There are over 5.7 million apps on the App Store and Google Play. But not all apps have the quality and performance we look for.
Do you know that only 0.5% of apps are successful? A study shows that 9999 out of 10,000 apps fail for some reason.It is not that the businesses behind these apps did not have the vision for a better product or service. Similarly, the app development company they hired would also have done their work dedicatedly.
But somewhere, they missed something that led to the downfall. It may be that they failed to create the:
- Unique designs
- User-friendly interface
- Easy-to-use features
- Seamless third-party integrations
- Security Protocols
The problem had been in the app development process, including tech stack, frameworks, frontend, and backend development.
Whatever the issues are, as a business, you must ensure that your mobile app is a success. For this, you should ensure your mobile app development goes smoothly as planned.
Having a checklist of mobile app development best practices helps. It assists you to keep track of your custom mobile app development progress.
Here you will know about each factor that plays a crucial role in mobile app development. Let’s take a look at the top 15 mobile app development best practices.
Top 15 Mobile App Development Best Practices
1. Conduct your research
The first thing you need to do to build a successful app is research. By research, I mean market and target audience research.
- Start by analyzing your industry and market potential.
- Explore the current mobile app development trends.
- Find your competitors.
- See what they are doing and offering.
- Minutely analyze their app and services.
- Find the market gap created by your competitors.
- Use this market gap to create an irresistible app with unique offerings.
- You also need to define your target audience.
- Research their preferences, behavior, likes, and dislikes.
Use all these data strategically to build your app.
If you don’t conduct in-depth market and audience research before building the app, you will end up with an app with no use. Our mobile app development best practices checklist recommends detailed market, competitor, and audience research for your app.
2. Choose your app development method
Not all apps are similar. Likewise, not all apps are built in the same way. The development method you choose depends on the:
- Type of app
- Services you are offering
- Niche/industry
- Business goals and vision
- Target audience
There are three types of app development methods – native, hybrid and web based.
For example, if you want to build a game app, you should go with the native app development method. Native apps are great for a flawless user experience.
But these are expensive to build. Also, you can build native apps for one platform at a time.If you want to launch your app on both Google Play and App Store, then the hybrid approach will be better.
If you are confused about which one to choose, discuss your project with us and we will build an app that is robust, secure, and scalable by employing the development method that best suits your app.
3. Identify Your USP
Mobile app development best practices prioritize leveraging the power of USP.
USP in business stands for Unique Selling Point. You did good research and came up with an exceptional app idea. However, you might be offering the same services as hundreds of others.
So, what makes you stand out from them?
Why Should customers prefer your app?
Here are a few tips that will help you identify your USP and attract users.
- Dig deeper into your niche and competitors.
- Review their app strategy
- Buy their services and experience what they are offering.
- Then make a list of their strengths and weaknesses.
- Make their weak points your strengths.
- The same service offerings, minus the weak points, make you better than your competitors.
4. Focus on app security
NetWeb Technologies prioritizes app security standards as one of the most important mobile app development best practices.
App security might be at the end of your list right now. But as the app development progresses you will understand how its crucial it is to protect your app.
Based on the app you are developing you will collect user data like:
- Email address
- Mobile number
- Postal address
- Payment information
- Credit/Debit card details
Moreover, your app will also have important business data. So, it’s your responsibility to protect your as well as your users’ data.
If for some reason you miss out on app security and your app is hacked, it will damage your brand image. Users will hesitate to install your app and use it.Here are a few ways you can ensure your app security.
- Heavily encrypt your app
- Invest in source code, file level and database encryption
- Incorporate data encryption like SQLite
- Use SSL or a VPN tunnel whenever possible
- Always use the latest cryptography technologies like AES with 512-bit encryption, 256-bit encryption, and SHA-256 for hashing.
Perform thorough quality assurance and security checks on your mobile app
5. Focus on user experience
Next on our list of mobile app development best practices is the user experience. 55% of users prefer an app for its convenience. Further, 48 likes apps that are fast, and 28% use apps due to their seamless user experience.
Let’s get one thing clear. You are developing the app for your users. So, you need to focus on what your customers want. You should build an app that caters to your users’ preferences.
That is why you need to understand your users:
- Pain points
- Preferences
- Behaviour
- Weakness
- Motivation
Only then you will know how to design your app that users like to use.
Commonly it all comes down to:
- Convenience
- Speed
- User experience
Users will prefer an app that is easy to use, simple and yet attractive and fun.
6. App Testing
Will you use a buggy app?
To ensure that your app functions as you intended, conduct thorough quality testing on all levels.
Mobile app development best practices for testing consists of three steps:
Functional testing
This is to ensure that the app is functioning smoothly.
It involves testing:
- Business flows
- User interface
- Cross platform functions
Performance testing
It is also called nonfunctional testing as it tests the nonfunctional part of the app like:
- Security
- Accessibility
- Uptime
- Programming interface
Manual testing
Manual testing includes checking how the app will function in real environments and conditions. It includes testing:
- Network conditions
- Testing app behaviour on interruptions like calls, notifications and msg
- App performance in background and foreground
7. Set App Design Guidelines
Your design guidelines should be rooted in your brand and tailored to your specific use cases, aiming to cultivate a positive and distinctive user experience.
Here are some fundamental mobile app development best practices for designing:
Minimize Cognitive Load: Streamline the user’s interaction with your app, minimizing the mental effort required. Unless your app is intentionally challenging like Sudoku or Wordle, prioritize ease of use and a clutter-free design. Present just the essential information on each screen and simplify user input.
User Empowerment: Grant users a sense of control over their experience. Employ recognizable interactive elements and standard navigation components, ensuring a seamless transition from other apps they are accustomed to.
Sequential Task Design: Organize app tasks into smaller, manageable segments. Craft task flows in a step-by-step manner, making even complex undertakings feel achievable.
Task Offloading: Identify opportunities to lessen user involvement whenever feasible. Seek out areas in your app that demand user input and explore alternate methods to accomplish these tasks, such as autofill or data import from other applications.
Proactive Problem Solving: Foresee potential user journey challenges within your app and proactively address them. Plan ahead to meet your user’s needs before they arise.
8. Build a strong core
Mobile app development best practices list is incomplete without discussing the app core. You should focus on building a robust core right from the beginning of app development.
Before you start developing an app, list features, functions, and third-party integrations you want in your app.Then make a list of the most important features that are essential for your app’s functioning. These will be used for your core coding.
Other features and functions can be added at a later stage as well as plugins. Using plugins makes your app lighter and runs faster on mobile. This elevates the user experience and simplifies your app maintenance process.
9. Ask for feedback
Collecting feedback is crucial for the comprehensive development of your app. Certainly, you will receive feedback from beta testers, yet there’s an opportunity to take this a step further.
Extend your outreach to fellow developers within your network for valuable insights and guidance. After dedicating significant time to a project, assessing your progress with complete impartiality becomes challenging.
You might overlook something glaringly obvious that a fellow developer would readily spot. Incorporating an external perspective is invaluable. Other developers can assist in identifying nuances that might elude a beta tester or an average user.
10. Follow App Store Development Guidelines
One of the few things you may miss in the mobile app development best practices list is the app store guidelines. Undoubtedly you will launch your app on either Google Play or App Store or both.
So, to ensure your app doesn’t get rejected at the last moment, go through their rules and guidelines in detail. Even if you plan to launch your app on one platform, acquaint yourself with the rules of both platforms.
It is because, eventually, you will want to launch the platform across all platforms. So, we will recommend you go through the guidelines and follow them religiously in your app development.
11. Make your app accessible
App accessibility is often ignored regarding mobile app development best practices. You should make your app accessible to all users, including those with special abilities.
For this, ensure to include app features like:
- Voice assistance
- Captions
- Text enlarge
And other features that may help those people.
12. App Personalization
Users prefer personalized services and products more. In today’s world, personalization is the key to business success. You can consider including AI models in your app to offer personalized services to your users.
AI models smartly analyze data like user preferences, order history, product catalog, and other details. You can use these insights to decode hidden trends and user behavior.
This will help you plan personalized offers, recommendations, and services for every end user. Therefore, elevating your user experience, upgrading your services, and creating a strong brand presence in the market.
13. Consider Analytics
Ensuring seamless post-development app analysis is one of the essential mobile app development best practices. As previously discussed, planning for tools that facilitate user behavior monitoring is crucial. However, it’s equally important to consider broader analytics.
Analytics play a pivotal role in enhancing your app and optimizing its performance. However, this consideration should be integrated into the development phase. By doing so, you set the stage for effortless integration of these plugins at a later point.
14. Emphasize third-party integrations
Third-party integration is one of the mobile app development best practices that you should adopt without fail.
Incorporating third-party services can significantly enhance your digital app, increasing user retention and improving overall user experience.
Consider Google Maps as an example. Beyond its basic function of finding optimal routes, third-party integrations such as Uber enable features like estimating ride costs and directly booking an Uber ride from within the app.
This not only amplifies utility but also bolsters your app’s credibility. By weaving in third-party services already in common use, you create a sense of familiarity for you as a user.
Nevertheless, it’s prudent to strike a balance and avoid excessive complexity when integrating third-party elements. Implementation can consume substantial time and resources. Hence, it’s advisable to select services judiciously.
Thorough research is essential to ensure that the majority of users will derive value from the third-party integration, warranting the investment
15. Update your mobile app based on user feedback
Frequently incorporating customer feedback into your mobile app updates can significantly enhance the user experience.
Here are effective mobile app development best practices to gain valuable insights into user interactions with your app:
Review App Store Comments:
The review section of app stores is a prime source of user feedback. Users often share their opinions and ratings and sometimes even highlight issues they encounter. This feedback can shed light on areas for improvement.
Solicit Feedback Directly:
Reach out to users through emails, in-app messages, or even personal calls to gather their thoughts and opinions about your product. This direct approach can provide deeper insights into user preferences and pain points.
Leverage Mobile App Analytics Platforms:
Utilize tools like Mixpanel to analyze the customer journey within your app. This platform enables you to understand user behavior, prioritize crucial aspects, make informed decisions, and better prepare for upcoming updates using data-driven insights.
By integrating these strategies into your mobile app development process, you can harness user feedback to continuously refine and optimize the user experience, resulting in a more successful and user-friendly application.
Conclusion
The above mobile app development best practices list is your ultimate checklist to build a successful app.
Custom app development requires winning development strategy and business planning. With the mobile app development best practices outlined above in mind, you can curate a strategy that can help you build an app that outshines your competitors.
Need help in mobile app development?
Get on a call with our experts. We assist businesses right from app ideation, market research, app development, deployment, and marketing. We are here to expedite your mobile app development and make it a success.
