Recent studies showed that use of mobile applications grew incredibly by 115% from 2012 to 2013. Apple, which produces more than a million apps for its iPhone, iPad and other devices, said recently that consumers spent over $10 billion on apps in 2013.
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Take WhatsApp, for example. This five-year-old company has more than 500 million active monthly users, and it recently signed a $19 billion acquisition deal with Facebook. One more example of such a successful app is BBC’s weather application which is downloaded by more than 20,000 customers every day, literally making it the company’s fastest-growing mobile application.
It is to be understood that there is no one-size-fits-all formula to forecast what apps will become popular and what apps will fail.
With hundreds of thousands of games, social media applications, editing tools and several other types of apps already available, with hundreds more, launched every day, businesses that are planning on developing apps need to work strategically with a mobile team that truly understands the market conditions intrinsically and extrinsically.
If enterprise-grade mobile solutions are concerned, it’s even more complicated. These companies typically require more complex mobile solutions, and their relationship with their mobile partner usually lasts long after their app launches. The mobile solution provider works hand-in-hand with the business house to develop the required mobile solution that can be used to solve business challenges. For companies that don’t know what problems are to be addressed, or aren’t sure what place they want to acquire in the mobile space, they should seek out a partner with a high level of expertise and understanding of every aspect of the ‘app universe’. A mobile solutions provider is a guide that navigates a company through every step of this complex mobile landscape.
The app developers, on the other hand, are mainly concerned with coding, designing or both, and are ideal for providing a very specific set of feature demands. They have quite a distinctive place in the mobile world. As such, the app developers are more familiar with the design and feature construction rather than the business strategy, audience targeting or third-party integration. So, they can readily write the code for an already mapped out mobile application for a company but building an intuitive mobile solution, especially the one in the enterprise sphere, requires a more distinctive set of skills. The group developing the app should understand the agile development process which is usually not the centre of work ideology at an app development firm.
Here are a few things that should be considered while choosing the best option for your needs:
Decide on whether the app is being developed for customers or solely for the purpose of internal productivity.
Check whether the infrastructure and back-end requirements are in place.
Decide whether the app is being designed to solve a clearly defined business problem.
You need to make sure that you have the required model in place that defines how the app will interact smoothly with the current company site and the email service provider.
You will need to decide whether it’s a one-time app build or it will require ongoing support, maintenance and updates even after the delivery.
Mobile Solution development and delivery is continuously evolving, and the future depends on much more than just technical expertise. As such, based on a company’s goals and needs, it’s important to consider all of the possible options before selecting a mobile partner.
