Developing an application that works smoothly and flawlessly is, of course, important for the project's success, but everything starts with the foundations, with an effective mobile app development strategy. Starting a new project without a solid strategy is like building a house without a robust foundation; it will collapse at some point. What will you gain with such an approach rather than wasting money and time? And if you think that the most challenging part of the project is coding, you may be surprised to learn that project planning and strategy are the most critical, resource-intensive, and time-consuming stages.
Is it worth investing in a mobile app development strategy? Is it worth paying high bills to develop a strategy? What are the crucial steps to be included in mobile app development? There are dozens more questions to discuss, so let’s take it slow and explore the key steps to crafting an effective mobile app development strategy that drives app success.
8-Step mobile app development strategy
A mobile app strategy is a comprehensive plan or approach devised by a business to gather the project's design, development, marketing, and management teams around one idea and goal and guide them in a predefined direction. It involves making strategic decisions and setting clear goals and objectives to ensure the app's success. A well-defined mobile app strategy considers various factors, such as target audience, market research, development approach, resource allocation, testing, marketing, and long-term sustainability. Instead of acting intuitively or adopting competitors’ strategies, you start by designing a strategy tailored to your needs and the needs of your product users.
Before jumping into building a strategy, take a pre-strategy step and fill in the following questionnaire:
- What is your company’s mission?
- What is your vision?
- What are the objectives and the mobile app development strategy’s outcome?
- What is the project scope?
- What is your competitive advantage?
Conduct market research
Thorough market research is an initial and crucial step in developing an effective mobile app strategy. It helps you gain valuable insights into user needs, preferences, market trends, and competitors, enabling you to make informed decisions throughout the app development process. It includes multiple steps to gather information for the next steps.
Identify the target audience: Define your target audience based on demographics, behavior patterns, and specific user segments.
Analyze user needs: The best practice is to conduct surveys, interviews, or focus groups to understand the pain points, challenges, and desires of your target audience.
Study competitors: Knowing your competitors is always a good idea, but copying their strategies, approaches, or products is not a very good start for your project. All you need to do at this step is analyze the strengths and weaknesses of your competitors' apps.
Analyze market trends: Stay updated with the industry's latest trends, emerging technologies, and user behavior patterns.
Seek feedback: Conduct product pivoting to gather feedback from a focus group.
Explore the app store: An analysis session of the app store data and reviews will help you gain insights into user feedback, feature requests, and competitor performance.
Consider localized research: If you targeting specific regions or countries, conduct localized research to understand cultural nuances, language preferences, and market dynamics that may impact your app's success.
Define Goals and Objectives:
Clear goals and objectives are the foundation of a successful mobile app development strategy. These goals should be aligned with the overall business objectives and can be focused on increasing revenue, improving user engagement, or expanding the user base. Setting specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound goals will ensure a focused and achievable strategy. This step will also bring all the stakeholders together around the project's purpose, guide the research process, and allow for measurable outcomes.
Choose the right development approach
One of the core processes of mobile app development strategy is deciding on the right development approach. This step requires the maximum involvement of product owners and developers, who will dive deep into the technical aspects of the project.
The development approach determines how the app will be built and what technologies will be used. Here are some considerations to focus on:
Target audience and platform preferences: Understanding the target audience will help determine which platforms they primarily use and decide whether to develop a native app or opt for a cross-platform or hybrid approach.
Market trends and platform popularity: Staying updated with market trends and platform popularity will help you align your development approach with user expectations.
Development time and cost: Consider the project's timeline and budget constraints. The tech stack and platform will determine the development time and costs.
Scalability and future growth: Consider the apps' long-term scalability and growth potential when deciding on the tech stack. If you anticipate expanding to multiple platforms or adding new features, a cross-platform or hybrid approach may provide more flexibility.
Build a development team
The project's success and mobile app functionality depends solely on the development team's expertise. Here are some key considerations when building a development team:
Determine roles and skills: Identify the specific roles and skill sets required for your mobile app project. This typically includes developers, designers, quality assurance testers, project managers, and potentially other specialists based on the app's complexity.
Hire experienced professionals: Seek experienced professionals with a proven track record in mobile app development.
Foster collaboration and communication: Build a culture of collaboration and open communication. Team members should be able to work together seamlessly, share ideas, and provide feedback.
Consider outsourcing: If you lack in-house resources or expertise, consider outsourcing mobile app development to agencies and external development teams.
Create a development roadmap
Next, consider building a development roadmap as a blueprint that outlines the following steps:
Define phases: Divide the app development process into distinct phases, based on logical progressions: ideation and concept development, UI/UX design, development, testing, deployment, and iterations.
Set milestones: Identify milestones within each phase and for each team to track progress and ensure timely completion.
Outline and prioritize tasks: Break down each phase into specific tasks for teams.
Estimate timeframes: Assign timeframes to each task based on complexity, dependencies, and available resources.
Identify dependencies: Identify any dependencies between tasks or phases.
Allocate resources: Assign the appropriate resources, including developers, designers, testers, and project managers, to each task.
Communicate and collaborate: Share the development roadmap with the entire team and stakeholders.
Decide on budgeting and resource allocation
At this point, you can already start determining the budget available for the app's development. Consider factors such as MVP development costs, design and marketing, ongoing maintenance, and potential contingencies. It's essential to have a realistic budget that aligns with your goals and objectives.
Prioritize features: Identify the features for the initial release of your mobile app. Thus, you will be able to allocate resources effectively for the MVP and iterations.
Consider outsourcing: Delegating certain aspects of mobile app development or the project entirely to an offshore agency can be a cost-effective option. It allows you to tap into specialized expertise while controlling expenses.
Test and iterate
Even if your team is sure of the product's quality, it is critical to test the functionality and each component of the mobile app. In the agile model, every feature passes testing before the final testing, so when the application is ready to be launched, it is tested and fixed countless times.
Once the application is available on the market, the team starts working on the next iteration, delivering new features and fixing existing ones based on early adopters’ feedback.
Market and launch the app
This may be the most time-consuming step of your strategy or even a separate strategy that deserves a new discussion. As general information, launching and marketing the app will involve the following steps:
- The App Store listing optimization
- App website or landing page
- App Store paid advertising
- User feedback and reviews
- Measuring Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Conclusion
An effective mobile app development strategy is the initial point to start with the project. You cannot be sure of your idea’s success unless you have a plan on how to execute your idea through a detailed strategy that includes:
- Market research
- Goals and objectives
- App tech stack and features
- The right development team
- Development roadmap
- Resource allocation
- Continuous updates
- Marketing and result measuring
Approaching strategy development seriously is your number one job. Every step you take is essential to the project's success.
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