MobileAPPtelligence.com
(http://www.mobileapptelligence.com),
an award winning mobile app development company
provides an overview of few process that one has to follow while
developing a mobile product which helps save money and time.
Be
it a small business owner with great idea or a mobile entrepreneur or
an enterprise mobility customer, they quite often face the question
of how much to pay to build an app.
Answering
on the spot is impossible, which is why we take some time, look into
the client’s history, ask him what his exact needs are and only
then do we offer an accurate diagnosis.
Resources
already exist online that show mobile app entrepreneurs how much
they’re about to spend for the app they have in mind
Generalizing
is tricky and we know it. Nevertheless, here is our take on the
issues of expertise and costs, derived from the experience we’ve
had developing several complex multi-platform mobile products.
Before
we get started, you should know that the perspective of this post is
of a mobile product that is complex. This generally involves a wider
batch:
- Cloud. Apps can rarely survive in the wild on their own, which is why we use Node.js to create unbelievably fast APIs that run on Amazon or Heroku.
- Single Page Application. A companion-responsive web application that is usually developed with Angular.js.
- Mobile Website Design. The mighty presentation website (WordPress-developed) that best describes the product.
Few
process that one has to follow while developing a mobile product
which helps save money and time.
- First step includes : Concept, wireframing and design: A significant amount of time is spent at this stage to understand the problem that needs to be solved. Work is dedicated to improving the business model and defining the proper high-level solution. As an immediate next step, we start creating wireframes, while, at the same time, building design options.
- Design Process : The design process requires as long a timeline as possible, with some cooling-off periods that help get the best out of the creative process.
- Prototype: During the wireframing and design process, prototypes are created on the actual mobile device. The rapid prototyping with Adobe Fireworks technique allows us to refine both navigation and screen flow and obtain an accurate view of how the mobile product will perform at a fraction of the cost.
- Proof of Concept (PoC): The native app (or the web app) now looks and behaves just as the real thing, without the API connection – we are basically developing the front-end of the application. This allows the client to start talking to investors, and to even show the app to potential users. At this stage, it is possible to see how the app feels and behaves, while still being able to make changes at a very low cost.
- Development: Once the PoC phase is complete, we start working on the full-blown implementation of the cloud API and we connect it to the mobile app. This process is SCRUM-organized, which gives flexibility for making changes to the product along the way.
- Quality Assurance. We’ve already talked about this in a previous post. In There is no such thing as bug free software, not even in the Big League, we argued that even big companies like Facebook, Paypal, Microsoft or Google struggle a lot to obtain perfect mobile products. For a small startup, however, things are even more complicated, as there sometimes are no second chances. Getting good quality is imperative, especially when an update process can take as much as two weeks before it reaches the customers (due to the Apple approval process)!
In
Mobilepptelligence
team, we are keen on practicing Continuous Integration and acceptance
testing automation, in order to reduce as much risk as possible.
The
people involved
Developing
a mobile product takes time and hard work. However, none of these is
as hard as getting the right people in the mix. The number of people
involved in a project varies depending on its complexity and its time
frame. So, if we were to sum up a selection of key roles, they would
look like this:
Business
analyst. Helps define the product, the major feature set, the
long-term roadmap, the product backlog, the business model.
Product
owner. This is usually the client.
Designers.
They create the wireframes, the design, the UX and prototypes.
Architect.
Defines the high-level technical solution and the choice for the best
technology stack.
Developers.
At least one for each technology, but not necessarily all at the same
time. This means a minimum of 5-6 people: 1 x API, 1 x each native
app platform, 1 x web app, and 1 x website.
Scrum
master/ product owner assistant. Helps elicit requirements from
the product owner and facilitates all processes until completion.
QA.
Writes test plans, does the testing, the automated acceptance testing
(usually with Cucumber).
This
means that at least 10-11 people are needed for taking a complex
mobile product from idea to market. Each of them has a different
level of involvement, at a different moment in time.
The
client decides how much the mobile app costs.
There’s
no short definite answer for estimating costs. An app can be built on
a freelance site for a few thousand dollars and even less; at the
same time, ambitious plans require big budgets of hundreds of
thousands. It all depends on the project scope.
But
how exactly can there be such variance?
Let’s
look at what all can go into an app:
It
could be any or all or combinations of these : API plugin, Data
Visualization, Point/Reward System, Geo-tagging, Live Chat, Media
Stream, Paid Subscription, Review/Rating, Search, Social Networking,
User Profiles, Navigation/Mapping, Login, Payment Processing, Sync
Across Devices, Admin Site
Then
there comes developer’s experience levels and location (android App
Developers and iPhone app developers)
Having
seen the breakdown of activities, the profiles of those needed to
contribute to the realization of a mobile product and the variances
brought by app features, developer skill levels and location, the
client needs to prioritize and at times compromise on what they would
like to launch.
But
if we still have to hazard a guess:
If
you are launching a prototype or hobby project – Spend between
$5000 -25000
If
you are an enterprise product that integrates with at least one
system and addresses 5+ use cases & has dashboards and report –
Spend between $50000 – $100000
If
you are an immersive game with heavy UI, interactions and a
sophisticated payments, rewards systems and animations – Spend
upwards of $50000 – $250,000+
To
conclude, here are some highlights on what the client should keep in
mind while evaluating cost:
Commit
to the project! You probably won’t build the next Twitter, Facebook
or Evernote with just a tiny bit of cash. Starting small and “just
trying out things” can prove more expensive than you’ve thought.
Experiment,
build things in chunks, validate your knowledge, apply the Lean
Startup principles!
Take
one step at a time: find out who your audience is (iOS, Android) and
start by building each platform slowly. It will be cheaper to make
changes along the way.
Better
design, speed, scalability require exponential effort. You can have
great design/UX in a few days or weeks, but to make that twice as
good it might take 10 times the effort and cost.
Keep
your expectations realistic! It will be pretty hard to build
something better than Google (or any other Internet giant), when they
have thousands of engineers involved and you only work with 1-2
developers.
MobileAPPtelligence.com
(http://www.mobileapptelligence.com),
an award winning android app development company. We deliver custom
android apps, android games including the latest features like NFC.
We also place dedicated android developers (android application
developers) at offshore for worldwide clients.
To
get a project quote, please fill following form and send it back to
us.
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