How to Evaluate Project Management Software in a Trial

To get a real answer from a software trial, load one live project and one live support queue, invite the people who will use the system every day, and test concrete scenarios in stages. At the end, choose a plan by user count and by the features your team actually used, not by the length of the feature list.

Most trials end without a verdict. Not because the product was poor, but because nobody had a plan. A manager creates an account, adds a couple of tasks called “test”, clicks through some menus, and then the day job takes over. When the trial expires, all that is left is a vague impression. This guide is meant to prevent exactly that. The examples use Hamahang, P-Soft’s project management and ticketing software, but the method works for evaluating any tool. If you are still comparing criteria at a high level, start with our guide to choosing a project management and ticketing system; this article is about the next step, actually running the trial.

Before the Trial Starts: What to Prepare

One hour of preparation before the account goes live is worth more than days of aimless clicking:

• A live project, not a made-up one. Pick something already underway, with several people involved and genuine deadlines. Demo data never exposes the friction points of real work.
• A real support queue. If your team also answers customers, route a slice of genuine requests into the trial so the ticketing side gets tested too.
• The right participants. Beyond managers, invite at least one delivery specialist, one support agent and someone who spends most of the day away from the office. A trial run only by managers tells you a lot about reports and very little about daily work.
• Five to eight success criteria. Concrete statements such as “no emailed request goes without an owner” or “a site supervisor can update status from the field”. Vague criteria produce vague decisions.
• One trial owner. A single person who keeps the plan on track, collects questions and stays in contact with the vendor.

How to Test Project Management Software: A Four-Stage Plan

Agree the trial length with the vendor, then split it into four roughly equal stages. If the window is short, compress the stages but keep their order.

Stage 1: Projects and tasks

• Create the chosen project and break its work into tasks, each with an assignee and a due date.
• Hand tasks to different people and watch how each person finds out about new work.
• Set reminders on upcoming deadlines and confirm they appear on the calendar.
• Attach a drawing, contract or photo to the relevant task, then ask a colleague to locate it without help.

Stage 2: Tickets and customer requests

• Send a genuine email to the support address and fill in a web form; check that both arrive as tickets. Our article on turning emails into tickets explains the flow in detail.
• Assign the ticket to an agent, set a priority and follow the reply through to closure.
• Open the project progress report and ask yourself whether you know where things stand without asking anyone.

Stage 3: Field work and team communication

• Ask a colleague who works off-site to change a task’s status and add a file from the Android app.
• If you are assessing the Pro plan, link a team messenger conversation to a task or ticket, then check a few days later that it is still easy to find next to the work.
• On the same plan, look at the kanban board, Gantt chart and dashboards using this project’s data rather than a polished sample.

Stage 4: Review and decide

• Go through each success criterion and mark it met, partly met or not met.
• Ask every participant for three sentences: what made the job easier, what was confusing, and what they could not work without.
• Send remaining questions to the vendor and pick the plan based on what this trial showed.

Software Trial Checklist: A Scorecard You Can Copy

Fill this in at the final review. The “tested by” column matters: a score given only by a manager is half the story.

Choosing a Hamahang Plan After the Trial

Two questions settle the plan: how many people need a login, and which features proved useful during the trial.

• Start, up to 15 users: covers the essentials of daily delivery: tasks and projects, a ticket queue, reminders on a shared calendar, attached files, progress reporting and a phone app, with support and updates. If your scorecard is green only in the Start rows, you do not need a bigger plan.
• Pro, up to 50 users: worth it if the team relied on the kanban board and Gantt chart, dashboards, notification automation, the team messenger or internal calls and meetings, and would not want to give them up. Support on this plan is prioritised.
• Elite, unlimited users: the fit when customers should raise and follow requests through a portal, when you need an SLA, when your process calls for custom workflows, or when you want organisational access levels. Deployment and training are included at this level.

A common mistake is sizing the plan on today’s headcount. If you expect the team to grow during the contract, raise it with the vendor from the start.

Cloud or Your Own Server? Test That Question Too

You can run Hamahang as a cloud service or put it on a server your organisation controls; users get the web version and the Android app in both cases. During the trial, ask: where will off-site staff connect from? Can your IT team maintain and back up a server? What does company policy say about where customer data is kept? For a fuller comparison, see on-premise project management software.

Evaluating Ticketing Software Before You Buy: Questions for the Vendor

1. What happens to the data we enter during the trial once we buy? Ask directly and get the answer in writing.
2. Can our current data be moved from Excel or our previous software, and which plan or contract clause covers that? P-Soft performs this migration as a service.
3. How are setup and user training handled, and which plan includes them?
4. Through which channel is support delivered, and how do Pro and Elite differ in response priority?
5. If our user count exceeds the plan limit, how does an upgrade work?
6. How are updates announced and applied, especially for an installation on our own server?

Mistakes That Waste a Trial

• Testing with invented data and tasks nobody is responsible for.
• Leaving field and support staff out until the final days.
• Trying every feature instead of the ones you genuinely need.
• Deciding without a closing review and without writing down the result for each criterion.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long is the Hamahang trial?

Hamahang offers a trial period; its terms and duration are arranged with P-Soft’s team when you request it.

How many people should take part?

One person from each key role is enough: a manager, a delivery specialist, a support agent and someone who works in the field. A small but varied group gives a more realistic result than a large uniform one.

Should we test every feature?

No. Test the scenarios that repeat in your daily work. Features nobody used are not a reason to buy a higher plan.

Which plan lets us assess the customer portal and SLA?

The customer portal, SLA, custom workflows and organisational access levels belong to Hamahang’s Elite plan. Mention them before the trial starts so they can be included.

How is our existing data moved after the trial?

P-Soft migrates data from spreadsheets or older systems as a service, and the scope is set in your plan and contract.

Ready to plan a trial around your own project? Visit the Hamahang project management and ticketing page to request a demo and trial from P-Soft.

Further reading

• What Is a Ticketing System and Why Do Companies Need One?
• The Best Project Management and Enterprise Ticketing Software in Iran: A Buyer’s Guide (2026)
• Enterprise Messenger vs. Ticketing System: Key Differences

Complete guide: project management and ticketing software