Choosing yacht business software: twelve questions to ask

Buying business software is a little like buying a yacht. The presentation is lovely, the details are in the survey, and the real costs appear in the second year. We are a software company, so we have a stake in how you choose. We would still prefer you chose well, whichever system you pick, and we would prefer to be asked hard questions.

Here are twelve worth asking of anyone, including us. Take them into every demo.

1. What problem are we actually solving?

Write it down before you look at any product. "Enquiries get lost between inboxes." "Owners keep asking for figures." "We retype every listing." A clear problem lets you judge each system by what it fixes, not by what it shows off.

2. Is it built for yacht businesses, or adapted to them?

A generic customer-relationship tool may be fine for a lot of firms. Yacht work has its own shapes: a yacht as the central object, owners and charterers as different parties, seasons, holds, multiple currencies, brokers who co-operate. Ask to see how the system describes a yacht, and how a charter or a sale actually moves through it.

3. Who owns the data, and can we leave with it?

Ask plainly: can I export everything, in a usable format, at any time? What does the exit look like? A good supplier answers calmly. A hesitant one tells you something.

4. What does it connect to?

Your business already uses email, a calendar, messaging, a payment provider, portals and perhaps an email marketing tool. Ask which of those it connects to today, how, and what is on the roadmap. Distinguish between "works now" and "planned", and ask which connections depend on a third party's approval.

5. How does it handle different people seeing different things?

A broker should not see every owner's figures. An owner should see their own yacht and nothing else. A freelancer should not browse the whole client list. Ask how roles and permissions work, and how fine-grained they are. This is a practical question about discretion.

6. How does it treat privacy and security?

Ask where data is stored, who can access it, what happens to it when you leave, and how they handle personal data under GDPR. Ask about sign-in protection and what records are kept of who did what. You do not need to be an expert; you need straight answers.

7. What will it really cost in year two and three?

Understand the pricing model: per user, per yacht, per mailbox, per feature. Ask what changes as you grow, what is optional, and what setup or migration costs. Ask about renewal terms and notice periods. We do not publish figures here, and you should be wary of any answer that stays vague.

8. How will we get our data in?

Most firms arrive with spreadsheets, a mailbox full of history and a folder of PDFs. Ask how contacts, yachts and documents are imported, who does the work, and how long it realistically takes. Ask for an honest view of what will not transfer cleanly.

9. What does a normal day look like?

Ask to walk through a real scenario, not a script. Take a recent enquiry of yours and follow it: first message, reply, quote, contract, deposit, handover. Count the places where you would still have to leave the system, retype something or ask a colleague. That is the cost of the gaps.

10. How much of the work does it help with, and how much does it claim to do for us?

Be sceptical of anything that promises to automate relationships. Helpful tools reduce effort on routine work and leave decisions with people. Where artificial intelligence is involved, ask what it does, what data it sees and, crucially, whether it can send messages or change records by itself. A draft you review is one thing; an autopilot is another.

11. What happens when something goes wrong?

Ask about support: who answers, in which hours and languages, how quickly. Ask what happens during an outage, and where status is published. Ask how changes are announced, and whether anything is switched on for you without notice. Yachting does not stop for a bank holiday.

12. Who else uses it, and who is it not for?

Ask for the kinds of firms that use it, and be careful with the answer. References from comparable businesses are useful. Also ask who the product is not for. A supplier that can describe its poor fits has thought about it.

How to run the process

• Name a small group: the person who will use it daily, someone who owns the money and someone who cares about the data.
• Agree your twelve (or fewer) must-haves in advance.
• Score each system against them the same way, in writing, right after each demo.
• Reference-check one or two firms of similar size.
• Pilot with a single yacht or team before committing everyone.
• Agree how you will judge success after three months.

Warning signs

• Reluctance to discuss export, pricing or limitations.
• Claims that everything is possible without examples.
• Demos that avoid your scenarios.
• No clear owner for your account.
• A long list of features and no sense of the daily flow.

Where Yachtbase fits

We would like you to ask these of us. Yachtbase is built around the yacht record and the chain from first message to owner statement, and is offered by application, so we can look at whether it suits you before anyone commits. If it does not, we would rather say so.

In short

• Start from the problem, not the feature list.
• Check yacht-specific fit, data ownership and exit.
• Ask what connects today and what depends on others.
• Test permissions, privacy and sign-in controls.
• Understand the cost over several years.
• Trial with your own data and a real scenario, with the daily user involved.