Freemium
allowly
An AI-powered governance platform that enables businesses to securely manage and control employee access to AI and SaaS applications, preventing shadow IT and ensuring compliance.
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About Saas Management
SaaS Management tools are specialized platforms designed to discover, manage, secure, and optimize an organization's entire portfolio of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) applications. By integrating with financial, identity, and HR systems, these tools provide a centralized dashboard for tracking application usage, managing licenses, and controlling spend. They are essential for combating shadow IT, reducing redundant software costs, and ensuring compliance with security policies. As a critical component of modern IT Management, they offer deep, real-time insights specifically tailored to the dynamic nature of cloud-based software.
Core Features
- SaaS Discovery: Automatically identifies all SaaS applications in use, including unsanctioned 'shadow IT', through integrations and data analysis.
- License Management: Tracks license allocation, monitors user activity, and helps reclaim unused or underutilized licenses to optimize costs.
- Spend Optimization: Provides detailed analytics on SaaS spending by department, user, or application, highlighting areas for cost savings.
- Security & Compliance: Assesses vendor risk, monitors for security misconfigurations, and helps enforce compliance with standards like GDPR or SOC 2.
- Automated Workflows: Streamlines user lifecycle management, such as automatically provisioning and de-provisioning app access during employee onboarding and offboarding.
Use Cases
SaaS Management platforms are primarily used by IT, Finance, and Security teams in mid-to-large enterprises. They are crucial for organizations experiencing rapid growth in SaaS adoption, those looking to gain control over decentralized software purchasing, and companies needing to prepare for security or financial audits by maintaining a complete and accurate software inventory.
How to Choose
When selecting a SaaS Management tool, consider its integration capabilities with your existing systems (e.g., Okta, Azure AD, NetSuite). Evaluate the accuracy and methods of its application discovery engine. Assess the depth of its analytics for usage and spending, and examine the power of its automation features for managing the user lifecycle. Finally, ensure the platform can scale with your organization's growth in users and applications.
Saas Management use cases
1
Controlling Shadow IT and Reducing Security Risks
An IT Security Manager in a fast-growing tech company notices employees are using unapproved apps, creating potential data leaks. Using a SaaS Management platform, they initiate a discovery scan that integrates with the company's single sign-on (SSO) and expense systems. The platform automatically flags dozens of unsanctioned tools. The manager can then assess the risk of each application, start a formal vetting process for necessary tools, and block high-risk applications, significantly reducing the company's attack surface and ensuring data governance.
2
Optimizing SaaS Spend and Eliminating Redundancy
A Finance Controller is tasked with reducing a company's escalating software budget. They use the SaaS Management tool's analytics dashboard to view spending trends. The tool reveals that three different departments are paying for separate subscriptions to similar project management tools. It also identifies 50 inactive licenses for a premium design software. By consolidating the project management tools into a single enterprise plan and de-provisioning the inactive licenses, the controller achieves an immediate 20% reduction in monthly SaaS spend.
3
Automating Employee Onboarding and Offboarding
An IT Operations team struggles with manually provisioning app access for new hires, which often takes days. They configure an automated onboarding workflow in their SaaS Management platform. Now, when HR marks a new employee in the HR system, the platform automatically creates their accounts and grants access to a predefined set of applications based on their role and department. Conversely, during offboarding, a single click revokes access to all connected apps simultaneously, eliminating security risks from lingering access and saving the IT team hours of manual work per employee.
4
Streamlining Vendor and Contract Management
A procurement manager uses spreadsheets to track hundreds of SaaS renewal dates, often missing deadlines for negotiation. They migrate all contract data into a SaaS Management platform. The platform centralizes all documents, tracks key dates, and sends automated alerts 90, 60, and 30 days before a contract expires. It also provides usage data for each tool, empowering the manager to enter renewal negotiations with clear evidence of the tool's value and utilization rate, leading to better pricing and terms.
5
Ensuring SaaS Compliance for Audits
A compliance officer is preparing for a SOC 2 audit and needs to verify that all applications handling customer data meet security standards. Instead of manually checking each vendor, they use the SaaS Management platform's compliance module. The platform provides a dashboard showing the compliance status (e.g., SOC 2, ISO 27001) of every application in their inventory. They can quickly generate a report of all compliant and non-compliant applications, providing auditors with clear, centralized evidence and drastically simplifying the audit preparation process.
6
Empowering Departments with Budget Visibility
A Marketing department head frequently exceeds their software budget due to decentralized purchasing by team members. The IT team provides them with access to a department-specific dashboard within the SaaS Management platform. This dashboard shows all active subscriptions, their owners, costs, and renewal dates. The department head can now see exactly where the budget is going, approve or deny new software requests through a formal workflow, and reallocate funds from underused tools to more critical ones, fostering a culture of cost-consciousness.
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Saas Management FAQ
What is a SaaS Management platform?
A SaaS Management platform is a centralized software solution that helps organizations discover, manage, optimize, and secure their entire portfolio of SaaS applications. Its primary goal is to provide visibility and control over SaaS spend, usage, and security. Key functions include automatically identifying all apps (including shadow IT), managing software licenses to reduce waste, tracking expenses, and ensuring vendors meet compliance standards.
How to choose the right SaaS Management tool?
To choose the right tool, consider these factors:
- Discovery Method: How does the tool find applications? Look for multiple sources like SSO, finance systems, and browser extensions for comprehensive coverage.
- Integration Capabilities: Ensure it integrates seamlessly with your core systems, such as your identity provider (Okta, Azure AD), HRIS (Workday), and accounting software.
- Depth of Analytics: Evaluate its ability to provide actionable insights on license usage, user activity, and spending trends to drive cost savings.
- Automation Features: Check for robust workflow automation for onboarding, offboarding, and renewal management to save administrative time.
What's the difference between SaaS Management and IT Asset Management (ITAM)?
IT Asset Management (ITAM) is a broad practice covering all of an organization's technology assets, including hardware, on-premise software, and cloud infrastructure. SaaS Management is a specialized subset of ITAM that focuses exclusively on the unique challenges of SaaS applications. While ITAM tracks what you own, SaaS Management tracks what you subscribe to, focusing on dynamic factors like user-level usage, recurring costs, decentralized purchasing (shadow IT), and contract renewals. It provides much deeper, real-time insights into cloud software than traditional ITAM tools.
What is 'Shadow IT' and how do these tools help?
'Shadow IT' refers to any software or application used by employees without the knowledge or approval of the IT department. This practice creates significant security risks, compliance gaps, and uncontrolled spending. SaaS Management tools help by actively discovering these unmanaged applications. They scan expense reports, analyze network traffic, and integrate with identity providers to create a complete inventory of all software, bringing shadow IT into the light so it can be properly managed, secured, or eliminated.
Who in a company typically uses a SaaS Management tool?
Several departments benefit from a SaaS Management tool:
- IT Teams: Use it for governance, security, and automating user lifecycle management (onboarding/offboarding).
- Finance & Procurement: Use it to track and control software spend, manage renewals, and eliminate redundant costs.
- Security & Compliance Teams: Use it to identify and mitigate risks from unvetted applications and ensure compliance with data regulations.
- Department Heads: Can use it to manage their team's specific software budget and application stack.