How to Build a Mobile App: Your Complete Step-By-Step Guide

The international mobile app market is about $407 billion.

That’s a huge market, but that doesn’t guarantee that your app will be a success. You have to take the right steps and learn how to build a mobile app that has broad appeal and buzz.

How many times have you downloaded an app and uninstalled it a few days later? You don’t want to have that happen to your app. You want it to be used to the point where it’s an indispensable part of someone’s day.

Read on to find out how to build an app and make it successful.

The App Planning Stage

The app always starts with an idea. You may have had a moment of inspiration to build the app. Now is the time to make sure that it’s a viable idea.

You have to start by looking at the market potential of your app. You also want to decide on your target market for the app. There is also competitive research that needs to be done.

Your research and planning should answer a few basic questions:

• How many people will use the app?
• Who are they?
• Why would they use this app over other apps?

One other question that you have to answer is how your app will make money? Apps aren’t inexpensive to develop, and it’s essential to treat your app like a business.

You have to make sure that there is a way to create a profitable business that will support growth. If you’re not sure what that looks like, get inspiration from other successful apps in your category.

Money for Developing the App

You’re going to have to find a way to finance your mobile app. Once you have your planning and research done, you’ll need to write a formal business plan. This document will be used to get financing for your app.

There are a few ways to obtain financing for your app. You can get investors to buy into your vision of the business. You would have to give them partial ownership of the company, but it could end up in your favor. You could negotiate a low ownership stake for the funds.

Another option is to get a loan for your business. There are SBA loans that come with lower interest rates. You may be able to score a bank loan or peer-to-peer loan if your credit is good.

Look at all of your options and weigh the pros and cons before deciding which route to take.

App Development

When you’re ready to develop your app, you have to hire your development team. You need to hire expert developers that can work in several app programming languages.

You’ll all come together and decide which platform you’ll use to develop the app. Companies usually will launch in either Android or iOS. They’ll then expand to the other platform when they establish themselves in the marketplace.

Other companies choose to develop in both platforms and launch at the same time. There’s nothing wrong with this approach, especially since there are more development frameworks that support both platforms.

When you decide your approach, you can then decide on the framework you want to use to develop the app. You should start with the best cross-platform frameworks because you will use both Android and iOS, eventually.

The final piece of the early stages of app development is to set a final delivery date for the app. You also need to create development benchmarks that will guide you through the entire process.

Initial Designs

In the app development stage, it’s essential to keep performance and the user interfaces in mind. Since you have a team working on this, the design and development people are likely working separately.

These teams must work together to create a functional app that people will love. The early development phase will have a prototype. This is something you can put to the test with a small focus group of users.

Notice what buttons they like to use, colors they want, and their overall thoughts of the app. You’ll take these notes and improve the app. You’ll test it again, make more improvements, and test it again.

App Marketing

In the meantime, you need to have a marketing campaign to build awareness about the app. It will take a while to create awareness of the app, which is why it’s best to do it early.

If you wait until the app is launched, your sales could be delayed by 6 months or more.

Beta Testing and Final Launch

The final steps in building an app are to complete one last beta test, knock out any bugs or issues, and then launch it. With the beta test, you release the app to an exclusive set of users.

These can be power users or everyday app users. You want to know how your app functions in the real world. You can see if there are usability issues on specific devices or other unexpected bugs.

Once these are cleared out, you can create a successful launch for the app. The marketing team should have built enough excitement around the app that it gets plenty of downloads from day 1.

How to Build a Mobile App That’s Successful

It’s not easy to build an app and make it successful. In fact, very few apps that aren’t backed by some kind of financing make any money at all.

You want to make sure that your app has every chance to be successful. You have to have an app that’s well-researched and viable. You need to plan out your development to ensure the app launches on time.

That’s the roadmap that shows you how to build a mobile app. How you execute the plan is up to you. Check out this site’s Technology section for more tech tips.