The widely popular mantra, “Choose two among good, fast, and cheap, not all three”, shows how quality, development speed, and cost oppose each other. Mobile app developers are often required to sacrifice one of them, and mostly they must choose either quality or favourable cost.
However, now this popular saying can be contradicted with a balanced approach. Given all the priority, quality can sometimes be achieved at a lower cost. App developers can optimise factors relating to development speed, app performance and cost by using the right methods and tools and adhering to the best practices.
How can an app project deliver excellent quality while not breaking the bank? How can it find the right balance between cost and quality?
Let’s find out.
Make a Meticulous Plan Following Well-grounded Research
Before diving into the development process, the first step is to identify your target audience for the app.
Who is likely to be the end-users of the app?
You need to identify the audience demographic accurately; for this, you need to conduct market research online and offline. The market research should consider several aspects like age, location, income, gender, digital preferences and lifestyle.
Following audience research, you have to review the competition. Start by evaluating their app features and the market challenges they face. What is your competition offering, and in what sense can you bring uniqueness to the users?
The app budget should also be discussed early to prevent unplanned expenses. On top of that, you need to document the entire development process along with the very plan itself.
Last but not least, it is also important to make a timeline for each development phase and the final deadline for the project. This will give you more control over workflows and reduce app development costs.
Partner with the Right Development Firm
Choosing the right app development company can significantly affect the mobile app’s quality. As experience goes, the success of any app project largely depends on the expertise and excellence of the development team.
Now when it comes to finding and selecting the right development partner, you have a wealth of app developers literally for hire for every different skill. You can go for mobile development startups, freelancers, or renowned software development companies.
Since there are so many choices, often entrusting your project to the right people becomes difficult. Instead of discovering hiring principles, know from the experience of other projects.
On a gross level, consider evaluating industry expertise, similar project experience, project management skills, and track record and portfolio.
Lastly, look for a development team that thoroughly understands your business domain.
Build an MVP App
It goes without saying that when developing an app with limited financial resources, you need careful planning and intelligent decision-making. In such cost-constrained situations, starting with a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is always wise. MVP is a minimalist version of the final app, offering only the elementary features that are necessary for the app’s core value proposition.
When you embrace the MVP development approach, you can launch the app quickly and prevent many unsubstantiated decisions. You launch with the key functions and start receiving feedback from users, and then you can validate the idea, many features and overall user experience. Accordingly, you can plan additions and alterations for the app.
When the MVP is tested and released, you can be open to suggestions and plan to invest further in enhancing the app user experience by including additional features. This incremental and iterative development approach helps increase the return on investment, besides helping to improve the app over time continuously.
Select the Tech Stack Wisely
Deciding on the technology stack for any app project is a critical step. It is a fundamental aspect of ensuring the success of an app project. Several key considerations exist for selecting the tech stack for an app project. Here we briefly mention a few of them.
- Client-side and server-side technologies, tools, and frameworks
- Risk management
- Automating development tasks wherever possible
- Improving productivity
- Adhering to best development practices
- Optimum utilisation of resources
- Adhering to budget constraints and timelines
Use Ready-to-use Templates
Ready-to-use design templates are often looked upon as a way to reduce app development costs by sacrificing quality. But building an app from the ground up may only sometimes guarantee top-notch quality, and sometimes even by using existing templates, you can develop an engaging app.
Although custom app development is always a better option for ensuring scalability and business-specific adjustments, a project with cost constraints can always go for a templating approach with manageable customizations.
Besides lowering the cost, ready-to-use templates also help secure faster time to market in a competitive landscape, which is extremely important.
Ending Notes
When you are hell-bent on avoiding hefty development costs for your mobile app project, reducing the coding load and avoiding custom architecture are always advisable. Using component-based development frameworks and libraries can reduce costs without compromising quality. On the other hand, a highly committed development team managing the project can give safeguards from drawbacks caused by budget constraints.
When developing a native app, the golden rule to strike the right balance is to keep the interface simple and equipped with only the necessary features. When you need a functional app that does its job well, you can do it without shooting all over the place.
A cost-effective mobile app development often focuses more on resource utilisation than rallying too many resources behind the project.