Without any doubts, customers have always been the mainstay of business and will continue to be so in the future as well. Whether you sell offline or online, knowing your customers is of key significance. Whether you are investing in a website or mobile app development, customer research is the starting point. Let us start with mobile apps because the majority of businesses are opting for their development these days.
The planning phase is perhaps the most critical one because this lays the foundation of the app. Even before you start working on the idea, you need to have a customer persona ready because the app’s success depends completely on how well it caters to the expectations of the end users. Here are some reasons why you must absolutely do customer research before you start with the development of the mobile app for your business.
Speak to the target audience
Running a business successfully is all about making an impact on your target audience through every single channel of interaction. Solid research forms the basis of building a user persona of your mobile app. Unless you have a clear understanding of what the customers expect, you will not be able to visualize the look and functionalities of your app. Therefore, this single step can help your business to achieve its true potential as far as the mobile audience is concerned.
Empower the app with the right features
Once you have the user persona ready, things will become much simpler for your development team. They will have all the facts about the buyers at one place, right from their demographics to preferences, shopping history, and everything else that they may need to know. Ideating the features of your mobile app will become much easier and the chances of its success are also increased significantly if you tailor the app to match your customers’ profile.
Choose the right operating system
Right from the start, businesses have been confused about choosing between iOS and Android platforms. Most of them decide to start with one platform and then have the other one after some time. Customer research can help you to decide whether you should opt for iOS or Android app development first based on the platform that a major proportion of your audience uses. This ensures that you are putting your money at the right place and are able to generate optimal revenue from them right from the day of launch.
Have a result-oriented marketing strategy
Beyond the development phase, customer research is also important to drive success for the marketing phase. In fact, the customers that you want to target will make all the difference in how the app will be marketed. For instance, if you are targeting the iOS platform, paid downloads are the way to do but marketing for the Android platform would be about just spreading the awareness about your brand to a larger audience. Unless you have complete knowledge and understanding about your target audience, you will not be able to craft a result-oriented marketing strategy.
Now that you understand the significance of consumer research as a part of the app development process, the next feasible step would be to ensure that you do things in the right way. Here is the list of key steps that you need to follow:
- Have a look at the current customer base to know their expectations. Also, visualize the target customers that you would want to onboard your app once it is launched. Make sure that the app you develop caters to both, the existing as well as potential users.
- Check your competitors and their strategy as well. If they already have a mobile presence, do see what they are offering through their mobile app and use it as your benchmark.
- Analyze your product or service and see what would go into creating an exceptional user experience to sell them. For example, developing an Augmented Reality app would be a good idea if you are selling a fashion line.
- Segment your audience on the basis of parameters such as demographics, behavior, attitudes, and preferences. Ensure that your app features are tailored to a generalized experience that matches the expectations if practically everyone.
- Have a trustworthy app development partner that can help you with the entire steps of the mobile app development process, right from researching your audience to building the wireframe for your app and implementing the right set of features into it.
At Mobibiz, we are a trusted service provider in this domain. We extend services that make is stand apart, with the experience and expertise of a seasoned team to look after the requirements of each client. You can connect with us to hire mobile app developers who understand your audience and business needs and replicates them into the apps we create. Share your requirements with us to get started.
