It is essential to understand that modern great software products are composed of 3 leading groups of characteristics: operational, revision and transition.
In the second section of the article, TechRivo provides 5 suggestions for applying those principles and building winning software.
Operational Characteristics
Operational characteristics of great software products are related to how it is perceived from the outside, and they’re about:
- Correctness: Is the product developed according to the specifications and its intended use? Is it a fit for purpose?
- Usability: Do users need assistance to use the product? Or is it self-explanatory? The learning curve of using your software indicates how usable it is. Great UI/UX practices allow users to fully use products from day one.
- Integrity: Does a slight code change have unneeded effects? Does a rarely used functionality work as expected, in the same way, all the time?
- Reliable: Is the app error-free? Do the users trust the information they see on the screen?
- Efficiency: Software should be efficient enough to occupy less space and execute in less time.
- Secure: Most of the highly demanded Software products are at one point under attacks of spying software. Good Software must be effect-free in terms of data collapse or data theft and comply with governmental security guidelines. External data threats are expected; in this regard, it is mandatory to take proper measures to secure the information/data related to the users and business.
- Safe: Life and the environment are critical factors; therefore, the proper security and safety measures should be taken to keep the Software safe from any hazard.
Revision Characteristics
Interior quality-related factors such as competence, credentials, and composition are related to software engineering baselines. Good Software has these qualities built in. There are many types of Revision Characteristics of software product/application, such as:
- Maintenance: Software needs to be designed in a way that maintenance procedures are seamless for all stakeholders.
- Flexible: Software should be easily adjustable so that its form allows the implementation of various requirements. The typical term we use for it is the “Flexibility of Software”.
- Extensible: Software should be developed in a way that its boundaries are easily adjustable. It is also known as “Extensibility of Software”.
- Scalable: The Software must be able to operate with several users at a time and function simultaneously without disbursing performance. This character is called scalability of the Software.
- Testable: Make sure the Software is running normally, on testing mode, and operating smoothly. Automatic tests are a key part of a modern system development life cycle. It is also called the “testability of the software product”.
- Modular: Software should consist of independent modules and units and function separately. The modularity of the Software should clearly define the modification and testing. This condition of units and modules is known as modularity.
Transition Characteristics
- Interoperable: Software should have the capacity to swap or exchange data with other applications/products and use the information with visibility. The whole procedure is termed interoperability.
- Reusable: Software components should be carefully designed so they do not duplicate the functionality but, most importantly, are reusable in different parts of the application.
- Portable: The capability of a software product to perform some types of operations across various locations, settings, and sectors is called “Software portability”.
All factors have different significance related to the task and properties of each software product. Hence, it varies from Software to Software. In a situation when the life of a human is at stake, key factors like reliability and integrity must be considered a top priority. Maintainability and usability are kept of high importance in business-related software/applications like Saas. However, software quality is the most crucial factor in high competing sectors.
So, before delivering a product, ensure it has these qualities and features.
Four suggestions for building great software products – A user-centred approach
Building software that lasts and performs requires every time chasing the principles above. We drilled down the following suggestions so that all entrepreneurs know why software businesses fail and have better chances of creating a winning software business.
1 – Don’t proceed without a proper market research
Proper market research is needed in the pre-launching of software products to identify or clarify the actual need of the product and its fit on the market. The user reviews are important to receive feedback at the initial stage of the software research. Consequently, this strategy will allow a product designer to draw the initial solution for the problem or gap found in the market.
2 – Keep the Proof of Concept as lean as possible
After performing the market research, think of the cheapest way you can test your hypothesis because creating a landing page or simply conducting a user survey might be enough to change your mind about your initial hypothesis. The mindset in this phase should always be trying to challenge your biases about the solution.
If you want to prove the concept, you need not only to prove that people will use your software but also that someone will pay for that use.
3 – Draft accurate Mock-ups of the product’s UI & UX
Usually, it is a graphic designer that creates the software prototype on Figma, and they look like beautiful final screens of a final product. After creating wireframes and mock-ups on every single screen in the system, you have the full product laid out in front of you. You know exactly what the user will see every step of the way, including error messages, buttons, menus and user flows.
Mockup documents are a supportive piece of documentation for study, development and testing purposes. In sum, it is a kind of reviewing content that teams use to aggregate data about any product or service.
4 – Develop the right architecture for the system
We don’t want to be building your future on top of weak foundations. It is common for founders to start with “ready-made architectures” and end up being stranded on the way when the system needs to be scalable or flexible.
Defining the best architecture from the start will be rewarded in the mid-term. Therefore, if you are not confident about what architecture to choose from, schedule a 30 min call and our specialist in system architecture will advise you on the best practices.
5 – The product owner should oversee and approve all the aspects of the software products
The product owner should be the number one advocate of the software. Thus, this role is crucial in the entire product cycle, from the product conceptualisation with designers to translating the gathered requirements into development tasks and their testing.
A common mistake that startups make is not to have the product led by a person that is a specialist in these areas of expertise and ends up underestimating the work behind managing a product.
TechRivo created a dedicated team of software specialists for extraordinary consultancy support and quality software development. Additionally, we understand the users’ needs, intention to buy the Software and usability best practices.
TechRivo validates the time, effort, and cost with a great development vision.
A good relationship with users and a feedback loop are of higher priority, so the best techniques and tools must be in place to build products that users love and pay for.