8 Things you Must know Before Building an App

Having a unique mobile app idea and getting things done by your developers isn't enough anymore. The mobile app market is quite competitive, and getting unprepared can result in frustrating, costly and brand-damaging mistakes.

However, if you invest in building the app mindfully, you can make the development process more accessible and successful for your business. First, let's learn how to start an app and create the app and its development process.

1. Start from market research:

The first step to start moving is doing market research on the mobile app development company. You need to know what's happening in the market and use that knowledge to identify an issue your app will solve. Thorough market research will help you identify:

•   The competitors
•   Your competitor's strategy
•   Strengths and weaknesses of the other app developers
•   What are the customers saying in reviews and on social media
•   Their unique selling point

Identify the answers to these questions, and you can avoid your competitor's mistakes. You can also build your strategies for developing a mobile app based on the answers to these questions and define your take on the issues. This thorough analysis will ensure that your app stands out. 

Browse through the Google Play Store or App Store to see how other similar apps are performing there. Competitor analysis will give you the knowledge and help you avoid mistakes you may make at the initial stage of app development.

2. Identifying user persona

A user persona is the fictional representation of the ideal app user. Establishing a user persona help identify the application features and promote the product when it's ready for the market. This is why it should come with a detailed description, including demographic data, goals, interests, challenges and other characteristics that match the specific user. 

To identify the needs of your audience, define a few personas showing the best recipients of your product.

Knowing about your audience helps determine how your app can solve their issues and help them achieve their goals. Design application functionalities to identify the needs of the user persona and ease the mobile app developer's work.

3. Define your pitch and target audience

Can you explain the purpose of your app to the audience, or can you name how it is different from your website? If not, this is the trickiest step for every marketer. However, defining all your ideas in a few steps is not just the trickiest but one of the core steps to ensure the success of your app. At this stage, you need to define:

•   What is your app's key functionality?
•   Can you define the issues that your app solves?
•   Who are its users?
•   Why would users want to use it?
•   How will your product add value to your viewers?
•   How will the audience benefit from it?

Answers to these questions will ensure that you don't waste resources on unimportant features or target the wrong people.

Also, you should be confident about your elevator pitch and keep it precise and clear with your app's purpose.  

4. Pre-launch buzz

If there's one thing that affects the success of your app, it's how you foresee the market and amplify it, including your PR, pre-launch-efforts branding and overall web presence. However, if you think it's too early to think about marketing before starting your development. A few things to keep in mind before starting the app pre-launch strategy are the following:

•   Define your branding: How your brand will look- its color, logo and the tone you put in the content will set you apart from other apps and businesses. Keep in mind the consistency of all these things across your app and the platforms where your app will exist.
•   Find all the channels: Where does your targeted audience hang out? Can you reach them through social media? What content do they prefer, and how much time do they spend on which device?
•   Create content: Based on the above, you will know your audience's needs and how you can reach them.
•   Do outreaching: What type of people are influencers in your industry? Research about them and educate them about your app to put it in front of their viewers.

5. Choosing the Right Platform

Choosing the right platform for your application can be quite confusing. Also, when settling on the choice among iOS, Native, Windows and Android, don't forget the UI you can deliver to your application. From native development to hybrid development, you can choose the platform per your business needs. 

Choosing a suitable mobile app development company is very important for the success of an app. So, choose the best platform according to the app development market growth. However, if you want to operate your app on specific platforms, you can use native app development.

•   Hybrid app: With multiplatform web technologies like CSS, JavaScript and HTML, hybrid apps are easy to develop and offer fast accessibility. A hybrid app will suit your preferences if you aim at regular usage and interactive and offline compatibility. It delivers the advantages of both native and web development approaches.

•   Native app: Native apps are designed for a single mobile operating system and cannot work on every device. For instance, Android apps are developed through Kotlin or Java, while the objective C or Swift for developers using iPhone or iPad. Also, native apps are ideal for heavy-duty gaming or photo/video apps.

The choice of the app doesn't just influence the developers but also affects the flexibility and scope of the app. The coding that goes into making new mobile app development will decide the adaptability and utility of the app's offering.

6. Choose the monetisation strategy

Now that you have conducted a market analysis and know that your app idea can solve a real problem of the targeted audience, you are sure that they will download the app; it's time to decide on how to make money through it. Look for the app monetisation models like:

•  Paid (premium apps): The users must purchase the app from the app store to use it. With this model, as the cost is associated, you need to demonstrate the unique and superior features as compared to the free apps.

•  In-app purchases: This works by using the app to sell digital or physical products as a mobile commerce sales channel.

•   In-app ads: This is the simplest model because the user has no cost barrier.

•   Sponsorship: This model is possible when you have a solid base as you can partner with specific brands.

7. Know your Resources

You will be able to launch the date ahead to create the hype around the launch, and for this, you need to be aware of the development time frame. And for this reason, you must think of mobile app developers and technical teams as early as possible. This way, you can create your entire project more effectively. Consider these points:

•   Use cases definition
•   Mapping of the required functionalities
•   Programming language/ platform selection
•   Wireframing
•   Programming language
•   Coding
•   App design
•   Testing
•   App analytics

These decisions help in putting a huge impact on your app business and development process. Through an app builder, you don't need to learn iOS development to make an app; the app developer will do everything.

8. Ensure the security measures

Lastly, you must include a privacy policy if your app gathers sensitive information from users. The policy must cover what information is being collected and how it is used. Many developers are more focused on their apps, and security gets neglected. But, it is the most important whenever you start a project. The benefit of taking this step is giving yourself time and implementing safety measures in the app.

Conclusion:

There's no single answer to how to start app development. You need to take the right steps to ensure success in the long run. So, before thinking about new features and updates, focus on how users interact with your app. Once you get into this preparation, you are ready to start the app development process.