The principles

Everything on this site is held to the standards on this page. Several of them are enforced in code: tests that fail our build when a page drifts from what is written here.

Independence is structural. No platform or software vendor we cover pays us anything, in any form: no commissions, no referral fees, no sponsorships, no affiliate links, no demo bounties. This is not a policy we chose and could unchoose. It is how the business is built.

A listing is a fact, not a recommendation. Firms appear in our directory because a platform’s public directory names them, and we compiled what it says. No firm pays to be listed. Nothing is ranked; there is no top, best, or recommended order anywhere on this site. A small number of firms are vetted partners, and the standard behind every badge states exactly what we checked and what we did not.

We won’t cite numbers we can’t source to a party with no stake in them. Where a figure is a model assumption inside one of our tools rather than a sourced fact, it is labeled as one. Where too few contributions exist to publish honestly, the page says too few to publish instead of estimating. We would rather show you nothing than show you a guess.

The data is never for sale. The pricing benchmark exists to be true, not to be sold. Rollups are public and free for everyone. Contributing earns access to the underlying figures as they accumulate: a trade, not a product, and the only one we offer. No platform, vendor, or buyer can purchase the dataset or access to it.

How we make money, completely: two ways. Service partners we’ve vetted pay us a flat referral fee only when they accept an introduction; the fee is disclosed and never varies with what you buy. And buyers can engage us for a paid review of an existing engagement, like the vCISO Audit; quote reviews on this site are free. That’s all of it. What we will never do: take money from the platforms and software vendors we cover, in any form; charge a firm to be listed; sell placement or rankings; or sell the data. The rollups are public and free, and contributing earns access money can’t buy.

Corrections are honored. If you are a firm and something on your page is wrong, tell us which fact and why. We review correction requests within two business days, a disputed fact is pulled from the page pending review, and a firm that asks to be removed is removed.

Advice that only points at a purchase is not advice. Every guide names who should not follow it. Every comparison names who should stay put. We regularly tell people to negotiate instead of switch, or to keep the spreadsheet another year, because that is what independent means when it costs something.