Does Your Business Really Need a Mobile App?

Check if you need a mobile app or not

Rimjhim Jain , 28 November, 2020

If you want to create an app for your business then do not hurry up and begin the process.
Instead, you just need to do some research and study why other apps failed and what mistakes they made.
This way, you can avoid making the same mistakes in your process of mobile app development. After all, the process of app development is quite expensive and it would be best to not invest time, efforts, and money.

Ask a question from yourself - Do you need a mobile app? Yes you undoubtedly do, but whether a mobile app or a responsive mobile website can serve your business better.

Though mobile websites and apps are very different mobile mediums but look very similar at face value. Deciding which medium serves your needs best depends on several factors, including target audiences, budget, and intent. This is the reason you should be mobile web optimized before considering an app – unless you are a new-to-market, mobile-only business.

Challenges you may face while building mobile apps

  • Cost of Development
    • If we talk about the cost of development then it will include a website and Apps.

    Apps - An Android app won’t work on iOS, and vice versa. You’ll need to build two separate mobile apps if you want to serve both platforms.
    Apart from the development cost, releasing apps on app store also cost you something -

    • Android App - Google play store costs one time fee
    • IOS App - Apple store costs yearly fee

    Website - Along with the mobile app, if you also need presence on the web (most probably you do), then also consider the cost of -

    • A mobile friendly website
    • Web Hosting charges
    • Admin Panel
    • Web app for clients

  • Cost of marketing

    • Marketing of any app is the biggest challenge you will face in the mobile apps world. Convincing customers to download your app and most importantly retain it, is a tedious task. Let us share some marketing methods and tentative cost -

    • For direct installations -
      • Paid advertising - Google Ads campaigns
      • Facebook advertising campaign
      • For IOS App - Search Ads, which is basically paid advertisements within the App Store. Basically, you’re able to bid for relevant keywords so that when a user is searching for apps using a particular term, your app appears first.
      If you want to increase your app installations and want guaranteed results then it would cost you approx $1 per installation.

    • Other approaches
      • Pitch to Apple’s editorial team to be featured in the App Store
      • Blogging
      • Intro video
      • Newsletter and emailing

  • Cost of Maintenance/Constant maintenance

    • Apps - Mobile apps require regular maintenance and need updates for bug fixes, security issues, to ensure the compatibility with the newly released OS of a different platform,etc. Not providing the updates may result in failure of your app or to be rendered unusable when a customer updates his phone to the new OS.

    Website - If you also have a website then that also needs to be up to date with every new feature, improvements, bug fix. So its maintenance and web-hosting costs will also be added in your budget.

  • App Store Approvals Can Take Time

    • It’s a tedious process and can take a few weeks to secure approval from the App Store.

  • Download Required
    • Use of the app requires that a user download and install it on their device. Some users may not want to install your app on their phones.

Answer these question before moving forward with app development


  • Is there any market for your app, which can give you a healthy return?

  • Will you be able to handle the maintenance and marketing, which comes after developing an app?

  • Can your app offer better performance than existing identical apps on app store?

  • Can it fix the problem your customer may have in a mobile website?

When to go for app development


  • If your app will include features that require access to the mobile device’s native functionality, a mobile app is probably the best option for you.

  • When speed is important, and if your app’s features are ones that could work faster on a native mobile app, then a mobile app may be the best option.

  • If your users need to access the app offline, a mobile app is likely the best option.

This is all about challenges of mobile app development and the steps to validate the need of mobile apps. We hope it will help you make a decision quickly whether to go for mobile app development or a mobile optimized website can work for you in the first launch.

/
blog comments powered by Disqus