<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Custom software is for big companies.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We looked into it once. It was thousands of pounds.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“We’re not big enough to justify that yet.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It’s a reasonable sounding belief. It’s also, in most cases, wrong. Or at least badly out of date.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The idea that bespoke software is only for large companies isn’t irrational. It used to be true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ten or fifteen years ago, custom software meant hiring a development agency, paying a large upfront project fee, and waiting months for something to ship. That kind of engagement genuinely did require six figure budgets and enterprise scale to make sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Small businesses looked at that price tag, correctly concluded it wasn’t for them, and went back to spreadsheets. Understandable at the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The problem is the market moved on, and the belief didn’t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Three things have shifted the economics of getting proper software built.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Smaller, focused engagements. Rather than one enormous build-everything project, software can now be scoped tightly around the two or three processes actually causing pain, and built for that. A job tracking system doesn’t need to also be a full accounting suite on day one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Solo and small studio developers. A lot of custom software work that used to require an agency of ten people can now be delivered by a single experienced developer, or a very small team. Lower overhead means lower prices, without cutting corners on quality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ongoing rather than one off pricing. Instead of one enormous upfront invoice, many smaller software providers now work on a monthly basis, similar to any other subscription cost the business already budgets for. That changes the entire conversation from “can we afford a big project” to “is this cheaper than what we’re already losing.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here’s the exercise most business owners skip. They compare the monthly cost of proper software against zero, because spreadsheets feel free.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Spreadsheets aren’t free. They’re just invoiced differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The cost shows up as staff time spent duplicating entries across sheets. It shows up as jobs that get missed because two people were editing the same file. It shows up as the person who understood the whole system leaving, and nobody else being able to make sense of it. It shows up as the hour spent every month reconciling numbers that should have matched in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
None of that appears on an invoice. All of it appears in lost hours, and lost hours cost real money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When business owners actually total that cost against a software subscription that removes it, the “too expensive” conclusion often flips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Even when the maths works out, a lot of business owners still hesitate. Three worries tend to come up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“What if it doesn’t fit how we work.” This is a fair concern with off the shelf software built for a generic market. It’s largely solved by bespoke software, which is built around the business’s actual process rather than the other way round.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“What if we’re locked in.” Reasonable, given how some larger software providers have handled pricing after acquisitions in recent years. The fix here isn’t to avoid software altogether, it’s to work with providers who are upfront about pricing from day one rather than change it once you depend on them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“What if it’s a wasted investment if the business doesn’t grow.” This one is worth sitting with. But the businesses that stall are just as often held back by the operational drag of spreadsheets as they are by lack of growth ambition. Removing the drag is sometimes the thing that lets growth happen in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not “can we afford bespoke software.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Instead: “what is it costing us every month to keep doing this the way we’re doing it now.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For a lot of businesses still running on spreadsheets, that number is bigger than they think, and the alternative is smaller than they’ve assumed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If spreadsheets are quietly running your business, and you’re curious what a proper system would actually cost, we’re always happy to give you an honest number, not a sales pitch. Get in touch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ask most small business owners why they still run everything through spreadsheets, and you’ll get some version of the same answer. “Custom software is for big companies.” “We looked into it once. It was thousands of pounds.” “We’re not big enough to justify that yet.” It’s a reasonable sounding belief. It’s also, in most cases, … Bespoke Software Is Too Expensive And Other Things Small Businesses Tell Themselves<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":47,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,3,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fsm-software","category-spreadsheets","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42\/revisions\/46"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sixfieldssoftware.co.uk\/insights\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}