Software as a Service or SaaS is a software model in which a cloud provider delivers applications over the internet, as a service. SaaS has been the largest growing market in recent times as more and more businesses are seeking SaaS-based solutions. Enterprises are preferring collaboration with SaaS providers who help indirectly accessing the software via the internet, rather than engaging their own workforce in complicated installation protocols of software & hardware. However, SaaS providers need to carefully hand-pick the right tools to build a favorable tech stack for their SaaS product.
Tech stack is a combination of tools, services, programming languages and platforms that are used to develop and maintain a product or company. Selecting the right combination of technologies to build your SaaS product is extremely crucial for its success since it establishes a foundation that defines the entire developmental process.
Here are a few factors to consider while building a tech stack for your SaaS product
- Defining Scalability Requirements
The new-age technology is very dynamic and it is bringing about revolutionary changes. It is recommended to always opt for scalable tools for your SaaS tech stack since every company wants its SaaS product such as Scalefusion Android device management software to be used by a wide range of audiences. To achieve this, companies should understand the nuances of tool scalability.
Outlining product requirements, target deadlines and a long-term vision can go a long way in reasoning out the scalability requirements that enable in deciding the optimum tech stack requirements.
For example, ‘Angular’ is an excellent framework if you want to target a large number of users and build a heavy app. On the other hand, if your focus is to deliver exceptional UX in a lightweight app with no significant scaling in the future, ‘React’ is a good choice.
- Frontend Programming
Front-end is the user-side of your SaaS product which makes it critical to get the design and interface right. Some of the popular technologies of front-end are;
- HTML (Hyper-text markup language): It is a standard markup language used for the creation of web pages and applications. Developers use this technology to finalize the content structure on websites.
- JavaScript: It is a programming language used by developers to make the website interactive.
- CSS (Cascading Style Sheet): It is a management toolkit that enables you to format and customize the look and feel of the website.
By using commonly available frameworks like Bootstrap among many others, you can give the desired structure, design and interactive elements to your SaaS product.
- Backend Programming:
One of the most crucial factors is backend programming which takes care of how the product runs. It involves codes that enable web browsers to communicate with servers and databases to make the product function smoothly.
Generally, tech stacks for SaaS development include one or more of the following languages JavaScript (NodeJS, MeteorJS, ExpressJS), PHP (Laravel, CodeIgniter), Ruby (Ruby on Rails), Python (Django, Flask)
and Scala (Play).
- Select the right Database
At the center of a tech stack of any latest SaaS product lies an efficient and scalable database. Selecting and designing the right database proves to be a crucial factor for the future of the product.
Depending on the nature of the service that you are catering to, databases can be designed to either function as self-managed or fully managed. A self-managed database gives the user the authority to control the features, whereas a Fully managed Database retains the authority with the provider. In addition, an SQL or non-SQL database can be of critical importance based on the product.
- Multi-tenant architecture
Having a multi-tenant SaaS product or saas rule allows you to use a single software instance to serve multiple users. In this case, the users have a shared database, however, the data of each user is specifically available to the respective user. The multi-tenant structure has an upper hand over single-tenant architecture as it enables lower running costs, better utilization of resources, easier to maintain and upgrade.
Multi-tenancy is especially recommended when the target market being catered to consists of freelancers and SMEs.
- Cloud computing
All the programming efforts that go into developing a SaaS product have to run somewhere. Since the dawn of Cloud computing, businesses prefer running their codes and programs on cloud platforms. It is essential to select a redundant and highly scalable cloud service in your tech stack keeping in mind the long-term scalability goals.
Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, IBM Cloud are some of the highly acclaimed cloud service providers adopted by enterprises globally.
Having a well-matched tech stack with the right combination of tools enables SaaS developers to build the product without hassles and enables a competitive advantage in the market. A poorly crafted tech stack leads to an operational collapse generating the requirement for improving the technologies in use. Once a tech stack is built, changing it to a new one is expensive. Hence, designing a tech stack that is easy to begin with, sustainable and scales well once the product has discovered its market is imperative.
