Intranet: buy or build?
An intranet is a centralised virtual office, where your team can collaborate, communicate and exchange documents or data. Intranet software is a significant investment for any business and, as with most technologies, it’s important to educate yourself on the pros and cons of each available option, before making that all-important decision.
A common question of those looking to purchase an intranet is whether they should buy or build. The difference is that the former is a one-size-fits-all model that can be deployed quickly, while a custom-built model is put together with your specific business needs in mind.
Which intranet model is best for you?
Custom-built intranets have been around for years. They have found success in businesses of all sizes, across many industries. With the advancement of the cloud, however, the ready-to-go intranet model has emerged on the scene.
There are various benefits and drawbacks to each intranet type:
Out of the box intranet
Ready-made intranets offer quick deployment, generally without the assistance of developers. They usually require little input from IT and their content curation and management systems tend to be user friendly – with little to no special skills necessary to oversee and manage. Ready-made intranets are also cheaper to deploy than their custom-built counterparts.
On the other hand, ready-made intranets offer very little scope for customisation, which means they may lack specific features or capabilities that are important in your business. Another downside here is potentially limited integration opportunities with other applications or systems. Though they are cheaper to install initially, their limitations may lead to additional costs when sourcing separate software to fill the gap.
Custom-built intranet
Alternatively, custom-built intranets provide complete control over navigation, build and customisation. You can guarantee the exact features that your business needs to be more efficient, and there are likely to be increased integration capabilities. A drawback to custom-built, however, is that development and deployment can be incredibly time-consuming, and there may be a significant dependence on IT for roll-out and ongoing support.
Fortunately, there’s a better solution. You don’t need to choose a ready-made intranet model that may not deliver an impactful solution. You also don’t need to choose a custom-built intranet that could take forever to build. Instead, you can choose the best of both worlds with Fresh – which promises the quick delivery of out of the box, while also guaranteeing the flexibility and enhancement benefits of custom-built intranets.
Make Fresh the centrepiece of your workplace
Essentially, Fresh has re-imagined the modern intranet to deliver a solution capable of transforming the way your teams communicate, collaborate and connect. Fresh has been designed to ensure rapid delivery, maximum impact and instant ROI.
Fresh was created to address problems faced by key stakeholders across your entire organisation. Unlike custom or standard out of the box intranet platforms, Fresh works to enhance Office 365 and creates a central, modern digital workspace in your organisation. With Fresh, businesses can cut through the options, features and user requirements to quickly deploy the ideal collaboration solution for your company.