Mobile apps should realise importance of good design & be willing to pay a premium for it

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When we ventured into software development in the mid-1990s or into mobile app development in late 2000s, crystal-ball gazing wasn’t in vogue. Now it is, especially around this time of the year, so 
let me do so for the business of mobile app development. Actually these are not fantastical, futuristic, wondrous developments (‘aliens will code!’) but more realistic takes based on what I have observed over the past few months.

The first is more of a hope than a conviction. I believe product owners and marketers looking to develop mobile apps will finally realise the importance of good design and be willing to pay a premium for it. While some evolved customers realise this and budget time and money for it, a blasé attitude does exist with much of the industry when it comes to design. It is time we shifted our attitudes to getting out a Minimum Lovable Product and not just a viable product.

I realise that it takes industry-wide effort to bring about change. It is a welcome move that mobile industry platforms like IAMAI are working to incubate startups and include design education as part of the process. Another factor driving this change is competition. The concept of USP is long gone when it comes to consumer-facing apps too; so for a grocery shop, ecommerce brand or a messenger-based help service app, the user-experience driven by design is a powerful differentiator and catalyst for brand preference.

I was hoping that brands investing in bespoke games would be the trend last year, but we didn’t see that happening in India. Consumer goods brands that target youth have a big opportunity to engage with their audience through mobile games. In India, 64% of the apps downloaded are games. Indians spend on an average 3 hours 18 minutes a day on their smartphones with one-third of that time on mobile apps. That doesn’t necessarily mean that all brands should create games–it is a highly cluttered category to break into and not all categories are suited for a game. If not bespoke games, brands can consider riding piggyback on games which are relevant to their category. A food brand or a kitchen appliance brand may consider associations with popular cooking games, for example.

I strongly believe that the premium end will belong to those who can go beyond app strategy, design and engineering. For a lot of companies which have a strong track record in mobile app development and deployment, the journey after the app submission is still a black hole. App marketing and analytics offered as an integrated service would prove to be a differentiator, albeit at the high end of customer profiles. I realise the immense potential of big data which allows for constantly fine-tuning offerings. In the coming months, clients, especially in enterprise mobility, will seek to work with mobility partners possessing such capabilities.