Author | Dirk Janse van Rensburg, Head of On Key Software Solutions

Last week, my son insisted on a pair of “proper” Birkenstocks, and I countered with a budget pair that looked close enough on the shelf. Same category. Wildly different price. The question I couldn’t shake was simple: in six months, will the cheaper choice still feel like a saving, or will it start costing us in ways we didn’t price in?

That question shows up in boardrooms and maintenance offices more often than we like to admit, especially when selecting enterprise asset management (EAM) software. We’re rarely choosing between “good” and “bad”; we’re choosing between apparent value today and sustained value over time.

And, that’s where organisations get caught: saving now, then paying later in rework, downtime, risk exposure, and a slow erosion of trust. Here are five questions I’d ask before letting price decide.

Five questions that matter more than the price tag

1) What outcome are you actually buying?

EAM software is not a digital filing cabinet. It’s a decision engine: prioritisation, work execution, asset strategy, and risk control. If the buying conversation starts and ends with features, you’ll end up with software that looks complete but doesn’t shift performance.

2) Does it win at the frontline?

Most EAM software value is realised (or lost) at the point of execution: how a technician receives a job, captures asset condition, closes out correctly, and feeds the loop back to planning and reliability. If the experience is cumbersome, adoption becomes optional, and once it’s optional, your data quality starts to drift.

3) Can you trust the data it will create?

Asset performance management is only as strong as the information behind it. If planners or reliability engineers stop trusting the work history, small inaccuracies become big operational surprises. People compensate with shadow spreadsheets and side channels, and that’s when control starts to slip. The cost of poor data quality is real, with Gartner estimating it costs organisations an average of $12.9 million per year.¹

So, build governance in: clear structures, workflow discipline, validation, and role accountability. If your EAM software can’t consistently produce audit-grade data, it won’t sustain reliability improvement (and will struggle to support ESG reporting or AI ambitions later).

4) Will it integrate cleanly – or will you end up “shoehorning” it in?

EAM software doesn’t live in a silo. It has to work alongside ERP, procurement, inventory, condition monitoring and, increasingly, the mobile tools used to execute work. If integration isn’t designed in from the start, you pay later with rigid interfaces, duplicate data, and parallel processes.

5) Is the platform built for longevity (yours and theirs)?

Industrial software is consolidating quickly, with investment flowing into connected frontline execution, AI-assisted workflows, and “field-to-enterprise” data continuity.²

That matters because EAM software is not a short-term purchase. You’re committing to years of configuration, data, processes, and training, and the platform must continue to earn its place. If the product roadmap, support model, or vendor stability can’t match your asset lifecycle reality, your “saving” may simply be a deferred replacement.

The reality check: Don’t buy software to compensate for ownership

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: no EAM platform can rescue a lack of operational ownership. The organisations that win treat EAM as a discipline first, and software second.

So yes, sometimes the “budget pair” is the right call – but only if it holds up: adoption, data integrity, integration, and staying power.

Back to the sandals: the real answer won’t be visible at the till. It will show up in wear patterns, comfort, and whether we’re shopping again sooner than planned. In EAM software, the equivalent question is: Eighteen months after go-live, are you still capturing trustworthy work history and making better decisions… or are you shopping again?

References (accessed January 2026)

¹ Gartner, “Data Quality: Why It Matters and How to Achieve It” (Gartner research, 2020).

² Barclays Investment Bank (Barclays Research), Industrial Software Market Update, December 2025, pp. 3–4, 8, 11 (subscription research; copy on file).