Why is Marketing Research Important for the New App Development?
Description: Even the most incredible app ideas are bound to fail without proper marketing research. Any serious app development team needs to understand the market trends, consumer needs, and the strategies that the competitors are using. Your mobile app needs to get out there when it's complete and ready to compete effectively and satisfy the user needs.
With tremendous growths experienced over the past few years, mobile app development is currently considered one of the most lucrative industries. We can't attribute this to anything other than the popularity that Android and iOS devices have been able to command. From the look of things, the apps will control all the aspects of our lives, starting from shopping, gaming, to studying.
Do you know what this means? App developers are going to 'eat life with a big spoon.' There is a huge market potential for these gurus. If you're one of them, you need to take full advantage of the opportunities life presents you. However, you're not the only one seeing this opportunity, as many other developers are also leveraging them. All you can do is strive to stay ahead of this massively growing competition.
To do this, you need to understand the importance of market research in web app development and how it's going to help you stay ahead of other developers. Copy the strategy used by mobile apps providers, who have done enough market research and understand their target customers. Without good research, your entire development journey can all go down the drain. So that you're convinced, this article discusses the importance of marketing research in your app development to help you understand everything better.
Helps You Get Your App Out there
After you have developed your app, you need to introduce it to the market. You want people to download it and start using it. But you can't just wake up one day and decide to release your new app to users without a solid plan. You need to know the kind of competition that awaits your app out there and how other developers are positioning theirs. You need to evaluate every insight about your competitors, know the strategies they are using, their strengths, and their weaknesses.
You must also understand what your customers like and what they don't like. All this will help you understand how to approach the market when releasing your app. Proper marketing research will help you avoid any mistakes that your competitors have done before.
Helps You Understand Your Target Audience
In every app you develop, you must have a target audience in mind. Not everyone out there is going to need your app. You have to collect extensive data about this audience and find out a lot of things like their needs, wants, and preferences. Define your target customers in terms of demographics, including age, gender, occupation, social status, etc. Once you know this, you have to narrow down to their specific needs.
Dig deep into your audience data. Segment your target groups so that you only focus on a specific niche market. Identifying and segmenting your audience is not something you're going to do overnight. Give it ample time in your marketing research to come up with valuable data. For instance, if you're developing dating apps, you need to segment your audience in terms of age, location, and needs. If you do this correctly, there's absolutely nothing that will prevent your app development company from achieving tremendous success.
Helps You Understand the Risks
Risks are part and parcel of every business, but you don't have to face every risk head-on. You need to do everything possible to dodge some of these risks, or your business will be in huge trouble. Go out there and find out what other developers are doing and know the struggles they are dealing with before introducing those popular apps to the market.
Find out which types of apps they are selling, and which ones are declined. Understand that some niches are short-lived; ones are seasonal, while others are simply out of the market. You don't want to run the risk of introducing some gaming apps out there only to find out that people are no longer interested in it. Study the market trends and understand all the risks involved so that you're not caught by surprise.
You Find the Problem When You Research
Another aspect of market research in your marketing app development journey is finding out the problem. If you think you're developing this app to make a profit from them, that will be the worst strategy you can ever think of. You need to think about your audience and focus on how your app is going to solve their problems.
One of the problems that users might have about the app is efficiency. Users expect your app to be data-efficient, or else it will be thrown into the gutter. If you come up with an app that will consume too much data, you won't be solving any problem as users will just forget about it with time. No one wants to run such losses.
You also need to understand that app users have a very low patience level, and your app will not be successful if it's only going to make people wait. Imagine someone playing a game, and the app keeps hanging or takes too long to load. A good and successful app is one that loads fast enough. Carry out your research to solve the problem of apps that take too much time to load and find out what it takes to develop an app that will load faster and satisfy user needs.
People Need Uniqueness
Copying what others have already developed is rampant in this industry. Well, sometimes, you might think your idea is unique only to release it and find that there are many other apps like that. You can't afford to waste your precious time and resources for something that is already out there. You should carry out extensive research about the market and come up with something unique and original.
App users are not so easy to please, and they can switch their attention whenever something new and more interesting comes up. With a variety in the market, users get bored too fast. Moving to the next app, even if it's serving the same purpose, is something you won't control. So, before you can implement the app idea, you should go out of your way and find something interesting and unique. You need to keep those users engaged in your app for the longest time, and only a unique and interesting one can help you achieve that.
Conclusion
You now understand that spending time and resources before developing or launching your app is not going to be a waste of time or resources. This is one of the most critical stages of app development that you're not going to ignore if you want your app to be successful and pierce through the intense competition. You can never run away from marketing research; all you can do is learn when and how to do it.
So, have you done any marketing research on your app before? Was the process helpful or a waste? We will love to hear from you as you help other upcoming developers to grow and become successful with their apps.
Author’s BIO:
Thomas Glare is a talented copywriter and consultant in the field of online marketing. He is an expert with sales online and teaches first-time entrepreneurs how to promote their business online without big investments.
