying on top of SaaS contracts requires navigating intricacies with robust processes and mechanisms. Here are some best practices to maximize value:
1. Automate contract creation
Set up pre-built templates that are approved by legal to reflect your organization’s specific needs. Features like clause libraries and templates increase efficiency and reduce the risk of compliance risks and errors.
2. Set up no-code workflows
Automate compliant workflows to route contracts for approvals. Eliminate the manual chase, delays, and potential bottlenecks. You can use sequential or ad-hoc approvers to suit your organization’s compliance frameworks.
3. Negotiate with confidence
Ditch the time spent on manual reviews, email back and forth, and multiple versions. As an essential part of your deal, get a good grip on the context, history, and expectations. Having a detailed audit trail with centralized version control helps you focus on true value in forging long-term relationships.
4. Execute safely and compliantly
Shaking your hands on it may require multiple safe and legally binding options. For example, e-signature integrations with software like DocuSign or platform native hand-drawn or OTP-based signing options.
5. Integrate with your CRM
Make sure your sales team is empowered to close deals in harmony with legal. So they can focus on sales KPIs and not contract admin. Effective contract management for sales streamlines the process, enabling faster deal closures. And AI-powered renewal tracking directly in your CRM allows you to cross-sell and upsell ahead of time.
6. Obligation tracking and dashboards
Track renewals with AI-extracted dates and auto-reminders sent directly to your inbox. Send automated reminders to users 30, 60, or 90 days in advance for customer retention and business continuity. Track what matters, run regular audits, and monitor performance with contract intelligence dashboards.
7. Centralize and protect all your contract data
A survey conducted by EY Law concluded that 90% of contracting professionals find it challenging to locate contracts after execution. Moreover, 49% of respondents say that they lack a defined process to store contracts after execution. You can overcome these challenges by centralizing contract storage.
Access and protect all your contracts and contract data in one place without juggling between platforms. Find the contract you need to get the full context and history of a deal with smart filters. With metadata auto-extraction, access the data you need without a manual hunt, spot risks proactively, and avoid contract breach penalties.
Top 5 SaaS contract management tools to consider
1. HyperStart
See HyperStart in action ☝️
HyperStart CLM is an end-to-end contracting platform that empowers you to create, agree, and find contracts 80% faster. Powered by HyperVerge’s proprietary AI, it automates manual contracting processes across the lifecycle.
2-second
contract retrieval
Never miss a renewal again
2-minute
first-pass AI redlining
Key features of HyperStart CLM
Create: Self-serve contract creation with dynamic standard templates, intake forms, and conditional logic for internal and counterparty papers. This feature allows you to focus on real opportunities, not routine drafts. Business teams are empowered with compliant, error-free templates for faster turnaround time.
Approve: Streamline approval workflows with easy-to-setup no-code workflows for high-volume contracts. Set compliant guardrails to manage risks and save time on the approval chase with automated email reminders to the right stakeholders.
Review: Automated repetitive tasks with next-gen AI-redlining. Get a first-pass review in 2 minutes saving contract review time by 75%. Send shareable links of a Microsoft Word-based editor for counterparty review. Track redlined versions in real-time. Comment, suggest, and get a detailed log of all approval actions.
Sign: Get fully compliant, legally binding signatures with fewer clicks. Choose from multiple options to sign – hand-drawn or OTP or integrations with DocuSign and Adobe Sign.
Store: Organize, store, and locate all your contracts in a single end-to-end encrypted repository. Instantly find the contract and contract data you need with advanced search filters. Protect sensitive information with role-based access control. Get key contract metadata like renewals, contract value, geography, liabilities, and other KPIs at a glance.
Track: Auto-generate custom dashboards on legal’s performance and business-wide contracts. Build a data-first culture with visualized data and make more confident decisions.
In-flight: Track all pending requests of ongoing contracts in one place. Unblock, measure, and improve your team’s productivity with process metrics like contract review time, turns taken, and contract status all in one in-flight dashboard.
Integrations: HyperStart integrates with key systems to initiate, manage, close, and track contracts, empowering other teams with business ownership of their contracts.
Pros
The HyperStart CLM repository can be implemented in 7 days, not weeks or months, and workflows can be implemented in 2 weeks. So you can realize ROI 75% faster.
HyperStart’s powerful AI automates metadata extraction so you find the contract data you need in 2 seconds with granular filters and never miss a renewal again.
Auto-generate dashboards with comprehensive analytics to reclaim revenue opportunities. Visualize contract metadata with 99% AI accuracy.
HyperStart’s solution is purpose-built for scaling teams, which makes it accessible and affordable without exorbitant consultant fees for setup and support. You get superior value at a fraction of the cost.
Cons
HyperStart currently integrates with ~20 popular business systems like Salesforce, email, OneDrive, SharePoint, and Microsoft Word. However, the product team is agile and responsive to the specific needs of customers outside this pool.
2. Juro
Juro is a popular contract automation software solution that enables legal and business teams to create, agree, and manage contracts faster than ever.
Features
Create: This feature empowers legal teams to set up templates to put routine contracts on autopilot in just a few clicks. Other functionalities like drag-and-drop fields, dynamic contract questionnaires, and conditional logic empower other teams to generate contracts without legal dependency.
Approve: Juro’s no-code workflows get contracts out the door quickly. Compliant approval waterfalls help set approvers with automated reminders.
Review: The native browser with comments and suggestions helps you AI draft, AI redline, and AI summarize contracts.
Sign: Juro offers secure native signing solutions so you don’t have to switch between tools. It is mobile responsive and compliant with eIDAS, E-SIGN, and UETA acts.
Query: This feature has a robust tagging infrastructure and automated reminders for key dates.
Store: Juro’s data layer helps maintain one unified source of truth for all your contacts. It offers structured search and contract reporting which is SOC2 and ISO27001 compliant with 256-bit advanced encryption.
Pros
Juro AI drafts, redlines, and summarizes contracts.
It is GDPR compliant with an IASME certification.
The platform integrates with 5000+ tools like Salesforce, HubSpot, and many more via Zapier for seamless and flexible workflows.
Cons
Users find that access controls and reminders could be more flexible. It is difficult to automate granular or detailed contracts on the platform.
The search functionality requires effective naming, making natural language search ineffective.
Internal reviews require user access, which adds a layer of friction to business-wide adoption.
Juro’s changed from a user-based to volume-based pricing module which chips off its competitive edge.
3. Ironclad
A named contract management leader by Garter and Forrester, Ironclad is designed by legal professionals for legal professionals. Its sophisticated features are suited to complex enterprise requirements.
Features
Workflow designer: This feature allows you to build and automate contract workflows with a self-serve drag-and-drop interface. You can also upload custom templates, add signers and approvers, and conditional clauses wherever necessary.
Editor: Ironclad’s Editor empowers legal teams you redline, revise, collaborate, and negotiate contracts in one place. The DOCX integration helps edit, comment on, and track changes easily.
Repository: An AI-powered repository that allows you to upload contracts at scale and then search, track, and extract data quickly to spot trends and opportunities.
Reporting: This feature provides valuable insight into contract performance, risks, opportunities, and compliance with custom dashboard views, pre-built customizable charts, and precise metadata drill-downs.
Signature: The e-signature solution is embedded in the platform to configure, launch, and sign contracts in one place. It also integrates with popular contract signing software.
Pros
Ironclad’s AI engine tags and stores 194+ AI-detected contract metadata properties. AI Assist helps redline contracts with suggestions, and the AI Editor helps review contracts 60% faster.
Ironclad’s Clickwrap functionality helps gather legally binding signatures in a click eliminating back-and-forth on low-risk or non-negotiated contracts.
Cons
Setting up the Ironclad repository and workflows is complex and time-consuming, taking weeks and months to get started.
Ironclad is priced for enterprise customers, making it inaccessible to scaling teams.
While its AI smart tags are comprehensive, the functionality requires manual editing in the backend, making customization difficult.
The AI review and workflow UI with DOCX are surprisingly unintuitive for legal teams.
4. DocuSign CLM
DocuSign is the gold standard for e-signature solutions. It has acquired players like Spring CM, Seal Software, and Lexion and recently announced the launch of DocuSign Intelligent Agreement Management. The current capabilities include contract assembly, signing, and management.
Features
Workflows: Marketed as DocuSign Maestro, this function helps easily build and deploy custom no-code workflows.
Repository: DocuSign Navigator surfaces key contract information from one secure repository with secure user access and oversight.
Track: DocuSign AI brings contract and process intelligence into every stage of the contracting lifecycle, from negotiations to process metrics to obligation tracking.
Pros
DocuSign approaches signature solutions with global standards like ISO 27001, PCI Data Security Standard, SSAE 18 (SOC Type 1 and 2, CSA STAR, and APEC PRP.
It also has an unrivaled security standard as a consequence.
It connects with 900+ tools for business-wide adoption.
Cons
Users find that DocuSign templates are limited with inadequate conditional rules, redlining, and editing capabilities.
You may have to get off your signing software to use DocuSign CLM.
Users also report the lack of essential tagging and search capabilities.
Its complex interface makes the learning curve steep and adoption slow for small and mid-size teams.
SpotDraft
SpotDraft is an AI-driven contract automation platform that simplifies contracting end-to-end. It enables internal legal teams to eliminate tedious aspects of contracting.
Features
Templates: Spotdraft templates are armed with built-in legal guardrails to empower other business teams to create low-risk contracts in a few clicks. It plugs into Microsoft Word and DraftMate, making it user-friendly for legal teams.
Workflows: This feature is both easy to use and set up to mandate sequential approvals from key business stakeholders based on contract values.
E-signatures: SpotDraft is compliant with ESIGN, eIDAS, and ECA laws, making e-signature workflows legally binding, secure, and efficient. It offers multiple ways to sign a document – hand draft, text box, and others across formats like Word, PDF, and URL.
Reporting: Generate custom reports to spot trends and risks across the contract portfolio, track specific metrics, and gain insight and control over contracts. The feature also allows you to measure team performance like status, volume, requests, and more.
Repository: This is a centralized and secure place to store, organize, and track contracts with custom views and role-based contract access.
Insights: The dashboard generates custom charts and graphs that demonstrate the value of the team’s work, help close deals faster, and improve the team’s productivity.
Pros
The Legal Hub functionality gives legal teams end-to-end control over all contracts in one single place. It empowers in-house counsel to manage different versions and update terms without relying on other teams.
The Microsoft Word plugin is purpose-built for better productivity, task management, and collaboration with contract reviews.
The Clickthrough feature empowers you to build consent on standard contracts in a single click.
VerifAI uses generative AI to highlight non-compliance and key risks, suggest edits, and help you build comprehensive guides over time.
Cons
The UI of an in-built editor, redlining, version control, and workflow capabilities have been reported to be subpar.
SpotDrafts AI engine lacks an automatic way to input metadata from executed contracts, which requires manual intervention.
How to choose a SaaS contract management software
1. Do your homework
Research the CLM vendor’s track record and gather social and data proof. Look for their uptime history, commitment to data security, compliance standards, UX/UI, and the infrastructure to keep your data safe and accessible. Also, identify stakeholders across the various departments in the company like in-house legal, legal ops, business users (from sales, procurement, and HR), IT, finance, and senior leadership.
2. Discuss contract terms, volumes, and users
Your CLM vendor should be equipped to handle your contract types, volumes, and number of users. Be prepared to discuss the nature of your clauses and the common challenges your organization faces. Examples: scope, plan type, pricing models, SLAs, data rights and security, terms and renewals, termination, visibility, and so on. Discuss ballpark figures on the number of contracts, the number of users, the types of contracts, and your alignment with your future needs.
3. Evaluate CLMs
You would benefit from initial demos with potential vendors to get an overview of offerings. Then, map out parameters and modules that bear the most significant impact on your contracting processes. When you discuss findings internally, gather feedback from stakeholders to openly list out the pros and cons of each solution. After which, you can request for close-up demos or avail of free trials to give your preferences a test drive.
4. Score and pick your vendor
After having evaluated granular features and functionalities, rate each vendor on high-level parameters like ease of use, contract lifecycle management from creation to renewals, customization to meet specific requirements, data security & customization, team training & support, and vendor reputation on review sites like G2 and Capterra.
Reasons to consider HyperStart
At HyperStart, approach the problem with context awareness to build solutions for your contracting needs, complexity, and scale. Here are a few ways in which HyperStart trumps other players,
We set the bar for implementation times. You can get started in 7 days, not weeks or months which is the industry norm.
We’re aware that your CLM is only as good as the teams empowered by it, so we’re built for business-wide adoption across roles, departments, and industries.
Access and protect all your contracts and contract data in one place without
Concluding thoughts
Each of the above CLM vendors caters to specific pain points at different contract touchpoints. While there is no one player to rule them all, the decision boils down to the work you want to automate, the inclusivity of the tool across the business, and costs.
Our approach empowers legal professionals to rethink contract management, embrace the automation of rote work, technologies, and unlock critical insights from AI-powered contract intelligence effortlessly.
See for yourself
