Custom web application development, from scratch

Website or web application: where the line is

A website publishes content: the same pages for every visitor, updated by your team. A web application is software that runs in the browser. People log in, each one sees different data, and what they do changes records, triggers rules and moves work along.

You are probably looking at a bespoke web application, rather than a website, if several of these are true:

• Users log in with different roles: staff, customers, suppliers, subcontractors.
• Each user works on their own data: their jobs, their orders, their documents.
• There are business rules: approvals, statuses, deadlines, calculations.
• It has to exchange data with your ERP, CRM, accounting or payment systems.
• It produces documents such as quotes, reports or certificates from your data.
• Mistakes cost money, so you need validation, permissions and a history of changes.

When WordPress or another CMS is enough

Often it is. W3Techs reports that WordPress runs 39.5% of all websites and 58.2% of those whose CMS it can identify, so plugins, themes and people who can maintain it are easy to find. For a marketing site, a blog, simple bookings, a small shop or a members' area, a CMS with well-chosen plugins is usually the cheaper and quicker route. We will tell you that on the first call.

It starts to fall short when plugins are stacked to imitate business logic they were not built for, when updates to one plugin break another, when data has to stay in step with your ERP, or when each user needs different rules and permissions. A common middle way is to keep WordPress for the public website and build the application separately, on a subdomain or behind a login, so marketing can keep editing pages without touching the system the business runs on.

Discovery and a clickable prototype before any code

When a project has no obvious template, the biggest risk is building the wrong thing well. Discovery turns an idea into a written scope: who the users are, what the first version must do, which systems it connects to and where the risks are. A clickable prototype then lets real users try the main screens before anything is built, while changes are still cheap.

That is also what makes a fixed price possible: once the scope is written down and the prototype is agreed, you get one price for the project. Our page on discovery and MVP development explains that first stage in more detail.

Mixed projects, and what shapes the price

Many projects that land on this page combine several things: a customer area, a phone app for staff on site, scheduling and document generation. These are planned around one data model and released in stages, so the first stage is useful on its own and later ones build on it rather than starting again. The guide how much custom software costs explains how a price is built and gives market reference figures. The factors that weigh most:

• How many user roles there are and how different their screens and permissions are.
• Integrations with existing systems, and the quality of their APIs.
• Documents to generate, and how many templates and variations they have.
• Data to migrate from spreadsheets or an older system.
• Use on phones in the field, and whether it has to work without signal.
• Accessibility and performance requirements, especially for public-facing parts.

How we would build your web application

A renovation firm could begin with a shared calendar for its own staff and subcontractors, then add quotes, site photos and customer sign-off once the calendar is part of everyone's week. Each stage is shown as a working demo every two weeks, with the code in a repository in your company's name. The method, including how scope changes are handled, is on our page about fixed price software development.