SOC 2 & PCI as a Growth Engine: Turning Compliance into Revenue

Most companies treat SOC 2 and PCI certifications as the cost of being allowed into the room. They’re not wrong — but they’re missing half the picture. For a growing number of technology companies, SaaS providers, and organizations that hold sensitive data on behalf of enterprise clients, these certifications aren’t just a procurement hurdle. They’re a direct path to revenue that was previously out of reach.

“This shift has been building since the mid-2000s and really accelerated in the early 2010s as more companies moved to SaaS models,” says Andy Pojuner, CISO, Managing Director of Intelligence, Data & Technology at Altum Strategy Group. “Certifications went from being a validation tool — something that confirmed what you already had — to a genuine business proposition. If you don’t have them, you’re not in the conversation.”

In a recent Altum case study, a technology company serving the entertainment industry was technically capable of competing for major enterprise contracts but couldn’t get past procurement without SOC 2 and PCI certifications. After working with Altum to build the operational maturity those certifications actually require, the company began winning contracts with some of the largest amusement parks and entertainment venues in the United States. The certifications didn’t just check a box — they opened a market.

Quantifying what absence costs

One of the more difficult conversations Altum has with prospective clients is helping them see what their lack of certification is actually costing them. The challenge is that the lost revenue is often invisible — deals that never progress past an initial conversation, RFPs they’re never invited to, enterprise prospects whose procurement teams screen them out before a demo ever happens.

“It’s hard to quantify the upside without analyzing a company’s existing customer base and their pipeline,” Pojuner explains. “But when we do that analysis, the pattern is consistent. Companies are losing deals — particularly with larger institutions that have strict privacy policies, or organizations where board members come from regulated industries and carry those expectations with them.”

The implication is that the ROI calculation for SOC 2 and PCI isn’t just about the cost of the audit and the remediation work. It’s about the revenue that becomes accessible once the certifications are in place — revenue that in many cases dwarfs the investment.

Earned versus papered

Not all certifications are created equal, and Pojuner is direct about the distinction. A SOC 2 report doesn’t provide detailed configuration information by design — it’s structured to minimize the risk exposure of sharing specifics. That means a prospective client reviewing a vendor’s report can’t always tell from the document alone whether the underlying security posture is genuinely mature or whether the organization did the minimum to satisfy an assessor.

“Having the report doesn’t guarantee security,” Pojuner says. “What it signals — when it’s properly earned — is that the organization has the operational discipline to manage its environment responsibly. But the market is shifting. Organizations are going to need to move toward maturity models that demonstrate automation capabilities, especially as AI-based threats evolve.”

This is where Altum’s approach differs from a conventional compliance engagement. Rather than building toward a point-in-time assessment, the team focuses on operational maturity that sustains itself — standardized procedures, consolidated monitoring, and automated evidence generation that makes compliance a by-product of how the business already runs, not a separate annual exercise.

Why companies stall

If the commercial case is clear, why do so many companies fail to get across the finish line? Pojuner points to three consistent barriers: the time required, the burden of evidence collection, and — most frequently — unclear roles and responsibilities within the organization.

“Compliance initiatives stall when nobody owns them clearly,” he says. “It’s not usually a technical problem. It’s an organizational one. People don’t know who’s responsible for which evidence, who approves which policy, or who’s accountable for remediation when something doesn’t pass. That ambiguity kills momentum.”

This connects directly to the argument Altum has been making across its broader cybersecurity and governance work. The firm’s 2026 Cybersecurity White Paper identifies organizational misalignment — not capability gaps — as the primary risk facing enterprises today. The same dynamic plays out in compliance: the tools and technical knowledge usually exist, but the operating model to coordinate them doesn’t.

Automation as the unlock

The most powerful shift Pojuner describes is the move from manual compliance cycles to automated, continuous monitoring — and specifically, the role that AI agents can play in making that transition practical.

“We use deterministic models with specific configurations to ensure consistent results,” Pojuner explains. “The AI pulls down security configurations and identifies issues using deterministic code, not probabilistic assessments. That matters because probabilistic tools can miss things due to limited context or performance variations. When you’re talking about compliance evidence, you need consistency and auditability.”

The practical impact is significant. When audit evidence is generated automatically as a natural by-product of daily operations, the compliance cycle transforms from a time-consuming annual project into something closer to a continuous readiness posture. IT and operations teams spend less time scrambling to collect evidence and more time doing the work that produces it.

This approach also connects to Altum’s broader AI governance positioning through Poseidon, its AI Lab. The principle is the same one the firm applies across all AI deployments: governance and human oversight built in from the start, with automation accelerating what’s already working rather than papering over what isn’t.

The operational upside

One of the under-appreciated benefits of pursuing SOC 2 and PCI properly is that the operational improvements extend well beyond the certification itself. Pojuner describes a client where the compliance effort prompted the organization to implement multiple AWS regions — a resilience measure that improved infrastructure performance and availability independent of any compliance requirement.

“The compliance work becomes a forcing function for resilient operations,” he says. “You’re not just getting a certificate. You’re getting an organization that actually operates better — more consistent processes, better monitoring, clearer accountability. That has value far beyond what an assessor looks at.”

In the Altum case study, the same pattern emerged: system uptime improved as a direct result of the operational standardization work, and monitoring was consolidated from six fragmented alerting systems into one — giving the operations team clear, actionable visibility rather than noise.

Where the market is heading

Pojuner’s assessment of the current landscape is unambiguous: SOC 2 and PCI have become table stakes for technology companies and organizations handling sensitive data. The question is no longer whether to pursue them, but how to do so in a way that compounds value over time.

“If you’re a tech company and you’re not certified, you’re already behind,” he says. “But once you have the certifications, the next step is making sure you’re communicating that to your customers effectively and automating as much of the ongoing compliance process as possible. The companies that treat this as a one-time project will always be playing catch-up. The companies that build compliance into their operating rhythm turn it into a durable competitive advantage.”

For organizations evaluating where SOC 2 and PCI fit in their growth strategy, Pojuner’s counsel is to stop thinking about compliance as a cost center and start thinking about it as a revenue enabler — one that, when properly implemented, improves how the business operates, how enterprise clients perceive you, and how quickly you can respond when the next set of requirements arrives.

For more on how Altum Strategy Group helps companies turn compliance into competitive advantage, read the full case study: Turning SOC 2/PCI from Checklist to Sales Asset, and visit altumstrategy.com/insights