Building a mobile app for your business can be time consuming and costly. There’s a lot to it. Trying to manage it yourself if you don’t have much experience can be overwhelming. However, there are a lot of paid services that can help you accomplish your goal of building a mobile app for your business.
The specific cost and timeline for building a mobile app heavily depend on the complexity of your business and the functions/features that you want to see on the app. If your app needs high-level security or new, innovative features that no one else has, you can expect to see a significant increase in cost and work hours because it will be a lot more work.
Building a mobile app for your business can be a worthwhile investment. People today spend hours looking at their phones. It is one of the most convenient ways to reach a targeted audience. So, it’s smart to take advantage of this avenue of communication. But, you have to do it right. Rushing the process just to get out an app that’s sloppy or buggy is not going to do you any favors.
If you try to be as cheap or as fast as possible and ignore quality, the time and money that you did invest will be a total waste if your audience doesn’t like the app you built. Take the time to do it well and invest in a good product.
From an Idea to an App
The time that it takes to build an app does not start with the programming. It starts all the way back at ideation. You need to start with an idea that either serves an underserved market or differentiates itself in some way from the competition. You have to do something totally new or do something old in a totally different way.
Once you’ve found a niche market to serve, you have to do research on that market to see what will succeed. What do they want? What are they not getting from your competitors? How can you meet that need? If you utilize a data-driven marketing strategy, use that information to help you understand how you can meet your audience’s needs.
After you’ve performed sufficient market research, you can move onto the blueprint phase. The concepts that you bring to the table during the blueprint phase should reflect the information that you discovered during the market research phase. This is where you bring in ideas for features that your market is interested in.
At this point, you want to work with experts that can help you execute your ideas. An app developer will help you put your ideas on paper so that you can see what your app will look like. This is called “wireframing.” It helps you create a cohesive design and organize your thoughts. You will work from this concept during the actual development.
Now you can finally start to develop your mobile app. Pick your development team wisely. This is where the majority of your financial investment comes it, so make sure that it is worthwhile. Find a team that has experience working with apps in your industry and get an estimate for your timeline.
Once you have a working app, you can start doing beta testing. Hire people from your target audience to give your app a try. They can tell you what they like and don’t like. Use this information to make changes before the app is released to everyone.
Even after you’ve made a successful launch, remember that you will continually have to patch and update your app to keep up with competitors, protect users, and implement new technology.
All in all, you can expect to invest 4-6 months on app development up to launch1. However, this is not a hard and fast rule. Sometimes people create basic apps in a matter of weeks, while others take years to perfect it. The features that you want, the responses you get from your beta testing, and the time you spend fine-tuning the app before releasing it will all affect your timeline.
Cost
The cost of your app depends on a few different variables. The amount of time you have to create the app, the features and functions of your app, and the complexity of your business. Your budget will also affect how much time you can spend on fine-tuning and beta testing. The bigger your budget, the more time you can spend perfecting your app.
The cost of building an app includes not just the programming, but also updates, salary, marketing, legal fees, and more. These numbers add up quickly. Your cost also depends on the level of expertise of your team. There’s a big difference in price between an offshore team and the team working on, say, the Facebook app. You will have to pay for quality.
Overall, the average app can cost anywhere between $140,000 to $210,000 to produce. The cost does not end there. There are marketing costs, maintenance costs, and costs to make the app available for download. Google Play stores charge $25 a year and Apple charges $99 a year to sell your app in their stores.
Remember these ongoing costs when you create the budget for your app. Budget in a cushion as well to cover any unexpected or overlooked costs.
Conclusion
Building an app is not easy, and it’s constant work even after it is built. In order to thrive, you need to work with experts in app development. You need to do a lot of research into what your audience wants or needs from your app. The process is expensive and time-consuming. If you think you have a great idea for an app, take time to consider the amount of work you will have to put in.
This guest post comes from JGBilling, a medical billing Chicago company.
