Section 8.21. Vendor

8.21. Vendor

There is a lot of important information you need to know about a company from which you plan to purchase such a mission-critical product as backup software. How long has it been providing backup solutions? What kinds of resources are dedicated to the products' development? What type of support does it have? Is is open to suggestions about its product?

Get the name of at least one reference site, and talk to them. Be aware, it is very hard for companies to come up with references. A lot of clients do not want to be a reference, just for political and legal reasons. Be flexible here. Don't require the salesperson to come up with a reference site that is exactly like your environment.

If you do get a reference site, make sure that you get in touch with them. The number one complaint of salespeople is that they go through the trouble of obtaining reference sites, only to have the customer never call them.

The Internet is also a wonderful asset at a time like this. Search for the product's name in the Usenet archives at http://www.google.com/groups. Look for names of people who say good and bad things, and then email them. Also, do general searches on all search engines. A really good product will have references on consultants' web sites. A really bad product might even have a www.backupproductsucks.com web site. Read everything with a grain of salt, and recognize that every single vendor of every single product has a group of people somewhere who hate it and chose someone else's product. Some clients have been through three backup products and are looking for a fourth.