We are going through a formative phase for designing mobile apps. Mobile app development covers areas from e-commerce activities up to content curation.
Mobile app development is playing a prominent role in shaping the online business. Although the design of the mobile apps is in the formative years, we see the application of mobile apps in almost all areas from e-commerce activities up to the content curation. The reason for which there is a rise in the number of mobile apps is more and more people are occupying the mobile space with their mobile devices like laptops and tablets, other than the ever-ubiquitous smartphones.
These mobile devices carry a huge volume of information, enabling the users to perform a plethora of activities starting from making online payments, viewing their banking transactions, browsing the net for information and more such activities. But, we see the product from most of these app development companies as a poorly designed app.
You need to follow the basic stages in mobile app development and these are:
Table of Contents
Set Up the Goal
Clear goals and clear vision are a must for the mobile app. There are too many companies in the marketplace, which invest behind those mobile app development companies and utterly fails at the end.
Other than starting with something simple, the mobile app that will be developed must cover certain aspects of the services and must aim to do certain things and not only that it will resolve some structural problems. One must also understand the user expectations of this mobile app.
Competition analysis is vital in this stage of mobile app development. You must find out the mobile apps that are popular with the clients and the kind of elements that they have, which meets the user expectations and which actually make your app flourish in the long run.
Design Matters
The UI/UX design is of utmost importance in mobile app development as that is what singularly prevents from providing a dismaying user experience, on the contrary, it provides the delight for the customers. So, for the app development company, it is always a design-first and develop-second approach.
We cannot afford to lose the resources behind an app idea, without proper planning. You must make a sketch of the idea on a piece of paper, for understanding the look and behavior of the mobile app.
Monetizing the Mobile Apps
With the goals of the mobile app fixed, you must find further details on the technical and commercial sides of the mobile apps. The niche market for mobile apps needs to be determined and the successful measures for monetizing the mobile app need to be found. All options for monetization need to be explored such as charging customers for downloading the apps as well as running advertisements for mobile apps causing major problems.
Defining the technical specifications is another with work done with the help of a mobile UX expert or professional support from someone. The cost of the mobile app has to be calculated at this stage too.
Surface Level Prototyping
Prototyping of the mobile app is one of the best practices to be followed. This is crucial for successfully launching the mobile app. You may incorporate some of the web-based prototyping models, which are easy to use and incorporates a lot on design additions, troubleshooting, and other functions.
Creating the Beta version for Testing
The creation of the beta version of the mobile application is about putting the plan to a real-life situation. The rudimentary form must have similar aesthetics as the real thing. This is the way to get good feedbacks about design. The feedbacks are then incorporated in the final product before it is actually launched. The second run of beta testing is needed before launching the app when there are radical changes in the app functionalities when you need to amend the wireframe and the technical specifications.
The app is showcased generally in the Google Play Store and it is quite flexible in displaying the app, but in the case of Apple’s App Store, it has the right to review and approve the app before it actually hits the marketplace.