How to create an app? It is the first question that arises once businesses have decided to create an app to further their enterprise. Businesses may know their target audience, demand, and supply. They may also know that the idea of creating a mobile app is going to be successful, and that it could potentially be a million-dollar idea.
The thing stopping them is that they do not know how to develop a mobile app. In this post, we share a step by step guide to building a mobile app.
1. Define your purpose
Many companies and start-ups make a mistake of not defining clear objectives while developing a mobile app. It is nearly impossible to get expected benefits if the purpose is not precise.
Before developing a mobile app, it is vital to find answers to such questions. How can your app create a difference? How can it be helpful to customers? Is your app going to reach more customers? Or is it just for brand awareness?
After getting answers to the above questions, you should look for improvements in your business through the app, as well as the expected outcomes. These things need to be crystal clear before going further.
2. Discuss features and functionalities
After defining the objectives, the second most crucial step is to discuss the functions and features of the mobile app. One of the essential parts of developing a mobile app is to write down all the necessary functionalities and features.
You can integrate features such as ML, AI, Payment Gateway integration, Real-time tracking, Face Detection, and others in your mobile app. If these features enhance the user experience, they may be included in the app.
Identifying and eliminating irrelevant features is an important sub-step of discussing features and functionalities. At the beginning, it is advisable to list down value-creating functions.
3. Know your competitors
There is high value for deep research in the industry of app development. It will be best if you discuss key points before jumping into app development.
- Which are the similar apps that attract your target audience?
- Who are your major competitors in the market?
- What are their mistakes?
- Who are your potential customers?
- What are the problems of customers that are unsolved by your competitors?
- Should you charge users to use your app?
- Why should people use your app?
The answers to these questions are essential to get insights into the demand for your app. Also, these brainstorming questions will help you fill the gaps your competitors left.
4. Design Wireframes
After performing the above steps, it is time to think about the design of your app, i.e., create a wireframe.
What do you mean by wireframing?
Wireframing is the visual representation of the app’s layout and the flow between multiple screens. It is a distraction-free method, and in it, users do not need to worry about different graphic elements.
Wireframing works as a bridge between your initial thoughts and the final product. There are two methods of building wireframes – Offline and Online.
5. Pick a development platform
After knowing the basics of wireframing, we head towards choosing a development path. This is a crucial phase where you choose developing platforms & programming languages.
It is not that difficult to discuss the app development platform if one has a clear idea about the needs, budget, and target audience. Here are the sub-steps of choosing the right platform as per your needs and budget.
- Develop an app for a particular operating system, for instance, Android, iOS, or Windows.
- Create a hybrid app that permits your app to run on both Android and iOS platforms.
- Use app building platforms if you do not have coding knowledge or have budget issues.
- The final step is to choose the right programming language.
6. Develop your mobile app
It takes time to create a robust and user-friendly mobile application. There are a few things which you should keep in mind while developing a mobile app.
It is better to avoid non-essential elements that neither improve functionality nor enhance user experience. If possible, use a single input field and minimize push notifications.
Create a future-proof app. As you want to fulfill the requirements of your customers, it is essential to make sure that the app brings profit for further developments.
7. Examine your mobile app
After the app development process, it is time to examine your mobile app to ensure that there are no bugs. Testing an application will help you to know user-experience. There are two types of testing that you can do – internal testing and external testing. Internal testing means the app development team tests the app as an end-user. External testing means people previously unfamiliar with the app test it.
The purpose of testing should be to fix bugs and user experience issues also, various tools in the market help to test your brand new app.
8. Launch the mobile app
Now, as the development and testing process is done, we can say that 90% of work is complete. It is time to present the mobile app to the audience. Submit your app to the respective application store. We recommend you to strictly follow the guidelines before submitting your app to the Google Play Store and Apple App Store.
9. Promote and Market your mobile app
Many start-ups and companies think that the right products do not need promotion and marketing. But that is not the complete truth. Marketing is the way to announce your app. Marketing helps the app reach your targeted audience.
Wrapping words
Now we all know how to develop a mobile app, and now it is time to improve user experience. For that, you must gather feedback from users often. Your modifications should not affect the user experience.
Businesses interested in Mobile App Development Solution can contact Smart Sights Innovations, one of the best Big Data Development and App Development organizations.
