One of the biggest commitments a business can ever make is to implement a web application with the purpose of solving business needs. The commitment is usually greater if the business web application is to be used in the entire organization.
Many companies require such web applications to support their business needs for the longest time possible. That's why many businesses thoroughly evaluate a business web application before making the decision of whether to buy it or not.
Moreover, it is not uncommon to see business leaders choose to hire a software consulting firms to help their companies make web application purchase decisions. These are some of the important questions the consulting firm will help you get answers to before committing to a purchase.
What problem does the web-application solve?
Web applications are designed to be used in businesses to generally solve specific problems for those businesses. For instance, time tracking applications assist businesses in solving the challenge of monitoring employee time while project management application assists businesses to track and manage different projects. The application's value to the business is determined by the problems it solves.
How does the application solve the problem?
Also, businesses require understanding how the business web application will solve the problems. A business cannot buy a web application that is cumbersome. Also, businesses usually disregard web applications that require a lot of maintenance.
So, businesses need to know whether they can internally solve the problems meant for the business web application or not. If they cannot solve any problem, they should buy one and vice versa.
Also, businesses should determine whether the methods used by the web application are going to be complicated, costly and time-consuming. If it is going to be so, they should consider other options apart from the business web application.
How closely does the business web application relate to the business?
Many times, businesses require to know how closely the web applications relate to their industry. For example, retail outlets normally require GDSN, a data sync pool to manage the product data between them and their suppliers.
So, businesses in the retail industry should look for web applications related to GSDN syncing for them to be effective.
Can the web application support the existing processes?
It is very important for businesses to evaluate if the web application can support the current business processes. It's hard for businesses to implement a standalone application.
How much effort is required to implement the web application?
It is a common occurrence for businesses to estimate the time necessary to implement and operationalize the web application. Businesses are ware that applications designed for complex business processes take long implement.
Simple applications, on the other hand, are not expected to have a high implementation timeframe.
What process does it automate?
Many businesses implement business web applications not to solve particular problems, but with the aim of automating certain processes. The more technical a process is, the better to automate it.
Inventory management applications are designed to automate the process of managing inventories. Manual inventory management and tracking can be very tedious, and such applications make the process easier.
How will users access the application?
Businesses at times require web applications to be accessible by users with all types of devices.
Users with mobile devices find it hard to access most of the web applications since they are limited by the size of their mobile screens. However, this is not a challenge for users with PCs since the web applications run on browsers.
Such cases require businesses to have mobile applications apart from the standard web interface.
How much maintenance will the web application require?
The chances of a web application being rejected are very high if it requires a high level of maintenance – no matter how good it is. No business wants to devote a lot of time, money and human resources just to maintain a web application.
ERP applications can be given exemptions since they require a bit of maintenance for them to keep running. However, these applications primarily cater for the business needs of the entire organization but not a few business needs.
