Total Cost Components
Platform licenses (per-seat, editions). AI consumption (tokens, conversations, outcomes). Data infrastructure (Data 360, vector DBs, observability). Integration platform fees. Third-party apps. Professional services. Internal engineering time.
Visibility
Tag every cost by team, feature, customer segment. Build dashboards showing total cost per outcome (revenue, supported customer, resolved case). Aggregate numbers hide optimization opportunities.
Optimization Levers
License utilization (retire unused seats). Edition rightsizing. Consumption discounting via committed use. Tier-shifting AI features. Vendor consolidation. Cache and reuse where possible.
Governance Cadence
Weekly: spike detection. Monthly: review against budget. Quarterly: vendor and consolidation review. Annually: comprehensive audit. Governance absent means cost surprises; governance present means controlled posture.