Smartphones are gaining enormous popularity among individuals and businesses worldwide. The world has become so dependent on smartphones that it is difficult to imagine a life without these handheld devices.
According to Statista, global smartphone mobile network subscriptions will likely surpass 7.7 billion by 2028. With the growing reliability of smartphones, businesses are leveraging the power of mobile apps to strengthen their omnichannel business strategies, offer more value to their customers, and increase their client base. Sensor Tower Store Intelligence Data reveals that global consumer expenditures on premium apps, in-app purchases, and subscriptions will likely hit $233 billion on Google Play and Apple’s App Store by 2026.
Hence, the demand for custom software development services is soaring substantially.
In today's blog, we will shed light on why you should prefer custom mobile applications over off-the-shelf software.
What is Custom Mobile App Development?
Custom mobile application development involves building custom or bespoke mobile applications to cater to the specific needs of businesses. These bespoke mobile apps, developed by custom mobile app development companies, offer all the features and functionalities that generic or ready-made apps cannot.
Nowadays, businesses of all sizes rely on custom app development services to maximise their reach and gain a competitive edge in their respective markets.
Why Choose Custom Mobile Apps?
There are countless off-the-shelf hybrid and non-custom mobile apps available in the market at a reasonable price to cater to the needs of businesses. Despite the affordability of generic apps, they may not offer certain sophisticated features you are looking for. Moreover, they may not be efficient enough to perform seamlessly across platforms. This is where custom mobile apps come into play. These customised apps suit your business requirements in every way.
Businesses across industries are increasingly embracing custom software development services to enhance user convenience and maximise profits. For instance, while retail business apps enable retailers to provide comprehensive details about their products virtually, e-learning apps enable students and educators to connect virtually, besides offering online study materials to add to their convenience.
Likewise, food and hospitality apps have emerged as the easiest means of ordering food from the restaurant of your choice.
Benefits of Mobile Application Development
Nowadays, businesses across sectors count on custom app development services to enhance productivity and stay ahead of the pack. Custom mobile apps offer businesses with a host of benefits.
- Boosts Efficiency: Custom mobile apps are developed keeping your specific business needs in mind. These feature-rich apps developed by custom mobile app developers perform multiple functions, thus eliminating the need for multiple applications.
- Boosts Productivity: Custom mobile apps are comprehensive applications designed to meet your business needs. These apps play a crucial role in boosting your team's productivity and the ROI of your business.
- Additional Security: Generic businesses may fail to offer the level of security that your business needs. Such apps generally lack advanced security features, which can put your data at considerable risk. Custom mobile applications, on the contrary, give you the power to incorporate the security features of your choice and keep potential threats at bay. Furthermore, customised mobile applications are compatible with various operating systems and APIs.
- In-app Extensibility: Generic apps can handle only a few resources at a time. This limitation makes them unsuitable for expanding businesses. As the business grows, regular apps may struggle with expanding data loads. In contrast, custom mobile apps are highly scalable, which enables them to handle huge volumes of data.
- Easy to Maintain: Customised mobile applications are easy to maintain. Unlike regular apps, bespoke mobile apps developed by custom mobile app builders provide you with complete control over the maintenance process. These apps are designed to serve specific business requirements, with a special focus on the intricacies associated with third-party involvement.
- Ensures Seamless Workflow: Bespoke mobile applications are designed to seamlessly align with your existing business software solutions. This attribute facilitates smooth integration and immaculate functionality.
- Streamlines Project Management: Custom mobile applications simplify your work by synchronising your phone with your PC, thus facilitating easy access to important documents and emails on the go.
- Reinforces Customer Relationship: With a custom mobile app, you can send personalised push notifications about your business offerings to your customers' devices in real time. You can also grab their attention with in-app promotions, special offers, discounts, and gift vouchers, or by hosting live chat sessions to interact with them on a more personal level. Moreover, a thoughtfully designed custom app offers a seamless user experience, which in turn helps build customer loyalty crucial aspect for the long-term success of businesses.
- Helps Build a Strong Brand Identity: With a custom mobile app, you can send personalised push notifications about your offerings to your customers' devices in real time. You can also grab their attention via in-app promotions special offers, discounts, and gift vouchers, or by hosting live chat sessions to interact with them on a more personal level. Moreover, a thoughtfully designed custom app offers a seamless user experience, which helps build customer loyalty–a crucial aspect for the long-term success of businesses.
- Enhances Brand Visibility: A majority of consumers prefer spending a considerable time on their phones. Thus, building a custom mobile app with your brand's logo and tagline can increase your brand's visibility, besides attracting their attention. Moreover, regular alerts and push notifications sent through custom mobile apps keep your customers engaged.
- Works on Both iOS and Android Operating Systems: Custom mobile app development companies, with their expertise in diverse platforms, offer comprehensive and responsive mobile apps that work seamlessly across all internet-enabled devices. This versatility reduces frustrations and prevents user churn. Simultaneously, it eliminates the need to invest in new backend systems.
These benefits make custom mobile app development a better choice for business owners who aim to serve clients in the best possible way.
Regardless of your industry, a custom-built app has the power to significantly enhance user experience through an outstanding personalised interface, specially designed to cater to their unique preferences.
Custom Mobile App Development: Things to Keep in Mind
A study conducted by Gartner in 2018 revealed that less than 0.01% of consumer mobile applications achieve financial success. Furthermore, most custom mobile apps get abandoned after their first use. Therefore, to make your app successful in the long run, you must plan ahead wisely before creating it. Think about what users need and strategise accordingly to meet those demands effectively.
To make sure your custom mobile app stands out in the competitive app market, adhere to the guidelines given below:
- Ideation: The first step is to come up with a unique idea and conduct adequate research to ensure its feasibility. Secondly, find out if the idea will help resolve customer pain points or improve user experience. Also, focus on every aspect that will make your app stand out.
- Understand Your Target Customers: After brainstorming your ideas, focus on the needs of your target customers. Identifying target customers and their needs will help you build an app that resonates with a specific group of people. For example, Blinkit focuses on instant delivery of grocery items to households in just eight minutes. Shopify, on the other hand, is a user-friendly app that helps small businesses manage their e-commerce business from mobile devices.
- Chalk out a Surefire Business Strategy: After identifying your target audience, build a results-driven strategy focused on customer satisfaction and revenue generation.
- Tech Specifications: This step involves defining the technical specifications to enable custom app developers to comprehend your objectives and deliver the application as per your requirements.
- Set up a Budget: It is crucial to create a budget for custom app development. Start by assessing your finances to ensure you can afford both development and maintenance costs. Simultaneously, find out if your existing in-house team is capable enough to handle the app or if you have to hire additional resources with the right expertise. This careful assessment will help you decide if a custom mobile app is a practical investment for your business.
- Choose an experienced custom mobile app builder: Before finalising a custom mobile app development company, make sure you evaluate its credibility to ensure you get the best services. Make sure you check the portfolio of the shortlisted companies to ensure they have the relevant experience in developing the type of app you desire. Simultaneously, do a bit of online research to determine the reliability of the company/companies shortlisted by you. Also, check online ratings and read online customer reviews to make sure the company has a good reputation. Last but not least, after picking the best custom app development company, you must sign a contract with the service provider to avoid future disputes. The contract must outline all your requirements, and contract duration, including technical specifications, and deadlines.
- **Test the custom mobile app: **Make sure you test the newly developed app on various operating systems before launching it officially. You may also consider hiring a third-party testing company for conducting the test.
- Seek Feedback from Users: It is essential to seek feedback from users soon after launching the app. This is essential for spotting any technical glitches, big or small, and making necessary improvements. User feedback serves as a powerful tool for understanding your target audience's preferences. By prioritising user experience throughout the development process, you can ensure your custom mobile app delivers real value to your valued customers.
Habilelabs–Your One-Stop Destination for Custom Software Development Services
Though custom mobile application development is a time-consuming process, hiring a custom mobile app development company like Habilelabs can help you streamline the entire development cycle.
At Habilelabs, we have a highly experienced in-house team of mobile app developers and designers proficient in developing native, hybrid, and cross-platform mobile applications for businesses.
Our custom mobile app development services have helped numerous businesses mitigate costs while driving their overall growth. Our proactive domain experts offer flawless custom app development services only after understanding the needs of your target audiences. We help you create scalable and efficient apps, aligned with your business objectives, in record time so that you can gain a competitive edge in the market.
If you are looking for trusted custom mobile application development services, your search ends here!
Partner with us and watch your business reach new heights with our game-changing custom mobile applications.