Website Instead of Mobile App

There is a Cheaper Solution for Mobile

📅 2022.12.12 - 👤 Borbély Viktor

Website or mobile UI design during product development Source: Unsplash, amayli

You have surely experienced writing down countless ideas for yourself. Finally, you managed to choose your favorite from among them. You spent your time researching the topic. No one has done this yet! Great! – you thought to yourself. Now you just have to implement it. But how? Should it be a website or a mobile application? Maybe a PWA? However, this is just the beginning. You need to ask yourself many other questions.

I already have an idea. How will anything come of it?

If you haven’t encountered digital product development yet, I recommend exploring the topic. The How to Design a Mobile Application in 5 Steps – Part 1 discusses the topic candidly. So I won’t describe it in detail now, you can read more about it there.

Where should I start with it?

“What do you mean where?? On the internet, right?” – Well, it’s not that simple! 🙂

I was lucky to talk with a few idea owners. These occasions are excellent for putting a few questions in place. Aspects come up that the idea owner didn’t think of. This is not a problem, since they share it with me so we can formulate constructive criticism together with expertise.

– **I just want a mobile app that does this and that. – says Feri – I understand. So you’ll have users, with login, right? – I ask – Yeah! **– he shoots back – Will there also be social login? – I ask. – You know, Google, Facebook, etc. – I didn’t even think of that. – he admits – You’ll also need a server. – I bring up – What for? – he doubts – You know, where will you see the payment transactions? What if a problem arises? – You mean an admin page? – his eyes light up – Yes. You’ll have paying customers who will have problems. – I confirm

The above dialogue is of course a product of imagination. Although similar ones are often heard.

Additional aspects worth answering for yourself:

How much is it?

You can’t talk about this in concrete terms. As many ideas, so many different combinations. However, rules of thumb can be made.

You should know that mobile development consists of more steps than creating a website. Because of this, prices are also more significant. The creation of a small-medium product can range from **a few hundred to several thousand work hours **. There are unavoidable parts. But some can be parallelized or postponed. From here, the math is simple, because the number of hours must be multiplied by developer hourly rates.

The whole can be defined in the following major phases:

Idea gathering

For whom?
What?
Paid or Free? Product definition
Features
What if… ?
Researching industry standards Prototype(s) creation
Drawings, Mock-ups
user interviews
design drafts (Figma, Adobe XD)
MVP Development
based on user feedback
finalizing design
coding
mobile app, server, website, automation, payment provider integration Testing
developer tests (unit, integration)
automated tests
end-user tests (end-to-end, E2E)
protocols, reports Launch, sales
sales, marketing, PR
community building, campaigns
release in app stores Afterlife, support
customer service, helpdesk
regular fixes
(product recall, withdrawal)

Talk to a professional

If these sound horrible, talk to a professional.

Many of the above activities can be omitted or simplified. You don’t necessarily have to do everything. It wouldn’t be realistic for smaller ideas either.

That’s why it doesn’t hurt if you don’t go it alone. A few consultations or conversations are still affordable before you bite off more than you can chew. You can ask for scheduling so the cash flow is in order.

A good professional can talk you out of an expensive or complicated part. They can even point out a good alternative replacement solution.

It’s worth taking advantage of their professional connections. They can help a lot in recommending appropriate service providers and partners. You don’t have to talk to 3-5-10 people in a given field. Of course, tasks can also be divided: everyone does what they understand.

Communication

Clear communication is important during the project. This can be in person, via video call, by email. The point is that it should be the most efficient. Everyone’s time is precious. A decision should be born by the end of the meeting. Let’s not just meet for the sake of meeting. Let’s record the questions that arise and the answers received in a system (issue tracker, task manager, Excel 🙂 ) where everyone has access.

Progress at your own pace

If you don’t have the knowledge, read!
If you don’t have the capital, get it! Or get a sponsor! Or a community that advances it to you. Such as www.brancskozosseg.hu.

It may be that at first it will only be presentable on a white A4 paper. After that, you’ll have a Figma plan, a prototype. Then a responsive website, PWA or a browser extension ( Firefox, Chrome extension) can come. If the development framework is good, native apps can easily be made from it. (Such as the most popular Flutter mobile app framework.)

I’ve written several articles on the topic, these may also interest you:

If you would like to develop a mobile app but don’t know how to start, or just need support, contact me through one of my contacts.