You can use the software to figure out the features you want and don't want so that you can create a better custom solution down the line. Meanwhile, custom software gives you exactly what you require according to your specifications.
There's no need to pay for extra features you don't want or use. Custom software is also easier to scale and can be modified to grow with your business. In the long run, using custom software likely saves you money because you won't have to pay a recurring subscription fee or pay for a large organization to regularly do maintenance on a massive software package.
Another benefit of custom software is "security through obscurity. Finally, custom software has one major advantage over ready-made software: You can take your data with you. Many out-of-the-box applications require you to keep your data within their platform and don't make it easy to export your data when you move to another solution. Ultimately, the best question to ask when comparing custom and packaged software is: Which one will serve your long-term goals the best?
Making the decision isn't about just what's right for your situation now but also whether it can grow and scale with your organization.
The good news is that it doesn't have to be a binary question. For example, you can use out-of-the-box software to get most of the features you need and then supplement that with custom software that matches the unique parts of your business. The Pros and Cons of Packaged and Custom Software As its name implies, out-of-the-box software has one big advantage: Getting started is as simple as purchasing and installing the application.
When a requirement is not met with the core software or service, your options should be explored in this order:. Wherever possible, work with your project team to meet your project goals without additional customization, using standard tools provided by the system or service, and as a final resort build your own custom solution.
While this advice may cause you to go back to the drawing board a few times, the final outcome of your project will be stronger and significantly easier to support in the future. Skip to main content. Customizing Software and Services Navigating the slippery slope of custom software design.
The Landscape: Configuring and Customizing Software Before they can be used at your organization, most feature-rich software and software services require careful setup, and may benefit from some to substantial customization. The Benefits to Customizing Software When looking at various software options, organizations may find that less configurable packages include features that address many project goals but do not thoroughly satisfy all of their requirements.
The Downsides to Customizing Software Customizations, being highly technical and specialized, require skilled technical support that is often difficult to find and costly to retain. Software and Users: The Negotiation While it can be tempting to customize your software or services to meet a particular problem, this can ultimately lead to inefficient solutions and unnecessary costs.
Software Customization: Important Elements Projects involving customization should pay special attention to definition and detail to ensure success. The Algorithm: Bending, Configuring, Customizing In both implementation and support, custom development is generally a time-consuming, costly process.
If the requirement cannot be changed to match the core software or service, then attempt to customize through supplied wizards, settings screens, and utilities. In contrast, off-the-shelf software is often chosen for quick deployment. It takes less time as the team just needs to purchase the software, complete installation, and get ready to use it. Cost — If we consider the initial costs, off-the-shelf software is obviously cheaper than developing a bespoke solution.
And in many cases, it could cost more than even the custom software solutions. The distinctive advantage of bespoke products is cost-effectiveness to eliminate wasting resources for some unnecessary functionality or unexpected expenses. Flexibility — A good reason to give it consideration as every team looks for the best solution while remaining flexible about arising needs. Therefore off-the-shelf software is far behind custom-made software.
It becomes hard to support software advancement due to the growth of your business. In fact, the team gets only the packaged features that may not correspond to your needs later. Whereas building bespoke software allows the team to scale the product due to arising requirements. Moreover, it comes with personalized support specifically for your software.
As business needs vary from organization to organization, their choices are also different. Though we always recommend looking from the long-term perspective and choosing the solution that will grow along with your business. Following the good market practice of building custom software shows that development efforts and up-front investments easily become advantageous and cost-effective over time.
Check the case studies The following is an example of the exclusive requirements given by a client company. You could find off-the-shelf solutions that do the same sort of things as scanning the QR codes program or processing loyalty cards. However, the client was expecting to see a program that unites the features and will also have its company branding.
The customer was expecting EXISTEK to devise and implement an easy-to-use solution for non-technical users that would enable the production of loyalty cards and quick, reliable scanning and tracing of loyalty card usage.
The Customer Loyalty Software also had to be integrated with the existing POS to allow staff to apply discounts using loyalty bonuses.
First, we needed to implement the real-time processing of the QR codes and Images. Also, there should have been a database of customers with data about bonuses amount, which included the automatic calculation of the discount and the percentage of bonus accruals. The solution for the implementation was found in a combination of image processing libraries for image processing and.
QR codes and account data is synchronized with the database. Any actions, such as card cancellation, are recorded. Considering this particular example, you probably want to know what is custom software advantage in this case.
This project explicitly illustrates the questions of what is custom software and what is an example of bespoke software. In this case, the customer had to acquire a custom-developed app due to specific requirements instead of simply buying an off-the-shelf solution.
As you can see, the wide range of features is narrowly focused. You can barely find a solution to your similar requirements. In the end, the client has obtained all-in-one hospitality and loyalty tool that completely fills in the workflow gaps. Moreover, the cafe franchise had exclusive ownership of the application, which meant zero licensing costs regardless of the number of users, accounts, and terminals.
As a result, the cafe management, staff, and visitors really appreciated the final product. The final product required almost zero maintenance and was extremely reliable. It was a risky move on the customer side, but the relatively high price resulted in greater financial and reputational earnings from a long-time perspective.
When you purchase mass-market apps, you hand over the node to that software. As for you, you take the middle path concerning time, effectiveness, and working capacity. Here are some advantages of bespoke solutions:.
The most obvious purpose of starting a custom development project is bringing profits to a company via the better organization of everyday processes and tasks. First off, it eases the overall workflow, having only the features that are useful for this area while having no extras that will have little to no use in the future. For example, applications developed for the hospital will include personnel records, past medical history, visit data, etc. Every point mentioned above helps the staff that works with the solution and the patients be aware of the healing regimens particular to that or another subject.
Of course, you may find the publicly available apps, but most of such tools are unified, which means they will not necessarily address all your needs. Besides, any software requires the highest security level while being compliant with all the necessary regulations. Custom-built applications are known for great security and are less vulnerable to attacks. This application may contain the full list of the dishes available for a restaurant with the accompanying prices, so the client will be aware of the meals available.
Supporting the presence of your business on different platforms like the web or mobile allows customers to reach your products and services on different devices. Simply put, the best examples of bespoke software use are those cases when companies really take care of the comfort of both their staff and customers.
To get the name, it has to follow the rule that the program made for the purpose of people working within the environment within a particular facility. These software programs do not come in the market and get designed specifically to perform a task for a company.
Houses, develop such program for third parties and sell it at their rates. It is a fact that prices for such programs are much higher than the ones that get sold publicly. The best example, in this case, is the JPMorgan developing a plan for the management department, it gets known that this will get used correctly by the staff and not the others in the company.
It is possible that each one of them has their source of dealing with particular things. Several restaurants also have such programs and are mostly used by famous brands such as Tesco, Walmart, and Sainsbury. Packaged and Custom software are two such terms which are usually confused by people who do not know much about them.
0コメント