SaaS
Development Company

A SaaS development company is a SaaS solutions provider whether custom or pre-built based on the business goals and objectives of entrepreneurs, startups or established organisations. The company hosts SaaS (Software as a Service) applications on their servers and provides them to customers via the internet. Some of the SaaS applications examples include calendar apps, email, photo editing tools, office tools, etc.

SaaS application development is the creation of a Software as a Service model that is hosted online by a third party SaaS solutions provider and makes it available for the use of the customers over the internet. Users can access this software distribution model hosted online without facing any issue related to installation, integration or maintenance.

Software as a Service is a software delivery and licensing model wherein software is hosted centrally and licensed on a subscription basis.

Using this model, businesses can make a single application model with a single configuration available to multiple customers. A SaaS application can also be installed on various machines to avail scalability.

In addition, there is a provision of creating a second version of the application for a selected group of customers. It can also be made available with the pre-release application versions for testing.

SaaS can be of two types:

1. Vertical SaaS: It is a Software as a Service solution that is dedicated to a specific industry. For example, software for agriculture, finance, real estate and other industries.
2. Horizontal SaaS: Here comes solutions that serve a software category. For example, developers tools, marketing tools.

SaaS applications a.k.a hosted software use cloud computing to deliver a single application to several customers, irrespective of their location. Also, it gives the freedom of handling different activities from central locations in a one-to-many model. An administrator doesn't have to worry about software updates. SaaS technology is all about reducing the time and cost of deployment.

The cost to develop a SaaS application depends on whether you hire a SaaS app developer (freelancer) or a SaaS development agency. Because an US-based SaaS app developer charges $60 per hour on average. Accordingly the overall SaaS development cost will be calculated $36k for 600 hours working on a project that takes four months of development time.

On the other hand, hiring top development companies/agencies will cost you more than hiring individual developers. Yet, you will leverage additional benefits. First, the companies’ experience of working on numerous development projects. Secondly, your active involvement in the project development process with the working team. Outsourcing your SaaS application development project to the best SaaS development company will cost you more as compared to individual developers because companies/agencies utilize multiple developers and a project manager on your project to deliver a quality rich product in the promised time.

SaaS is a software delivery model in which a cloud provider hosts apps and makes them available to access for customers over the internet. When it comes to SaaS development, mostly SaaS development companies build their platforms on the cloud or use cloud computing or other cloud offerings such as hosting, data backup, security, etc.

A SaaS solution can be built easily following the 6 steps process given below.

1. Market analysis: Evaluate your idea and its scope in the market comparing it with the competitors available and determine features and functionalities accordingly.
2. Discussing requirements: A fool proof plan is the key to a project's success. In a SaaS model ensuring maximum security is the must as it is the foundation of a good solution.
3. Defining the MVP: Building a Minimum Viable Product is like creating a product with its core features that will be tested by its early users and later be transformed into the final product.
4. Choosing the pricing model: There are various pricing models available for SaaS solutions. Each model has its own competency to greatly influence your product’s popularity. However, the selection of pricing models and further advancements should be made as per your target audiences’ needs.
5. Deciding on technical aspects: This is the phase where you need to decide how to build your software and what tools & technologies to use. You can take professionals’ help to define your needs.
6. Finding or creating a development team: You can either build an in-house team or outsource development fully or partially as per your project requirements. However, outsourcing your development to a SaaS development company will avail you with numerous benefits. Also, you will be able to focus fully on business processes like marketing.

Developing a SaaS application is not an easy task. You may encounter following challenges during SaaS application development

1. Inadequate Execution: When a project fails, people without giving a thought start blaming the idea but in reality, the execution was poor. A proper SWOT analysis ensures your idea is not executed effectively.
2. Lack of Trust: You can gain your users’ trust by providing them a solution with proper security.
3. Small Audience: It is necessary that your idea is evaluated and updated regularly to maintain its relevance.

However, you can avoid all these challenges working with an experienced SaaS development company. Specialists at JPLoft will ensure your SaaS solution stays up-to-date and adhere to the latest security standards.

There are a lot of SaaS metrics that avail you with the important information to tell about the status of your product. You can use tools like Google Analytics or Hotjar but sometimes they may not be enough.

Here are some of the key SaaS app metrics or KPIs- Key Performance Indicators, many SaaS businesses consider

1. Monthly or annual revenue: It demonstrates the total amount of revenue generated by a SaaS business within a month. SaaS companies that work on monthly subscription plans mostly use this KPI.
2. CAC (cost of acquiring a customer): This metric tells about the amount of money you invested in acquiring a customer including advertising, marketing and sales expenses.
3. LTV (customer lifetime value): This metric tracks the revenue generated by a customer over the lifetime of their subscription.
4. NPS (net promoter score): This metric measures the loyalty and satisfaction of the customers by asking them to rate their likelihood of recommending your SaaS product to others.
5. Customer Churn: This metric tells about the customers who cancel their subscription of your SaaS products over a period of time.

Software as a service including cloud-based applications is distributed through a centralised model where the software provider hosts and manages the application on remote servers. Users access the application over the internet without installing it. Whereas the SaaS business model is deployed and maintained at the provider’s end. Eliminating the need of users to provision and update software. The distribution process involves delivering the software as a service solution over the internet allowing users to access it from any device over the internet. This approach provides flexibility, scalability, and ease of access making cloud-based SaaS applications an increasing popular choice among businesses and individuals.