What to choose?

• A Software as a Service?
• Build your own using AI?
• Use developers to build it?

We have a lot more to choose from these days when it comes to finding a software solution which is absolutely fantastic! This has made sofware so much more accessible to diverse businesses.

But how do you know what to choose?
Which solution will deliver the functionality that you need at a price that will also enable you to have a return on profits?

That's a BIG question!

There is no one size fits solution. It really does depend upon what your needs are and what you are expecting to achieve.

Software as a Service

For example, choosing Software as a Service, i.e. a SaaS platform makes perfect sense if you are a startup and you are still finding out what you need. You don't have a huge budget to shell out on building something specific to your business and also, you may have got those "must haves" wrong. Choosing a SaaS solution will give you a lot of features and an affordable monthly price. You many not use all of those features and you may find that it lacks some of the features that you need but you can use this time to find your feet.

Get AI to Build it

Choosing to build your own solution using AI is a great way to tease out your requirements and create a quick prototype. It also gives you an insight into at least a little of how development works. And if the thing that you are creating isn't business critical, it can help you to to get more done or it can inform your next step which may be to build your software for publishing.

n.b. building using AI is much like using AI in any other area, it does hallucinate (get things wrong) and it does look totally plausible. Make sure that you have an experienced developer at hand should you need it to do more than act as a prototype. Did you ask your AI to deal with cyber attacks? What did you ask it to do exactly? Did you provide your AI with enough edge cases to enable it to function correctly? What design patterns has it chosen, is the code open for extention but closed for modification?

Hire a Developer

Then there is the situation where you have been in business for years, you know many of your requirements and an off the peg software solution is not going to deliver the functionality that you need. What's more, it's going to end up being much more expensive in the end as you are only renting out the service.

Building your own means that you own it and once the development is complete, you have a vastly reduced monthly cost and the ability to change the software when your requirements change.

If you are feeling that this is getting all too technical and don't know who to trust, give us a shout, we love talking about software and we love helping people to navigate opportunities and grow their business.