What is Saas App Development? How do we make it Successful?

Software is developed in a variety of ways. Various programming languages with their pros and cons, libraries, and other tools and technologies are available. So that applications of different types can be developed that work flawlessly on mobile devices, desktop computers, and web browsers. The development, licensing, and delivery of software are issues that need attention. To address all these issues, Saas App Development has into the picture, and let’s read about it in detail here.

It is important to note that customers always depend on the development company for choosing technology framework, or programming language to develop an application that meets their business requirements. They have to rely on developers’ expertise and experience. Nevertheless, customers and developers may be affected by technology choices, frameworks, and delivery models, since each has its pros and cons and may require different strategies for application development. In this blog, we’ll discuss the benefits of SaaS (Software as a Service) and one of the most authentic and long-lasting benefits of using it.

Top SaaS Stats

• There will be more than $170 billion in Software as a Service revenue in 2023.
• The SaaS market has grown roughly 500 percent in the last seven years.
• Software as a service (SaaS) is essential for business growth.
• There are eight times as many SaaS firms in the US as everywhere else.
• A developing segment of the IT security industry is cloud security.

SaaS Trends And Growth Statistics

• It is estimated that the SaaS market is worth approximately $172 billion (Gartner)
• From $31.5 billion in 2015, the SaaS industry is anticipated to reach $171.9 billion in 2018. In only seven years, that’s a fivefold growth.
• The Software as a Service industry is expected to grow at its fastest rate ever between 2021 and 2023, reaching $171.9 billion in revenue by the end of the year.
• The annual growth rate of the SaaS industry is expected to exceed 17% in 2023.

What is SaaS Application Development?

This software delivery method allows the user to access data using any device with web access and an active internet connection. 

The SaaS model is web-based. Software vendors host the applications on their servers. On-premises software delivery models face many challenges, and this model overcomes them. It requires minimal investment on the part of companies to host the software on high-end hardware. If this leads to outsourcing software troubleshooting and maintenance, the SaaS vendor handles it all for the company, adding more cost to the business.

Perpetual licenses are offered on-premise, but maintenance and support are also charged annually. As opposed to SaaS, customers pay monthly or annually for subscription fees, including software licenses, support, and maintenance. SaaS offers the possibility of spreading out costs over a long time. Thus, Saas App Development is very popular. A software architect should prepare your high-level architecture design regardless of whether you use AWS or another service for your SaaS project.

A SaaS application may be the next natural step in your business growth. ‘ Software development, on the other hand, is not a decision to be taken carelessly or without adequate research. If you’re going to hire a dev team, allocate funds, or advertise a new solution, you’ll need to know everything there is to know about the SaaS development process.

Why is SaaS Development functional?

• Cloud service providers host the applications on their servers and make them available to customers over the Internet.
• Centralized management of the application
• Service providers are responsible for handling hardware, software, and security.
• We don’t require our customers to upgrade their server space or licenses. Simply upgrade your vendor’s SaaS subscription.
• It is more usable since nobody wants to spend much money on customized software. Any time, SaaS vendors provide support and learning. SaaS models are based on pay-per-use fees.
• You’re ready for immediate use once you enter a few basic profile-related information after purchasing a subscription. Installation and Configuration of the applications are done prior.
• Access the Saas App from anywhere on any desktop or mobile device. Because it is hosted in the cloud and accessible through the Internet.
• With SaaS, customers can start a business without worrying about server configuration and software updates. This is helpful for startups with limited budgets, those who want to deploy across desktop and mobile devices, and those who want to launch eCommerce websites without worrying about server configuration.

What is the difference between SAAS development and traditional software licensing?

To use cloud-based SAAS applications, users don’t need to install any software on their computer or mobile device. For traditional licensed software, users must purchase software licenses and install the software on their computers or other devices. Unlike traditional software solutions, no servers or specific devices are required to execute SaaS apps. As an alternative, Cloud providers offer clients software ready to use and can be accessed from any computer or mobile device.

SaaS Technology and Architecture

In terms of quality, Software as a service must be develop using the most up-to-date technology. Cloud services can be use by businesses and individuals to move their technological tasks to the cloud. Businesses must invest in developing applications with expanded capabilities if they want to improve their solution, keep it current, optimize their resources, appeal to a bigger audience, and please that audience.

SaaS application development necessitates a careful examination of the technology involved. It’s also important to keep in mind that they’re selected based on the scope of your project and the available funding.

Programming language (Python)

Sophisticated and clear programming languages are require for SaaS development to ensure the production of a current and progressive solution. It’s not a secret that choosing a language among the many available options might be difficult. Python’s versatility and readability make it an excellent choice for SaaS development. Additionally, JavaScript and SQL are beneficial.

Database (MongoDB)

Every successful SaaS product must use a secure database. Its primary characteristics are its tiny size and its capacity to store data in a more flexible manner. Additionally, the database could be optimize using cutting-edge technology like Python.

MongoDB’s automatic sharding capabilities may make it your primary database. It provides high scalability and speedy, efficient execution of various tasks.

Queuing system (RabbitMQ)

Communication protocols in software design are commonly referred to as queuing systems or message queuing (MSMQ) technologies. Exchanging messages allows the software to communicate with other entities like APIs and servers. A message queue system is used to store and distribute app messages.

RabbitMQ is a dependable and scalable messaging platform. Aside from being free, open-source, and compatible with many operating systems and computer languages, this system is also easy to set up and use.

Cloud Computing Services and CDN (AWS)

A cloud computing service is essential to a SaaS development platform since it enables the built features to work. Regarding technology, AWS (Amazon Web Services) is now one of the top options. Its potential applications are data storage, content delivery, and other business-enhancing features. Anyone with an internet-enabled device can access the files that have been uploaded.

Elastic Compute Cloud (ECC) also works well with AWS (EC2). The AWS EC2 architecture provides scalable cloud computing capacity and increased technological resources. Your EC2 servers can be located anywhere you choose. You should also think about utilizing a content delivery network (CDN). One of the most valuable tools for creating and managing software material is available here

SaaS application development can only proceed if a list of features is drafted during the project description. By splitting the features into those that are needed and those that are optional, business analysts can prioritize them.

Here’s the basic setup of features for the SaaS application development platform:

• Functional tools– Here are the essential and inherent features of SaaS. Slack, for example, may allow users to communicate with each other by text message and video call.
• Analytical tools. A CRM system should include reports, statistics, and more.
• Management tools. SaaS systems should offer a variety of user roles. The specified role determines the access tiers and functionalities of a SaaS product.

Determining if your company is ready for a SaaS 

Regardless of the size of your company, these options are worth considering. Your company’s business goals, budget, and clientele are what really count.

This delivery model allows B2B suppliers to sell one platform adapted to the needs of multiple clients from diverse industries or organizations, as well as the needs of their end users. This is the ideal option for SaaS adoption in the B2B segment.

Make sure your company has the right people in place before you start building SaaS. An experienced team of people who can plan, design, build, and implement innovative solutions is required to work with SaaS apps.

When you don’t yet have a team, you have several options to choose from:

• Hiring an in-house team allows you to create and improve long-term solutions, but you must pay regular salaries regardless of whether apps are developed.
• Hire freelancers for temporary work if you don’t plan to update your application regularly after its initial release or if you don’t plan to extend it after a short time. If you decide to continue development, your new team will spend a lot of time exploring the app.
• When hiring an outsourcing software company, you should look for companies that offer software development and consulting services. TechnoBrains, for example, is an experienced provider of such solutions. A team of experts can be assembled quickly with this option. If more work needs to be done on your project, your outsourcing provider already has documentation. A flat fee will be charged, and your outsourcing provider will provide all documentation. 

From project to project, the structure of a SaaS application development company varies. There are still a few universal core team members: DevOps, backend developers, SaaS app developers, frontend developers, quality assurance specialists, UI/UX designers, solution architects, and project managers.

How do we make Saas Software Development Successful?

Despite its immense potential, the SaaS business model does not guarantee success. The success of an organization depends on its ability to offer an easy-to-learn and easy-to-integrate solution.

Read our blog to learn why you should outsource the saas development.

To go above and beyond our users’ expectations, we invited you to learn 6 secrets to building a successful SaaS platform.

1. User Experience & Design

A great mobile user experience and slick design are crucial factors in success when the internet has become necessary, and most people use smartphones. Other factors such as User Experience and User Interface should be consider when engaging, converting, and retaining customers.

2. Product Requirement Prioritization

To develop a SaaS product, you must determine the crucial features. As a first step, you must consider two major concerns.

Features

To provide value to your customers, you need to consider what features you should include. Research and analysis are necessary to get a clear picture of your customer’s thinking because no matter what you think he or she may believe, the truth is always very different.

User Stories

We recommend that while listing out your SaaS requirements, you include user stories; and short & simple descriptions of the features from the user’s perspective.

3. Prepare a List of Deliverables

After the product requirements are outlined, then start with product designing. The design and Saas App development teams must agree on a target “deliverable” to build a successful SaaS product.

Depending on the technical aspects of the project, some features may seem reasonable on paper but may not be realizable. In this case, flexibility is the key to finding a solution.

4. Find a Great Offshore Developer That Gets You

Skills are necessary for creating wonders. You must develop your SaaS products with a dedicated team. Managing your developers directly would be very beneficial if you wanted to control their work. Regardless of how far your product development has gone, you always have the option to alter your requirements.

5. Do Not Forget About Sales & Marketing

Assume as if no one knows about its fully-tested SaaS product once it has been built. 

Advertise the product in the marketplace. As a result, you must implement your marketing strategy for SaaS promotion.

6) Customer Engagement Metrics

Product management and customer success teams closely monitor the new feature. Similarly, you need to focus on metrics that measure customer engagement. It’s more competitive than ever in the SaaS market, so it’s imperative to develop and implement product innovation strategies if you want to create a successful SaaS product.  

Adopting new features is an important step that helps you ensure customer retention and determine if your customers are following the roadmap you have outlined for them to follow in the first place.  

In addition, finding the number of customers who initially tried a product’s new features becomes vital. You should check whether the customers use the features continuously. Therefore, you need to monitor regularly how deep the adoption is, how long it takes, etc.  

The more important metric, however, is the customer engagement and retention metric, which considers the number of actions and durations taken by your customers. You can use this data to determine the success level of your SaaS product.  

Set up adoption and retention plans with specific triggers, followed by onboarding and activation processes. The elements above have a direct impact on conversions.  

The Overview of SaaS Development Challenges

You may encounter several pitfalls during the development process. Let’s take a closer look at the most popular ones.

Challenge 1: Integration of Third-Party Services

Some functionalities are constructed by third parties and integrated into the Software-as-a-Service via application programming interfaces (APIs), while others will be developed from scratch.

The payment mechanism is one of the most popular third-party features in most SaaS applications. This functionality facilitates subscription payments and other monetization/pricing-related tasks.

Integration can be difficult because technological requirements are highly complex.

Stripe, PayPal, QuickPay, Braintree, and Skrill are standard payment options incorporate into SaaS applications. Due to complexity, each payment platform provides API documentation that assists users through the implementation process.

The best method to overcome this difficulty is to recruit an experienced development team.

Particularly one with a skilled QA to do manual and automated tests to guarantee that the third-party integration functions as intended.

Notably, the sort of third-party integration a Software-as-a-Service platform requires relies on its core functionality.

Challenge 2: Having a Secure Database

SaaS programs include a vast quantity of sensitive data that may be accessed from nearly any device with a web browser. This increases its vulnerability to hacking.

To circumvent this, SaaS database service providers utilize SSL and TLS as their standard encryption protocols for user-to-server and user-to-user connections.

However, this protection is insufficient to protect the quantity of data handled by SaaS solutions.

To ensure security, nations are beginning to enact laws to govern the platform’s development and management.

The team must adhere to these protocols from the outset of the development process.

Challenge 3: No-Downtime Deployment

The regular update of the platform must be given a high priority. A difficulty is that the platform is frequently inaccessible during maintenance windows.

Traditional systems will alert users of downtimes during system updates. Nevertheless, as most software-as-a-service platforms must be continuously accessible, their maintenance teams employ a zero-downtime deployment technique.

A common no-downtime strategy is a blue-green strategy.

Several users are transferred at regular intervals from an earlier version of the platform to an identical new release, both of which are accessible, according to the application release model.

The older version of the program is referred to as the blue environment, while the more recent version is referred to as the green environment.

The blue environment can be utilized either as a backup in case of a malfunction or as a template for the next update.

Challenge 4: Management of a Subscription Lifecycle

Software as a Service has a lot of features, and subscription is a complex feature that entails:

• Subscribing,
• Trailing,
• Upgrading,
• Canceling,
• Unsubscribing.

These checkpoints all deal with managing subscribers’ lists. There are two ways to create them, The first is by using and creating your subscription system from scratch, while the other entails using external APIs.

How Much Does It Cost to Build a SaaS Platform?

After considering the process and pitfalls of how to develop SaaS applications, let’s calculate their final price. The final cost of building SaaS solutions varies on the following factors:

• The complexity of features
• Hiring option
• The team’s hourly rates
• The number of third-party integrations

Top Seven Strongest SaaS Providers on the Market

We’ve selected the top seven SaaS companies to inspire while building a SaaS product. These companies provide their software to many businesses from all over the world. The list is based on customer reviews, social networks, and online sources.

Google

137 Google products provide Internet-related services, such as digital analytics and document creation, among other things. Google’s suite of tools includes Google Drive, Google Docs, and Google Sheets, among others.

Slack

When it comes to team collaboration, Slack is the go-to chat app. With it, you’ll be able to communicate by text, voice, video, and various bots. Slack is a popular tool for facilitating communication among employees within companies.

Salesforce

E-commerce enterprises can rely on this well-known SaaS provider. CRM, automation, email marketing, and so on are all included in the service.

Shopify

Another eCommerce and retail SaaS supplier. Shopify, Shopify Plus, and Burst by Shopify are the three most popular options.

HubSpot

Customers may be better managed with the help of HubSpot’s CRM software. Solutions such as HubSpot Sales, CRM, and the HubSpot Academy are just a few of the options available.

Adobe Creative Cloud

Adobe is a major player in the market for cutting-edge solutions that produce stunning images. In order to use the editor’s audio and video assembling features, you must purchase an annual subscription to Adobe Photoshop. Graphic design, picture and video editing, web development, and so much more can all be done using the Creative Suite software.

Amazon Web Services SaaS

Amazon’s SaaS provides a platform to construct and resell a wide range of third-party SaaS products, some of which are included in this list.

So, where to hire SaaS developers?

Software engineers can be hired in three ways: freelancers, in-house teams, or vendors.

Freelance Developers

Increasingly, people are working as freelancers. With freelance engineers, it can be difficult to work on SaaS development teams for long periods of time. Deadlines can be missed if they switch to another project. Furthermore, it’s difficult to gauge a SaaS developer’s knowledge and skills unless you are a tech guru.

In-House SaaS Developers

Building your development staff can be a wise investment if you’ve previously introduced your product to the market and made some money. Many investors are interested in your solution, and you need to upgrade the application. Using this recruiting option is more expensive because of the associated costs of office rent, technology, software, and taxes. As a result, it’s best suited for enterprises already in operation that need to grow their workforce. You should also hunt for SaaS platform development experts or pay a tech-savvy person for help to get the best results.

Outsourced Development Team

The inexpensive hourly rates, skilled developers, and high quality of the final product are all reasons why outsourcing is becoming increasingly popular.

Offshore software development firms make it possible for developers from all over the world to work on Saas platforms. Hiring an outsourced SAAS development company has the following advantages:

SAAS APP DEVELOPMENT SUCCESS BEGINS WITH CUSTOMER SUCCESS.

There is nothing like your Saas App Development company. Depending on their needs and preferences, your customers may have different preferences. They define success differently. They will have a different definition of customer success from another customer segment.

You will find the right path for your organization if you keep an open mind and listen to your users.

That mentality will position you well to achieve tremendous success with SaaS customers. -Oracle.

As a result, your customers will remain loyal to you (and your retention rate will be higher).

How we help companies build a successful SaaS business

At TechnoBrains, we follow Agile methodology while building a dedicated scrum team and a SaaS product. Result to that; our teams have the freedom to work by themselves and manage their work.

Regularly, we equip our team to deliver the highest quality at the best time to market. As an outcome, our customers get an advantage from competitive business, which turns out to be the most satisfying experience for our customers. Thus, for  SaaS application development, trust TechnoBrains.

Outsourcing SaaS development with TechnoBrains

In working with various companies and projects, our experts at TechnoBrains have gained valuable experience that we value highly. After difficulties are encountered, our staff uses the knowledge they’ve gained to fix them, does everything they can to avoid them from happening again, and ensures that the deployment process is smooth, automated, and error-free.

There is a risk of system failure and data loss if the deployment procedures are not properly planned and executed. System components could operate in an unstable manner if role and permission management systems are absent. DevOps and release engineers have a difficult time resolving performance issues in real time. Working with inexperienced software engineering businesses can help you avoid these problems.

When creating SaaS applications, TechnoBrains makes use of and supports sophisticated automation approaches. Automated testing methods are used to prevent human errors in architectural design.
You’ve now learned how to build a SaaS app.

A SaaS system is clearly time-, talent-, and money-intensive to design. Assess the level of experience and knowledge of any SaaS development firm that has been selected. With years of experience working with SaaS applications, TechnoBrains’ experts have honed their skills in creating high-quality designs that can withstand years of active growth, while still maintaining high levels of performance and security in software development. If you’d like to work with us on developing SaaS solutions, please get in touch.

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