Advantages and Disadvantages of Off-the-Shelf Software

In today’s competitive business world, cost is typically a major concern – making it difficult to decide whether to purchase off-the-shelf software or custom-built solutions. Sometimes a general package will fit the bill, but a specialised business will often need specialist processes to support it.

A manufacturing business, a PR company and a service provider will all have different structures, processes, needs, and customers. The entire way they do business will be fundamentally different, which means a “one-size-fits-all” approach often simply doesn’t go all the way towards meeting their unique requirements.

These are some of the considerations to bear in mind when making strategic decisions around business software:

• Training
• Support
• Development influence
• Price
• Fitness for purpose
• Software updates and upgrades
• Ownership
• Trials