Do you want to create an application for your company? Well, know that you came to the right place!
Monitora is a digital solutions company founded in 2010, fully Brazilian and with international impact specialized in helping businesses become digital through methodology, processes and software.
Since our job is to help you get your app off the drawing board, we’ve separated some basic guidelines for those who want to start this project.
Why do I need an application? If you own your own business, chances are you have already realized that having an app is more than necessary.
In today’s digital age, it is basically impossible to consolidate yourself in the market without offering services, spreading the word, and communicating virtually in a direct and immediate way with customers (and potential customers!).
By starting to build this relationship, your company is one step closer to building customer loyalty through the convenience and comfort offered by your business.
With this in mind, we have put together an article that will guide you through this digital insertion within your company’s segment. During the reading, you will discover 5 necessary items when creating an application for your service, how to maintain it, and how Monitora can help you!
What is needed to create an app for the company?
To begin with, you need to keep in mind that to make the app happen, you need to be willing to invest. The money invested will go toward the professionals and resources needed to build the app.
Without capital and, consequently, without hiring good professionals, the app will not go forward. But don’t worry, we will talk about this later! Read on and find out 5 items that cannot be missing in your business app.
1. Know the client and the market
Before starting the process of creating a company app, you need to know in depth the needs of your business’ audience and plot your goals from there. Once you know who your target audience is and what their demands are, you can develop a service that focuses on addressing their specific needs.
When starting a project, it is necessary to be clear who the specific target audience is, even though this may change as the application progresses. The ideal is to remain aligned with the original primer of the project idealization, to have a greater focus and direction of what – and who – you want to reach.
What is the profile of this public? Age, the area they work in, interests, social class, and so on. The study of the public and its trends helps not only to plan the best strategies in the making of the application, but also gives the possibility to foresee future problems and prepare to overcome them.
In addition, it is just as important to study the market in which your application/service will be inserted. What is already being done? A thorough analysis of the competition allows you to understand not only customer demand, but to realize the deficiencies and highlights of service providers similar to yours.
By knowing and understanding them, you and your team have the elements to build an application that will not only meet the customer’s desires, but also stand out from the competition.
From this look at the market research, you can already think of a model to be followed, which should be as detailed as possible. Start confabulating which services will be available, the layout of the platform, and even the buttons are items to be thought about and included.
2. Define your goal
One of the most basic steps during the process of creating an app for your company is to be very clear about your goal. Once you have outlined the main goal of the application, the rest of the work is all guided and permeated from this, because with a specific and clear objective, the functions are guided.
Now that you have analyzed the profile of the customer and the market, you can understand what is missing in the market, and seek to develop in your service precisely the features that fill these gaps.
In this way, you will be creating your differential. The main function of any app – and what keeps it in use – is to offer a solution that has not yet been proposed, after all, what is the point of creating an app like all the others in the same segment?
This is nothing more than establishing a very clear notion of what the utility of your application is. Note that having a utility does not necessarily guarantee a differential. It is important to note that even if your application has a clear and relevant function, it needs to bring something that shows that it is not only useful, but unique.
This reasoning is directly linked to the idea of innovation needed at the base of your project. Tip: it is interesting to bet on a new market. In a segment still little explored, it is easier to observe and develop points in that area that give you a differential.
One of our customers, the Agricultural Cooperative Coopercitrus, is one of these companies attentive to innovations and found in Monitora the technological arm to offer new technologies to its members and ensure more productivity in the field. Our biggest goal is to generate business value, so we understand the strategic objectives and focus on generating results through IT.
Keep in mind that differentiation goes hand in hand with usefulness. What will set your app apart from the others is what useful service it can provide to the intended audience that the others have not yet been able to provide.
Aesthetics, as we will explain later, is a fundamental feature in the adhesion and permanence of a clientele, however, what will sustain you in the market is the level of usefulness of your service.
What is the point of having a well-made design without content and functionality to offer? If this happens, your app will be seen as misleading advertising and will not sustain itself.
3. Integration and structure
Integrated access to the app is key, and to ensure this, your company’s app needs to be compatible and available across different devices and systems.
Adaptation to different screens (the famous “multi-screen app”) is also an important feature, giving your app flexibility. This dynamism is very useful in expanding the app’s popularity, since the more adaptable it is, the more devices and more potential customers come into contact with your services.
It is important to be aware of the variations and peculiarities between the two major operating systems: Android and iOS. The first, more popular, has more limitations in functions, while the second is more advanced, but promotes restrictions on certain apps.
By planning an integrated application – that is, one that is suitable for different systems – we create what we call a hybrid application. This denomination designates a mix between the native app and the Web App, where the developer builds the hybrid app using the same code for iOS and Android.
With this type of development, the productivity of your company’s app is optimized, however it becomes more difficult to measure the possibility of errors. Once this method is put into practice, the developer needs to rewrite some of the native code to make the app available for the other platform. Besides the improved productivity capability, this option automates processes and delivers the best product to the customer.
Attention
Although this tip can be applied to your company’s app, it is worth pointing out that each project brings different characteristics and needs, and it’s up to you and your team to assess what is the best thing to do.
We brought the example of Android vs iOS because they are the biggest references when it comes to operating systems, however, in some cases, after studying your target audience, the team may conclude that they only use one of the systems, for example.
In these cases, there is not such a crucial need to perform the integration we explain here. The important thing is to analyze the project’s viability for the company, and to serve a final product that meets 100% of the client’s demands.
In this context of optimizing the development and the whole creation process, it is worth highlighting the concept of framework: it is a development model to be followed, which already has several functions that save the developers’ work.
This is because with the framework, codes that have already been tested and had their effectiveness analyzed are reused, making it possible to save time in software development.
Thus, the use of the framework for company apps contributes to a number of factors, among which are cost reduction, production time savings, reduction of implementation errors, and code standardization for all developers, making it more readable.
It also makes possible a greater concentration on the applications being made, avoiding the lack of consistency in some parts of the project.
Because it increases practicality and productivity, the framework is becoming increasingly popular when it comes to developing applications. Thus, there are several templates that can be used to solve different languages, with members that create and test various functions.
4. Hire good professionals
It is important to rely on specialized professionals to get the app off the ground. First of all, check your hiring options to be able to proceed with the process.
If you don’t have an IT team, it is fundamental to start thinking about it. Both the so-called back end, that works on the infrastructure part of the app, as well as the front end, that implements the visual part.
Programmers, UX/UI designers, information architects, data analysts are some of the indispensable professionals to make the app run.
These are just some examples of the professionals needed to build your app. That’s where Monitora can help you. Our company takes care of the entire technology development process – service design, requirements engineering, software design, implementation, quality control, deployment and maintenance – to help you stay focused on your business strategies.
A skilled workforce prevents your application from having basic errors and guarantees you an expert service. Did you know that the work of a designer, for example, prevents many customers from uninstalling your app? A bad interface and “dirty” layout, with too much information, leads most people to give up using an application, or not even install it.
Design is still closely related to the app’s ability to communicate with the customer. Intuitive layouts and interfaces facilitate access, assimilation, and fluidity in the use of the application, thus improving your company’s communication with customers.
A distant interface that promotes little interaction will not help you. Tip: a “welcome!” message when opening the application is one way to minimize this distance and prevent your company from losing a customer because of cold communication.
If customer service is important in the real world, it is no different in the digital arena. It is quite possible that you will give up on a purchase or a service if the salesperson/service provider is rude or has terrible communication when addressing you. So why shouldn’t the same logic apply in virtual dynamics?
Thus, one can see that the activity performed by the designer impacts on fundamental aspects, including your client’s permanence in using your app. This is because an attractive, clean and intuitive design is a great ally for the communication of your service with the client. In addition, your app should have a concise and direct language.
Before we get to these aspects, there is a professional whose work will be fundamental in this aspect of your app and will entail several steps ahead: the information architect. Having an even more initial role, he will be responsible for gathering the client’s demands and putting together the whole idea even before the app is created.
Important aspects in creating the app
In this phase of app creation, there are 4 existing layers to be assembled by the architect, they are:
- Organization system: It establishes the grouping flow and content categorization.
- Navigation system: This is the layer in which your end user’s passage is designed so that the experience is the best possible.
- Search system: Every application needs a search system. This is where the customer can search for an answer to specific questions or a set of common or expected questions. Later, with more time, this field can include “frequently asked questions”, aiming to solve possible questions from users in a more comprehensive way. Tip: it is good to have a database to help you in these moments.
- Labeling system: Name your business! In this step, you must establish the titles of each category within the app, such as tab names, images, pages, among others. Tip: Always consult with your customer. No one can give more useful feedback about a service than the person who uses it!
We also recommend an investment in marketing and promotion of your app. It is always good to remember that good marketing and good external communication (campaigns, publicity, etc.) are directly linked to knowing your target audience.
With a team focused on understanding and capturing what the customer needs, your engagement tactics tend to take off. Tip: invest in promoting your app on social networks.
To ensure a very high standard of delivery, we prioritize the presence of the best professionals in our teams and invest permanently in training and qualification. Thus, we can offer extremely specialized and competent teams in the best technologies.
5. Project review
Finally, the revision of the project is fundamental to establish comparisons between its objectives before starting its use. As with any kind of work, a final and/or periodic review brings benefits and improvements over the initial raw material.
The inspection and final adjustments should be programmed in your planning to be done periodically, aiming to keep it always updated and aligned with the demands (the initial ones and the new ones that come up) of your users.
This step aims to adapt the app for a better reception. Research and listen to your audience before and after using your app. As we saw before, by doing research beforehand, the team understands what needs to be done and which application should follow.
Research after the use of the app makes it possible to review what went right and what went wrong in the strategies. Adding new items, removing others, are the result of a necessary analysis for the project to maintain the level and quality of its idealization added to the improvements that only experience can promote.
Is it clearer now what steps should guide your journey to launching an application? To facilitate the viability of applications for your company, check out Monitora’s work in depth.
