Ten bespoke software examples and the signs you need one

Bespoke software is software designed and built for one business, around the way that business works, rather than a product sold to thousands of customers who all use it the same way. You will also hear it called custom software.

Most businesses get a long way on spreadsheets, a shared inbox and a few subscriptions. The question is when those stop being enough. Below are ten common examples of bespoke software: what each does, the sort of business that has it built, and the sign you might need one. Then comes an honest look at when buying is better.

What bespoke software looks like in practice

For most businesses, bespoke software is a web application that your team, and sometimes your customers, use in a browser or on a phone. It keeps your data in one place, follows your rules, and talks to the systems you already pay for, such as your accounts package or online shop.

It does not have to be large. Some of the most useful systems do one job the products around them can't, and leave everything else alone. Our page on bespoke software development covers how a project like this is scoped, built and run.

Ten bespoke software examples

A customer or supplier portal

A secure place where customers place or repeat orders, check progress, download invoices and upload documents, or where suppliers confirm orders, dates and prices. It uses the same records your team does, so nobody has to pass the message on.

Who has one built: wholesalers, manufacturers, logistics firms, property managers and professional firms with many repeat clients.

The sign you need one: much of your inbox and phone time goes on people asking where something has got to.

A quoting or estimating tool

It turns the pricing knowledge in a few people's heads into a tool the whole team can use. Pick the products, materials, labour and options, and it works out the price, applies your margin and discount rules, and produces a quote that can become an order.

Who has one built: manufacturers, fabricators, printers, installers and any firm whose prices depend on many variables.

The sign you need one: quotes come from a spreadsheet only one or two people understand, and they slow down when those people are away.

A job or field-service scheduler

A planner for work done at customers' sites: who goes where, when, with which parts. Engineers see their jobs on a phone, record what they did and capture a signature, and the office watches each job move from booked to done to invoiced.

Who has one built: maintenance and facilities firms, installers, cleaning and security companies, and anyone running vans and engineers.

The sign you need one: the schedule lives on a whiteboard or in one person's head, and jobs are invoiced late because the paperwork comes back late.

Stock and order management across channels

One record of stock and orders across your website, marketplaces, trade accounts and warehouse. When something sells anywhere, stock updates everywhere, orders go to the right place to be picked, and reorder levels warn you before you run out.

Who has one built: brands and wholesalers selling through several channels, especially with bundles, kits or made-to-order lines that standard tools handle badly.

The sign you need one: you sometimes sell stock you don't have, or someone copies orders and stock counts between systems by hand.

A booking system

Customers see what is available, book and pay online, and the booking lands in a back office that handles reminders, changes and payments. Booking systems tend to grow into billing and customer accounts, because a booking is often the start of a longer relationship.

StoreBay, the self-storage management software we designed, built and run, shows how far that can go. Alongside online booking and a website for the operator, it covers billing and invoicing, card payments, Direct Debit through GoCardless on the operator's own account, late-payment chasing by email, licences signed online, a customer portal, a back office, and an API with webhooks.

Who has one built: businesses that let rooms, spaces or equipment under rules a generic booking widget can't follow, such as deposits or agreements to sign.

The sign you need one: bookings arrive through a widget, then get typed into a spreadsheet and an invoicing tool by hand.

An internal operations dashboard

A live view of the numbers that run the business: orders in, jobs late, stock low, money owed. A good dashboard pulls from the systems you already have and links each number to the records behind it, so people can act on it.

Who has one built: businesses with several sites or teams, and any firm whose managers ask the same questions every morning.

The sign you need one: a simple question, such as how many jobs are late, needs a report built by hand, and the answer is out of date when it arrives.

A CRM for an unusual sales process

Most CRMs are built around a familiar pipeline of leads, deals and stages, and they can be configured a long way. Some sales processes still don't fit: long tenders, several parties to one deal, site surveys, regulated steps or contracts that renew. A bespoke CRM holds customers, quotes, jobs and renewals the way your business thinks about them.

Who has one built: recruiters, letting agents, specialist distributors, and service firms with contract renewals or partner sales.

The sign you need one: your team keeps the real pipeline in a spreadsheet next to the CRM, because the CRM can't hold what matters.

An integration layer joining existing systems

Sometimes the right bespoke software has almost no screens. It sits between the tools you already use, such as your online shop, accounts package and CRM, and moves data between them when something happens: a new order, a paid invoice, a signed contract. It checks the data and flags records that need a person. This is close to our business automation work.

Integration can be small and still worth building. Add to CRM, the Chrome extension Phil founded and runs, adds people from LinkedIn, Gmail and Outlook to a CRM in one click, with a verified email, and works with 29 CRMs.

Who has one built: businesses that pay for several good tools and connect them by hand.

The sign you need one: the same customer, order or invoice is typed into more than one system, and the copies don't agree.

Document and compliance tracking

A register of the certificates, inspections, training and renewals your business must keep current, each linked to the person, site or vehicle it belongs to. It reminds the right people before anything expires and gives you a clear record when a client, insurer or regulator asks.

Who has one built: firms with regulated work, such as letting agents, care providers, contractors, transport operators and recruiters checking right to work.

The sign you need one: expiry dates live in a colour-coded spreadsheet, and you find out something has lapsed when somebody asks to see it.

A pricing engine

Where a quoting tool helps a person build a quote, a pricing engine sets prices from rules and data: supplier costs, customer terms, volume breaks or stock levels. It sends the right price to your website, trade portal and sales team at once, and records why each price is what it is.

Who has one built: distributors and wholesalers with large catalogues, and businesses with agreed pricing for key accounts.

The sign you need one: a supplier price change means a long round of spreadsheet updates, and customers see different prices in different places.

Build or buy: an honest answer

Off-the-shelf software is usually the better answer when your process is common and isn't what sets you apart. Accounts, payroll, email and HR records are solved problems, and good products for them are tested by many businesses, updated for you, and ready now. Building your own would rarely pay for itself.

Bespoke software tends to be the better answer when:

• the way you work is part of why customers choose you, and a product would make you work like everyone else;
• you pay for several tools and still join them together by hand;
• your team works around the product every day, and no setting fixes it;
• you want to own the system and the data, rather than depend on a supplier's plans and pricing;
• a product does most of what you need, but the missing part is the part that matters most.

There is often a middle path. Keep the products that do their job well and build only the missing piece: a portal on top of your existing system, or an integration that ends the retyping. That is smaller to build and easier to change than replacing everything.

Bespoke software also asks something of you. It needs hosting, security updates and someone who knows it, and it needs your time at the start, because a system is only as good as the explanation of how you work. Before you commit, check that you will own the code and the data, and that another developer could pick it up.

Two questions help decide. If you bought the best product in its category, what would your team still do by hand? And will that grow as the business grows? If the honest answers are "not much" and "no", buy the product. If they are "a lot" and "yes", a bespoke system deserves a proper look.

Where we come in

We design, build and run bespoke software, then host it and look after it. You own the code and the data. Each project is quoted as a fixed price per stage, then a monthly fee for hosting and looking after it. If one of these examples sounds like your business, start a project and tell us how things work today.