App development tips for tech entrepreneurs starting an app

Are you struggling to turn your great idea into a (minimum) viable product? Maybe you’re not sure how to start an app business? Or perhaps you lack teck skills? Let us give you some app development tips and help you find the right approach to creating your ground-breaking innovation.

1. Design first, develop later

Many companies can’t resist the temptation to start developing an idea straight away. The problem is that the idea is often badly defined and not well-communicated. This means that in the long-term the whole process takes a great deal longer, mistakes are made throughout and development from start to finish costs a lot more.

Make sure you design your idea from the outset before any development is undertaken. We find that using wireframes is an effective way to quickly understand what your app should look like. It also allows you to estimate time and cost to develop your app. This then gives you a better idea about its feasibility, particularly from a financial perspective. Furthermore, tweaks are easy to make as the developer is given a visual, skeletal representation of exactly how the idea should work in practice, what goes where, which areas link where, etc.

Not sure who to turn to? Proxify’s network of developers includes experienced and talented UX/UI experts.

2. Define your dev needs

You may be adding to, improving on or redesigning parts of your website or application. In such a case the technologies to be used may have been decided for you. If not, then determine which technologies your platform will use. For example, will it be built using PHP or C#? What database management system will you use? This is also true of the design phase. Certain design applications interact seamlessly with other programmes that can later give you and the developer simple instructions as to the development needs. Sketch and InVision are examples here, to name just two.

3. Have a project manager in place

Some consider a technical background or programming/design knowledge as an absolute must in order to be able to project lead the development of a product or service. Such knowledge would be beneficial, but it is not necessary.

Essentially, a project manager is important because their communication with the developer or designer is what will get the work done. Their job is to translate and communicate a company’s design, priorities and needs into the heads of those who will implement them. They keep everything moving, ensure that progress is checked, deploys are tested against design and that changes are made when and where necessary.

4. Develop the design

Start to develop the idea based on the designs created. Here it is essential that you are working with the right app developer, experienced in the technologies you are using and, moreover, talented and professional so as to mitigate technical debt accumulating.

This is what Proxify offers - a network of the best developers and designers suited to your needs.

5. Maintenance

Don’t assume that work has finished when you have implemented your design. There will be maintenance to be performed so you should understand this before committing to an engagement. Even with the best developers implementing an engagement, unforeseen bugs often occur. Nobody is prescient in this sense and often things happen during a project that are not the fault of anybody in particular.

You might prefer to have those responsible for the maintenance of the platform or application separate to the developer or you might want to employ the developer thereafter on a needs-be-basis, but it is important to know beforehand that work does not stop once the design has been developed.