Microsoft AppSource – the road to IKEA-like implementations
AppSource gives both customers and the partner community a great insight in the availability of relevant standard solutions. And to benefit from ‘IKEA-like’ implementations.
Using a generic ERP/CRM solution as the basis for your business information system, completed with specific functionality for your industry and organization has proven itself to be a true success formula. In today’s world however, these customizations are increasingly being replaced by add-on’s or Apps. In order to support this switch, Microsoft created AppSource – a portal where Dynamics 365 partners can showcase their add-on’s. AppSource gives both customers and the partner community a great insight in the availability of relevant standard solutions. And to benefit from ‘IKEA-like’ implementations.
When implementing a traditional business software solution, the favorite choice for long years was customizations. For customers it felt great to have functionality developed that supports their own unique way of working. But over time, they also experienced the downsides. It takes a long time to develop, there is a high cost and risk, the helpdesk support can be defined as poor and the solutions are often badly tested and documented. Real problems show up when the customer wants to upgrade to newer versions: that is often only possible with a costly re-implementation. Customizations are one of the main reasons why so many organisations still use old(er) versions.
The concept of customized software seems to have lost momentum. In today’s fast changing world with very demanding customers, organizations simply cannot afford to take years to implement a new solution. It’s all about time-to-value. Besides, it doesn’t make sense to re-automate outdated business processes, right?
That’s why, a few years ago, Microsoft created AppSource (Business Apps – Microsoft AppSource) – a store for add-on’s or app’s for Dynamics 365. Independent Software Vendors (ISV’s) from all over the world use AppSource to showcase their solutions. And the Microsoft resellers (VAR’s) and their customers use the insights into the global add-on offering to create successful projects.
Today, AppSource offers more than 10.000 solutions for the various Microsoft offerings. Microsoft sets high standards for both quality and availability. Since after all, they are used as part of her cloud offerings. So that’s a guarantee for you! AppSource is also good news for the thousands of Dynamics 365 partners as they don’t have to develop all solutions themselves!
Using these standard solutions requires of course the acceptance and ability of your organization to change your business processes towards the standard solution. And it will impact the partner’s business as well. They will have to switch from developing all solutions themselves to becoming a kind of broker that brings supply and demand together and glues the different solutions towards a winning system.
Your yield is huge! AppSource supports you to move towards ‘IKEA-like’ implementations: fast, good and cheap. So your implementations will be faster. The quality of your solutions and of the support will be better. And all this at a more affordable price level.
When will you start using AppSource?
