Practical recommendations for those who want to create their own application

The cost depends on the type of application and the complexity of the work. There are two types distinguished.

Standard Solution

For most common tasks, there are standard solutions available. If you need an application for a beauty salon, hair salon, or delivery service, there is no need to build it from scratch. It is cheaper and more convenient to use a ready-made template, change the color scheme, add content, and incorporate your logo—then you’ll have your own application. An example of such a solution from WINFOX’s portfolio is Premier Cru.

For whom:

Primarily small businesses: service companies, restaurants, food delivery services, bonus program online stores.

Pros:

• Low cost
• Rapid development

Cons:

• Non-custom design
• Inability to add new functionality
• Sometimes you have to pay the owner of the standard solution a percentage of the orders or a fixed monthly fee
• All data collected through your application belongs to a third party—the owner of the standard solution. This is not secure.

Cost: Starting from 1745 Euros per platform (iOS, Android)

Development time: Starting from 20 working days

Application from Scratch

Some tasks are so complex and unique that there is no universal template or builder for them. In such cases, we create a mobile application from scratch: conducting business analysis based on client data, preparing a technical specification, describing user stories, and creating prototypes. Examples of such applications from WINFOX’s portfolio are 1HonestCar and «Elzhur.»

For whom:

Startups looking to test a new business model, corporations and manufacturing enterprises seeking to automate business processes (accounting, dispatching, data visualization), automotive businesses, government organizations.

Pros:

• Custom design
• Solutions for user tasks of any complexity
• Full adaptation to the client’s requirements

Cons:

• Complex development process
• Long development time
• High cost

Cost: Starting from 7 k — 9.5 k Euros

Development time: Starting from 2 months

How to Save

There are several ways to reduce the budget without compromising the quality of the product.

Focus on the core functionality

Avoid unnecessary additional features and don’t add everything you can think of to the application. This will confuse users, and you will waste money unnecessarily.

We often advise clients to reduce the number of screens, avoid real-time video and audio processing, and skip augmented reality tools unless they are the main feature of the service.

Potential savings: up to 50% of the stage cost.

Follow guidelines

Don’t try to come up with a unique design just to impress everyone. It is more logical to follow the guidelines provided by Apple and Google. Designers from these companies have already created recommendations on how applications should look to be convenient and user-friendly. You just need to apply these guidelines in practice, using the recommended fonts, interface elements, transitions, and animations.

Potential savings: up to 100% of the stage cost.

Optimize user scenarios

Ideally, users should be able to perform the task they downloaded the application for in just a few clicks. If they have to perform multiple actions to achieve their goal, it is not ideal. Additionally, as a client, it will be cheaper for you to design three screens instead of seven. Therefore, pay special attention to the design phase and try to reduce the number of screens, making the service user-friendly.

Imagine you are building a house, and you made a mistake during the foundation pouring phase. If you realize it in time, it won’t require a significant amount of money and time to fix it. But if you have already erected the walls and put the roof on, and suddenly the house leans, you’ll have to demolish it and start all over again. As a result, you will pay for two houses but end up with only one.

Creating an application is similar to building a house. It is better to carefully plan user scenarios in advance and address any issues during the design phase rather than dealing with redesigning a completed design and paying for the work twice.

Rustam Mukhamedyanov, Head of WINFOX Studio.

Use familiar navigation

Developers of iOS and Android operating systems have come up with three universal navigation scenarios: flat, hierarchical, and mixed. There are ready-made components available for each type. Use them instead of inventing unique scenarios. Most likely, users won’t appreciate them, and implementing non-standard navigation will require developers much more time. You will pay for it without achieving the expected result.

Briefly

Building an application using ready-made modules is always cheaper and faster. Creating an app from scratch requires more money, time, and effort.

To save some money on development, avoid additional features, follow guidelines, keep navigation simple, and carefully plan user scenarios.

To assist those who have decided to create their own mobile service, we have written a book called «Mobile App for Business: What Clients Need to Know.» In this book, we have endeavored to provide answers to the most common questions asked by our clients. This book does not contain vague advice like «How to Create an App in Three Easy Steps.» Instead, it offers the experience accumulated by WINFOX over the past five years in the mobile development market, practical examples, and a guide to action.

Those who approach our studio receive a printed version of the book.

Rustam Mukhamedyanov, Head of WINFOX Studio.