How To Build Enterprise Mobile Apps for business

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Enterprise Apps
By: Sandeep Agrawal

How To Build Highly-Productive Mobile Enterprise Apps?

When it comes to business, mobile apps have started playing a crucial role for organizations these days. Mobile applications have the power to redefine the way we conduct a business. Embracing mobility in true sense not only provides a competitive edge to your business, it also enhances customer satisfaction. Come 2020 and the global enterprise mobility market will be worth $140 billion.

Today, as many as 75% of the Fortune 500 companies are gearing up their efforts to deploy HTML 5 based mobile apps for their business. What’s more, the Mobile CRM apps are expected to grow by 500% in 2014 and about 50% of the enterprises will use hybrid cloud by 2017. All this implies that enterprise mobile apps are definitely going to be very important for businesses in the coming years.

However, building and deploying enterprise mobile apps is far from easy. There are various nuances one needs to consider while developing such applications. End-user requirements, technology to be used, cost factors, scalability etc. need to be considered before creating a mobile enterprise app. So, if your business is considering having a mobile enterprise app for better productivity, here’s what you need to know about creating the ultimate app.

Have a Clear Objective

It’s very crucial to be crystal clear when it comes to the objectives behind building a mobile enterprise application. Whether it is simplifying business processes or improving customer relationships, you must have a good idea about why you are investing in developing a mobility enterprise application. The underlying principle of building a mobile enterprise app is always to add value to your business enterprise. For instance, consider the following examples.

A life-science company might build an enterprise app to help scientists/researchers search compound IDs to make drugs. This process generally takes hours to complete. With a mobile enterprise app, it could take a few seconds for a researcher/scientist to search compound IDs. The objective here is to simplify complex tasks.

Large organizations that are in retail business often require their district managers to go out to do store auditing. Now, this audit process generally is paper-based which is very time-consuming. With a mobile enterprise app, district managers would have to spend a few minutes instead of hours to register information regarding store issues.

It is, therefore, important to understand the basic objectives before you invest lots of money into building that mobile app. If objectives are not clear, you might be wasting your money. Also, remember that the objectives come first than choosing the right technology. Technology will only help you achieve those target goals.

Never Compromise on UX

No matter how many brilliant features you put into your application, if it does not offer the right user-experience, your efforts go in vain. Your mobile enterprise application has to be extremely user-friendly. For instance, if you are building a mobile CRM application for your sales team, it is essential that the managers are able to use with little technical knowledge. The application has to be easy in terms of entering lead information, managing customer contacts, email marketing campaigns etc. Think about the end-user and build a mobile enterprise app. Take a look at some tips for building a wonderful UX for enterprise apps here.

Contemplate before Coding

Many developers don’t think before coding a mobile enterprise application. That’s when all the blunders are made. Before you sit down to code, think twice! Know the requirements properly before coding and programming. What will be the workflow, will the application run online or offline, what will be the back end system like etc. are some crucial factors to be considered before writing those long pieces of codes.

Involving End-Users is Crucial

The golden rule to build highly productive and amazing enterprise mobile apps is to involve users in your development process. All users want is an easy to use application that helps achieve their objectives. If it’s not user-friendly, you won’t get that WOW response from them. Once you build a prototype or something, ask your end-users to use the features. They will give you valuable feedback which can then be applied to create those killer enterprise applications.

Follow the Best Practices

There’s always a certain method, best practice to build an enterprise mobile app. Make sure you follow that. These practices will help you build remarkable apps that allow end-users to perform their tasks effortlessly. Remember it’s all about helping the users out there rather than being cool! Remember that your mobile app has to leverage the capabilities of a handheld device. Creating task-oriented applications is very much important.

Don’t Complicate

If you want to impress your end-users, instead of complicating features in the enterprise app, make it as simple as possible. By keeping the app simple, you will be able to achieve the target objectives more quickly! By being focused and eliminating unnecessary features, you allow your users to accomplish complex tasks seamlessly. The key is to include a few features in your application that perform brilliantly!

Testing Matters

Lastly, don’t forget the testing part! Test your enterprise app across multiple devices and see how it performs. Most developers overlook the testing part because it can turn out to be very time-consuming and expensive as well. But remember, testing will show you the loopholes in your enterprise app and also help you incorporate useful changes.

Conclusion

As smart phones continue to become popular, mobile apps will also see an upward trend in the years to come. Gradually, businesses will have to realize the importance of having an enterprise app for their organization because of the many advantages associated with having one. It is important to remember that you will also have to identify and measure the success of your mobile enterprise app apart from considering the points mentioned above. And, most importantly, all this has to revolve around your business goals and objectives!

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