How to select the right features for your custom software

Custom software should make your life easier. When designed well, it will save you time, cut down costs, be enjoyable to use, and deliver a ton of value. In order to ensure these benefits, a well-managed software project kicks off with clarification of the big-picture strategy. What key problem needs to be solved? What functionality will be the core of the new application?

Financial software might be designed to more efficiently track and forecast expenses. Human Resources software might be built to more effectively facilitate the hiring process. But let’s think for a moment on a more granular level: what happens when someone actually uses the software day-to-day? What is their experience like from start to finish?

Exceptional core functionality is essential to the success of your new software. But feature selection can make or break the user experience as well. Implementing the most important features early - while forgoing or holding off on those that are merely nice to have - will ensure that you maximize value, minimize costs, and get the solution you truly want.

When selecting your initial features, consider these key questions: How essential is the feature to your goals and business needs? How much value will it provide? The features you rank most highly should be prioritized in the earliest versions of the application. Features ranked lower can be placed further down the product roadmap or discarded altogether.

Here are several features to consider when designing your new software:

User interface

Excessive user error or frustration can derail the effectiveness of a software application faster than a tire blowout sidelines a race car. An intuitive user interface and strong UX (user experience) design can prevent these problems from the start. What’s more, a very well designed interface can delight users, encouraging them to utilize the application to the fullest and derive maximum value.

When designing the user interface, consider whether a client self-service portal will be needed, or if only internal employees will need to interact directly with the application. Especially in cases where the interface will be client-facing, make sure branding is on-point as well (company logo, colors, images, copy, etc.).

Automations

In many cases, a key goal of custom software is to increase the efficiency of one or more business processes and save time. Building automations into your software can contribute significantly toward achieving this goal.

Common process automations include time-saving features like automatic file transfers, task scheduling, notifications and reminders, workflow approvals, auto-generated reports, and shortcut keys. You most likely don’t need all of these - but it’s worthwhile to consider including any automations that will add notable value.

Admin functionality

Chances are someone in your organization is going to need to perform at least a few basic administrative tasks with your new software. For example, there may be a need to manually add and remove users as positions turn over. Or you may have an admin responsible for basic troubleshooting and error resolution.

With good design, admin processes don’t need to be overly cumbersome. You may find it very useful to implement a good error logging feature or an administrative dashboard. Carefully consider what sort of in-house administration will need to be handled and which corresponding features will maximize efficiency.

Data reporting

What type of data will you need to retrieve from your new software system? Do you want to track usage statistics like how many people have interacted with the application, how often they’ve accessed it, and which tasks they’ve performed? Will you need to extract certain data to perform a business operation or conduct an analysis?

Your application should include features that facilitate a quick and easy way to extract any data you need, whenever you need it. And if there are certain types of data you’ll regularly need to examine, it may be a good idea to build in a reporting feature or data dashboard.

Security features

Another important consideration is what sort of security features you may need. How sensitive is the data you’ll be managing with your software? What level of protection does it require? Will you need data encryption, two-factor authentication, or access tracking? How will you know if any data has been compromised?

Each user will need a way to securely log in and access the data they need, but only the data they need. Features should be implemented to ensure that this is possible, to minimize the chance of a data breach by unauthorized access, and to flag such occurrences. Take care to determine upfront which security features will be necessary to adequately protect your data.

Integrations

Another critical consideration when selecting software features is which other systems you’ll need your new application to communicate with. Do you have data stored somewhere else that you’ll need to pull in? Will you need to extract certain data to send to another application? How will you migrate data from your legacy system?

A major benefit of custom software is that you can choose the exact integrations you need to implement. APIs (application programming interfaces) can be created to seamlessly facilitate interactions between the systems you need to connect. Identifying your integration needs up front is essential to maximizing the effectiveness of your new software.

Scalability

Changes in market conditions and user needs may necessitate rapid innovation at any point in time. It’s important that your software has the flexibility to scale and evolve as required. Fortunately, custom software is ideal for this, as a well-designed custom application should allow you to add new features quickly whenever you need them.

Clean code that is easy for developers to understand and update is vital to the long-term success of your application. Code should also be well-documented, in case the original developer is no longer available. Make sure that best practices are utilized in both the front-end and back-end development of your application.

Looking to build software with an optimal feature set?

At Basecode we help you conduct a thorough assessment of your goals and needs before we write the first line of code. Only when we have a solid strategy in place do we move forward, building out the most valuable features first and ensuring that you get the highest return on your investment - right from Day 1. Find out more.