How to Increase Renewals Using Contract Data

Key takeaways:

• Start the contract renewal process at least 90-120 days before expiration to allow adequate time for performance review, stakeholder consultation, and negotiations without last-minute pressure.

• Distinguish between contract renewals, which create new agreements allowing term modifications, and contract extensions, which simply add time to existing agreements without changing terms.

• Implement a centralized contract repository to prevent missed renewals, as research shows contract data typically sits in 24 different systems within large organizations, leading to an estimated 9% loss in annual revenue from lifecycle management mistakes.

• Leverage contract metadata to identify upsell opportunities and non-sales growth drivers such as logo usage rights and case study permissions that marketing teams may otherwise overlook.

How many renewal opportunities slip through your fingers each year? If you’re like most legal and procurement teams, the answer is probably more than you’d care to admit. You know contract renewals are crucial—they drive retention, reduce costs, and keep revenue flowing, especially when you consider that 90 percent of annual revenue across industries is documented in contracts, according to McKinsey & Company. But tracking dozens or hundreds of renewal dates while juggling everything else on your plate? That’s where things get messy.

Here’s the thing: your contracts contain a goldmine of information that can transform renewals from a scramble into a strategic advantage. The right contract management approach gives you the insights you need to not just catch renewal dates, but manage the entire process strategically. With automated reminders and searchable contract intelligence, you can know:

• When a contract is set to renew
• Conditions for renewal
• Whether the agreement will automatically renew or require renegotiation
• Roadblocks to past contract acceptance
• What forms were used in the last agreement

What is contract renewal?

Contract renewal is the process of extending an existing agreement beyond its original end date. This happens when both parties choose to continue their business relationship under either the same terms or newly negotiated conditions.

Most contracts include specific expiration dates established during initial negotiations. When these dates approach, parties must decide whether to renew, renegotiate, or terminate the relationship. The renewal process can maintain existing terms or involve complete renegotiation depending on changing business needs.

The key thing to understand is that contracts typically spell out their renewal terms upfront. They’ll tell you whether the agreement will automatically renew, what conditions need to be met, and what notice periods apply. Understanding these details early gives you the power to plan ahead and make strategic decisions about whether to continue, renegotiate, or terminate the relationship.

This is where having the right contract data becomes crucial. The information you need to make smart renewal decisions is already in your agreements—you just need a way to surface it systematically instead of hunting through documents when renewal dates are looming.

Contract renewal vs contract extension

People use these terms interchangeably all the time, but they actually mean different things. It’s a small distinction, but it has a real impact on how you manage the agreement.

Think of a contract extension as just adding more time to the clock. You’re taking the exact same agreement, with all its original terms, and just letting it run for another few months or a year. It’s quick, it’s simple, and it’s what you do when everything is working perfectly and you don’t want to change a thing.

A contract renewal, on the other hand, is about creating a new contract to replace the one that’s expiring. This is your chance to renegotiate. Maybe you want to adjust the pricing, update the scope of work, or add new clauses that reflect changes in your business. It’s a formal process that results in a brand-new agreement, even if it looks a lot like the old one.

Here’s the bottom line: if you just want more time, you extend. If you want to change the terms, you renew.

Improving contracts during the renewal stage

Now, if you’re going through the renewal process anyway, why not make the most of it? Contract renewal gives you a perfect opportunity to evaluate what worked, what didn’t, and how you can structure a better deal moving forward.

During the renewal evaluation process, analyze both successes and challenges from the original contract lifecycle. Focus on these key areas:

• Evaluate the actual value of the contract and any self-made losses; research shows that average contract value erosion is 8.6%, a figure that can climb to over 20% for the worst-performing companies, though The 2025 Contracting Benchmark Report estimates that enterprises can prevent two percent of that leakage by implementing a robust mitigation strategy with a CLM..
• Note any challenges the organization faced in getting contract acceptance
• Use digital software data metrics to improve renewal of contracts
• Decide how to tailor new contracts to avoid previous pitfalls

Improving the renewal stage takes a concerted effort. This effort, however, is greatly reduced when you use comprehensive contract management software. It can provide you with the vital information you need to improve the renewal stage.

Contract renewal best practices for maximizing success

Getting renewals right isn’t about luck; it’s about having a solid process. If you want to avoid last-minute scrambles and secure better terms, you need a playbook. Here are a few things that have worked for us.

• Start the process early. Don’t wait for the 30-day notification window. Depending on the contract’s complexity, you should be thinking about renewal 90 or even 120 days out. This gives you time to review performance, talk to stakeholders, and prepare for negotiations without being rushed.
• Review performance and value. Before you even think about renewing, ask the hard questions. Did this contract deliver the value we expected? Were there service issues? Talk to the business teams who actually used the service or product. Their feedback is crucial.
• Analyze your contract data. This is where having a CLM really pays off, as nearly half of organizations investing in their contracting process cite better contract data visibility and management as a key benefit. This trend is accelerating, as The State of AI in Legal 2025 Report found that in-house trust in using AI for contract analytics is up 17% year over year. Look at the contract process data from the original contract. How long did negotiations take? Which clauses caused the most friction? This information tells you where to focus your energy and what to watch out for this time around.
• Prepare for negotiation. A renewal is a negotiation. Know what you want to achieve. Are you looking for better pricing, improved service levels, or more flexible termination rights? Define your ideal outcome and your walk-away points before you get on a call to get to yes faster.
• Standardize your approach. Use your approved templates and clause library to build the renewal agreement. This ensures you’re starting from a strong, compliant position and reduces the time legal needs to spend on review.

Reasons contract renewals get missed

The reality is that missed renewals happen more often than anyone wants to admit, and the consequences are real. In fact, mistakes in managing the contract lifecycle can cost companies an estimated nine percent of their annual revenue, leading to lost partnerships, increased vendor replacement costs, and time-intensive process restarts.

But why do these renewals get missed in the first place? It usually comes down to these systematic issues:

• Lack of a centralized repository. Scattered contracts make them hard to find—a problem compounded by research showing contract-related data on average sits in 24 different systems within large organizations—or lead to inconsistent results.
• Lack of effective contract tracking. Poor contract tracking means you have to do it by hand. This wastes time and increases the likelihood of missed renewals.
• Lost contracts. Contracts lost in the cloud or a dusty filing cabinet may mean the loss of renewal revenue.
• Lack of searchability of contract terms and key data points. When you cannot easily find contract terms or important dates, significant employee hours are needed to make these simple assessments.

Effective contract lifecycle management software keeps your contracts in the same place. It makes them searchable and automates many of the renewal processes.

Use a contract repository to identify key contract dates

A contract repository is a centralized system that stores all agreements in a single, searchable location. This centralization transforms contract management from scattered document hunting into systematic renewal tracking.

Key benefits include:

• Improved accuracy through single-source documentation
• Faster contract searches and information retrieval
• Automated deadline tracking and renewal alerts
• Reduced risk of missed renewal opportunities

Having a dynamic repository helps make sure you never miss a contract deadline. It highlights the information you need to ensure you responsibly track contract renewals.

A repository does more than simply store your contracts and their data. It is a software solution to your contract renewal needs. It turns the contract into an active source of data that you can query directly—no more manual searching required. It transforms the information into intuitive legal documents that enable you to complete a renewal.

Centralized storage

With a dynamic repository, you get to keep all of your contracts in a single location. They are no longer scattered across the cloud or local storage. Without a centralized location, you can lose contracts or spend hours searching for agreements created years before. Not only are these agreements stored in this central location, but they also become fully searchable.

Contract metadata for increased renewals

Completed and stored agreements are analyzed for their metadata. The software helps your legal, sales, and other teams analyze contracts automatically for important dates, including renewal dates. It can provide searchable information such as, but not limited to:

• The renewal dates
• Automatic renewal, termination, or extension
• Conditions of contract renewal
• Party names and contact information
• Contractual expectations and requirements

A dynamic repository makes your contract data active and useful. With smart alerts and automated workflows, you can connect contract data to the other tools you already use.

Contract reminder software

Too often, key information like renewal dates is lost in antiquated systems. A dedicated contract reminder software built into the repository can help you stay on top of your contract renewals. Most companies tend to rely on individual employees to remember when these deadlines arrive. Manual tracking of these critical dates does little to protect your company from a potentially significant revenue loss.

Digital contracting software can navigate contract data to find renewal dates and create automatic reminders. Additional metadata provides you important information on how to renew including conditions and past roadblocks to success. Top-performing companies are proactive in getting contract renewals.

Another risk is accidental renewals. You may not want to renew a contract with a particular company. If the contract is set to renew automatically, you need to know this information to avoid getting locked into unfavorable contract terms. You may wish to renegotiate the contract or terminate it entirely if the business relationship is not ideal.

With contract reminder software, you have the power to determine what contracts you will renew without the risk of missing important dates.

Search for agreed-upon terms for upsell motion and client growth

Here’s where contract metadata starts to show its value beyond just tracking renewal dates. When you have all your contract data searchable and organized, you can spot revenue opportunities that might otherwise stay hidden until the next sales call.

Metadata analysis supports growth through:

• Identifying unused services or capacity limits
• Revealing successful terms that can be expanded
• Tracking customer satisfaction indicators for upsell timing
• Comparing contract performance across similar clients

Driving a successful upsell means understanding how the client would like to grow. They need to see the real benefits of an upsell. With contract metadata, you can analyze the benefits they already receive to demonstrate your company’s value to the client. Further, you can analyze the terms of the contract to determine potential points of upsell. It’s cheaper to upsell an existing customer rather than acquire a new one, especially since poor supplier performance and contracting gaps can lead to higher total costs of 10 to 20 percent.

Upsell opportunities are more readily apparent with the right data in hand. A digital contracting platform can provide you with useful information like:

• The previous length of the agreement
• The sales terms and services provided to the customer
• Potential services that were previously turned down
• Legal requirements for the client

Using metadata, a sales or CS teammate can compare the services offered in the previous contract with potential upsell options offered by your company now. Where these opportunities fit the client’s needs, you can seek to upsell services and create client growth.

Maximize non-sales terms your marketing team is missing

While your sales team is focused on obvious revenue opportunities, there are often valuable non-sales terms buried in contracts that can drive growth in unexpected ways. Digital contracting software can identify key non-sales terms the marketing team may be missing.

This can include key areas such as dealing with logo and trademark rights. The use of a company’s logo requires special permissions but can create an opportunity for potential growth. The same is true of case study rights. A proper case study can help determine where processes can be improved for the client.

These types of rights may not have been readily apparent or considered in the pre-digital age. The right contract lifecycle management software finds these non-sales terms, giving you more ways to renew and upsell contracts.

Increase renewals by using contract data

When you put all these pieces together—centralized storage, automated tracking, searchable metadata, and systematic renewal processes—you’re not just avoiding missed renewals anymore. You’re actively increasing your renewal rates and getting better terms in the process. This comprehensive approach yields tangible results, with organizations seeing an average 55% improvement across value metrics when using Ironclad, according to the report.

Automated contract data management delivers:

• Systematic renewal date tracking without manual effort
• Automatic metadata collection for strategic insights
• Increased revenue through improved retention rates
• Reduced administrative burden on legal and procurement teams

The bottom line is this: your contracts already contain the intelligence you need to transform renewals from a reactive scramble into a proactive revenue strategy. You just need the right tools to put it to use. Request a demo of Ironclad today. See how to cut your contract processing time by 80% and get business done better.

Frequently asked questions about contract renewals

What does a contract renewal mean?

A contract renewal means you’re creating a new agreement to continue a business relationship after the original one expires. It’s a chance to revisit and update terms, not just continue the old ones.

What is a renewal term in a contract?

The renewal term is the specific clause in a contract that spells out the conditions for renewal. It will tell you if the contract renews automatically, what the notice period is, and what steps you need to take to either renew or terminate the agreement.

What’s the difference between contract renewal and extension?

A renewal creates a new contract, which allows you to change the terms. An extension simply adds more time to the existing contract without changing any of the original terms. Think of it as starting a new lease versus just staying an extra month.

How far in advance should I start the renewal process?

It depends on how complex the contract is, but a good rule of thumb is to start at least 90-120 days before the expiration date. This gives you enough time to review performance, get feedback from your team, and negotiate without being rushed.

Can contract terms be changed during renewal?

Yes, absolutely. That’s one of the main points of a renewal. It’s your opportunity to negotiate better pricing, update the scope of services, or change any other terms that aren’t working for you anymore.

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Ironclad is not a law firm, and this post does not constitute or contain legal advice. To evaluate the accuracy, sufficiency, or reliability of the ideas and guidance reflected here, or the applicability of these materials to your business, you should consult with a licensed attorney. Use of and access to any of the resources contained within Ironclad’s site do not create an attorney-client relationship between the user and Ironclad.