On the surface, this makes for simple maths when it comes to remote access pricing until an IT team tries to work out what a deployment will actually cost. Subscription prices are only half the picture. Factors such as the number of users, computers, technicians, concurrent connections, included features and future growth can drastically alter the actual cost of a remote access solution.
For organizations comparing LogMeIn to alternatives the most practical way to compare is price, illustrated against actual operating needs. If your organization prefers to predict budgetary outflows while also having a licensing structure based on how teams access and support remote computers, it may be the best fit for you. Comparing structured rates is how decision-makers differentiate between a desirable advertised rate and sustainable long-term value.
The Full Pricing Model
Teams examining LogMeIn pricing relative to competitors should begin by identifying what they actually need to license, then compare with LogMeIn on a consistent basis.
The headline subscription price is not the only telling sign of how much an organization will spend. Is the pricing based on users, technicians, managed computers or some other capacity limit that IT teams need to determine? They can also indicate which capabilities fall under the relevant plan and which must be moved to another subscription tier.
A pricing comparison is more meaningful when each provider’s plans are directly mapped to an organization’s expected deployment, and, as such, comes first in this evaluation. LogMeIn can then be evaluated against these same user counts, endpoint needs, and operational assumptions.
This avoids the difficulty of comparing two plans that may appear similar but differ in capacity.
Calculate Cost Around Actual Usage
When selecting a package, an organization should structure its comparison around realistic usage rather than using company size as the sole deciding factor. A company may have hundreds of employees, but only a small number of them actually need to access the computer remotely. By contrast, a small organization might have a decentralized staff, in which almost every worker requires constant access.
That same principle applies to IT support. The support team may comprise a few technicians, but has to cover a very large pool of computers. For example, one organization might have fewer endpoints but need access for a larger subset of admins.
That is, these peculiarities make licensing units.
An instructive example from outside the remote access category is usage based enterprise licensing guidance, which explains how consumed licenses can determine charges rather than requiring a fixed quantity to be committed in advance.
The general lesson for everyone else is: know what it takes to make a billable unit. From that clear position, they can model expected consumption and tilt alternatives on equivalent assumptions.
Learn to Differentiate Between Initial Price And Total Cost
However, a low subscription price does not translate into the lowest overall price. What happens after the purchase of the service should prompt questions for IT leaders.
Deployment requires staff time. Administrators have to set rewarding access, determine rights, install program packages, create groups of users, write guidelines on how to operate the hardware and help employees via emails or calls. License administration on a recurring basis also costs money, even if it may not be directly reflected on an invoice.
So teams should calculate both direct costs and indirect costs. Subscription charges, as well as any capacity required to run users or computers, are also included in direct costs. Indirect cost such as deployment labor and ongoing administration, training costs, migration effort and time to adjust licenses as staffing changes.
By comparing with LogMeIn in this manner, you give decision-makers a more holistic view than an offset price table offers. The option that is best value for money will be the one that balances reasonable financial constraints with appropriate admin costs over the planned deployment period.
Test Pricing Against Growth Scenarios
The number of licenses you have today may not be what you’ll need next year. Office locations are changed, hybrid policies adopted, new workforces expanded and departments reorganized. Every change can affect the need for remote access.
Therefore, pricing comparisons should allow for multiple scenarios.
A baseline scenario can indicate current requirements. A moderate-growth scenario can project the impact of adding users or computers in the next budget cycle. A much more complex scenario can examine what happens post-big expansion, such as an acquisition or a change in policy.
Then the organization should measure how much the pricing of each platform responds
Comparisons to current subscriptions only may not reveal differences that this exercise can highlight. An attractive pricing model at the initial deployment scale might turn unfavorable at higher requirements. Another alternative might present a clearer scaling roadmap.
Forecasting also allows finance teams to build more stable budgets rather than creating unpredictable spikes around remote access costs.
Examine How Licenses Are Managed
Not just the dollar amount of a license, but the actual mechanics thereof. The ease with which an administrator can increase capacity, eliminate unnecessary access, and change subscriptions when organizational demands shift must be outlined.
Licensing practices in other enterprise software categories demonstrate why this matters. For example, resources for managing software licenses emphasize purchasing choices and tools for managing licensing arrangements.
When it comes to remote access, procurement teams can take the same high-level principle using their investigative skills and cognizance of the full license life cycle. They need to know what happens when a new hire needs access, when a tech leaves the company, when an endpoint is retired, or when temporary capacity is not needed.
Administrative simplicity has measurable value. Etc. If everyday licensing modifications take a whole lot of manual work effort, then that manual effort is basically part of the platform’s operational fee even if it isn’t clearly reflected in the subscription price.
Look at Features for the Right Tier
Price comparisons become a little deceptive as teams compare plans without checking whether the capabilities they need are available on the same tier.
IT should first document capabilities that are actually needed before diving into the costs. It isn’t designed to be a long list of features. Instead, teams should first determine which features have day-to-day operational implications and which subscription level provides them.
At that point, both can be analyzed against the price of achieving those defined needs.
This approach allows you to pay only for the necessary functionality. Also, a premium tier could include features that seem beneficial but deliver little value to a specific company. If a less expensive plan can deliver all content delivery and streaming needs, then the unused extras should not be the deciding factor.
REMEMBER RENEWAL AND BE PREDICTABLE WITH THE LONG-TERM BUDGET
Remote access is often not a one-time purchase but rather an operational requirement, which typically needs to be performed regularly through your cloud offering since you are initially training the model on historical data. Long-term cost, therefore, matters.
In particular, procurement teams should take a look at what renewal costs they expect, potential changes in capacity and how easily they can predict spending over future budget cycles. They should also record any assumptions made in the original comparison that they will need to address later.
Workforce patterns do change, making a periodic review helpful. Employees who now work remotely might come back to offices, support duties may widen, or endpoints that were previously necessary, retire.
Given the evolution of these needs, It can be especially attractive if its pricing and licensing philosophy is more in alignment than that of LogMeIn. However, the final decision should hinge on your organization’s documented need rather than on price alone.
A disciplined evaluation takes into consideration subscription price, capabilities required, administration and scalability as well as anticipated usage. That provides IT and finance teams with a solid rationale for choosing a remote access solution that remains economical to use.
What To Look For In A Remote Access Pricing Comparison
Evaluate subscription prices, per licensed user or computer, necessary features, administration, and scalability overheads incurred to keep the software maintained as expected in the medium- or long-term, effort needed for deployment.
When it comes to remote access plans, is the cheapest one always the best deal?
No. If you need to add more capabilities, capacity, administration or future growth, drives up costs a lower advertised price may not reflect the total cost.
Forecasting remote access expenses in IT teams
Under moderate and high-growth scenarios, model current usage and then determine how many additional licensing and administrative requirements will be needed for each scenario.
