Posted by ecohen on January 14, 2010

When given a choice, customers visiting an ERP website clicked SaaS (61.1%) over on-premise (38.9%) when learning about ERP purchasing options.

Click results - ERP SaaS vs ERP license

What can we learn from this?

One possible conclusion would be that more people are interested in learning about SaaS than an on-premise solution. This certainly makes sense given the analyst predictions, the hype, and all the press regarding SaaS and cloud based solutions. SaaS and cloud are the wave of the future, and this statistic confirms that VARs and customers want to learn more.

Another conclusion would be that fewer people understand SaaS than an on-premise solution. This also makes sense given that everybody understands what is involved with a software license, while SaaS is a newer offering. Everybody wants to learn about SaaS and cloud, but the real question is … how many will buy it?

The truth is probably a mix of these two ideas.

The missing statistic

What really matters is not which model customers investigate, but which model customers actually purchase. Over the next few months we will keep an eye on the purchase statistics and report them to you along with trends.