Ways To Build A Successful Branded Application

By Author: Yancy Marry
Total Articles: 184
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Most enterprises today, especially the big and medium sized businesses, want to deploy a mobile application that is customized to promote their company’s brand. Unfortunately, not many enterprises know what features and functionalities are to be included in a mobile application for it to successfully promote the business brand. Here we discuss the steps that software developers must follow for building an effective branded mobile application:

Do not treat the app as the business’s marketing campaign – If you want to build a software to make a business brand more visible, advertising networks are a better option as opposed to mobile apps. Therefore, developers should not include information about the company in the app content; they should rather concentrate on providing features which will serve the mobile needs of the target customers and explain how to use those features in the content. It is to be remembered that the contemporary mobile audience is informed and aware and will therefore avoid downloading an app if it tries to sell the enterprise brand too much.

The app should not be the replica of the company’s ...
... website – In an attempt to promote the enterprise brand, most developers tend to include all the features of a company’s website in the app. But that is not what a branded mobile application is supposed to be, say mobile market analysts. More than 75 percent of the mobile audience has been reported as saying that a branded app is one which will enable them to learn about an enterprise more quickly and more elaborately than can be achieved from a website. The bottomline is that features that work well on the web do not function as efficiently on mobile devices; generally websites have more complex features when compared with apps. So, developers should include only a defined set of functionalities in branded apps.

The focus should remain on the target customer – Since branded apps will be successful only if they satisfy the expectations of the target customers, developers should thoroughly research the mobile usage patterns of a company’s user base before designing a branded mobile application. Therefore, a branded mobile app should be user centric.

Do not compromise on utility – In a survey conducted towards the end of last year, more than 75 percent of the respondents said that they prefer using branded mobile apps which perform functions that match their mobile needs and expectations. Therefore, it will not be wrong to say that utility is the chief ingredient of a successful branded mobile app. But developers also have to remember that the utility of each branded app has to be unique. For example, developers can introduce an app function through which users can order products without having to wait in long queues. A prominent example of a branded mobile application that has successfully been able to introduce utility is the Starbucks app which allows users to order their coffees just by tapping a few keys on their mobile devices.

It is to be remembered that branded mobile apps must be designed following the above steps since bad experiences after use of a branded software will force the user to avoid downloading all other mobile apps launched by the same brand. One unsuccessful branded app affects a developer’s future application building efforts as well.

The author is associated with a well known enterprise application development companies in India. The mobility consultant has a team of experinced enterprise application developer has providing mobile healthcare solutions to the clients.