Why custom API Development is important
Application Programming Interfaces, more commonly referred as APIs, are the glue that holds the internet together. They enable disparate software systems to interact and share data with one another. While we can unite your SaaS platforms via our API Integration Services to ensure all your data is in sync across the systems you use, this may not be enough. Many businesses need custom built applications to ensure they function smoothly and with those applications come the same issues with siloed data for your internal systems and they did for your external platforms. So how can we integrate our own API into our systems if we don’t have them? By building custom APIs for your internal platforms, of course!
How custom API development works to unite your organization’s platforms
Let’s say your B2B manufacturing business caters to both wholesalers and consumers. You’ll likely want to serve these two audiences through separate websites even though they may show the exact same products or service offerings. A new item needs to be added to both sites by you or your employee. If that item changes, the same process needs to be followed again. Not only does this double your workload, it also opens you up to inconsistencies: maybe data gets miscoppied in one site and not the other or one site gets missed when updating content.
This gets even more costly to manage while widening the margin for error when we throw in more platforms. Say you add a web or mobile application for your sales representatives to showcase offerings or generate proposals and presentations for customers. Now you’re up to three systems, all of which need to be updated every time something changes.
This misalignment can cause headaches for your customer service team and can lead to lost revenue, be it through refunds or a confused potential customer leaving your site and choosing another option.
By developing a custom API to serve as the central repository for all your data you can push content to your previously unconnected systems, leaving you with a singular point for your systems making updates easier and reducing the potential for human error.
Free your data
Once your data is removed from a particular application the sky’s the limit with what you can do with it. Sure, connecting divergent systems is a great way to keep your business aligned, but it can also improve your offerings for your clients. Let’s say that the wholesaler we mentioned above wants to make the products or services they purchase from you available to their customers. With your custom developed API you can provide that data to their systems seamlessly. This allows you to be more flexible in how you work with your customers, amplifying your offerings, and making you an ideal partner.
Secure data protection
There is no shortage of data breaches these days and in many instances these are the result of insecure APIs. We will work with you and your compliance team to ensure that we lock down your API in a way that works for you, be it through tokens, rate limiting, Oauth, gateways, or any other cyber security measures you throw our way.
We use REST and GraphQL paradigms to structure your API.
In addition, we use our AdaCMS as our basis for custom APIs. AdaCMS’s secure authentication and authorization system prevents unauthorized users from accessing sensitive data or paid resources while giving you full CRUD (create, read, update, and delete) control over the all data housed within the API.
Custom API development with an award winning web design company
Our dedicated team of programmers and web development professionals is fully equipped to architect solutions for your company with custom API development that matches your unique requirements. Custom developed APIs are a highly versatile solution to your business’s connectivity challenges. APIs are an efficient way to power websites and native apps, but they must be managed by skilled professionals with an acute eye for detail to keep data flowing smoothly from system to system. At Lform, our top API priorities are to connect different parts of your business seamlessly and to keep your data secure. We strive to streamline your organization’s workflow by building a central storage location for all your data that connects to all your existing software systems and applications.
Interested in having a custom API developed by the B2B web development experts at Lform? Simply schedule a needs assessment with us!