Considerations for Building an App: A Startup’s Guide

“You have an awesome idea!”, says everyone around you, and you tend to agree. Look, we all have awesome ideas every now and again. In fact, there are over five million ideas (that someone considered awesome) combined in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. Having a good idea isn’t that groundbreaking anymore, it’s how you set your app up for success that really matters. There’s a lot of considerations for building an app, and our guide for startups will walk you through the most important aspects.

How to know if your good idea is desired by the masses

Do your research! You need to know how many times people search for an app like the one you have imagined. Use the internet to see how frequently searches are being performed using buzz words related to the problem your app will solve. Visit social media groups and study online forums on Reddit to see how many people are discussing the problem. As we all know, if there is a problem that needs to be solved, the internet is where people are complaining about it. Use this data to gauge the size of the demand and determine if it is an ongoing demand. After all, apps can’t be a one-and-done type of app to be successful. Apps need droves of people to keep coming back for more.

Be honest with yourself.

Is your idea really that good? Very rarely do people close to you want to be dream killers, so maybe the company you keep is just being nice and telling you that your app idea is genius. Maybe it isn’t. Maybe your app idea is horrible.

Determining all of this in the beginning and compiling a list of considerations for building an app saves a lot of headaches along the development way. To help you take stock of your idea, you need to know how many similar apps are already available. And, if you move forward, you need to improve upon them in a hugely noticeable way. Think of yourself as an unbiased consumer while doing this. When you use the current apps, think of what can be improved up. Utilize your consumer experience to push ideas further.

Think twice about ads

Advertising might seem like the easiest way to make a quick app buck but ads are becoming more and more of a deterrent. Luckily, there are a significant number of methods to monetize apps apart from advertising. Depending on what kind of app you are producing, these methods might turn out to be more lucrative anyway. Consider subscriptions, upgrades, and sponsorship opportunities as alternatives to the classic advertising approach.

Work with people who specialize in application marketing

Not all marketing is created equal. A person or a company that markets your business might not be the right person to market your app. They could be, but they might not be. Marketing can very quickly turn into a budget eater, so having the right person or team in place at the beginning is an invaluable asset.

Planning and creating an app can be very exciting. It should be exciting. It is exciting. Just make sure you are prepared and your awesome idea may really end up as an awesome app.