This post will focus on the following topics.
- 1. Unpolished UI
- 2. Not Testing Across Devices
- 3. Not having a Clear Roadmap
- 4. Adding Too Many Features
- 5. Not Optimizing Performance
- 6. Not Creating an MVP
- 7. Inaccurate Budgeting
- 8. Working with the Wrong Team
Mobile applications have risen significantly. As data costs around the world decrease and more and more people access the internet through mobile devices, having just a website is not the norm.
Today, a business needs a lot more than a website and web app to succeed. Any business that is looking to serve its customers better and get ahead of the competition needs to have a mobile app.
Mobile apps can be installed on mobile devices, and you can make them platform-specific or native. They leverage multiple technologies and provide an easy way to users to connect and get their work done.
There are more than 2.9 million mobile apps on the Google Play Store alone, and more than 4.75 million apps are available on the Apple app store. These numbers are humongous, and it is hardly the case that your app will have something unique.
If you are building a business app, you have high competition on these platforms, and the best way to win is to avoid mistakes.
Repeating the same mistakes as others will always give you the same mediocre results as others. So, in this article, we will discuss eight deadly mobile app development mistakes you should avoid.
Once you have avoided these mistakes, you will quickly achieve your objectives for the app. Let's get started.
1. Unpolished UI
Developing mobile applications is different from web apps. Here, a user will only download and use your app if the UI is good. Many other apps do the same thing as your app, and if you don't have a good UI, you can easily lose.
Before starting app development, you should understand the target audience, their preferences, and many other things to create a design that belongs to them. If a user does not like your app's UI, and it is buggy, they won't suggest it to anyone.
Create minimal yet extremely useful UI for your app by putting in ample time in User experience research and understanding requirements. The better the UI, the more people will use it, and it is only going to be better for your business.
Have how-to videos about the app's UI, and give proper navigation routes so that users can find their way through the app naturally. You should never design a UI that seems like a maze and gives users different confusing options; instead, help them to reach their targets easily, and you'll be rewarded with more active and loyal users.
2. Not Testing Across Devices
When you are creating mobile apps for android, you have to focus on a more significant number of devices, and that should not scare you. Mobile phones come in a wide variety. There are different screen sizes, processors, screen types, and other components that change the app's performance across devices.
Before making the app public or showing it to potential users, you should complete your app’s testing across various platforms, screen sizes, and processors to ensure that your app is perfectly functional.
Not testing across devices is the biggest reason why mobile apps fail to provide a seamless experience. The testing teams suppose that everyone has the same specifications and rely on the results from only a few devices, which is wrong. When the app is publicly available, it will be used by all kinds of users, so extensive testing is needed.
You can find out many things about the app and its performance by testing and noting down the various results. This data and finding can then be used to create effective strategies that eliminate as many issues from the app as possible. Testing the app's backend APIs and services is also equally important.
You can have an entirely bug-free frontend, but if the backend is not that effective, there is no meaning, as users cannot have the best experience. Moreover, apps that are not tested thoroughly may hinder your growth by making the user experience awful, which can result in a drop in customer base.
3. Not having a Clear Roadmap
Every failed product is a result of insufficient planning and an unclear roadmap. If you are looking to build successful mobile apps, having a roadmap is important.
A roadmap is the end-to-end encyclopedia of your mobile app development project. It starts with explaining the app idea, how it should work, the target audience, etc.
Roadmaps include important information on which technology will be used, which features will be developed when they will be developed, who will develop them, the entire project plan, and even future improvements with deadlines.
An efficient mobile app development roadmap can be developed only when there is enough research and understanding of the idea. Without proper communication of the idea, the development team and product managers cannot create effective product roadmaps, and it will ultimately lead to a substandard mobile app.
4. Adding Too Many Features
From a business perspective, everyone loves to add as many features as possible to make their apps the only app their audience needs. But that is a deadly mistake that most companies make. In the pursuit of adding many different features to the app, businesses end up with no one excellent module that drives customers toward them.
Providing features in the mobile app is good, but that should not come at the dire cost of other features. You should make the choice of which features you should include and which features are just gimmicks.
No application needs all the features, and it is best to leave certain things to other apps or websites that are excellent at doing something. If you follow this closely, you’ll build meaningful apps, and your users will not be bombarded with so many useless features.
5. Not Optimizing Performance
Having an app with awful performance does not make users happy. No one wants to wait for 10s of seconds before your inventory loads on the mobile app, and that is why you should continually optimize for performance.
Businesses that optimize for performance often beat the ones that don’t, and that makes them earn more and grow rapidly. You should use multiple backend servers of high capacity that can process user requests instantaneously.
Moreover, all graphics on the app should be cached in CDNs around the globe so that it decreases load times for users whenever they request any page. The better your performance, the easy it is for customers to fall in love with your app.
6. Not Creating an MVP
MVPs provide a significant idea of how the app will look once it is done fully. It helps stakeholders decide whether the solution is worth investing time and money in, or whether it will fail.
Every mobile app development idea looks incredible on paper and in meetings, but the reality is only experienced when you can use it in real life. That is why having an MVP is important.
Many business owners are too sure about their app development idea and skip the MVP creation part. They think they are building the app faster and getting a lead, but in reality, they are just releasing a prototype to their actual audience.
This can have awful results for the business, as users can quickly move away from the app.
7. Inaccurate Budgeting
Every mobile app development project needs budgeting. No matter how much money you have in your accounts, you cannot use it all behind the development of one application. That is why it is necessary to budget. Inaccurate budgeting keeps you haunting for cost overrides, and it can restrict the team from trying out important things.
Before a mobile app development project starts, creating an accurate budget is important. It will save significant time, money, and energy at the later stages of project execution. You should consider different stages of app development and the costs involved with them.
8. Working with the Wrong Team
A mistake t
That you can make very frequently is choosing to work with the wrong team. This happens when you choose offshore teams and other such engagements where you don’t have direct control over the resources.
You can have an excellent app idea, but it may not come out as expected because you made the mistake of working with the wrong team. Such mistakes cost time and money and leave traumatic experiences to you and your customers.
It can be a tedious and lengthy process to develop an app. Developers will make mistakes along the way that could hinder the app's success. Bad development practices include a lack of understanding of users, too many stakeholders, and neglecting user retention rates.
There are many other mistakes that you can make, but those may not be as deadly as the ones we discussed above. Make sure to avoid these mistakes, and your app will surely beat competitors.
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