Table of Contents
Application Maintenance
Yes, your mobile app is live on the market, and everyone loves it.
But do you think your work is over? Well, your job is only starting.
Yes, you heard that right—to keep your app supporting its users and performing well, you need to put in a lot of effort to maintain and update it. Application maintenance is a vital part of constantly improving the app.
Not all businesses have the resources and technical expertise to do it themselves, so they must hire application maintenance services.
If you are wondering what application maintenance involves and how to do it efficiently, this blog post explains it all.
Let’s get started.
The answer to this question is very simple—it is how you maintain your app once it is live.
Application maintenance includes 5 elements.
Taking care of these elements ensures that your app performs better and satisfies the users. And that’s going to keep the users active on your app.
Developing mobile apps is just one side of the equation. If you want users and retain them to grow your business, you need to maintain the app.
Here are the top 5 reasons for mobile app maintenance.
Users expect their apps to perform well at all times. They want the apps to be fast, responsive, and secure. And it is impossible to meet the expectations with the first version of the app. You need to understand where the app lags to make the changes.
It is easier to make such observations when your users utilize the app. In addition, users will also let you know what you need to improve through reviews and feedback.
Through constant maintenance and updates, you can make the app better and better.
A major hurdle most apps face while trying to satisfy their users is a bad user experience. Your users need easy-to-use and friendly interfaces. And it is a hard nut to crack.
When you invest regularly in maintaining the app through updates, you can understand what the users want. You also will understand the type of people using the app, their preferences, etc.
In addition, user experience also depends on the platform or OS that the user is using. These platforms also roll out updates that you need to catch up with.
As you do this, the user experience of your app will improve, and your app’s retention rate also will improve.
Despite taking a lot of time and effort to develop, you may still have bugs and glitches in your app. Maintaining the app regularly is a way to fix these issues.
Even if you have developed an exceptional and well-designed app, errors and glitches can happen when users install the app on diverse mobile devices. You cannot test the app for millions of scenarios.
With regular maintenance, you can look for these types of bugs, errors, and glitches and roll out updates to fix them.
That will improve the app’s quality, performance, and user experience.
Hackers and identity thieves are always looking for vulnerabilities in mobile apps to find a way to exploit them. Constant maintenance to shut down all such vulnerabilities is crucial.
If you fail to look at such vulnerabilities in your app and close them down, you are inadvertently giving room for hackers to act. This may lead to data breaches and put your users’ data at risk.
Updating and maintaining your app to meet the latest security guidelines and protocols safeguards your users and business from attacks.
You need to host your mobile apps in app stores like Google’s Play Store and Apple’s App Store. And these stores change their policies and app requirements from time to time.
It is vital for your app to meet these requirements and policies to still be in the store. As a business, you need the app to be in these stores as people mostly install apps from these stores.
When you maintain and update your app regularly, you can easily comply with the requirements even if the stores change them.
Maintaining mobile apps offers diverse advantages to you as a business. Let’s look at some of the top benefits of mobile app maintenance here.
Improving user satisfaction is the biggest advantage of mobile app maintenance. When the app is well-maintained and updated to improve its performance, speed, responsiveness, etc., the users will be happy.
Satisfied and happy customers stay with your app, and it leads to more business for your app.
It is very likely that your app has numerous competitors in the market. Regular and correct app maintenance can keep the app performing well and meeting users’ expectations.
This will ensure that your app offers better services and support to users, keeping it competitive.
Users will uninstall your app if it does not perform well and meet their expectations. Hence, maintaining your app well ensures that the users will continue to use it.
As you keep the app high-performing, secure, and user-friendly through updates, customers do not uninstall them.
Customers are aware of the security threats in the cyber world. Hence, they always look for regular security updates and support from developers of the apps they use.
Maintenance ensures that you can improve the app’s security and have the latest systems in place to keep the app safe.
Users tend to use apps that are compatible with the platforms they prefer.
Mobile apps need to also be updated depending on the changes happening in platforms like iOS and Android. These Operating Systems roll out updates, changes, and improvements regularly.
With app maintenance, you can keep your app compatible with these changing platforms.
As mobile apps collect and use user data for various purposes, there are several regulations to protect the data from hackers. These regulations change from time to time.
When you are on the lookout to improve the quality and security of the app, you can release updates to make your app comply with new regulations.
This makes your app secure and users confident to use it.
Every business is in the long-term game. So are mobile apps. To make the app run for a long time, you need to update the app.
You must add new features, expand the functionalities, etc., to make the app appealing to the changing users and their preferences.
The only way to do that is to maintain the app regularly and keep it fresh.
The way people use apps changes as time goes on. It could be because of the changes happening in the field of technology or how the world is progressing.
That’s why you need to add new features to the app. And maintaining the app well helps you understand what features the users want.
You can also remove certain features that your users no longer need.
If you are looking to ensure constant maintenance of your app, you need to understand different types of app maintenance.
Let’s try to understand each of them.
This is proactive app maintenance, where the updates are derived from the analysis of the app’s users and data. These data sets offer insights into the preferences and choices of the users.
Based on these insights, an app maintenance services provider fixes issues before they become a pressing challenge for users.
In adaptive maintenance, the focus is on making the app compatible with changing hardware and platform requirements.
This is often needed for most apps as they work on Operating Systems like iOS, Android, Linux, etc.
Businesses often need to do this as these platforms themselves change.
This is the most common and essential maintenance. In this type of maintenance, an app maintenance agency or company resolves the existing issues with the app.
This type of app maintenance considers various factors, such as coding, designing, app logic, etc.
Corrective maintenance helps improve the app’s performance and functionality.
In this type of maintenance, the app is constantly checked for issues such as bugs, errors, performance issues, security issues, etc. When an issue is identified, it is immediately corrected by updating the code.
Preventive maintenance is proactive, and the goal of this type of maintenance is to prevent the app from having glitches or errors.
Whether you hire an agency offering application maintenance services or do it in-house, you must follow certain practices to make it worthwhile.
Here are 5 of the best mobile app maintenance practices we use at Fullestop.
The first thing you need to know whether your app’s performing well is to monitor it. Regularly checking how well your app is meeting the user requirements helps you also know if something is wrong with the app.
Such insights can help you respond quickly to issues right from the beginning and prevent them from becoming complex.
You can analyze various elements to understand the app’s performance. At Fullestop, we look at the following metrics.
This data-driven approach helps you approach app maintenance with concrete insights and data-backed suggestions.
Design is a crucial element that makes users want to switch to your competitor. Your app’s design affects user experience, and the aesthetics are only secondary.
Hence, you need to be on the lookout for new trends in your industry and adopt the same.
It is important to offer a fresh, new look to your app. When the user opens the app, they must get a ‘wow’ feeling, and updating designs has a huge role in evoking such emotions.
After rolling out your apps, it is quite easy to understand how the users interact with the app and get their feedback. This will tell you what your app is missing and how you can improve its functionalities.
There are several ways you can gather data to understand this. Some of the most common means are below:
You can add features to your apps and remove them if users don’t like or use them at all.
Nothing makes a user dissatisfied, like bugs and errors that freeze their mobile devices. Hence, you need to always be on the lookout for these errors and bugs.
And whenever you come across these bugs, rectify them quickly and address the issue before it blows out.
You can also use social media to announce the fix, which will help your brand with its proactive approach.
The best way to know whether your app needs a facelift, core update, or new feature is to stay abreast with your users. Everything you do is aimed to satisfy the customers. Hence, keeping in constant touch with them helps you know what they want.
Once you know what makes them happy and what is not, you can work on your maintenance plan. This strategic approach helps you streamline your maintenance plan, as well.
Mobile app maintenance is a complex task. Several factors affect the complexity of the work. Hence, it is hard to explain the cost of app maintenance without looking at the scope of the project.
In addition, different companies have different pricing models—some may take an AMC, while others might charge for each maintenance assignment.
There are mobile and website maintenance companies that charge for the hour.
Here are some crucial factors that affect the cost of app maintenance.
Larger and more complex apps require more extensive app maintenance services, which drives up the cost. If your app has more screens, users, features, etc., each of these elements needs to be taken care of, which will take time and effort.
If your app needs a large team to constantly maintain the app, the cost of the project will be higher. Each member of the team needs to be paid, and the resources they need to work on the app must also be provided. This leads to higher costs.
Different agencies use different technologies to develop apps. Sometimes, it is based on the client’s preferences. However, the more complex the technology, the costlier app maintenance becomes. For example, maintaining native apps is more expensive than maintaining hybrid apps.
When your app has high-quality code with proper logic and fewer bugs, it is easier to maintain. Apps with low-quality code are harder to maintain and update.
All these factors affect the cost of app development. Hence, it is difficult to explain the exact cost of app maintenance.
The best idea is to ask for a quote for the cost of app maintenance from the agencies you want to work with. After analyzing the quote and comparing the value proposition, you can pick one.
No matter the type of the app, it is crucial to maintain it properly. App maintenance must be a strategic part of your app or business growth plan. No matter if you have a custom mobile or web app, you need to keep working on it to make it keep performing well in the market. One thing you must have in mind is that you need to hire professional app maintenance services to ensure your app gets the care it deserves.
Fullestop has been offering customized website and mobile app maintenance services to businesses worldwide. Our team of expert app developers ensures that your app receives the care it needs, and we do it by looking at your app data so that you know what you get.
Contact our support team to learn more about our app maintenance plans.
