How much time do you spend buying a car? A few hours for several nights on the internet researching, a few phone calls to friends, an afternoon walking the dealer lots, a few test drives, a little haggling, then the purchase. Sound familiar? According to a 2010 survey, the average person spends 10 hours on the purchase of a new car. And on average, Americans will use their car about 30 minutes per day and only keep a new car for about 4.5 years.

Would it surprise you to find out that most people spend more time choosing a car than they do choosing an enterprise software package? This is true, even though most enterprise software programs have a useful life of 6-9 years. I know what you are thinking – it isn’t a fair comparison because selecting software isn’t exciting like driving home with new wheels. But there are a lot more similarities than you might think. And it is a great analogy because of the simplicity. Let’s dig a little deeper.

First, in both scenarios, you need to understand your true needs (requirements). Need to pull a boat? Maybe the VW Beetle isn’t the best choice. Need to send invoices to customers? Maybe you should take the time to make sure the software can produce them in the format you need. Must have 7 cup holders? Are you sure you really need 7, or would 4 be sufficient? Need that software to integrate with another system automatically? Perhaps someone could manually enter the few data elements rather than build a software bridge. Unless you have a good handle on this, and some understanding of how to prioritize your needs, you are doomed to end up with a product that surprisingly (or not) can’t do what you thought.

Second, in both scenarios, you need to realize that no perfect match to your needs exists, and although you will find competing products (according to a specific class), you will find it hard to truly compare apples to apples. Need fold-down rear seats in the minivan? Great, but you might have to upgrade to the platinum trim package for an extra $1000. And if you don’t spend the bucks on this, you might lose the DVD player. But the other minivan has lay-flat seats and two DVD players. How do you compare? The same is true for software. Most packages have various tiers that engage blocks of functionality together. And each vendor will have their own spin on how a certain function works. Diligence is a must here – only by taking time to carefully compare products not against each other, but against a documented list of requirements can you know how close a match you will have.

Do you know anyone with shiny object syndrome? They are distracted by any shiny objects no matter how small, and totally lose focus on the task at hand. Car salesmen and software salesmen often use this tactic. The car comes with a built-in barbeque grill in the trunk for tailgating. Whoa. Not on my requirements list, but only another $500, and think about how cool this would be. The software package comes with a life-size 3-D hologram avatar with a British accent that serves as an interactive helpdesk system. It was the first thing the salesman showed me. Whoa. Where do I sign? These features alone might sell the entire product even though it lacks some basic things. This is where a structured product demonstration can help fine tune the process to generate predictable results. And not structured by the vendor, structured by you. If they don’t play ball with your process, they go home without a sale. Make them prove that they have the meat and potatoes before they bring out desert.

So what is the point with this? The point is that like buying a car, purchasing software without a methodical process designed to accurately determine needs, compare and evaluate products against these needs, and control the selection process, a decision is likely to occur for which the team will regret in a year. No one wants to live with a bad decision for the next 8 years. And with the cost of these enterprise systems hovering in the mid 6 figures, no organization can afford to make a bad choice.

Make sure the software selection process is done right to minimize the risk to your organization.