Custom software development is the process of designing a solution from scratch that can meet your exact business needs. This is an alternative solution to off-the-shelf software, which is designed to meet a wide range of needs for countless clients.

We believe custom software is the way of the future and the best way to give your company long-lasting software support. But why is custom software development so important? To answer that, we’ll go over what it can be used for and the benefits you can expect.

What Is Custom Software Used For?

The beauty of custom software solutions is they can be used for virtually any purpose. If you need to optimize an old process or simply improve another software solution, custom software can help. And in many cases, it can address problems and offer solutions that no off-the-shelf software includes.

What Are Examples of Custom Software?

So what do these benefits look like in action? The potential applications are nearly infinite, but organizations have made use of custom software for the following:

  • Student Education Portals
  • Business Account Management
  • Content Management Systems
  • Customer Relationship Management
  • Invoice Automation
  • Business-Related Calculators
  • Point-of-Sale Software
  • Inventory Planning
  • Scheduling Tools
  • Volunteer Coordination Webpages

Why Is Custom Development Best for Your Business?

Overall, custom development is best for your business because it offers a streamlined and straightforward experience for both you and your customers.

As consumers get more tech-savvy, they want an increasingly improved user experience with your brand.

The same goes for your employees. While it may seem like employees will have to learn completely new software when they start working for your company, that’s not exactly the case. Your customized software will use familiar language and comparable interfaces to popular off-the-shelf software. Your employees can easily learn and master it.

What Are the Main Advantages of Custom Software Development?

Custom software allows you to develop a program that is perfectly suited to your business’ needs and offerings. Here are four benefits of custom software development.

1. Uniquely Optimized

Many software solutions label themselves as a “one-size-fits-all” product. But in reality, no premade software program will meet every need of your company; it’s impossible to create a program with every organization’s unique needs in mind.

Customized software means you don’t have to change your business model to better suit generalized software. When you’re developing your custom software, you can prioritize the services that are essential for your business. Then, your software can be tweaked and modified to meet your exact needs so you can continue to do business exactly the way you want—no need to compromise.

2. Perfectly Flexible

Even if a third-party software solution seems to meet all of your business’s current needs, those needs are subject to change. And while that software will receive periodic updates, those updates will never be tailored to how your company has grown and evolved.

With customized software, you can scale it as you modify your business practices. Compatibility problems will never be an issue either, as you are in control of how the software supports your employees. It will always be a reliable asset in your business’ toolkit.

3. Highly Secure

While customized software may not actually have more security measures than off-the-shelf solutions, they are much less of a target to hackers and other cyber-criminals. Most of the time, hackers want to target as many people as they can so they can access more information with a single breach. But with customized software solutions, you are the only one using it, thus making your software a low risk for potential security threats.

4. Incredibly Cost-Effective

In many cases, companies will purchase a software solution and then not even use a large number of the offered tools. You may end up spending more money on programs you don’t even want to use. Your employees agree—64 percent of survey respondents said they have more applications than their business needs.

Customized software lets you pay money for the services you want to automate—nothing more. While there may seem to be higher startup costs to determine which systems you need to automate, the à la carte approach to automation will save you money in the long run.

Customize Your Software

Want to learn more about how custom software and consultation can deliver impressive and lasting results to your business? Contact our experts at Emergent Software today.

We’ll guide you through the software development process and help you figure out exactly what services your business needs to thrive.