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Commercial software often is not an exact fit for the needs of employees, contractors, and customers. This well-known issue can be handled in a few different ways. Sometimes commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) software can be made to work, by modifying a certain business process. Designing a custom template sometimes helps. Finally, creating a full customized piece of software is an option, whether it is done in-house or contracted out to a software development firm. Investing in custom software development work brings numerous benefits. 

1 – You Get a Tailored Solution

This is the main reason companies consider custom software development, to get a software solution that meets their exact needs. Commercial off-the-shelf software is convenient and affordable, but made for everyone who needs the functions of a spreadsheet, a project tracking tool, and so on. A custom solution adds functionality that matches your company workflow, business processes, or prospecting tactics. There is no need to create a workaround or modify business processes to suit a particular piece of software. 

2 – Increased Control

When you buy software from a company, you are somewhat vulnerable to ups-and-downs at the vendor. They may go out of business. They may not find and patch a security vulnerability. Their hosting may not as reliable as you would like. If you can build and host the software on your own server or servers, you have more control over patches, updates, and availability. If data security is of utmost importance, having software hosting on another company’s machines increases your risk of a data breach.  

3 – Enhanced Growth Potential

Software that scales with your growing business is valuable. That custom set of worksheets might be easy to expand, but you are still managing your sales team with a spreadsheet. If you add staff or add steps to a process or need new reports, standard software can come up short. This will end up costing time and money, as well as causing frustration.

4 – Easier Software Integration 

Your custom software will be made to work with any software you currently rely on. Your custom project management tool can be guaranteed to work with your email and cloud storage, to cite one example. If you rely on COTS products, you may find yourself creating workarounds in your business processes, or you may have to buy new software and invest in training everyone who needs to use it.  

5 – Full Design Control 

When you pay for custom software development, you can choose the features you want and the underlying technologies that will run the software. For sophisticated enterprise software, this is important. If you need a mobile app, this level of control for iOS and android mobile app development in Murfreesboro TN is ideal. 

Custom Software Is Often Worth the Cost 

Paying for custom software often makes sense just on the time and effort saved from trying to work around the limits of commercial software. The ability to grow easily and control the technologies used in your mission-critical software are also valuable.