Imagine a compliance system is priced at $12,000 per year. Does it cost a lot?
It depends on what you are replacing.
If $12,000 is used to save hundreds of hours collecting evidence in an extremely complex technology environment It could be that is well-invested. If a small business of seven people could have the same proof manually in a few minutes every month, the cost appears to be quite different.
That’s a useful way to approach the search for a Vanta alternative. Don’t begin with asking which platform has the most features. Ask what those features will help your business save time and work.
Automation has an economic break-even At this
It’s not necessarily either good or bad. The benefits of compliance automation alters as the business grows. Imagine a rapidly growing tech company with hundreds of employees, numerous cloud environments, multiple applications, and regular access changes. Continuously gathering evidence manually could be a major operational burden. Integrations that automatically monitor systems and collect evidence can justly justify the expense.
Now consider a 10-person startup making preparations for its first SOC 2. Its infrastructure may be relatively compact, and evidence collection might be manageable with the need for extensive automation.
This difference is important when evaluating Vanta’s pricing. The capabilities of an advanced platform are impressive, however they can only be of value in the event that an organization requires them.
Compare Architecture And Not Just Brands
Searching for Vanta or Drata could quickly turn into an exercise of feature-by-feature. Both are established systems for compliance built around automation and integrations. Hence, looking at their supported frameworks as well as integrations, service contracts, and individual quotations could prove useful to companies looking to implement this approach.
There’s another decision to make before that. Are you interested in an integration-driven platform for compliance? Certain businesses require automated evidence collection and constant monitoring. Others prefer to present evidence on their own, especially if the workload remains modest.
Vanta Competitors Do not all follow the same model
A number of well-known Vanta competitors compete in an identical category that is focused on automation. There are platforms with a lighter design that focus more on system organization than connectivity.
CertAssist is part of the latter category. CertAssist, created by internal auditors, compliance consultants as well as other experts, is a system for organizing controls frameworks within a central workspace. It offers editable policies and guidelines for the auditing process, and allows auditors to look over evidence using read-only access.
It does not set up agents or connect to the infrastructure system. Customers upload their own proof.
Consideration should be given to the system’s access.
It is evident that the removal of integrations is a disadvantage. Someone has to gather evidence manually.
This means that there is no need for integration, and the use of compliance is not dependent on an integration with the operating environment.
The structures of one are not superior to the other. It is important to ask which tradeoffs make sense for your company.
CertAssist is targeted towards teams with five to 200 employees and gives pricing information, rather than having to have an actual sales call. The initial price is $225 monthly, which compares to the regular price of $375 a month.
Let Complexity Take Its Place
What is required of a startup with 10 employees aren’t necessarily exactly the same as the company that has 100 or 500 workers.
Compliance can be managed with an easy platform. The cost of automation could be increased as systems, employees and frameworks increase. That’s a healthier way to buy compliance software: let complexity earn its rightful place.
Don’t spend money on fifty integrations because they appear impressive in a chart of comparison. They’re worth the cost in situations where the task they are replacing is more costly than doing them manually.