Mobile Project Management Redefined: User-Centric, AI-Enhanced, ROI-Focused

Building an app presents incredible opportunities, and that’s not just for tech disruptors. You can sell your product, grow your business, delight and engage customers, and even transform your customers’ experience. It's all possible with the right app development partner. But finding that partner means asking the right questions at the forefront—questions like the following.   Questions on Developer Capabilities Before diving into the specifics of your project, it’s crucial to understand the overall capabilities and expertise of your potential app development partner. The following questions will help you gauge these critical aspects. What technologies do you use and why? This question helps you understand how the development company thinks. Worry less about the specific technology they use and more about whether the development company can clearly articulate their reason for using it and the benefits to you and your product. Unless you are already a technology pro, choose a partner based on their expertise. Let them use tools they know to get great results. Have you done anything similar to what I’m asking you to do? You don’t need an exact match or even a company that has developed a similar app. Still, your potential development partner should be able to draw parallels to their relevant work. Shared connection points, whether on the industry, product, or technical level, will increase the likelihood of your project’s success. What are the riskiest parts of my project? Asking your app development partner this question will give you insight into your project and its areas of expertise. To know whether it’s worth continuing down the development path, consider risks early on to develop a plan. The riskiest parts are those that will likely make or break the product. How do you approach integrating AI and other emerging technologies into app development? This question helps you understand the development company’s experience with AI and other emerging technologies and their commitment to staying current in these rapidly evolving fields. A competent partner should be able to explain their approach to integrating new technologies. Look for a partner who can articulate the potential benefits and challenges of implementing AI and other new technologies in your project. They should demonstrate a balanced approach that leverages innovation while ensuring practical, user-focused solutions.   Questions on Digital Product Strategy & Design A great app is more than just code—it’s a solution to a problem or a means to achieve a business goal. These questions will help you understand how your potential partner approaches the strategic aspects of app development. How do you approach digital product strategy and planning? A strong app development partner should have a clear process for supporting digital product strategy. This process might include market research, user persona development, and competitive analysis. Understanding their approach will help you gauge how thoroughly they consider your app’s broader context. What is your UI/UX design strategy? Look for a development partner who integrates UI/UX design throughout the entire app development process, not just as an afterthought. A competent partner will explain how their UI/UX process helps transform your ideas into user experiences that are both functional and visually appealing. How do you ensure that the app’s design aligns with user needs and business goals? An effective app development partner should systematically align design with user needs and business goals. They should conduct in-depth discussions to understand your product vision and objectives. Ask about their methods for gathering user insights, such as interviews, surveys, or usability testing. A strong partner will incorporate user feedback throughout the development process. How do you handle post-launch strategy and ongoing improvements? App development doesn’t end at launch. Ask about their approach to gathering user feedback, analyzing app performance, and planning for future updates and feature additions. A good partner will have a clear strategy for maintaining and evolving the app over time. How do you ensure long-term relevance and competitiveness? With technology evolving rapidly, it’s important to understand how a potential partner stays current and evaluates new technologies for inclusion in their digital product strategies. Look for a partner who demonstrates a thoughtful, strategic approach to technology adoption, rather than simply chasing the latest trends. They should be able to provide examples of how they’ve successfully incorporated new technologies into past projects to drive long-term value and competitiveness.   Questions on Process & Communication The success of your project often hinges on smooth collaboration and clear communication. These questions will help you understand how the development team operates and how they’ll keep you informed and involved throughout the process. Do you outsource or offshore any part of your development process? Most app development projects loosely break into several stages: discovery, design, development and testing, and deployment. Some companies choose to outsource one or more parts of this process. Seek to understand how the company will work with outside contractors, if at all. Offshoring may offer reduced hourly rates, but consider other factors. Offshoring typically requires extra project management effort. Cultural differences can introduce risk to the project. Less cohesion and familiarity among team members can increase the total time required. Do these trade-offs decrease the price? Who will be my main point of contact once the project kicks off? Multiple people will probably be involved in building your app, but you don’t want to have to navigate who the right contact is for what. There are also times when it’s more efficient to go right to the source when discussing technical or design challenges. Make sure you can talk with developers and designers as needed, but that there is a project manager keeping tabs on your project—and who is your first point of contact for any needs. How will we communicate during the app development process? Numerous ways to interact remotely include phone calls, video conferences, screen sharing, and collaborative online workspaces. The best app development partners take advantage of all these options, creating a virtual environment that’s as interactive and productive as in-person collaboration. Ideally, your app development partner provides seamless interaction, whether you are working through complex issues or getting answers to quick questions. Electronic communication is equally essential for project management and knowledge capture. Many developers use tools such as GitHub, ZenHub, Asana, Slack, Microsoft Teams, or others to track project progress and facilitate team communication. These tools help ensure the project stays on track and team members remain aligned, regardless of their physical location. You might already have such a tool in place, and your potential app development partner should be on board with using it or integrating it with their existing systems to streamline project management and communication. Look for a partner with a proven track record of successful collaboration who can clearly articulate their approach to maintaining strong communication in a distributed work environment. How will I receive status updates, and how often? The answer to this question should consider your personal preference. You want to ensure the frequency of status updates is compatible with your desire to receive them. As noted above, there are numerous ways for you to stay connected, and your chosen app development partner should be willing to adapt to your needs. How involved will I be in the project? When do I get to provide input? Big reveals make for good television on home renovation shows, but it’s not how you want to receive your product. It’s best to monitor your software throughout the project’s life, so you can make course corrections as needed. The best app development shops work with agile methodologies, simultaneously building and testing small code sections. Expect to interact with the app early in the process and as your developer adds each piece of functionality. Furthermore, you are likely the subject matter expert for your product, and your partner ought to rely on you for knowledge of your industry and customer. Your feedback, including help with testing the app during development, ensures that the best product is delivered. What if my priorities or scope change during the project? Successful software projects are rarely defined completely and then built to that definition. You want a software development partner who can adapt to your needs. Ideally, your developer will provide you with a central point of contact throughout the project and expect things to shift while allowing flexibility to meet your changing priorities and timelines.   Questions on Financials & Legalities Understanding your project’s financial and legal aspects is crucial for avoiding surprises and ensuring a smooth development process. These questions will help clarify your app’s cost structure and ownership details of your digital product. How much will my project cost? You want to be able to plan your time and budget for the length of the project. Ensure your development partner provides a written estimate so you can expressly agree on the expectations. Beyond the total cost, it’s essential to understand the pricing structure. The most common options are an hourly rate or a fixed cost, plus maintenance and support. Hourly Rates: With hourly pricing, the developer charges a rate for each hour worked and tracks the amount of time spent on your project. In the proposal, the development company estimates how many hours they believe the project will take but will charge you for every hour worked, whether that total time is below or above the approximation. Fixed Cost: In a fixed-price project, the developer will provide you with the project’s total cost and (hopefully) stick with that number. When work above and beyond the original scope is necessary, the developer should tell you how much extra work will cost before moving ahead. Maintenance & Support: Ongoing work after the app launches is almost always required to acquire new users and keep current users engaged. This type of work ranges from bug fixes (there will always be bugs!) to testing updated operating system releases and adding new functionality to the app. It’s worth understanding upfront how your partner would recommend structuring a maintenance and support program and the associated fee structure. Who will own the app? As the customer, you should own the finished product. Find the Right App Developer for Your Project For the success of your project, take the time to find the right developer—one who: Has the expertise and strategic insights to help you deliver the app you want to build. Focuses on real user needs, tangible results, and effective communication. Has the proper cost structure for you. Use these questions and considerations to help you learn more about potential app development partners before you choose.  For more resources, consider reading our free book, InspiringApps: A Business Perspective on Building Mobile Apps, to gain a foundational understanding of the business and technical considerations involved in building an app. And, if you’re curious about how InspiringApps would respond to questions like the ones we’ve just shared, find our answers in Your Journey With InspiringApps.

The discovery phase of app development is crucial for the success of your mobile app. What is app discovery? The first of the app development phases, app discovery lays the foundation for design, development, and deployment. Comparable to strategy development, discovery phase goals are to: To build a shared understanding of your vision and objectives through detailed research, discussion, and analysis of your idea To visualize the entire scope of the app, defining a feature set that will drive app goals and create real value for users Those new to the app development process might wonder what on earth we are unearthing in the discovery phase, so we’re going to devote this post to a deep dive into what’s involved. As a best practice, we recommend the discovery phase include two parts—first, research and then, the discovery workshop—described in detail below. Discovery Phase Part 1: Research Most mobile app development companies use a workshop-style meeting to discover, or “get to the heart of,” your idea. But there’s work to be done first to make that meeting more effective. Before launching into an app development project, it’s critical to clearly define the opportunity you have in mind and reflect on what solutions already exist. Research at the outset of the discovery stage includes: Opportunity analysis Competitive analysis Industry analysis This analysis is necessary regardless of whether your target user is an internal team or a consumer external to your company. Even for gaming apps, differentiation is always valuable. Opportunity Analysis The Opportunity Gap In app discovery, opportunities arise when there is a gap. That gap exists between what is currently on the market and possibilities open up for economic change, technological advancement, or new social trends.  When you develop an app to fill the opportunity gap, it’s part science and part art. But the app development process always involves creating a solution perceived as meeting three criteria: the app must be useful, usable, and desirable. Even apps aimed at improving internal productivity or systems must meet these criteria. If people don’t perceive a benefit from using your app, they won’t bother. Customer Development The more you can do to define the opportunity you see at the outset, the better your success at creating the right product and knowing how to market it. This process, sometimes called customer development, is a way to reduce business risks by challenging assumptions about who the customers are, what they need, and why and how they do their work. In her book Lean Customer Development: Build Products Your Customers Will Buy, Cindy Alvarez writes, “Customer development is critical to success but grossly underutilized.” Alvarez offers practical education in customer development, noting that only customers make a product successful. In her words, “Without customers willing to buy a product, it doesn’t matter how good or innovative or beautiful or reasonably-priced a product is: it will fail.”  Every hour spent defining the customer pays dividends in the development lifecycle. That’s because knowing your customers means knowing which features are critical and which are not. Market Considerations To help define the opportunity and be best prepared for the discovery workshop, start by answering key questions about your app. Work together with your team to consider areas like these: Your Value Proposition: What problem will this app solve? Your Target Market: For whom will you be solving that problem? Your Market Size: How big is the opportunity? Minimum Expectations: How does your target market address the problem currently? Requirements: What features are critical for success? Your Differentiator: Why are you best suited to do this? Competitive Analysis External & Internal Solutions Once you’ve defined the problem as clearly as possible, you’ll need to learn about the currently available solutions—the alternatives to your app, which will help reveal key factors:  External Competition: If you’re selling an app externally, alternatives to your app will become your competition. You’ll need to quantify what unique value your app will bring relative to them.  Internal Efficiencies: If you’re looking for a solution to gain internal efficiencies, what you need may or may not already exist. Competitive analysis will reveal whether you can use an off-the-shelf app, which could save you money and time, or if you need to have something built that’s tailored to your unique needs. Market Intelligence Where do you go to find out more about the competition? Here are three places to look and analyze: Search Engine: One of the best places to begin is simply on your favorite search engine. Look for products using relevant keywords that describe the functionality of interest.  App Stores: You’ll also want to search Apple’s App Store and Google Play Store similarly. If you find apps that seem relevant, download them on the appropriate device and experiment with them so you can see their strengths and weaknesses.  Reviews: Reading reviews will also give you insight into potential gaps in functionality that might be opportunities for you—or red flags if you were planning to use the app in your organization. If a similar app already exists, consider whether developing something new is worthwhile. Your app development partner can help sort through this market intelligence to help determine where and how you could differentiate. Industry Analysis Understanding the competitive landscape can give solid insight into obvious hazards opposing your market entry. But there’s no guarantee of success if the current competition is weak. Here’s where industry analysis comes into play. This type of analysis may not be possible until later in the app development phases, but we’re including it here because any insights you can bring to this end are always helpful.  Industries are constantly changing, and buyers, suppliers, and other companies are all dynamic factors influencing who will prevail and profit. Sources to understand these dynamic factors can include:  Industry experts—what has worked, what hasn’t, and what trends do they foresee? Conferences & events—how does your competition interact with and attract customers? Tech trend reports—what are the newest companies and technologies? Industry analysis can help put you ahead of competitors, elicit additional ideas for your app, and improve your market positioning overall.  Discovery Phase Part 2: The Workshop Once you’re equipped with as much information as possible on the user’s needs and business opportunities, you’re ready to engage in a discovery workshop with your app development partner. Discovery Workshop Goals At InspiringApps, we want to analyze the opportunity from every angle. We use the discovery workshop to marry our technical and process expertise with your user and market knowledge. Our goals are to visualize the entire scope of the app and to help you define a feature set that will drive app development and create real value for users. While we want to “dream big” during the discovery phase, we advise our clients to avoid creating a product that “does it all” in its first iteration. Instead, the aim is to leave discovery with a plan to build something that allows users to accomplish just a few core tasks perfectly. This concept often referred to as the minimum viable product (or MVP), is derived from Steve Blank and Eric Reis’s lean startup movement. The MVP is an app (or other digital product like a chatbot or an Alexa skill) that is as simple as possible while providing a useful and enjoyable experience. Why do we suggest the MVP approach? Simpler products are easier and less expensive to design, build, and maintain. Building an MVP also enables you to get honest user feedback on your product before you’ve invested a lot of money building something that wasn’t quite right. Even the best market research isn’t as good as a trial with your user base. Discovery Workshop Methods User Story Mapping While there are various ways you can define your MVP, we recommend and apply a method called user story mapping. User story mapping outlines the users’ needs and ensures the use-case scenarios align with the product objectives for your app. Minimum requirements for a viable app are best able to surface when we clearly describe who your users are and how, when, and where they will use your product. This user-centered approach highlights fundamental technical decisions that need to be made early on, such as starting platform (iOS, Android, web, etc.), device form factor, integrations, and analytics. Success Metrics While we cover app analytics in another post, we’ll note here that it’s important to define success metrics and desired ROI at the beginning of your project. Doing so enables your app development company to help you determine how to measure these metrics and build the right analytics tools later in development. Even the first iteration of your app should have at least one key metric you’re evaluating to know you’re on the path to success. Discovery Workshop Output Once the MVP has been defined, app designers should spend time developing sketches and then wireframes to help your stakeholders visualize the user experience. These wireframes can serve internal teams and provide a way to get external feedback through user testing, saving time and money before developing code. For more details on wireframes, see our post describing the app design process. Closing Thoughts on the Discovery Phase It may be tempting to gloss over the app discovery phase, but time invested before digging further into the app development process reaps significant benefits later. App discovery enables you to identify your user base, define what will create real value for them, create a matching feature set, and test assumptions while it’s still easy to make changes. To learn more about the app development process and fine-tune your app design ideas, visit: The Essential Guide to the Mobile App Development Process How To Design Products for Every Generation App Integration: Building Apps That Interface With Others Your Journey With InspiringApps