Custom Software Product Development Checklist

When talking about the Custom software product development process, little do we realize that a major part of the process is involved in NOT building the software!

In fact, coding is only a small portion of what needs to happen during the development and release of a software product. Administrative tasks, brainstorming and waiting for tests combine to overtake the hours spent designing and coding the product.

Software development is a multifaceted process. Even though projects may differ in size and complexity, all of them go through the same stages. This blog offers a practical breakdown of the steps taken in developing a custom software product from scratch, in the form of a checklist. But before heading to that let’s understand what a custom software product development is.

Custom Software Product Development

Custom Software Product Development involves designing software for a specific user, a group of audience, or organization and is not packaged for reselling. Such software is designed to precisely address the needs of the target group/organization as opposed to more prevalent and traditional off-the-shelf software. The software is usually developed by an in-house team of developers or a custom software development service provider.

The Need for Checklists

Checklists are versatile and hence they can be leveraged in any industry irrespective of the business focus. But what is their purpose in the software development process?

Similar to the fields of medicine and manufacturing, software development entails complicated pipeline steps. It encompasses the interaction of different teams and departments with proper coordination to release a final product.

In such a complex landscape, checklists become the effective management tool that stores petty and easy-to-forget tasks and free up your mind for comprehending and analyzing tons of other important data. There are three things that checklists help you achieve in the custom software product development process –

1. Save time by averting silly errors that would eat away your valuable time and effort
2. Offload your brain so that you can pay attention to more complex things
3. Communicate effectively with teammates by using a smartly tailored checklist

The Ultimate Checklist for Custom Software Product Development

If you’re reading this blog, you’ve either decided to go custom or are trying to choose between the two options. There also might be a few who have already begun their bespoke product development process.

Well, here’s the good news. Our checklist comes in handy for all of you out there. No matter where you are in your custom product journey, you can benefit greatly from whatever is written hereafter.

We’ve prepared a checklist for each phase of the product development process to help you make sure that each and every task in a phase is completed before moving onto the next phase of the process. Going through these checkpoints will help you make smarter decisions as you will have everything in place right before moving on to the next step.

PHASE ONE — RESEARCH

The first stage of your bespoke software product development cycle begins with an extensive research. This should be done even before you consider any development work or hiring external resources.

This phase involves gathering requirement for your project and analyzing them to understand your project specifications, your goals, your target audience, initial costs, estimated time for completion, etc.

Follow the given checklist for the research phase before moving onto Stage 2 of your development lifecycle –

• Identify 3 problems you want to address with your innovative product
• Share your vision with your team and invite further ideas
• Identify the customer segment you want to serve and classify them
• Identify competitors and competing solutions prevailing in the market
• Conduct online problem research via discussion forums
• Define an initial pricing model
• Calculate your initial budget for the project

PHASE TWO — STRATEGY

As you reach the planning or the strategy phase, your custom software product has already begun taking shape. In this stage of the development lifecycle, you create a set of plans to help guide your team through the implementation and conclusion phases of the project.

The strategies you lay down during this period will help you manage cost, time, quality, change, issues, and risks and ensure that the project is delivered on time and within the defined budget.

Enlist the help of our checklist to move through this stage of your custom software product development lifecycle.

• Summarize potential solutions for problems identified in phase 1
• Define your unique value proposition
• Choose features that would deliver the highest value
• Identify technical challenges and risks
• Calculate a basic budget for Minimum Viable Product development
• Set and agree on the target delivery dates
• Identify factors that would affect your timeline

PHASE THREE — DESIGNING

Once the research and planning phases are done, we move on to the development phase of the product development process. In this phase, the developers and technical architects begin with designing a prototype.

The best design approach is selected based on risks, time, budget, technologies to be used, the capability of team members, and technical details as discussed with stakeholders. The selected design outlines all the modules that need to be developed.

You are now one step closer to designing and launching your MVP (minimum viable product). Follow the given checklist to get through this phase onto the next one –

• Speak with subject-matter experts who know the industry well
• Build the prototype, test it and collect feedback
• Define your most important metrics
• Start defining and shaping your brand
• Develop marketing activities to approach initial users
• Acquire funding for development of Minimum Viable Product
• Check if everything is working as expected

PHASE FOUR — IMPLEMENTATION

After the prototype is designed and tested for inconsistencies, the teams move on to the next phase of the bespoke software development process, i.e. the implementation or development of the software. In this stage, the developers start coding as per the requirements discussed in previous stages.

Like in the previous stage, you’ll go through the processes of building, testing, learning, and feedback once again. Once the software is developed, the stage of implementation comes in where the product is pilot tested to detect anomalies.

The checklist given below will help you move through the development and implementation process and move on to the final phase.

• Formulate technical specs for development
• Build a working Minimum Viable Product
• Have metrics built into the product to measure performance
• Launch the first workable version of your product
• Deploy initial marketing activities to bring people into your funnel
• Test and collect feedback
• Begin the improvement process by addressing bugs and issues

PHASE FIVE — PROGRESS

After launching the first workable version of your product you may get some traction. However, there’s scope for learning, improvement, and progress.

Once the customers start using the developed product, there is a fair chance that they will raise issues which need to be solved from time to time. This is the maintenance part of your software development lifecycle. Additionally, the software needs to be upgraded from time to time to adapt to changes.

The following checkpoints will guide you through the progress phase of your custom software product development process –

• Build a mechanism to collect customer feedback continuously
• Monitor your competitors closely
• Establish and measure core business metrics
• Start long-term marketing initiatives
• Evaluate and prioritize feature development
• Optimize your marketing funnel for better acquisition
• Optimize pricing and cost structure

It is important to focus on the right things at the right time when creating a new software product. We hope this checklist was accommodating in helping you focus on paramount aspects of your bespoke software development service.

Originally published at henote.com