You Have Usage Data. Now What? Turning Metrics Into Action

Most organisations with a SaaS management platform can tell you that 30% of their Salesforce seats haven't been used in 90 days. Far fewer have a defined process for what happens next. The gap between insight and action is where most SaaS optimisation programmes stall.

Define Your Thresholds

Before you can act on usage data, you need agreed thresholds that trigger action. A reasonable starting framework: users inactive for 30 days receive an automated nudge to the tool owner. Users inactive for 60 days are flagged for licence review. Users inactive for 90 days have their licence revoked unless the owner provides a specific justification for retention.

Assign Ownership

Every tool needs a named business owner who is accountable for licence utilisation. IT can provide the data, but only the business owner can determine whether a specific user's inactivity is a problem (they've moved on to a different tool) or expected (they're on extended leave). Without clear ownership, usage data sits in reports that nobody acts on.

Build the Feedback Loop

Usage data should inform your renewal negotiations. Three months before any major renewal, pull a utilisation report and use it as the opening position in your commercial conversation. A vendor who knows you have 40% inactive seats is in a weaker negotiating position than one who doesn't. Make the data part of your standard renewal preparation process.

Automating the Action Workflows

The most effective way to close the gap between insight and action is to automate the notification step. Configure your SaaS management platform to automatically email tool owners when a user in their tool crosses the inactive threshold — 60 days, say — with a one-click response option to retain or revoke the licence. This moves the decision to the person who has the business context (is this user on leave? are they expected to use this tool next quarter?) without requiring IT to manually chase each case.

Automate the revocation step too, where vendor APIs allow it. For tools with robust admin APIs, a confirmed revocation response from a tool owner should trigger an automated API call to remove the user from the tool, not a manual ticket to IT. Removing the manual step between decision and action dramatically increases the throughput of the optimisation programme and reduces the time between insight and saving.

Communicating Value to Leadership

Usage data and the actions it drives need to be visible to leadership — both to maintain programme support and to build the case for continued investment in SaaS management tooling. A monthly one-page summary showing: licences reclaimed in the month, annual savings identified, savings confirmed by updated invoices, and the renewal pipeline for the next 90 days gives IT and Finance leadership the information they need to make good decisions and attribute value to the programme.

Connect the savings numbers to specific business outcomes where possible. "We reduced Salesforce licences by 22 seats, saving £18,700 annually — those savings were reinvested in the Sales team's new prospecting tool" is a more compelling narrative than a line item in a cost reduction report. Stories that connect SaaS optimisation to business capability investment resonate with leadership in a way that pure cost reduction numbers sometimes don't.