B2B Software Procurement Made Easier

Technology columnist Sean Doherty takes a look at G2 Crowd, a resource for businesses looking for peer-reviewed software and services.

When consumers plan to make a purchase, they often gather information from friends, family and online reviews to find the best software product or services to accomplish a task. When businesses start the purchasing process, they often rely on analysts and trusted professional networks, but business software reviews are more limited than consumer reviews. G2 Crowd aims to change that.

Founded in 2013, G2 Crowd is a business software review platform that has acquired more than 37,000 user reviews. Co-founders Tim Handorf, Godard Abel and Matt Gorniak, with a shared history at Big Machines (configure, price and quote software as a service acquired by Oracle Corp. in 2013), have a vision to help businesses purchase software. Their vision recently caught the attention of the Pritzker Group Venture Capital, Chicago Ventures, and Hyde Park Venture Partners to secure $7 million in series A funding.

G2 Crowd reviews are categorized into approximately 18 broad software categories, including accounting and finance, analytics, collaboration and productivity, content management, customer relationship management, hosting service, and information technology infrastructure. Business software is also grouped by industry, such as agriculture, automotive, dental, and legal. The legal industry is subcategorized by court management, e-discovery, intellectual property management, legal billing, legal case management, legal research, and other legal software. See Figure 1.

Figure 1. G2 Crowd’s software review platform, called the Grid. Users can filter software views by industry category, ratings and tags and sort results by popularity, alphabet or ratings.

G2 Crowd’s search function includes a Google-like search box to enter keywords with a type-ahead feature to select a vendor or software category as you type. Searches are filtered by category and sort options provide lists of the most popular and the highest-rated software.

Reviews are easy to write and review. G2 Crowd’s platform, called the Grid, provides consistent review descriptions and metrics that can compare and contrast software products and services. Users can research software on the system, but they are asked for contact information when they dive deep into reviews. Contact information is shared with the vendors under review.

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Users are also asked to contribute reviews but they don’t have to be expert reviewers. They are, however, asked to validate their review by detailing their experience with the software confirming whether they use the software or service. Reviews from G2 Crowd’s user community are scored in familiar stars: from one (worst) to five (best).

The Grid prompts reviewers to rate how likely they would recommend the product to peers on a one (worst) to ten (best) scale; what features they liked and disliked the most; what purposes they used the software for; what business problems they attempted to resolve; and what size company they work for and their role within the company. Additional questions include whether the product met the company’s requirement, its ease of use, and the quality of the vendor’s software support, all on a one (worst) to seven (best) scale. The Grid also asks the user for his or her level of experience with the product, what previous products they used, and their recommendations to others considering the product. The review includes a section on price and terms but that information is not required to complete and publish the review.

With consistent review data, the Grid makes comparing products easy. See Figure 2.

Figure 2. G2 Crowd’s comparison of time and expense software. Mouse-over products in the left window pane highlights the product in its respective Gartner-like magic quadrant on the right, be it a leader, contender, high performer or niche product.

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From product lists, users can check product boxes to compare products or choose from the most-compared products below the chart. Product comparisons use quantifiable review metrics, such as the ratings for whether the product met a reviewer’s requirements, usability, maintenance, and support. The comparison also includes testimonials from the most helpful and favorable reviews determined by users.

Users can order product lists by name, number of ranked reviews, overall user satisfaction, market presence, and G2 score.

G2 Crowd scores products and vendors using data aggregated from user reviews, online sources, and social networks. The company applies a patent-pending algorithm to calculate real-time customer satisfaction and market presence. The satisfaction rating comes from aggregated reviews and their currency—more recent reviews receive higher ratings. Market data comes from a vendor’s annual revenue, year-over-year growth, and its number of employees; social impact from Klout Score, Twitter, and LinkedIn followers; Web traffic; and the number of years the vendor has been in operation.

The Highland Park, Illinois-based company (see the team here) supplies individual reviews by validated users, aggregate data from consistent review metrics, company information, and crowd-sourced social network information. For businesses looking for peer-reviewed software and services, G2 Crowd appears to be a trusted resource for due diligence in business software procurement. I will look forward to more legal software reviews.


Attorney Sean Doherty has been following enterprise and legal technology for more than 15 years as a former senior technology editor for UBM Tech (formerly CMP Media) and former technology editor for Law.com and ALM Media. Sean analyzes and reviews technology products and services for lawyers, law firms, and corporate legal departments. Contact him via email at sean.doherty@ibmverse.com and follow him on Twitter: @SeanD0herty.

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