SaaS is most often referred to as Software as a Service and allows developers to build Software without the hassle or cost of building and maintaining their infrastructure. It’s a software-as-a-service that is accessible for a monthly fee. They help developers to focus solely on making and implementing their Software rather than worry about how to manage and maintain infrastructure.
SaaS offers a number of advantages over traditional IT services and software development technologies. According to Gartner, SaaS was expected to account for 42% of the total enterprise software market by 2020. Companies will save $13 billion in IT consulting costs alone. A recent study found that companies using SaaS increased their annual return on investment by 50% over non-users. From a business perspective, SaaS is the most cost-effective and rapid way to build and run Software. It saves time and money through automatic software updates and eliminates the need for dedicated IT support staff.
To get the most benefit from a SaaS application, developers need to know how to build and use the right tools. These tools include an effective version control repository (VCR), which is a tool that developers can use to manage software changes over time. When working with a SaaS application, you will typically find yourself constantly changing code.
Having a version control system such as Subversion is extremely beneficial to developers. Version control allows you to track changes to files and applications and makes it easier to find files that were changed since an earlier version was created by deleting the older versions of the same file. If someone was to change the same file in two different ways, and you can not always see which change was made, it becomes a headache trying to figure out what changes need to be made. Below are the 11 best SaaS tools for developers.
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Heroku is a cloud-based platform that uses PHP, Ruby, Node.js, and others technologies to deliver a hosted service in the cloud. It facilitates easy deployment of applications using the command-line interface (CLI) or through the Heroku Toolbelt. All infrastructure is managed from a single dashboard which includes monitoring performance and health, provisioning instances across multiple datacenters, and scaling up as needed. It helps developers write, deploy and scale applications without worrying about the underlying infrastructure.
Heroku Key Features
- Supports the modern languages
- Elastic runtime and smart containers
- Simple vertical and horizontal scalability
- Created for delivery and integration that is continuous
Pricing for Heroku
- $0 per month for free and hobby
- $25 per month for production
- $250 per month for advanced
- Quotation based on Enterprise plan
Getflow is a SaaS for developers that allows them to create, run and re-use their automated tests. It’s a tool that makes testing easier with a web-based platform that uses Watir from Fluentd. Getflow can pair your application code with your unit or functional tests. As such, you’ll always be able to run them all at the same time efficiently. It’s an open-source SaaS offered by Google partners.
Getflow Key Features
- Easy to use API with pre-built steps and functions.
- Test Failures History Dashboard available in real-time.
- Unlimited Projects, Tests, and Run Configurations
- It Runs entirely on the cloud, and you don’t need to install or maintain anything locally.
- Supports all the popular languages like Java and Ruby.
Getflow Pricing
- Basic @ $6 per month
- Plus @ $8 per month
- Pro @ $10 per month
Pingdom is designed for debugging and performance monitoring. It allows developers to run their site through a series of tests to ensure everything is operating well. It runs a series of tests like load testing, functional testing and more. Pingdom also allows developers to set up alerts that will notify them of problems. It’s a monitoring solution to help developers keep an eye on the performance and debugging of web apps. Pingdom also provides services that can be used to track application behaviour and improve the quality of service.
Pingdom Key Features
- Speed – Monitoring your site speed is the first step in improving it.
- Real User Monitoring – See how real users are experiencing your site in your browser or mobile app and not from a proxy server.
- Free SSL – If you’re using a free SSL certificate to secure your site, Pingdom can monitor your health and performance.
- Site Monitor – Monitor the availability of your entire domain and subdomains that you specify.
Pingdom Pricing
- Real-user monitoring for $10
- Synthetic monitoring for $10
Outseta is a SaaS platform that offers collaboration tools to developers. It’s a groupware application that helps teams organize their team members and client issues. It is like Slack but for in-person and remote meetings. Instead of using direct messages, Outseta offers the option to send instant messages or share text files with recipients from the Outseta Web App. This platform helps teams share their knowledge and files with others. Developers use Outseta to prioritize their tasks and participate in team chats. Outseta allows developers to create virtual teams with one or multiple members.
Outseta Key Features
- Outseta offers real-time messaging features for teams so they can talk to each other even if they are thousands of miles apart.
- Offers the ability for teams to discuss and share files in real time.
- Create virtual teams with one or multiple members.
- Bootstrap integration for sharing and collaborating on design files in a group session.
- Offers the option to schedule meetings with other users in your team at a specific date/time and place.
Outseta Pricing
- Founder @ $39 per month
- Start-up @$79 per month
- Growth @ $99 per month
CloudCraft is a platform that helps developers focus on their products by providing them with features to manage users and tickets for events. It provides the ability to have a conversation between the customer and team members during and after an event, allowing developers to manage the ticket count, communicate with customers and leave feedback in real-time. Developers can also save time by creating reports that show all the elements needed to create a successful event, such as type of event, number of tickets sold and more.
Cloudcraft Key Features
- It Allows users to create a free account that allows team members to communicate with each other during and after specific events.
- Provides the ability to interact live with customers, ticket counts, purchases, feedback, and more.
- Allows users to save time by creating reports to help them manage their events
- Allows developers to analyze user behaviour and emotions in their system via their dashboard or the out-of-the-box analytics module.
Cloudcraft Pricing
- Free @ $0 per month
- Pro @ $49 per month
- Enterprise on a quotation basis
Demostack is a platform that allows developers to test their applications and deliver them to the client in their live environment. They offer various services that can modify the production application, change how the server operates or are a SaaS interface for applications and websites with scripts, for example, that can be used to build forms or content in one click. Developers can also use it from wired or wireless networks with features like access management and analytics of user activities. It is ideal for developers who need a quick solution to expedite their applications into the production environment. You can showcase your products to your customers and generate revenue by selling hosting, support, customization and application development services.
Demostack Key Features
- A great way of creating demos.
- A variety of services to modify the production application.
- Easily showcase your products
- Clone your products
Demostack Pricing
- Pricing is quotation based.
Hotjar is a tool that helps developers collect data about their customers’ usage and behaviour on the website. It offers features like heatmaps, polls and conversion funnels so developers can know how users interact with their websites. Hotjar is an all-in-one solution for user experience and conversion analysis, featuring everything from eye tracking to form analytics to help you understand how users interact with your website.
Hotjar Features
- User Testimonials
- Session Recording
- Conversion Funnels
- Form Analytics
Hotjar Pricing
- Basic @ $0 per month
- Plus @ $32 per month
- Business @ $80 per month
- Scale is quotation based
Versoly is a platform that helps developers monitor how their users interact with the application and individual web pages. With Versoly, developers can check which areas of the page should be redesigned to increase user interaction and whether or not they are meeting their sales targets. It allows developers to analyze the user experience of their applications, websites and web forms to improve conversion rates and user engagement.
Versoly Key Features
- Faster than custom code
- Has a faster loading speed compared to wordpress.com
- It is more user-friendly compared to web flow
- More flexible
Versoly Pricing
- Starter @ $0 per month
- Pro @ $ 19 per month
- Advance @$ 40 per month
MailChimp is a service that allows developers to send marketing emails to their users. It offers a variety of email design options so developers can easily customize the layout of their campaigns and send messages to the people that matter most. Mailchimp offers features like email tracking, A/B testing, multivariate segmentation and drip-campaign emails that help marketers with automation, targeted messaging and increased engagement.
Mailchimp Features
- Offers Analytics and insights
- Management of audience
- Helps in automating marketing
- Business marketing is made easy
Mailchimp Pricing
- Free @ $ 0 per month
- Essential @ $ 11 per month
- Standers @ $ 17 per month
- Premium @ $ 299 per month
Typeform is a tool that lets developers use a simple form creator to create their customized forms or surveys. This form creation tool comes with pre-designed templates like order forms and questionnaires for research purposes. Users can choose from a wide range of questions, fonts, colors, and layouts to build their brand’s online presence and collect user data. Typeform provides an easy way for marketers to create forms without having any prior coding knowledge quickly.
Typeform Features
- Followup is effortless
- Great user experience
- Personalized data flow
- Easy to share
- Available for Web, Desktop, and Mobile
Typeform Pricing
- Basic @ $ 25 per month
- Plus @ $ 50 per month
- Business @ $ 83 per month
Sentry.io is a tool that allows developers to track their application and website’s performance. It offers server monitoring and alerts, crash reporting, error tracking, uptime monitoring, and real-time metrics. Sentry monitors all the critical errors automatically in real time so developers can fix them quickly before users notice them.
Sentry.io Features
- Easy to get started
- Features like error tracking, crash reporting, uptime monitoring, server monitoring
- Real-time metrics
- Easy to setup and use
Sentry.io Pricing
- Developer @ $0 per month
- Team @ $26 per month
- Business @ $ 80 per month
- Enterprise is quotation based
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What is the best saas tool for web developers?
Heroku is the best saas tool that developers can use to host their web application or website. It is also a cloud application platform that allows users to create, deploy and scale applications with just a few commands. Developers use it to host their applications in the cloud, Heroku provides a wide range of add-ons like I Will, Papertrail and others that can be used to customize your application.
How can I track user behaviour inside SaaS?
When using a SaaS solution, you must understand how your users use the application. You can use Typeform and Hotjar to track user behaviour. Typeform is a service that people can use to create beautiful online forms, and Hotjar tracks user behaviour on the web and mobile applications.
What are the most popular SaaS applications used by developers?
Many developers use SaaS applications, Heroku and Pingdom is the most popular. SaaS applications are essential because they provide several features that developers can use to create desktop applications, mobile applications and web applications with great ease. SaaS applications also allow you to create high-quality features that improve the overall user experience simply and cost-effectively.
