I HAVE AN IDEA FOR AN APP, BUT I DON’T KNOW WHERE TO START
Coming up with an app idea is easy, figuring out what to do next is the hard part.
By the end of this story, you’ll have priorities you need to handle if your app idea is ready to go. Each one requires a lot of time and energy, but if you can knock them out of the park, you’ll be well on your way to starting the app business of your dreams.
How to Develop an App Idea
If you successfully passed through the stage of discussing your idea for an app with trusted people and got their appraisals, and if you think it is the right time for you to start doing something exciting, then get ready and patient: developing an app idea is not an easy and fast process.
Step 1: Do the research!
When you want to visit an unknown country, you read tour guides, talk to friends. When you want to eat out in an unknown city, you look for the best option on review websites or apps, talk to locals, etc. If you want to buy a new laptop, you read articles in trusted media and watch YouTube videos. Any time you want to do to buy something new, you do the research first.
The same goes for developing your app. Treat your app idea as a serious business project. You might get very excited and emotional about your concept but remember that the app business is very competitive. There might be tens or even hundreds of similar apps fighting for users all over the world.
Just imagine: As of the second quarter of 2019, there were 2.46 million apps available on Android, and 1.96 million apps on the App Store. Those are the two biggest stores, don’t forget about the smaller ones.
When conducting your market research, ask yourself the right questions:
- What kind of app do I want to create?
- How will my app benefit the user?
- Who is my target audience? Are they men or women? Are they adults or children? What devices do they use, and how often?
- Are there similar apps out there? If so, how many? How big/successful are they? In what app stores are they present?
- How will my app be different from competitors? What features will my app include that other apps don’t?
- What are the pros and cons of my app idea?
- How can I make money off my app? Do I show ads? Do I offer in-app purchases? Do I sell data to third parties?
These are just a few of the primary questions required to find the answers to if you want to develop your app.
Once you’ve answered these questions, and then some, then you can move on to the next phase of your app development strategy.
Step 2: Create a Business Concept
Based on your findings during the research phase, take the time to craft a meaningful business concept/app monetization strategy.
It’s crucial that you write these things down instead of just keeping them all in your head. Staying organized during this phase is essential to how you carry out your plan.
Your business project should consist of several blocks:
- The app – the main idea, advantages for the user, pros and cons, features
- Your users – analysis of your target audience
- Market and your competitors – apps you will be competing against
- Monetization strategy – how to make money from an app idea
- Marketing – how you are going to promote your app
Step 3: Find Investors/Business Partners
Let’s face it.
Unless you already have millions of dollars at your disposal, you’ll never be able to create an app on your own.
You require investment capital to get your app off the ground and downloaded onto millions of potential users’ phones.
The most successful app creators didn’t get to where they are now on their own. They had investors and partners.
If you’re on the hunt for a quality business partner, consider choosing one who has similar goals but has qualities you lack.
For instance, if you’re a creative spirit or “idea man” who lacks business intelligence, choose a partner who is all about the benjamins, baby!
Step 4: Hire an Application Development A-Team
Congratulations if you are a developer and can do it on your own with a couple of friends-developers. But if you know nothing about coding, you will need to find an agency or some freelancers to do the job.
Based on your research (Step 1) you will know where you will publish your app – Android, or iOS, or both.
The best kind of help you can find is through professional software development companies. They have the resources that you need to develop your app quickly, efficiently, and affordably.
Step 5: Prepare for the launch and create a marketing roadmap
While developers are coding, you should focus on your app launch and some business development tasks.
Think about the branding
When launching an app, you most likely will not think about building a big brand. Nevertheless, you need to invest time and money in creating your app’s icon and developing the brand style to be consistent with all your visual materials across communication channels.
Learn about ASO
Think about an efficient app listing before launch, and not when you see that you have too few downloads.
ASO (app store optimization) helps you to get a lot of organic downloads – meaning with no money spent on advertising. But it’s not easy if you know nothing about it. So do your research and learn how to:
- Do keyword research
- Find relevant keywords
- Create the right app name
- Design the icon
- Write good descriptions, subheadings
- Design converting screenshots
- Track keywords over time
- Improve your app listing with app A/B testing
Prepare for the launch
How do you want to make the world know that the new app is released? Is the announcement on Product Hunt enough? Or you want all the national media talking about you? (I highly doubt it but who knows).
Publish your app at the app stores and keep up the good work
You might think that publishing your app is the final step, but it is, in fact, only the beginning of a cool adventure.
You need to constantly update your app, introduce new features, provide feedback to users, fix the bugs, promote the app, implement activities to improve retention rate, grow the user base, and of course – you need to make money with it. So, exploring new monetization opportunities while keeping good engagement and retention rates will keep you busy.
You must get out of your own way.
Oftentimes, business owners struggle with self-confidence, and their business suffers for it. Don’t let this happen to you.
The most challenging part of app development is to get going initially, but after you get rolling, you must keep rolling.
Don’t get discouraged if something goes wrong. Don’t quit at the first sign of trouble. If you really want to develop a successful app, then you must remain vigilant.
Theodore Roosevelt once said, “nothing in this world worth having comes easy.”
This speaks true for everything, especially app development. Think about the most successful apps on the market. You have Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Tok-tok, Uber, and the list goes on and on.
Do you think it was easy for any of these companies to get to where they are today? No, we think not.
That’s why you must make the right business decisions and stay focused.
Hiring a trusted mobile app development partner will allow you to plan your market strategy and forget about the technicalities. The right partner will guide you and work tirelessly to breathe life into your idea.
In the current digital climate, there are three app development imperatives: adaptability, scalability, and viability.
At Perpetuum Code, we tap into these qualities by allocating the time to properly curate ideas and develop incrementally using a feedback-driven roadmap.
It’s not that difficult to get started. The question that you must ask yourself is, “do I want to get started, or do I want my app to remain just an idea?”
Well, if you decide to pursue your dreams, then give Perpetuum Code a call. We are highly experienced and dedicated app developers who are eager to hear your story and see how we can help.
