Do you need an app for your business or are you building it just because it’s trendy?

This is a question some business owners ask themselves when their business seems to be getting traction beyond their website.

It’s rare to see a business that doesn’t have a website in today’s digital age. Recent consumers see a brand without one as untrustworthy and inexperienced.

It gets to a point where startup founders and many business owners invest in app development as they grow, for a multitude of reasons, one of them being to create an easy experience for their users or consumers. This is common among e-commerce platforms.

Unfortunately, a lot of businesses hesitate when it comes to investing in app development and reasons may vary, from budget constraints to lack of technical expertise and, of course, if it’s really a necessary business decision.

This article will highlight the five major signs that indicate you need an app for your business growth and how to get started on the building journey.

 
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Top 5 Signs You Need an App for Your Business

 

Wondering if you really need an app for your business? Here are 5 signs you definitely need an app for your business.
 

1. Your Business Has Outgrown Its Current Systems

Growth is a great indicator that you’re not shutting down soon and are on the journey to scaling globally.

Unfortunately, your backend systems can’t stay in the same capacity forever, and with time, they won’t be able to keep up. If you were utilizing 6 different tools to ensure smooth operations, there would be frequent complaints of slow operations, which isn’t a good sign.

Having a mobile app can help centralize operations and this is where specialized and experienced developers come in, for easy personalization and system maintenance.
 

2. You’re Checking Out New Revenue Streams

You might be looking to launch a subscription service, monetize your services, or introduce customer tiers.

The introduction of in-app purchases or a monthly membership business model helps make monetization scalable and user-friendly.

Especially with the introduction of direct debit, which helps with customer retention and loyalty.

If you’re still in the stage where you’re unsure of what your monetization model should look like, building an MVP (Minimum Viable Product) app can help test your ideas with real users.
 

3. You’re Searching For New Customer Satisfaction Strategies

If you’re creating new strategies to improve user experience when it comes to your brand, then you need an app for your business and you need to start planning as quickly as possible.

Mobile applications make business interactions easy and it’s a direct connection to the user.

With personalized features, you get to learn user behavior and usage patterns, which makes it easy for your customer representatives or service agents to interact with different users uniquely.

It’s a great way to keep your brand in tune with your users and send updates and offers through push notifications. Which is a useful marketing hack.
 

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4. Your Competitors Are Ahead in The Market

Every industry is filled with intense competition, some more than others. This is why every advantage is needed to keep your business afloat, top-of-mind, and ahead of the game using the current innovation.

If your competitors have an app and have established their presence in the market, you’re already playing catch-up.

This is why you need an app for your business and you need to be strategic and quick with planning and execution.

This can only be possible if you have a great selection of technical experts who monitor recent trends and know how to efficiently deliver a quality application, that helps user experience, helps your brand deliver better service, collects more customer data, builds stronger, and looks more innovative.
 

5. Your Website Isn’t Converting Mobile Users

If you’re noticing a large amount of traffic from mobile users and they aren’t converting, you need an app for your business quickly.

The work doesn’t end after getting a large amount of traffic from users. If there’s no conversion, it would seem like a wasted effort because no conversions equals no financial returns.

Some websites aren’t optimized for mobile experience, they have slow load times and have hard-to-read texts.

When users struggle to interact or complete actions on mobile phones, they drop off fast. Building an app gives you full control over mobile experiences and designing it specifically for ease and speed, makes it even better.

If you’re losing leads quicker than you can count, a mobile application is the answer to your problem.
 

Major Reasons Why Businesses Build Apps

 

Mobile applications aren’t just useful for big corporations and organizations. They can serve as useful tools for startups and small businesses whose operations require the need for an app. Here are some of the major reasons why businesses build apps:
 

1. It Helps Create a Direct Marketing Channel

Phones are now seen as an extension of the human hand in this day and age and due to the recently discovered short attention span, businesses are looking for different ways to make the experiences of their customers using the “One click away” marketing tactic.

Apps help businesses establish a powerful and accessible channel to market directly to customers. Push notifications are a great example of this as they allow for timely offers, promotions, and updates.

Unlike social media, businesses using applications face no algorithm issues and their target audience has already been established. This is real-time engagement and it boosts customer loyalty and value. It’s the perfect way to keep the brand top-of-mind.

 
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2. To Collect and Utilize Customer Data

Mobile applications allow businesses to ethically gain access to first-party data, which is allowed by the user. With this data, they get to track usage patterns or purchase behavior.

This is a key reason why business owners build apps for their businesses as it allows them to upsell, include personalized recommendations, and suggest loyalty programs to their users. This allows them to make smarter decisions on product and strategy.
 

3. To Enhance Brand Identity and Recognition

Businesses that invest in building a mobile application for their business from the beginning, gain points from prospective users as it builds familiarity and trust. With strategic marketing strategies, having a mobile app extends the brand beyond websites and social media.

They also get bonus points for having a well-designed app that is easy to use and it positions their business as modern and forward-thinking. It’s a great way to stay memorable in the user’s mind.
 

4. To Offer Better and Easy Customer Support and Service

With features like live chats, AI chatbots, and support tickets, users are at ease knowing they can communicate their issues to available support agents easily. This makes calls the last option for users, which is a plus for most people nowadays.

Startups that are in their early stages can gather the necessary feedback needed to build their product, and already established organizations use this feedback to continuously improve customer experience, increase customer loyalty, and gain new ones.

By resolving issues faster, they get a larger percentage of satisfied customers at the end of the day.

Some businesses even go the extra mile of personalizing support based on user data or history, which makes the users feel valued and boosts retention. It makes it easy to turn the users’ pain points into a brand advantage.
 

5. It Helps Build a Community Around Their Product or Service

This is another major point that pushes brands in their early stages, to build apps for their business. It’s a great place to introduce features like groups, social feeds, and user forums to foster interaction and loyalty.

Businesses get to encourage these interactions with badges, points, or progress tracking. It’s an opportunity for businesses to increase user retention by getting real-life feedback and amplifying word-of-mouth referrals.
 

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What Are Your Next Steps?

After taking into consideration the need for easy user experience, speed, personalized features, and easy functionalities, you need an app for your business that has all this planned out to help scale easily and retain users.

This isn’t impossible as you need a team of technical experts who have the right experience needed to bring your vision to life quickly and efficiently. A great choice that has the right team of experts for your business is RocketDevs.

RocketDevs is a vetted marketplace of over 15,000 developers who have been matched to over 500 startups.

Companies and solo founders who hire remote software developers and engineering teams experience an average success rate of 98%, saving their hiring costs by 70%.

The reason for this is not far-fetched, RocketDevs is 3-4x cheaper than competitors like Toptal and Turing, with developers starting at $8/hr.

You can also get a developer from RocketDevs within 24 - 48hrs. Be rest assured of a quality mobile application that will improve your brand identity and satisfy your users.

Ready to build a mobile app for your business?

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