People truly caring about their business venture want to make sure that everything is done in the right way. They establish worker routines, a roadmap to reach their goals, and events to bring the people they work with closely. All of this is done to cultivate relationships, foster the feeling of company unity, and encourage a spirit of companionship alongside a business relation.
Business is mostly about people. Those people, to document their actions, create files. Those files are what keeps everything in its rightful place, and if there is ever an issue, it is easy to backtrack what kind of file caused it, or where a misunderstanding might have occurred. To catalog those documents, and store them in a safe space, data room services might help. How to pick one that will add value to your company? Here are three simple steps to help you out.
1. Start with defining your needs
Putting a plan in place is a necessity. At first, you need to establish what kinds of tasks you will use the new tool for. Talk to coworkers, ask them how they access and use company files, and find out what if they would ever like to try out a virtual data room. Explain the benefits, and check if they are technology literate enough to use the tool. If not, think of ways to educate them on the topic.
You also need to take into account how accessible a VDR is to newcomers, and if the support offers free training. After you have taken all of your steps, you might proceed with defining:
- Volume of storage. Do you need 1 GB, 2 GB, or maybe even 10 GB for all of your digital files? You need to know the capacity you are aiming for.
- File types. Are you using mostly PDFs, DOCXs or some other space-consuming format? Are there ways to reduce their size, or are they all unchangeable big documents?
- What amount of the company’s money are willing to spend on a software solution like that? Are there special resources for that kind of investment, maybe even some additional funding?
- Number of users. Who is going to be allowed to enter the virtual space? Will all of your workers have access to it, or just a selected team, or just some individuals?
- Types of work. Is this strictly a storage space for files, or is there some other underlying use you would like to have for that software solution? Are you going to use that tool to make your business an even bigger one?
- Potential changes in workflow. Is the workflow going to be altered after introducing the data room solution? That might be a factor you need to take into account while thinking about employing a data room service for your company.
2. Compare virtual data rooms
After you have asked yourself all of those difficult questions, you need to look through the market and see what the industry has to offer. We assure you that there is a lot to choose from, but with that amount of variants, it might be hard to decide. Here are a couple of aspects you need to take into account while browsing through the offer of data room providers.
- Does digital space use some kind of special encryption, and what kinds of options are left for the user to manage? This is a space that will host the most sensitive files of the company, which means that the security of this online file storage needs to be at least bank-grade.
- You need to be able to use the tool, and not be used by the tool. It should be a support to all of your business operations, and not a hindrance, so features like an accessible interface, quick file upload, and easy-to-access permission settings would be a huge plus.
- Important modules. You might require special modules for needs. One of those modules might be Q&A, a useful feature, accelerating M&A processes. Annotating the files on the go is also important for intercompany matters.
- 24/7/365 Support. How many of the tools within the software solution are you gonna use, and is the usage going to cause you any problems? This is almost impossible to predict, and this is why having a strong support system from the provider of the solution is almost crucial in your virtual data room endeavors.
- Functions and costs. Are you willing to pay for all the futures you are never going to use? Will the purchase be cost-effective? This might seem an obvious question to ask, but many businesses lose a lot of money due to software solutions they never use.
3. Test the selected software for free
After answering the questions above, and choosing the characteristics you would like to have in your software solution, there is still the question whether you will like the tool or not. A free trial period is almost always available in data rooms, and during that time you can find out a couple of cool things that would be otherwise impossible to check.
- You can actually test the offerings they promise. All the features presented in a plan might be great to look at, but to test them out in a real-time setting is a whole different experience. You can use the tool that you are thinking about employing, and that gives you the ability to gauge how much use you can get out of it.
- It is not an aggressive way of marketing. You are not bombarded with time-bound offers, e-mails from all over the place when you are working inside the tool. A free trial is all about how you use the tool, and it is not about getting you to immediately press the “buy now” button.
- There is zero risk involved. You might immediately love the tool, or you might straight away hate it, but for your wallet, it does not make a difference. There is no risk involved, you are not signing any contracts yet, and you can freely roam the possibilities this virtual data room solution offers.
- It is not difficult to get into the tool after the free period ends. If you choose to go with the proposed tool, it isn’t difficult to save your progress, and continue working on the paid version. Your files and everything you have done in the trials period can be used in the future cooperation between the virtual data room provider, and your business. You will already be competent in the data room environment after the trial period, so teaching others how to use it will be much easier and your competency with the tool will grow even further.
Conclusion
Online data room providers are great tools. They store your files, increase their safety, and are a place where deals can be made. Picking a good solution for your business might at first seem difficult, but by adhering to the rules written down on this blog article, you should have it all under control. We covered all the steps you need to undertake to find a solution custom-fit for your company’s needs. For more details, check dataroom-providers.org.
