From SupplyChainDigest, what would characterize the perfect software (or any for that matter...) vendor?
Clarity and simplicity: the vendor is able to tell you what products they have, and what those products do, in very straightforward and simple terms. Does not require a game of "20 Questions" to answer this question, nor are the answers seemingly more intended to obfuscate than clarify.
Well-trained sales people: Sales reps and account managers capable of answering reasonable questions about the vendor's products, pricing, and policies.
Easy deployment: Simplicity in the application (even if the underlying capabilities are powerful) and/or tools that enables deployment (from a software only perspective) in a few months with a modest level of both vendor and company resources.
Remembers you after the sale: The perfect vendor would pay a high level of attention to its installed base, as demonstrated by actual resource allocation.
Support and maintenance: Written support policies for bugs and issues, and consistent execution against those policies.
Flexibility: Makes it relatively easy for you to change to configuration of the software when the inevitable changes to your business occur.
Software that evaluates itself: The vendor's software solution should be able to tell you when results are not meeting expectation, and even better, give you some intelligence as to why.
