With the rise of digital applications and software as a service online, we see more and more clients investing in white labelling the intellectual property of their native apps or web portals. Let's explore the benefits of doing this, and what to look for if you go down that route.
What is a white label web application?
We're currently working with a lot of clients who are building web portals for their businesses to answer a specific need for their customers. But most of the time they are not alone in that industry: either other divisions in their own group of companies, or other related industries can bolt on. Sometimes even competitors have the same business needs.
The concept of white labelling an app allows to share the same features, the same business logic, but can be rebranded to other companies. The configuration in the code can allow for different rules, different pricing, or even different data sources. Everyone can run their own independent application, sharing the same code base.
What are the main benefits?
There are three main benefits of such an approach.
- The first one is that you can get extra revenue. More than just building the app for yourself, you can sell as a license that's fully rebranded and then take a commission on the transactions. You keep the intellectual property and benefit from economies of scale. You can run multiple instances of the same application on the same codebase and the same hosting environment.
- The second point is that you can reach a wider market, as you let your partners and customers promote your services via their own channels. You might not get the full brand recognition if it's fully transparent and rebranded, but you still process all the transactions and get access to some of the data.
- The third point is that your features can improve with the requirements from wider industries. There could be some drawbacks because you don't want to be able to do everything for everyone, and it's usually hard technically to allow every different permutation with different rules for different types of transactions... There are some technical challenges and a few business elements that you need to consider... We might get into more technical details in a future video - let me know in the comments if you're interested.
Like everything, there are pros and cons to each option, but overall from what we've seen with our clients, it's a net positive in all cases.
The case for investing in a white label app
If you are building a web application and you identify some potential use cases for partners or other industries, it might be worth building that white label architecture early on. You're already making a big investment to build that platform for yourselves and your own customers, so why not invest an extra 20 or 30% upfront and reap much longer-term benefits and wider opportunities?
That's it for today. If you are considering building a white label application or need to upgrade your current systems, just get in touch. Don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel and follow me on Twitter to keep learning with me and grow your career in digital.
Until next time, stay safe and see you soon.
