With almost 500 unicorns on the market that have hit $1 billion, it’s easy enough to get into the cognitive bias and start underestimating the statistics. Forbes states that 90% of startups fail. Our experts in software development have thought of crucial steps and some tips on how to maximize your chances for success with simultaneously minimizing costs for the development of your application.
Taking into consideration that more than 70% of new entrepreneurs use personal funds for the development, marketing, and launch of the new product, we believe these recommendations will help you to save your money.
1. The business analysis goes first
According to the CB Insights survey, 42% of startup failures are caused by a poor analysis of the customers’ requirements, and the misunderstanding of the marketing needs for the product. Before you even start thinking about the technical specialists you will need for your application, find answers to these questions:
- Who is your target audience?
- What is your planned share of the market?
- Who are your main competitors?
When you have these issues covered and are positive that your new product will add value to society, proceed with the next step of the business analysis. Find out how much time and money you will need to develop your application and what’s more important, choose the monetization methods for your app.
2. Delegate it!
Minimize your expenditures on software development by hiring a dedicated team of coders. Choose the HRM method that will work the best for you. Opt for outstaffing or outsourcing the development process to a reliable partner and have all your needs covered by professionals.
If you’re a US or Europe-based startup, take a closer look at the outstaffing and outsourcing companies based in Ukraine. The developers’ fees here are not as high as in the US or the countries of Western Europe, while the quality of coding and the diversity of IT specialists will be a nice surprise for you.
According to some national surveys, Ukraine is home to more than 200,000 IT specialists with IT services taking 5th place among the main export categories of the country.
3. Create an MVP
Don’t try to integrate all the exclusive features into the first version of your application. The MVP or the minimum viable product is the first draft of your project. There are several reasons why you should opt for the MVP when creating a new application, especially if it operates in some highly-competitive field. Developing an MVP is much faster and cheaper than placing an application that is fully-packed with intricate features on the market.
4. Choose cross-platform development
Though the debates on which platform, iOS, or Android, is better, when it comes to minimizing costs, everyone agrees that cross-platform development is the best choice. If you’re certain that your target audience uses only iOS or only Android, you can opt for one-platform development but if you’re about to make your application available for all the platforms, pay attention to the cross-platform development. For example, MWDN applies ReactJS, and Flutter for their mobile development projects.
5. Go Agile
According to the Agile Manifesto, the best workflow for the team is the one the team selects for itself. If you’ve delegated your startup idea to the dedicated remote team or if you’ve hired your in-house coders, stay agile to allow changes-on-the-go to happen. Planning is crucial, but taking new settings, data, or feedback into consideration during the working process, might dramatically increase the quality of your product.
6. Don’t invent the wheel
Free templates, open-source software, existing APIs: All these tools will decrease the price of your app development and will make the process faster. For example, by choosing JavaScript and Ruby on Rails for the web version of your application, you will get a variety of customized solutions that will satisfy the needs of your customers.
7. Test it!
By engaging experienced quality assurance specialists at the very beginning of your application development, you minimize the risks of critical bug fixing at the finish line. We recommend conducting automated and manual testing of both the functionality of your application and its UI/UX.
8. Take care of your customers
According to the before-mentioned survey, 14% of startups have collapsed because they haven’t paid attention to their clients. What a dedicated team
can do to help you out from this situation is to maintain the functionality of your application and improve your product according to the feedback from your customers.
MWDN provides experts for the whole cycle of your mobile app development, starting from the design of your future application, through the coding, testing, and up to maintenance of the ready-to-use app. Find out more about the company’s expertise and don’t postpone your dream to found a startup any longer. Delegate your software development to a reliable ally and increase your chances to become one of the next unicorns.