How to find the right application development company
Finding the right application development company to assist you with your Mobile App, Web App or Desktop App is no easy task. You have to account for many factors at once that will impact the future of your product and its life-cycle.
Here are 3 things you should consider in order to pick the right software developer for your needs and some budget-friendly tips that could help you tremendously when getting started with a project!
1. Which platform do I want to develop my product on?
Do you just want a mobile application? Should it be accessible from browsers? Is it desktop only?
At first, you will most probably have to pick your battles instead of going for a fully fledged suite of applications. A client of mine once asked me to develop a Tablet App for businesses.
Back in 2014, the iPad represented 80% of the businesses tablet market share. I recommended him to get started with an iOS App solely which ended up saving him 50% of development costs. Needless to say, he made the good decision and appreciated my research.
Nowadays however, I will always recommend clients to get started with a Web Application first. Why is that? Multiple reasons:
- Smartphones are now as powerful as small laptops and can handle browser apps just as well
- With frameworks such as Angular, it is easily possible to port a Web App to mobile and desktop afterwards
- It's versatile and JavaScript/TypeScript developers are plentiful
2. Which stacks/languages/technologies will be used for developing the application?
This one, although often neglected at the beginning, can easily come back to haunt you down the line when you need to push updates to your application or some technologies get replaced.
I have dealt with multiple clients either running older applications or picking languages that they were most comfortable with personally to develop a new prototype. It almost always resulted in a complete rewrite of the application to avoid further headaches down the line.
Ask yourself the following questions:
- Does my App do a lot of data processing, number crunching? If yes, go for a Python back-end.
- Will I use my App as a CMS (Content Management System)? If yes, go for a Python back-end.
- Do I require strong security or is my environment heavily reliant on Microsoft? If yes, go for a C# back-end.
- None of the above? Go for a NodeJS server and keep both your back-end and front-end all in JavaScript.
For most projects, I recommend that my clients use a full JavaScript/TypeScript stack such as NodeJS + Angular or NodeJS + React. It allows them to focus on one language which will make maintenance of the Application more affordable down the line. JavaScript developers are plentiful and the Apps can be easily ported over to Mobile and Desktop.
3. Should I hire developers myself or go through a software development company first?
Hiring developers is a tough job. The industry is in high demand right now and it's definitely a sellers' market. Developers will demand more upfront for their services and it might not be easy to retain them down the line.
I have had countless clients tell me about their unfortunate experience with developers that just lost interest over time or even worse, that were never a good fit with the company to start with.
If you are already making a large time and resource investment by developing an App, may I suggest you save yourself the headache of trying to build a team at the same time. However, once success with your product is reached, it will be more cost-efficient for you to hire someone to maintain the application. By that time, you will be able to forecast demand for new features much more consistently and will be able to hire according to the required workload.
It's always a balancing act between cost and convenience. There is a reason why so many successful companies choose to completely outsource application development even through time, it allows them to focus on their core competencies and better serving their customers.
Need some help figuring it all out? Feel free to reach out to us at [email protected] we will be delighted to help you!
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