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Custom Business Software

At some point, the workaround stops working.

Most software is built for the average business in its category. When your operation has something specific about it, that's where the workarounds start — and they cost more than they look like they do.

  • Are your employees tracking time or jobs on a spreadsheet — or on paper?
  • Does your process only make sense because one person holds it all in their head?
  • Are you paying for software that does most of what you need and forces a workaround for the rest?
  • Is something that should take five minutes taking twenty?
  • Bottom line: How much is the workaround actually costing you?

Why Generic Software Falls Short

Most software was built for someone else's business.

QuickBooks, Jobber, Monday.com — great tools for a lot of businesses. The moment something about your operation is specific, you start hitting walls and building workarounds around the gaps.

It's not a people problem. It's a tools problem. The right tool fits how your business already works — instead of asking your team to work around how the tool was built.

user experience

Custom Software Solutions

Software built to fit your operation.

Web-based tools built for your specific business — not a template, not a plug-in, not a feature you'll never touch.

team blog

Employee time & job tracking

Clock in, log job details, track hours by crew or project. No more paper timesheets nobody can read by Friday.

Job management dashboards

Every active job, status, and crew in one place, in real time — so the answer to “where are we on this?” isn't a phone call.

Client portals

A place for customers to submit requests, view updates, or sign off on work without the back-and-forth email chain.

Estimate & proposal tools

Consistent, professional estimates without rebuilding them from scratch every single time.

Inspection & field reporting forms

Mobile forms that feed straight into your records — filled out on site, not re-typed back at the office.

Internal workflow tools

Whatever's currently running on memory, sticky notes, or a whiteboard, we can build the system for it.

If it happens regularly and you're doing it manually, it's probably worth automating.

Team collaborating at a computer screen in office.

Software Solutions for Real Businesses

We didn't figure this out in theory.

A field-service company came to us with a familiar problem: tracking hours and job activity across crews and sites was a mess of paper timesheets and manual entries that nobody trusted by the end of the week.

We built them a web-based timesheet and job-tracking app their team could use from any device in the field — and their office could pull clean reports from without chasing anyone down.

How We Build Your Custom Software

A better tool starts with a better understanding.

Discovery meeting

We map your process and find exactly where it breaks down (it's not always where you think!).

Interface design

You see the screens and the workflow before a single line of code is written.

Build and test

Staged development with check-ins along the way, so there are no surprises at the end.

Team training

Your team learns the tool before launch to ensure smooth adoption.

Ongoing support

We update your tool stack as your business changes, so it stays useful.

Comprehensive Marketing Strategy

Custom software works best as part of a bigger system.

Website design

Your website is often where customers first enter the system: forms, quote requests, bookings, accounts, payments, portals, or product orders. We can build the customer-facing side and the behind-the-scenes tool so they work together from the start.

AI-Powered Website Chat

If people need help choosing a service, asking a question, checking availability, or starting a request, AI chat can guide them before the custom software takes over the workflow behind the scenes.

Why Work with Us

A developer who doesn't know your business builds the wrong thing.

Most custom software fails because nobody fully understood the problem before building. We've spent 13+ years helping Tri-Cities businesses operate better — so when we build a tool, we're thinking about how your team will actually use it day to day, not just what was written in a spec.

This works best for owners who want to be part of solving the problem. If you need something fast to a fixed spec without much back-and-forth, there are shops better suited for that.

Two men smiling in office with laptop

125+ 5-Star Reviews

When you do great work, people notice.

Josh created a style guide for us to help with consistency throughout our agency. He did a great job creating the guide with little information. He did a great job explaining everything to us. He went above and beyond troubleshooting a zip file issue. Our services with Josh Kandle were 5-star service! He was kind, patient, thoughtful with his work and helpful with creativity in our style guide as well and assisting with technical difficulties. Thanks again Josh!

Cougar Digital has been so incredible to work with! They are always able to turn our words and ideas into a beautiful finished product quickly. The staff is responsive and professional and we love working with Josh. He is a true artist and always delivers a stunning product. Thank you Cougar!

Cougar Digital worked closely with us to create a website for our business that truly reflects our vision. They dedicated time and effort to ensure every detail aligned with our goals, and the end result exceeded our expectations. We’re extremely happy with the final product and appreciate their commitment to quality.

Mykaela Faulconer at Cougar Digital is one of my favorite people to work with, ever, across the board. She is incredibly talented, and has done consistently stellar graphic design for me and my team at Tri-City Orthopaedic Clinic. I have never had a bad interaction with Mykaela, and she goes above and beyond to provider exemplary customer service at every turn. I feel incredibly lucky to be able to work with Mykaela on a daily basis. Everyone at Cougar Digital is amazing, and I would recommend them whole-heartedly.

Thank you Cougar Digital. Over the past couple of years we have worked with Cougar Digital for rebranding, website updates, new logo, updating our business card and promotional material. They also produced an amazing testimonial video - so much fun working with Josh and his team to create this. I can’t begin to express how happy we are with the work Cougar Digitial has completed for us over the years. They are professional, punctual, very creative and so easy to work with. Looking forward to our partnership for years to come. I would highly recommend Cougar Digitial. Our team at New Leaf Creations is thankful for all of your amazing work and looking forward to working with Cougar Digital in the future.

Excellent service and good pricing. It was a pleasure working with Travis and his team. I highly recommend them!

Had a great experience with Cougar Digital. We lost our photographer last minute and called Cougar Digital and they stepped up and really did a bang up job for us. Plus their WSU Alum and that added good fun to the shoot. Super appreciate these guys and recommend them to anyone. #AGENT509

We are SO grateful with Josh from Cougar Digital! We are a community workspace and Josh came in and took some fantastic pictures of our brand new space! We are very pleased with the work that he did!

Josh Kandle and his team did a great job educating us about the importance of up-to-date digital tools, and how quickly out-of-date solutions can hinder our on-line reach. The solutions he offered were more than fairly priced, paid immediate dividends, and I am happy to refer him to any business in need of a productive digital marketing program.

Travis and the Team impressed me as having great listening skills! I had them create a website and the main priorities were SEO, Responsive across all devices, Reasonable loading speed and the Contact Info was responsive so it’s easy to place a call or send email. They surpassed these objectives and did a great job of matching the graphics with the content on each page. Very punctual and professional and we’re sensitive to my schedule also. I was impressed by the way all Team members signed off before launching as a measure of quality control. Their values are put into action and not just on a plaque in the office.

We had a great experience working with COUGAR DIGITAL for creating our website and helping us with our ongoing marketing needs. Ashley, did an exceptional job with the website. Josh created an awesome logo and branding bible for us, and Makayla's photos added a professional touch. Highly recommended for top-notch digital marketing solutions!

Working with Josh at Cougar Digital Marketing & Design was an excellent experience! The process was incredibly collaborative, allowing us to bring our vision for the Pasco School District Career Guide to life. Josh listened to our ideas, provided valuable insights, and worked tirelessly to ensure the final product exceeded our expectations. We are thrilled with the outcome and can't wait to share our new Career Guide with our students and families. Highly recommend Cougar Digital for any design and marketing needs!

These guys are top notch! Very knowledgeable and helpful!

Cougar Digital Marketing ROCKS! I've worked with Travis and Josh from the very beginning. These folks know their stuff and do a fantastic job with website design & promotion, digital photography and so much more. Their services are very reasonably priced and they know how to GET RESULTS. Great BANG for your marketing BUCK. Look no further that Cougar Digital - these folks will take good care of you.

Josh was fantastic to work with! He took Real Estate photography photos on the 14th, and had all of them beautifully edited and back to me in 24 hours! Highly recommend his services!

Ashley redid our website. She was professional, quick, and listened to all of our requests. Thank you!

Couldnt be happier with Cougar Digital! They crushed our websites!

Cougar Digital provides excellent follow through on all our projects. We trust them with developing solutions for our email marketing campaigns, graphic design, and collateral creation. Their designs are used by our partners nationally. We count on them for specific website support work and they always come through for us. They are solution oriented and their upbeat, friendly customer service is unparalleled.

Great company, great people. Vision matched customer expectation!

I highly recommend Cougar Digital. I am currently working with them on 3 separate projects. They took over 2 community based websites that were painful to use and turned them into user friendly, performant websites. Their website & database design is outstanding and they have consistently exceeded my expectations. It has been a pleasure working with everyone at Cougar Digital!

I recently had an opportunity to choose a web designer to re-vamp and optimize Stepping Stones Alliance's website. Having worked with Cougar Digital before they were my choice for this project. I'm so glad they were able to work with us! The entire process from first meeting to re-launch of the site was stellar. They are quick to respond, listen to feedback, professional and clear in their communications, and spot-on with fulfilling the client desires. The entire team was great to work with along the way and I appreciated the high level of customer service at every point. Not only will I continue to work with them for all our organization's website needs, but I will recommend them to anyone looking for website and marketing projects.

I honestly don't know where to start. My partners and I could not be happier with the process from start to finish working with Ashley and Cougar Digital Marketing. It was an absolute pleasure working with Ashley and I would recommend her to anyone who is looking to either create a website for their business or enhance their current one like we did. The service and pricing we experienced completely exceeded our expectations.

We have nothing but great things to say about Cougar Digital Marketing! Travis took the time to understand our goals, worked around our schedule, and went above and beyond to make our vision come to life. Ashley was a whiz and was always available when we needed her. Our site turned out better than we imagined. Can't recommend them enough.

Great company, great people. Vision matched expectations!

Cougar Digital has been an outstanding company to work with. Excellent customer service, response time & product! Highly recommend!

We absolutely loved working with Cougar Digital on the launch of our new website and throughout several incredible photo shoots. From start to finish, their team was creative, responsive, and truly understood our vision.

Cougar did a wonderful job with our new site. Ashley and Travis were extremely helpful, knowledgeable, and friendly. We will definitely be coming back for any needs in the future!

We’ve had the pleasure of working with Cougar Digital Marketing on both of our company websites—Ellison Earthworks and EE Traffic Management—and we couldn’t be happier with the results. From the very first meeting, their team was attentive, creative, and incredibly easy to work with. They took the time to understand not just our services, but our brand values and voice, and they translated that into two beautiful, functional, and user-friendly websites. Their communication was consistent and clear throughout the process, and every step felt collaborative. They made what could’ve been a stressful experience feel seamless and even fun. The final products truly reflect the heart of our companies and the industries we serve. We highly recommend Cougar Digital to any business looking to elevate their online presence. Thank you for bringing our vision to life so perfectly!

I am the Office Manager of a business that badly needed a website reworked. I knew that Cougar Digital was up to the task, but I was unsure of my own Manager. He really didn't want to go through the steps to work with anyone on anything like a website. Nick was fabulous (as in over the top) in his Customer Service skills with a very hard to work with man. The professionalism of Cougar Digital, coupled with the patience and skills of Nick, provided my Manager with everything he needed to get a new website. The website is beautiful and I am one very pleased customer. I will always go to Cougar Digital for all of my marketing needs.

It was such a pleasure working with Cougar Digital. Not only was the process fast and easy, the work they created is amazing! Josh gave us a variety of different options to work with after taking the time to carefully listen to our needs. He made every little detail count and really brought our vision to life. We will definitely continue to work closely as our business continues to expand. Thank you, we could not be any happier.

We highly recommend Cougar Digital Marketing for their exceptional marketing services. We used them initially to build our new website for our commercial and residential General Contracting company, and we signed on with them for future partnership hours. We have been pleased with the seamless results Travis's company has provided us. The team's collaboration and communication with the website designer, Ashlie, the marketing guru, Josh, and the photographer, Mykayla, were ALL GREAT. Having these marketing resources under one roof has made our transition from our last website company, much easier than expected. Their prompt availability and amazing support made the entire experience enjoyable. We are extremely satisfied with the results and grateful for their partnership and guidance!

Working with Josh Kandle on several video projects was such a great experience . He is not only a real pro and easy to work with but he was also so open to all of my ideas for creativity and understood a lot of what I was looking for as an independent recording artist. i would highly recommend him and look forward to hopefully being able to do more in the future. ~ Lisa Mitts, Recording Artist Songwriter, Performer

Great work and very professional! Thank you!

Josh did a great job making a couple of highlight videos for me. Easy to work with and prompt service

My class and I had a great time learning from Josh about his background, experience in design and video, and creative process. Thank you so much for volunteering!!

Very grateful for Cougar Digital's marketing work for my medical practice. They really helped increase my online presence and improve my ratings online. I have referred my colleagues to Cougar.

Cougar Digital Marketing & Design does outstanding work. Prosser School District has utilized their expertise on multiple occasions to assist in communicating our message. They are easy to work with and most importantly, they deliver!

Working with the Cougar Digital Marketing team was an absolute delight. Truly good people who are VERY skilled at what they do. Running a large regional food company, it's a blessing to work with an experienced digital team here locally, and not have to seek services in the Seattle or Portland market. I highly recommend working with Cougar Digital!

Josh and the Cougar Digital team did an amazing job with a drone video production that included narration. The quality of audio and video show a professional production level. I appreciate the attention to detail and quality of work by the Cougar Digital team.

We had an amazing experience working with Josh at Cougar Digital for our excavation company's new website. He was extremely professional, detail-oriented, and made the entire photo shoot and drone footage process seamless. The quality of the photos and drone shots exceeded our expectations, capturing our work in a way that truly showcases our expertise. Josh's professionalism and creative eye made a huge difference, and we couldn’t be happier with the results. Highly recommend him and Cougar Digital for any photography and digital needs!

Travis Hartliep and his crew are amazing! I worked with Josh on designing a book cover and he was great... was willing to work through numerous changes and updates, suggested helpful things to push the project along, and was very patient and courteous. We came in on budget and on time for the project and the end result was fantastic. I highly recommend Cougar Digital for any and all of your design and marketing needs.

Cougar Digital has been great to work with! With their support we have seen significant improvement with our marketplace campaigns.

Happy we have businesses like this locally! Great customer service. Stayed in communication with me through the whole process. Five-star service.

Travis, Josh and everyone at Cougar Digital have been super to work with. They have become a partner in our business. Our web design and online media presence has greatly improved by implementing their recommendations. They go the extra mile.

Josh was professional and personable. Produced great picture and he is a Coug to boot. It doesn’t get any better. Go Cougs

Cougar Digital should be your only call for web design. I would give them 6 stars if I could. #Silverline

Cougar Digital answered the phone, literally. During a company name change, we reached out to multiple design and marketing groups from the Tri-Cities to Walla Walla to Spokane. Although we'd left messages with each vendor, Cougar was the only one courteous enough to respond. After a couple consultations, Joshua Kandle, Director of Marketing took charge of the design of our new company logo. With patience and professionalism, he listened to our concepts and following a series of modifications, he created a logo that is printed on millions of labels and boxes that're shipped globally. The logo is headlined on our website and our email, along with being printed on our work garments. Digital art might be easy with today's technology, but without Joshua's patient nature and ability to listen to our ideas, the incredible logo wouldn't have been possible. Vehemently I recommend Cougar Digital. They're professional yet personable. They're communicative and driven while remaining patient.

Josh at Cougar Digital built us a beautiful website! He and Travis are wonderful to work with and made the whole process easier than I imagined it would be. I would recommend them to anyone that wants a great, quality website

Josh Kandle was excellent to work with on remaking our branding guidelines, etc. He was helpful, patient and his work was outstanding. Thanks Cougar Digital and Josh for making this process so great.

Great company! Love how quickly Josh responds to our needs, questions and requests! Highly recommend them

Custom Software Development FAQs

Questions? We've heard 'em all.

If you’re thinking it, there’s a good chance someone else asked it too. 

How is custom software different from off-the-shelf tools?
Do my employees need to be tech-savvy to use custom software?
What does custom software cost?
Does custom software replace the tools we already use?
Can custom software connect to the tools we already use?
How do we know if we need a custom software solution?

Digital Marketing for Busy Professionals

Learn more. Grow faster.

Quick, useful reads to help you think bigger and market smarter.

Schedule a Consultation

If your process is held together with duct tape, let's talk.

We’ll look at how your business runs, where the work slows down, and what your current tools are missing. If custom software is the right answer, we’ll say so. If an off-the-shelf tool would do the job, we’ll point you there instead.