Businesses often struggle choosing between custom software development and commercial off-the-shelf software solutions. The off-the-shelf software are slightly cost effective and are much easier and quicker to implement. However, the commercial off-the-shelf software solutions or COTS doesn’t offer any out-of-the-box functionality and are not designed for exclusive and individual business needs. The COTS are designed for masses and are usually aligned with the industrial standards and benchmarks. The custom software on contrary are fully aligned with internal workflows and business processes. The custom software development offers automation of sophisticated and repetitive tasks, and offer intuitive interfaces which help boosting business efficiency.
In the highly dynamic and competitive business markets such as in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and other regions of UAE where the competition is rapidly increasing, the customer demands are always high and the new trends are reshaping the entire industries, custom software development is the only way forward. It will help businesses gaining groundbreaking edge over their competitors by accounting all minute details, incorporating features that empower existing processes and workflows and offering user-friendly tools and interfaces to employees to boost their productivity. In this blog we will discuss how custom software can greatly improve business efficiency and growth.
What is Custom Software Development?
Before we discuss how custom software can extraordinarily enhance business efficiency, first let us understand what is custom software development? Traditionally the commercial off-the-shelf software solutions are designed for masses, with a one-size-fits-all approach in mind. However, the custom software are built from ground up to perfectly align with unique business needs, objectives and internal workflows and processes. This gives custom software a great advantage over the commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) software solutions. While implementing a commercial off-the-shelf software solution businesses might have to adjust according to the software structure and in some cases businesses might have to modify their important workflows and internal processes.
However, the custom software development is a process where the entire existing business structure, workflows, processes and culture is analyzed critically and then the custom software is constructed to align with everything including existing IT infrastructure. This make adoption easier and it enhance and empower existing processes, workflows and structure, ensuring minimum to no disruption at all. The custom software development offers excellent flexibility, scalability and customization, enhancing operational efficiency and performance, which could be a great competitive advantage. That is why businesses in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi and all around the UAE are turning towards custom software development.
What are the Advantages of Custom Software Development?
Custom software offer great many advantages, and that is the reason the global market volume of custom software development industry is steadily growing every year. The market trends are shifting towards more customer-centric business models, businesses are also realizing the importance of customer satisfaction. The challenges are rising day by day, hence the business efficiency is a key to long-term and sustainable success. In order to achieve higher operational efficiency businesses rely on various software applications. Every business have unique goals, unique challenges, and completely unique sets of strengths and weaknesses.
A customized software can offer 100% solution to all challenges, addressing all pain points, and has capabilities to turn weaknesses into strengths while driving operational excellence. Here are some key advantages of custom software development which are crucial to optimizing and greatly enhancing the business efficiency, productivity and performance.
Tailored Solutions Enhance Efficiency and Productivity
One of the most impactful advantage of custom software development is that it deliver exclusive and tailored solutions to address the specific pain points and unique challenges individual business and its employees are facing. The commercial off-the-shelf software solutions might offer a wider range of features however, they fell short on addressing to the challenges that are unique for an individual business. Every business has its own unique organizational culture, customs, and long-term goals. Every business take a unique path to achieve their goals, this is what differentiate it from others and this is something that is very positive and healthy for competitiveness.
The unique business needs cannot met with a standard software solution that is not designed to address those needs, in fact a custom software is built from the scratch keeping those needs in mind. Hence a custom software solution is very capable of delivering exclusive solutions, optimizing and empowering internal workflows. Businesses can seamlessly implement a customized software solution and integrate it within their existing business process without causing any disruption and without requiring any modification to their existing practices. This is crucial as this eliminates the need of additional training, it reduces repetitive work and it empowers individual employees and teams. Consequently the business efficiency get raised drastically.
Higher Scalability and Flexibility
In today’s fast-paced and dynamic business landscape, the scalability and flexibility are the most essential features of any software solution. The commercial off-the-shelf software solutions fell short on adopting to emerging market trends, since these types of applications are developed for masses, they have slower response towards market changes. It is this aspect of the commercial off-the-shelf software which result in inefficiencies and limitations down the road. However, the custom software development keep emerging trends and needs in mind, hence the custom software offer quicker and reliable solutions to emerging needs, growth and customization without causing any disruption.
Furthermore the custom software development offers more control and authority over your software application which enable businesses to quickly adopt to emerging needs and enable them to respond quickly to changing market trends and customer behavior. The custom software can be customized deal with new challenges, whether it is adding new features and tools, third-party system integration with a new solution, any change in compliance or regulatory requirements, or scaling up for rapid business growth, businesses can deal with such challenges with very less friction and disruption.
Personalized Experience and User-Friendly UIs
The user adoption and user experience are the most crucial factors to the success of any software application. Businesses often implement expensive and top-of-the-line commercial off-the-shelf software solutions but these applications fail to deliver the desired value. Despite having remarkable feature a software could still fail if it doesn’t have user-friendly experience and intuitive UIs. The UIs or user interfaces plays crucial role in user adoption. Using the familiar feature names, color schemes, information structure and navigation plays crucial role in user adoption. The custom software development provides ability to design user-centric applications, which are not only functionally superior but also easy-to-use and intuitive.
The custom software development allow businesses to involve end-users in the software designing and development process, enabling them to share their feedback at every stage and which help incorporating features and experience as per users’ needs. This minimizes the resistance to change and raises the adoption rate, which itself is very effective in raising business efficiency. The custom software development offers personalized experience and workflows along with user-friendly design and UIs which empower your employees and enable them to work more effectively and efficiently.
Enhanced Security and Better Compliance
With the rise of internet access the negative actors and cyber security threats are increasing concern of not only businesses but also customers. Businesses of all sizes and types are taking extra measures to ensure the security of their customers and valuable business data. A small security breach could drastically harm business reputation. The off-the-shelf software may poses a bigger security threat as most of the time these applications are hosted on cloud and another big disadvantage is that the application structure is well-known, which also makes it easier to exploited. The commercial off-the-shelf software are used by thousands of businesses which means they are more exposed.
The custom software on the contrary are not available for masses, their information structure and security layers are hidden and only known to the management team which makes them more secure and well-protected. The custom software development enable businesses to implement advanced encryption technologies, robust security and network protocols tailored to their needs and regulatory requirements. On top of that the application structure is hidden, which makes it very difficult for malicious actors to exploit or breach. Furthermore the data is also stored in your custody which also help enhancing the security of customized software application.
Easy Integration with Existing Systems
The modern day businesses rely upon several software application which forms the digital ecosystem and IT infrastructure of the entire organization. Finding a new software for the needs in a big challenge, however, integrating it with the existing software, databases, central information system and IT infrastructure could be even bigger challenge. This is something the commercial off-the-shelf software solutions are not very good at. The ready-made software have strict integration requirements and doesn’t always offer the required flexibility and compatibility required for a seamless integration. Eventually businesses end-up wasting time, paying additional costs for middleware and inefficient manual work.
However, building a software from ground up provides a chance to consider all possible integration scenarios along with considering all existing software, databases, IT infrastructure and integration requirements. This makes integration completely seamless and frictionless. This also enable customized software to consolidate information and data from different sources into a unified platform which greatly enhances efficiency and productivity. Integration help minimizing latencies, redundancies, and repetitive work driving higher business efficiency across entire operations.
Conclusion
Custom software development is a way forward in a very dynamic and fast-paced business landscape where the market trends are changing swiftly, the customer demands are increasing, the new technologies are emerging every day and the competition is rising exponentially. The commercial off-the-shelf software solutions (COST) might seem a cost-effective option at first, but in long term they are more costly, costing businesses in terms of efforts, money and inefficient business processes. The custom software development on the contrary seem expensive at first, but in long-term it is much more cost-efficient and reliable. The custom software development help businesses built tailored solutions that precisely address each and every pain point and are fully aligned with unique and exclusive business needs.
Furthermore the customized software offered tailored solutions through highly personalized user-friendly experience. With ability to integrate seamlessly with existing IT infrastructure, third-party software tools, databases and central information system, the customized software solutions are ideal for the present day’s needs and have potential to greatly enhance and improve business efficiency. In this blog we have discussed how custom software can improve business efficiency, if you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to develop a highly cost-effective tailored software solution for your business, please feel free to get in touch with us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.