The success factors for business-specific apps are the same as those that are targeted towards the general audience and consumers, even though myths surrounding the contrary to the above claim are commonplace. Failure and success factors for mobile apps have the same traits in all categories of apps. Therefore, if you have a majority of these key elements in your app it has a better possibility of becoming a winner.
Here are the top critical success factors for mobile apps that every developer should know about.
Keeping the app simple and easy to use
Simplicity in apps is beneficial in more than one way. A simple app makes a user spend more time than apps that makes it harder to find ways and navigate. If a user finds your app to be difficult in navigation, they will quickly delete the app and find another app that fulfills the purpose they need. Users show very little patience when it comes to a clumsy app which can’t show them what they want easily. Thus, simplicity goes a long way in gaining customer trust.
Friendly Mobile Experience
Mobile users can be categorized as individuals and professionals. Therefore, the developers of mobile applications are therefore largely responsible for offering smooth and uncomplicated services to their app users.
It is common for the apps that are simple and straightforward, to gain the user popularity soon. We, humans, have a tendency to get attracted to things that provide us great comfort, the same goes for mobile applications as well. Apps with a fast and responsive access are likely to gain user acceptance quickly. The sole purpose of app development should always focus towards building apps with an interface that is easy to use as well as understood by the common man.
Ensuring fast loading time
Being impatient is human nature, thus an app that takes a long time to load is already a failure. Any ideal enterprise app should ideally not take more time than 15 seconds to load. A loading time of 16-20 seconds, however, is still manageable.
The CPU and RAM capacity of your mobile phone play a critical role in the determination of the app loading time. This is the reason why the same app may not take the same time to load on different devices. All the same, you must make sure that your app loads as fast as possible.
Size and Position matters
Larger screen sizes are a double-edged sword for mobile app designers. While there is more room to place stuff, there is remaining space to put the unnecessary stuff. It is necessary to keep in mind the position and the size of the buttons and controls. When designing for task concordance, part of the design should consider the ease of operation from a hand-friendly perspective.
Ergo, the need to consider most common platforms (screen size), thumb positions, hand size of the most common users etc.
Examine the task
Some businesses just want to convert their web functionality into mobile, bringing the same functions and content to mobile. This doesn’t work. It is important that the functions and content on the mobile platform are optimized specifically for that platform. Examine the top tasks that users will perform and the list them by their frequency and importance.
Split the list into important and not important tasks and make the most frequent and important tasks easiest to execute. The ‘easiness’ of execution should be left to the developer.
Users can make mistakes
For an app to be useful, it must be understood that users can and will make mistakes. In that context, it needs to prevent errors, as well as make users aware in an appropriate manner when an error has been made. Error prevention can be done in many ways – like context-sensitive assistance and utilization of context-sensitive defaults in order to prevent typing mistakes.
The app should also have an emergency exit button so that users can go backward and escape out of function/task. The app should prevent future errors by teaching and instruct the correct manner to avert mistakes.
Performance
This factor is the backbone of application development. Developers must ensure that the app and all its functionality are working flawlessly before they are actually out in the market. Efficient and successful apps should function as they are expected to, regardless of the device they are being operated on. Apps with a unique and powerful functionality, are sure to make their position in the App Store and stand out among the thousands of others in the mobile application market.
Off-line Capabilities
A number of times, it may happen that the internet is out of our reach. Therefore, many app users may prefer the app to possess the proficiency to perform even when disconnected from the internet. Therefore, an app working without wireless becomes much more resourceful. It also ensures user loyalty and their continued usage.
Integration with Social Media
This is one factor that is significant to make the app self-sustaining and profitable. Integration with social media, lets the app users recommend and share new app activities on various social networking sites. Wondering how will this help? This can help more and more people (like the app users’ friends and acquaintances) know about the app and raise their curiosity levels. Thereby, social sharing can help increase the app visibility and gain acceptance among people that would not have been otherwise possible.
Value
Every app should provide a unique value via the services it offers. Value addition can be in the form of both entertainment and information. An app should have some real qualities that make its users look for the same, despite the availability of similar options in the market. The app should feel satisfied every time they use it.
Agility
The application should be agile enough to open right away. The app speed should be fast enough to negate any unnecessary delays. The app should have seamless transitions between its pages. Also, ensure that the app doesn’t have any impractical additions to occupy unnecessary memory in your phone.
Design
Although I am talking about this factor at the last it is one of the most important ones to consider especially in case of mobile app development. An app should be designed in such a manner to look sophisticated and exclusive. That will surely influence the potential users to give it a try, despite what its ratings or reviews are. When it comes to layout, the app must be modern with high-definition graphics.
Therefore, these are a few factors that largely influence the success of mobile applications. The success quotient is determined by how well we can optimize the factors mentioned above, and how well they can intertwine to achieve the final goal. Thus, it eventually lies in the hands of the developers to make their mobile apps exclusionary and user-friendly through solid development measures.
