5 Tips to Find the Right Software for Your Firm

Do you ever feel like the potential of your talented team is not being fully realized, or that projects require much more legwork and repetitive tasks than they feel like they should? You may be in need of a new software option that eliminates tedious processes and empowers your team to produce the exceptional results of which you know they are capable. Whether you work in hydrology, mining, geology, construction or the environmental field, there is a tremendous amount of data to sort, categorize and represent. Without an intuitive and highly functional software platform that lends itself to each area, the quality of work will continue to be hindered. Here are five qualities or features to seek when researching a superior option.

1. An Intuitive Interface

The degree of complexity involved in the work you do requires a high level of functionality, but the even the most powerful solution will remain underutilized with an esoteric and inaccessible user interface. Look for software with the smallest learning curve, one that does not require users to bounce back and forth between multiple functions and windows to accomplish a single task. If a developer offers product trials or demos, try running through a diverse series of tasks to determine how easy the interface is to use.

Surfer User Interface
Potentiometric contour map created in Surfer

2. Developers Familiar with Your Industry

Even the most talented developers might struggle to make an option that is effective for you if they lack familiarity with your industry and the needs of those in your field. A product designed by someone with your level of experience will be far better suited to your purposes as it was designed with a paradigm of understanding and functional application. If you speak with a sales representative, ask about the backgrounds of their development team.

Golden Software’s website even features countless articles highlighting the real world results from industries you care about.

3. Regular Updates Based on User Input

Even with use exclusively within the aforementioned industries, products such as mapping and graphing software have applications that can feel almost infinite at times. As a result, you may find that even the best-designed options lack certain features or functionalities that you need, or perhaps even those you did not realize you needed. For this reason, it would be wise to explore an option that listens to its customers and is willing to integrate their suggestions into future updates. The Golden Software development team is always happy to hear new feature suggestions, or in general workflow improvements! Leave any and all feedback here: New Support Ticket

4. Dependable Customer Support

While intuitive ease of use is important, there still may be times when a user is unsure of how to complete a task. What’s more, they may be unsure of whether or not they are using software to its full potential, or whether it can complete a highly specific function or task. As such, it’s important to choose an option that features strong and reliable customer support that not only allows you to speak to a real human and is not simply an outsourced CSR.

Golden Software team picture 2022

5. Robust Software User Resources

While live customer support is crucial, it is also important to support users that enjoy learning and exploring a software option independently. Seek an option that provides extensive resources for free on their site, such as training videos, case studies, and automation walkthroughs. Another nice feature is customer outreach like free live webinars focused on workflow, which allow users to ensure that they are getting the most out of the software.

This may seem like a demanding list of features and functions, but here at Golden Software we think it’s just the minimum that a software company should be offering. Contact Golden Software online or call us at (303) 279-1021 to learn more about mapping and graphing options that offer all of this and more.

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