Operations guide
How to use a free trial so it tells you something useful
Most trials are wasted clicking around an empty demo company. Use your own awkward records and you will learn more in a day than a month.
Most free trials are wasted clicking around a demonstration company full of somebody else's invoices. Use your own awkward records instead and you will learn more in one day than in a month of browsing.
Delete the demo data
Every product ships with a sample company designed to make it look good. Every workflow is smooth because the data was built to make it smooth.
Start a clean file and put your own information in. Ten of your customers, ten of your suppliers, your actual chart of accounts. It takes an hour and it is the difference between a demonstration and a test.
Bring the awkward case
Every business has a transaction that is difficult. A part payment against three invoices. A credit note that crosses a VAT period. A foreign supplier. An employee with a commission structure nobody can explain.
Put that through the trial. The smooth path works in every product on the market. What separates them is what happens at the edge, and the edge is where your time actually goes.
Connect the things it has to connect to
For accounting, connect your real bank accounts and wait two or three days to confirm transactions actually arrive, complete and daily. A feed that connects is not the same as a feed that delivers.
For anything else, test the integration you are relying on. If the plan depends on the CRM talking to the accounting package, build that link during the trial rather than assuming a logo on a website means it works.
Give it a task and a deadline
An open ended trial gets nowhere because nobody has time. Instead set a specific task. Reconcile last month. Run last month's payroll in parallel. Load the current pipeline and produce a forecast.
Book two hours in a diary, and pick the day. A trial without a booked appointment expires unused, and you end up choosing on the sales page after all.
Involve whoever will actually use it
The person who will capture invoices every day should be in the trial. Their opinion about how many clicks something takes is worth more than any feature comparison, because they are the one who will repeat it two hundred times a year.
It is also the cheapest way to get adoption. People who chose a system defend it. People who had one imposed on them find reasons it does not work.
Test support while you are still a prospect
During the trial, send a real question to support and time the reply. You will never have more leverage than as an unconverted prospect, so the answer you get now is the best case rather than the average.
Ask something specific to South Africa. A question about VAT treatment, a bargaining council or a local bank feed tells you far more about whether the vendor understands this market than a question about a general feature.
Common questions
01How long are software free trials in South Africa?
Thirty days is common for accounting and payroll, including Sage, Xero, QuickBooks and Business Central. Fourteen days is typical for CRM. Shopify offers three days. Some vendors offer a trial without publishing a length.
02Do free trials need a credit card?
Often not. Xero, QuickBooks and Pipedrive all start without card details. Check before you begin, and if a card is required, diarise the cancellation date immediately.
03What should I test in a free trial?
Your own data, your most awkward transaction, your real bank feeds, and any integration the plan depends on. Testing the smooth path tells you nothing, because every product handles that well.
Editorial note
This guide is general buying guidance and not accounting, legal or tax advice. Amounts and deadlines set by SARS change, so confirm the current figures for your own business before you rely on them.