How Avail Achieved SOC 2 Compliance

What is SOC 2 & Why is it important?

Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). Through a SOC 2 audit, an independent auditor evaluates a company’s policies, procedures, and systems to ensure their controls are both properly designed and effectively functioning. A successful SOC 2 audit demonstrates a company’s dedication to safeguarding customer data and upholding rigorous security standards.

Achieving SOC 2 compliance signals a strong commitment to building customer trust while enhancing an organization’s overall security. As cybersecurity threats continue to rise, it’s crucial for businesses to prioritize the protection of their systems and data. By completing the SOC 2 audit, we had our security controls independently verified, providing added assurance to our customers about the integrity of our practices.

Security In Promotional Products

As companies across industries prioritize data security, it's critical to choose a promotional product vendor who not only understands these risks but actively works to mitigate them. A SOC2 Type II certification is a clear indicator that your vendor has established robust controls to protect sensitive information, from customer data to financial details. By partnering with a SOC2-certified vendor, businesses can confidently ensure that their information is handled securely, minimizing the risk of breaches and maintaining the trust of their clients and customers.

Why we pursued SOC 2 now

SOC 2 compliance is a crucial way to demonstrate to our customers, stakeholders, and partners that we take their trust seriously and have implemented strong security measures. We recognized that now was the right time to pursue this certification, ensuring that we safeguard data and proactively address potential security risks both now and in the future. As we grow into larger markets and bigger opportunities, having SOC 2 Type II certifications would be essential to earning that business.

Avail's Journey to SOC 2 Compliance

Compliance Partners  ‍

We partnered with Vanta, the leader in the Trust Management space, to help us automate the collection of our audit evidence. Vanta provides us with the strongest security foundation to protect our customer data.

Advantage Partners 

Our audit firm, Advantage Partners, was extremely helpful in creating a seamless audit experience. With their guidance and support, we were able to achieve SOC 2 compliance in a swift, efficient manner. 

Process 

While SOC 2 can be a big undertaking, our compliance partners streamlined the process. We leveraged Vanta to integrate our key systems and guide us in implementing policies and procedures to quickly become audit ready. Vanta gave us the direction we needed to pursue our compliance journey. 

Advantage Partners then confirmed our audit readiness and we kicked off our Type [I OR II] audit. For the audit, Advantage evaluated the controls we have in place and opined on their state. Shortly after our audit window ended, Advantage Partners drafted and issued our report. 

Timeline 

A key takeaway from our SOC 2 journey is recognizing that enhancing our security posture and achieving compliance is a significant undertaking. While the right compliance partners can simplify the process, it still requires focused effort and time from the organization. The readiness phase often takes the longest, but by prioritizing compliance, we were able to become audit-ready in weeks rather than months.

We also found it valuable to collaborate with Advantage Partners to establish an audit timeline, set an ideal audit date, and plan backward from there to ensure we were fully prepared. Now that our controls are in place and security is a top priority, future SOC 2 audits will be even more streamlined.

Lessons We Learned

• Focus on improving security posture, not checking boxes‍
  • Compliance is not one size fits all. 
  • Security is a continuous project that should be prioritized in an organization. 

• Start the process early‍
  • It is easier to implement policies earlier rather than later. ‍
  • Building secure procedures and infrastructure are key components of a successful security program. 

• Improving security and achieving compliance can help scale your business‍
  • Vendor security reviews are highly requested in sales cycles and SOC 2 can help unblock that business. ‍
  • Mitigating risk early will protect your business and earn the trust of prospects and customers.