5 Questions to Ask Before Purchasing or Expanding ServiceNow

Summary

Many ServiceNow investments fail to deliver ROI because key questions go unasked before implementation or expansion begins. This article outlines five critical questions that executives should ask to ensure their ServiceNow investment strengthens the platform, aligns with business goals, and sets the stage for long-term success. It also offers practical insights from Datavail on how to turn each question into action.

When you’re preparing to expand your ServiceNow footprint—or evaluating whether to purchase a new module—the first questions that come to mind are usually the right ones:

• How much will it cost?
• How long will the implementation take?
• What outcomes can we expect?

These are essential questions and will help you determine if an investment is warranted. But they won’t set you up for a successful implementation.

The reality is that the success or failure of any ServiceNow investment is rarely determined by the purchase decision itself. It hinges on what happens before—and after—that moment: the structure, strategy, and stewardship that surround the implementation.

This article is not about the obvious questions. It’s about the ones that seasoned leaders only learn to ask after things go wrong. Ask them now, and you’ll be ahead of the curve.

1. What is our definition of success, and how will we measure it?

It’s a basic question, but one that rarely gets the clarity it deserves.

Too often, ServiceNow projects begin with broad ambitions like “streamlined workflows” or “better visibility.” What’s missing is specificity: How much time will we save? How will it positively affect our profitability? How will we know when we’ve succeeded?

Success isn’t about getting a module live. It’s about achieving tangible, measurable improvement. In a Nucleus Research case study, the NBA realized a 51% ROI and boosted productivity by 10%—because they scoped outcomes with rigor from the start.

Pro-tip: Start with a structured KPI discovery session that aligns module functionality with real business pain points. Document 3–5 metrics that will define success, and set benchmarks for those metrics before implementation begins. This creates a clear value case and keeps your rollout grounded in outcomes, not activity.

2. Have we built the right ownership and support structure to sustain this expansion?

ServiceNow modules don’t usually fail in the first 30 days—they unravel in month six, when usage stagnates, goals drift, and no one is quite sure who’s responsible for driving continued adoption or resolving emerging issues.

The failure isn’t about a missing name on an org chart; it’s about the absence of sustained ownership. When the initial project team disbands and business users hit roadblocks, momentum fades unless there’s a clear structure to guide iteration and support.

Adding a new module means adding operational complexity. It means new workflows, expectations, and performance demands. Who owns the outcome? Who ensures it matures and scales?

Without defined roles, you get miscommunication, support bottlenecks, and half-activated functionality.

Pro-tip: Use the RACI model to define decision-making and ownership roles across IT, business, and support teams. Pair this with an enablement plan to ensure the module has long-term advocates inside the organization. Make platform governance a pre-launch priority.

3. Will this move strengthen or strain our platform foundation?

It’s easy to believe that a well-architected platform like ServiceNow can accommodate new modules without disruption, but that assumption can obscure the deeper impact each expansion has on platform integrity. Every module added—whether during an initial rollout or a future expansion—reshapes the broader ecosystem. It affects CMDB relationships, workflow performance, integration behavior, and reporting fidelity.

This question applies just as much to first-time implementations as it does to those expanding their ServiceNow footprint. Are you laying the groundwork for scalability, clean data relationships, and consistent user experience? Or are you introducing complexity that will be costly to untangle later?

Misalignment often results in overlapping data structures, siloed functionality, and inconsistent performance—all of which erode your platform’s ability to deliver ROI over time. ServiceNow’s own Common Service Data Model (CSDM) is designed to help prevent this by standardizing how services and data relate across the platform.

For example, a large global retailer expanded its ServiceNow footprint by quickly adding HR and Facilities modules to its existing ITSM implementation. However, each department had different data models and naming conventions for assets and services. Without aligning to the Common Service Data Model (CSDM), the company ended up with duplicated CI records, broken cross-module workflows, and conflicting reports that leadership couldn’t trust. The time and effort to reestablish a unified platform foundation and regain stakeholder confidence can be significant.

Pro-tip: Conduct a technical readiness assessment that evaluates dependencies, integrations, and platform load. Use it to build a “friction map” that flags potential bottlenecks and helps you engineer around them.

4. Are we managing this as a strategic platform evolution or as a feature deployment?

Whether you’re implementing ServiceNow for the first time or adding a new module, it’s easy to slip into a tactical mindset. A department identifies a gap, a feature is proposed, and the decision is made to deploy, often without zooming out to assess broader implications.

But ServiceNow isn’t just another IT product. It’s a strategic platform meant to evolve with your business. If you treat implementations or expansions as isolated fixes, you risk introducing silos, duplicating efforts, and creating governance challenges down the line. If you treat initial implementation as a one-time project, you miss the opportunity to design for scale and sustainability.

This question is about intent: Is this a reaction to an immediate pain point, or part of a deliberate platform evolution?

Pro-tip: Establish a review council that vets new deployments for strategic alignment and impact. Balance responsiveness with long-term platform health to ensure every module contributes to a coherent ecosystem.

5. What is our plan for managing challenges, from adoption to unexpected technical hurdles?

No ServiceNow deployment goes exactly as planned. Challenges are inevitable: users may push back, integrations might fail, and initial data may not behave the way you expected.

The critical difference lies in preparation. Do you have a strategy for identifying early signs of trouble? Is there a clear escalation path when friction occurs? Are you collecting feedback and adapting continuously, or waiting for problems to escalate?

New implementations and expansions alike benefit from a resilience mindset. Building flexibility into your rollout ensures minor setbacks don’t spiral into systemic issues.

Case in point: Datavail achieved a 250% ROI from its ServiceNow implementation by pairing strong implementation with structured feedback loops, rapid iteration cycles, and responsive support systems.

Pro-tip: Develop a friction-response framework that includes playbooks, communication plans, and feedback loops. Equip your teams to pivot quickly, capture lessons, and continuously improve.

How Datavail Helps You Build on a Foundation for Success

Every one of these questions reflects a deeper truth: ServiceNow success isn’t just about what you deploy. It’s about how well you design for scale, alignment, and resilience.

That’s where Datavail adds value.

We help organizations:

• Define success in measurable terms
• Align architecture with operational goals
• Map governance and support frameworks
• Create a long-term platform roadmap
• Navigate user adoption and post-launch iteration

Some specific examples of Datavail’s client work include:

• Datavail helped an enterprise financial group optimize their ServiceNow platform by delivering specialized technical and support resources across the platform.  The result was streamlining workflows, enhancing asset visibility, and improving employee service experiences through custom portals and applications. These improvements increased automation, reduced manual effort, and aligned the platform more closely with business operations and compliance needs.
• Datavail enhanced ServiceNow performance for a national non-profit by delivering end-to-end managed services, including ITSM support, seamless upgrades, and timely break-fix solutions, that ensured platform stability, reduced downtime, and improved service request responsiveness across departments.
• Datavail supported a regional utility company by serving as a trusted client advocate during their ITSM implementation with a large systems integrator, ensuring business needs were prioritized and translated effectively into ServiceNow. Additionally, Datavail led a Strategic Portfolio Management (SPM) implementation to help transition project management processes from siloed tools into a unified ServiceNow environment.

Datavail helps you translate implementation into long-term advantage, turning a functional deployment into a scalable, resilient business asset.

Don’t Miss the Deeper Risks

These five questions are just the starting point. If you’re not thinking beyond go-live, you could be setting your ServiceNow investment up for stalled ROI, user frustration, and costly rework. Download our white paper, 7 Pitfalls That Limit ServiceNow ROI (and How to Fix Them), to uncover the missteps most organizations don’t see coming until it’s too late.