Custom Software Development Pricing Explained And What To Expect From A Quote
It’s the age-old question: how much will it cost? For any business, knowing the ballpark they’re about to part with is essential. This budget is carefully factored into the business plan, fundraising strategy and financial forecast. Business owners realising they need a custom-built tool or platform can feel overwhelmed. How much ROI will the investment create? Will it even be a success? How much of a budget is enough to get what I want? What do I want?
We know about this train of thought because we’ve heard it from clients when they come to us. So, how much does it cost to develop custom software? While we can’t tell you a fixed custom software development cost, we can put your mind at rest by explaining how custom software agencies like ours price this service.
Custom software development is becoming more of an essential digital service every day. Read on to get clued up on where your project quote comes from.
Factors that Affect Custom Software Development Pricing
Unlike mobile app development, custom software development isn’t constrained by one device. Additionally, the tailor-made aspect of custom software means each project is intended to be one-of-a-kind.
All this makes it even more difficult to give the average cost of custom software development. Here are all the factors that affect the quote you receive.
What is in the project scope? The significance of complexity.
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Broadly speaking, the scope of the project defines it's parameters and what it involves in a general sense. This is where the software is outlined: its functionality, features and objectives. The defining limitations of custom software development are extensive. After all, the very point of any custom software is to fill a gap or a need that out-of-the-box solutions can’t fill.
Typically the more complex your project, the longer it will take to build and the higher the price will be. ‘Complexity’ can have a range of meanings for a custom software project. For example:
How does it work? The nature of your custom software defines so much of the scope and, therefore, the length and complexity of your project. How many featuress does it have? What are the integrations? Are there associated licences that need to be integrated? Basically, what shape does your custom software take? More on this below.
Does a prototype need to be designed and tested before the final software is developed? .
Is the custom software a complete, stand-alone tool used independently of other software? Or is it built to be an ‘add-on’ to an existing system? Building a piece of software to work with a pre-existing system can make a project shorter and easier or longer and more complex, depending on the compatibility of the software.
Development Team and Location
Depending on the complexity of your project, some agencies price work differently according to the seniority of the developer assigned to the project, where higher custom software development rates apply to more skilled team members or on a rolling basis until completion. This isn’t the case at Myth Digital, where our team of developers works on each project as a whole for a blended fee, allowing you to avail of the whole teams knowledge and experience without cost impact.
Integrations, functionality, and APIs
Integrations and APIs are the connections between your custom software and other external software it needs to interact with. The more integrations a piece of software has, the longer the project becomes as the developers work to build these into your software. There are many different types of integration your software can have. Here are some examples
Your CMS and eCommerce platform. This allows the software to work alongside your website.
Any legacy business systems that you already use to carry out business operations. These may be outdated or may be custom-built themselves, so integration could be complex.
Your CRM systems. Any CRM systems will likely store essential information your new software needs, so these need to be integrated.
Security systems. One of the main advantages of custom software is heightened security, so it would be an oversight if they didn’t integrate successfully with any existing security systems in the business.
Consider a phased approach
At the beginning of the project you are likely carrying a big vision of what the platform or offering can be, the problems it solves and features that will engrain it more and more with customers. The scale of the project can be overwhelming and when costs come it the reality of the investment can really hit.
When building a SAAS offering, having funding in place to build the whole platform is rare, more commonly a phased approach is required and even recommended. Our clients typically move through prototype, minimal viable product (MVP) and hen commercial launch. This not only breaks it down into clean pieces of work but also gives the founding team the opportunity to test the market and build early adopter relationships through customer engagement with those early versions. Often times the outcome from this testing augments what the initial vision of the product was, saving the team costly refactoring and benefiting the product int he long term. As the phases develop you are also equipped with something tangible to demonstrate to funders, VCs, angel investors etc.
There's more than one way to skin a cat when it comes to custom software development, our team are committed to helping you navigate the best course for you, your opportunity and resources.
We’re excited about the future of custom software development and what it means for businesses of all kinds. If you’re interested in success through custom software, talk to us.
