Off-the-shelf software: fast and proven, as long as you bend to it
Off-the-shelf software installs in a few days, has already been tested by thousands of companies and is paid monthly. When your process looks like everyone else's, a contact, a quote, a follow-up, an invoice, it is the right choice, and we say so during the diagnostic: when an existing tool covers the need, we configure it properly rather than building for the sake of building.
The price is not on the invoice: it is the method. The tool imposes its vocabulary, its screens and its rules; you adapt to it, or you work around it with a spreadsheet on the side. Add the per-seat pricing, which climbs with the team, and the modules that are always missing exactly when you need them.
The right test: if your way of working is what sets you apart, pouring it into a generic mould means erasing your advantage. If it is not, the market wins, and the money for custom software is better spent elsewhere.
The freelancer: the right choice for a short lot, with a pilot in-house
A good freelancer, on a well-written lot, does excellent work, fast, with no intermediary. We know it all the better because the agency itself works with a network of selected independents, developers, designers, data and AI experts. The difference is not the quality of the people; it is who carries the framework around them.
With a freelancer, that framework is yours to carry: writing the scope, settling trade-offs, testing every delivery, deciding the architecture, organising maintenance. If someone in-house knows how to do that and has the time, a freelancer is probably the right choice for a first module.
The risks are known and manageable: availability, since a freelancer has other clients; continuity, with code nobody else knows; and breadth of skills, since a developer is neither a designer, nor a data specialist, nor responsible for hosting. Insist from the start on the code, the documentation and the access in your name.
The agency: a framework, a team, accountability over time
What you buy from an agency is first a framework: a written scope before the price, a price fixed per lot rather than by the hour, a delivery every week that you follow in your client space, a signed acceptance. That framework costs more than a freelancer on a small lot, and it is worth the price when the project cuts across several teams.
It is then a complete team under a single responsibility: design, development, data, AI, hosting. With us, a Sprint starts at €6,000 excl. VAT for one component in production within 4 to 6 weeks, a Program at €15,000 excl. VAT for the complete system, team training and documentation included. What we deliver belongs to you, code, interfaces and content, with the documentation to carry on without us.
It is finally what comes next: Care, from €250 excl. VAT per month, covers monitoring, backups, fixes and small evolutions every month. A tool nobody maintains eventually stops being used; that is the reason for these plans, and the main difference from a lot delivered and then forgotten.
The four questions that decide
Is your process standard or differentiating? Standard: the market. Differentiating: custom, freelancer or agency. How long must the tool live, and how many other programs must it connect to? An isolated tool for one year can go to a freelancer; a tool connected to accounting, CRM and invoicing for five years calls for a team.
Who steers in-house? Without someone to write the scope and test the deliveries, a freelancer works blind and an agency becomes indispensable. We turn down projects without an executive sponsor for that very reason: a system that cuts across the company cannot be carried by an intermediary alone.
What happens if the provider disappears? The answer must be written before starting: code and data in your name, documentation, access to the hosting. A provider, freelancer or agency, who hesitates on that question has already answered you.
Combining the three, and in what order
The three paths combine more often than they compete. The most common pattern: off-the-shelf software at the centre for what is standard, custom software at the edges for what sets you apart, all connected so that data entered once flows everywhere.
Scoping also separates from building. Our product scoping, in 2 to 4 weeks, delivers written user journeys, clickable mockups, an architecture and a milestone-by-milestone estimate; those deliverables belong to you and can be used with the team of your choice, freelancer included. A scoped project is one a freelancer can deliver without calling you every evening.
If you still hesitate, the €500 excl. VAT Express Diagnostic settles it within a week: off-the-shelf, custom or hybrid, and with whom. The report also prices the options that do not go through us; it belongs to you, and you can carry it out with whoever you like.