In nearly every product conversation we have, the question comes up:
“Can we integrate with [Slack, Stripe, Salesforce, Gamma, OpenAI, insert tool here]?”
And the answer is almost always: “Yes, technically.”
But at Telos, we’re less interested in whether it’s possible—and more interested in whether it’s necessary.
That’s because integrations are rarely free. They introduce new dependencies, new failure points, new maintenance costs. And when they’re done prematurely or without a clear goal, they often lead to more confusion than value.
We’ve seen platforms become fragile, bloated, or even break entirely because of a well-intentioned integration that wasn’t essential.
So while we’re more than capable of integrating with just about anything, our default approach is more deliberate:
Build only what’s needed. Integrate only what adds value. Keep the rest out of the way.
Every Integration Is a Decision With Downstream Cost
On the surface, integrating with another platform can seem simple. A few API calls. A webhook or two. Maybe a plugin.
But every integration you add brings questions:
What happens when that third-party service changes its API? What if the client’s credentials expire? What if it goes down mid-workflow? Who owns debugging when things break?
We don’t ask these questions to scare clients away from integrations. We ask them because they need to be answered before we build—not after something breaks in production.
That’s why we approach integrations like any other product decision: with intent, guardrails, and a strong “why” behind the “what.”
Our Criteria for High-Value Integrations
We don’t maintain a list of “approved” tools. We’re flexible, and we work with whatever your team is already using. But we do have a mental checklist we run through to help clients make good choices.
A smart integration usually has at least one of the following going for it:
- It saves users significant time or steps. (E.g. triggering messages in Slack based on in-app activity.)
- It connects to a system users already rely on. (E.g. syncing transactions with Stripe or QuickBooks.)
- It’s needed to launch a core workflow. (E.g. importing data from an existing CRM to get started.)
- It adds clear, measurable utility to the product.
If it doesn’t pass one of those tests—or if it’s mostly “nice to have”—we usually recommend scoping it for a future release or building a manual fallback first.
Sometimes the Best Integration Is No Integration
This is something we’ve had to say out loud more than once, especially when a project is at risk of ballooning:
“What if we just didn’t integrate that yet?”
And more often than not, the product gets better.
Because instead of wiring everything together prematurely, we focus on getting the core experience right—then layering on integrations as they become essential. Sometimes, a CSV export is enough to validate a process. Sometimes, a simple webhook does the trick. Sometimes, it turns out that the integration wasn’t needed at all.
We don’t default to “do everything.”
We default to “do what matters first.”
We’ve Built the Complex Stuff—So We Know When Not To
We’ve integrated with Slack, Stripe, OpenAI, SendGrid, Zoom, Salesforce, Google Cloud, and more. We’ve built notification systems, data pipelines, webhook handlers, and bi-directional syncs.
So when we recommend holding off on an integration, it’s not because we can’t do it—it’s because we’ve done it enough to know when it’s too early, too brittle, or too expensive for the stage you’re in.
Our job is to help your product stay lean and stable, especially early on. That means putting the user first, not the feature list.
Building a Smarter Stack, One Connection at a Time
If your product truly depends on a third-party tool, we’ll help you make that connection work seamlessly. But we’ll also help you make sure it’s worth doing—and done the right way.
Because integrations are supposed to make things easier.
Not harder to build, harder to test, and harder to maintain.
