There is no shortage of customers success stories on the internet – with great ventures often require great collaboration efforts to make those venture success. But in reality great partnerships, products and ventures aren’t the one-night stories they require compromise, innovations and continuous problem-solving on a daily basis. Yet often doesn’t matter how excited, enthusiastic you are how great the idea is sometimes these ventures break down due to the continuous setbacks after setbacks. Same goes with custom software. If neglected at the right time Custom software setbacks can become the biggest reason for project failure if they were neglected at the right time. In this article, you will read the major reasons for software development setbacks and how to prevent Custom software setbacks.

What Is Custom Software Development?

• Many times, it occurs that off-the-shelf software is unable to perform all the needs of a business organization or any specific needs of a company. Due to such Issues, developers create custom software, keeping in mind the specific needs of a particular business organization.
• As a matter of fact, Custom software development is, designing and developing different software applications for a user or a group of users. This software is designed to explicitly address these users’ needs better than ongoing and extensive “off-the-shelf” software can. Custom software applications are typically developed for these specific users by a third-party or in-house group of developers.

1. By custom software development, it is meant the production of exclusive technological solutions.
2. The procedure of custom software development is costlier than that of off-the-shelf software.
3. Custom software development involves proper planning and a thorough strategy.

ADVANTAGES OF CUSTOM SOFTWARES

• Custom Software Provides the Exact Set of Features that You Need.

When you want to make a deal with any company, you conclude a custom software development agreement that describes all the features that should be there in the final product. Although this approach helps to guarantee that after the development is over, you’ll be the owner of the application that is adapted to your specific range of needs.

• Potential for Business Improvements

You can provide a developer with the list of day-to-day issues that your employees face during the process. Having a generous amount of experience in custom business applications development, a custom software development company will come up with a solution that will not just perform some daily operations, but bring new potential for further business improvements.

• You Can Rely on Support Services

If there will be any problems during the work with your custom software, you can always look up to a qualified support service. The support service company will inform you about the important updates related to the problem you are facing.

• Advanced Security Measures

These companies particular attention to security measures. As every company is focused on long-term relationships with every client the safety of their businesses is one of the main priorities.

• Can Be Added One by One

If you are not sure what range of features is required specifically in your case, the developer can deliver you the MVP in which only the core functionality will be implemented. After the trial of your customized app, you can frame the new set of requirements. The software development company, in return, can add on the required features one by one until reaching the desired result.

DISADVANTAGES OF CUSTOM SOFTWARES

• High Costs

The disadvantage of every custom software is the high cost. You will require the most advanced and costliest technologies. Your project may need a team of experienced developers, designers, and project managers resultant in which the costs will be higher as compared to expenses incurred in off-the-shelf software. But you should always keep in mind that the upcoming benefits will dominate the costs.

• Gathering resources takes a lot of time

You will have to spend a sufficient amount of time and resources to define your business needs and decide how the custom software will help you reach the goal.

• The Danger of Choosing the Wrong Vendor

Among these companies, there’s a lot of people who offer inferior quality and improper solutions. Thus, you should never rush while choosing a developer or a company. Spend a good amount of period on exploring, and you’ll guard yourself against even larger losses later.

• Risks involved

The risks associated with custom software will always vary. You must be well-aware of your company’s requirements and should have the ability to convey to your software development team about the ways in which you want your software to satisfy those requirements.

• Changes due to increasing needs

It’s common to determine new needs during this procedure, and this results in additional costs and development time. Common changes can result in loss of project scope and a product that is insufficient or different from what you initially intended.

4 WAYS TO PREVENT CUSTOM SOFTWARE SETBACKS

1. Miscalculated Resources

All the customers looking for custom software, want a cost-efficient solution. But virtuous software companies will never exaggerate themselves by agreeing to an unattainable delivery date at a discount. Though the process for outsourcing software development project requires a detailed plan, it is a simple procedure. You have to keep two things in mind – your budget and the purposes that you want to fulfil with your software.

2. Failure to Define Clear Vision

Custom software development is a long process and requires strong planning and a clear vision to keep it moving forward. The software should always provide value to a business, help generate revenue, and make life easier for employees and management to use. But, approaching the project with a clear vision and having knowledge of all the information, will help you to remove hurdles on the path of your success. The more detail you can provide, the more likely the development team will be to get a clearer vision of what you want to have.

3. Budget Woes

Estimating the cost of custom software is difficult. But it’s important to get a detailed estimate from your software development team. There should also be room for additional costs if ever you decide to add extra features or want to speed up the software development timeline by adding more developers to your team. Having to stand a project or stop one overall because of unexpected financial issues, it can be sidestepped by having a good estimation from a reputable software firm.

4. Misguided Expectations

One of the major pillars of a great software development project is communicating well with your team members. It’s extremely necessary that you keep in touch at every step of the process. This helps you to control whether development is going on the right track or not. Dealing with a local firm will allow face-to-face meetings and make it easier to conference calls with your development team. Also, managing expectations is about structured and technical communication and not about inconsistent or informal chats.

CONCLUSION

So, with all the above-mentioned risks covered, why still choose custom software? You will get the same services from off-the-shelf software also but there are various limitations.

Therefore, custom software still proposes the best price for money when conventional off-the-shelf software fails to meet the specific end users need, and when the long-term total cost of ownership is too expensive to approve.

You can easily evade the disappointing outcome of your CSD plan now as you know all the matters that can ascend from ineffective communication with your seller. Also, changes in the internal and external business environment can bring challenges to which one must be able to overcome on time.

When you are using “off-the-shelf” software

It is not possible to address all your requirements at once.  You should also keep this in mind that the conditions of doing business can change too. There are some variable parts such as legal aspects and market particulars that can disturb the way of how things are to be done. In case of need, we can adapt the process of working application to the changing business environment.

Business analysts can assess the business impact of changes that needed to be made. All requirements will be analysed and documented which will help to guess the amount of the approaching work. Being a “bridge” between the business problem and the software solution, a business analyst provides the development team with the exact set of requirements. Since developers will know your business needs, the task that modifies the working application won’t take much time and effort.

Different organizations have different needs. When evaluating the potential for the custom software solutions of your company, first ask yourself what your exact vision is for having custom software. What do you intend to do with it? How will it impact your organization?

Before developing custom software, you should keep in mind the different complications that are faced while creating as well as using custom software.

All these difficulties can be solved if you select the right software development team – one with experience, ability, and a strong track record.

3 FAQS

1. How to choose a software development firm?

In the first place, there are dozens of sites that provide reviews on Custom Software development firms. Novateus is a custom software development company that is helping its customers to meets business challenges with best in its class software. Contact for no cost obligation consultancy. Make sure that the software development company is focused on the apps which you are interested in. Portfolios and case studies will help you to know if a company has enough experience in your industry.

2. Can the software be upgraded in the future as new technology becomes available?

Of course! There are up-gradations available according to the latest technologies

3. How long does it take to develop custom software?

It’s very hard to tell in advance about how long the development of a custom application for your company will take. To guarantee a better outcome, you have to do some preliminary work prior to going to the working process. Communicate with your employees to understand what are the issues that they face daily and find possible solutions.