Expert Tips For Mobile Development

Do you have a great app idea, and are wondering what the cost of mobile dev is to bring your idea to life? If so, you’re in good company. At our mobile app services agency, the estimated mobile dev cost is the most common question we get from new contacts seeking out our app development services.

The thing is, there’s no quick answer to this common question. You can think of estimating mobile dev costs the same way you would estimate the cost of purchasing a new house. What type of house do you want – a single-family home or a townhouse or condo? How many bedrooms and bathrooms do you need? Are you looking for a starter home that can be updated over time or a forever home with all the latest upgrades?

The purpose of this house analogy is to show you that the cost of mobile dev depends on the scope of your project.

And there are two main influences to project scope – internal and external mobile development factors.

Internal Mobile Development Factors

You – or your company – may have a lot of domain knowledge about the industry or consumer sector you want to target with the mobile app features you have in mind. Or you might just have a great idea, but need help fleshing it out. Your domain knowledge is going to directly impact the cost of your mobile dev. For example:

• What’s the Scope of the Project that You Want to Outsource?

Some companies looking for mobile app services need help with the entire project, including specifying how the app will work. Other companies already have an idea of what they want, they simply need a team of app developers to do it. Where you fall on this spectrum will impact mobile dev cost for your app.

• How Strong is Your Domain Knowledge?

Let’s say you have a great idea for a game app for kids. How much do you know about kids’ games, what colors and shapes they find appealing, what music they like, how challenging the app should be to keep them to want to continue playing it, and so on? If this knowledge is in your wheelhouse, then you’ll need less help from a mobile app services company like ours specifying your app.

But if you simply have a great idea, but don’t have the domain experience to spec the app out yourself, you’re going to require more mobile app services. While agencies like ours can definitely help with this process, this work will add to your overall cost of mobile dev.

• Will You Be Providing App Assets?

Some companies seeking our mobile app development services have the in-house capabilities to create and share app assets, such as images for the app and app copy. If you’re going to be relying on your own internal team to create these assets, you’ll reduce your mobile dev cost. Conversely, if you need to outsource these tasks, your cost of mobile dev will go up.

• What’s Your Entire Budget (Including for App Promotion)?

When determining what mobile app features to include, you need to be thinking about your entire app budget. And it’s important that you don’t forget the cost of promoting your completed app, too. After all, you can upload an app to the App Store or Google Play, but it needs to have a marketing push behind it to get people to download it.

Once you know how much of your entire app creation and promotion budget can be dedicated to each mobile app development stages – that is, planning and development, maintenance, scaling, and promotion – you’ll be able to have a better idea of what your mobile app dev costs will be.

• How Tight (or Flexible) is Your Deadline?

As the old saying goes, time is money. If you have a tight deadline for turning around your app, you’re going to need a larger development team, and thus, your mobile app dev costs will be higher. 

Alternatively, if you’re flexible on your app upload date, a smaller team can work on mobile dev over a longer period of time, oftentimes for a lower cost of mobile dev.

External Mobile Development Factors

We live in a capitalistic society, which means, of course, that external mobile development factors are going to impact the cost of mobile dev for your new app. Some of the most common external mobile development factors include:

• The Current Market Price for Developing Mobile App Features

The supply of mobile app developers – and the demand for them – is constantly changing. This means, at any one given point of time, the cost of mobile dev for the same app will be different than it would be at another point in time. 

Geography affects app development costs too. Mobile dev costs vary greatly by regions of the US and international locations.

• Your App Contractor’s Company Size

When you work with an established mobile app development company like ours, you will be paying a premium for that expertise. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you should search elsewhere if your budget is on the small size.

Working with an experienced team may lead to more development delays, confusion, and bugs, which will end up costing you more in the long run.

• Your App Contractor’s Location – And Whether or Not They Use Distributed Teams

If you think your app must be developed by Silicon Valley developers, get ready to pay a premium. The simple fact is that the local economy of where your app development company is located will affect your mobile dev costs.

After all, app development agencies have to be paid salaries comparable to what their local competitors are paying to their development teams.

However, this is where the beauty of the distributed mobile app development industry comes into play. You no longer need a Silicon Valley resident to develop your app.

Competent mobile app developers are located all across the US, and many of them work on remote teams using a variety of cloud-based workflow technologies to stay on the same page. 

The simple fact is, you really can find the same caliber of app development talent in Dallas, Texas as you can in Cupertino, California.

• Whether or Not You’ll Be Using Emerging Tech in Your App

If you want to leverage emerging technologies and specialized development languages, you’ll be paying more for those services to create mobile app features because fewer people are capable of building apps with this new type of tech.

But if you want to use tried and true technologies, your talent pool will be bigger, which will drive down mobile app dev costs.

We Can Help You Develop Mobile App Features

If you need to outsource mobile app development, we’re here today. Contact us today to schedule a consultation by calling (877) 682-2012 or fill out our online contact form.

Not big on reading? That’s okay. Watch “Factors Impacting Mobile Development Cost” instead.

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