Business requirements vary from organization to organization. Large enterprises to Small & Medium businesses to Start-Ups, their needs vary and so do the solutions respectively. Information technology is playing a big role everywhere. SMBs are leveraging the technology to level-up their presence in the global market and streamlining operations to bolster newer revenue opportunities.  The focal point of the entire system is the magnificent role of an IT / Enterprise Application Development Head who sits on the steering wheel monitoring and ensuring that the system works without hiccups. Challenges are plenty – finding what’s new in tech to adopt, IT teams are really working hard while budgets remain in checks, data remain secure and employees stay up-skilled with time.

Not easy, right? So, if you are that person who is heading application development in your organization, this story is for you! Let’s focus on your challenges and how you should tackle them-

1. Business Needs and Platform Change

Your client may change gears abruptly and demand new changes in their current landscape which requires new ideas to implement. Your current enterprise application system needs to be in the adaptive –mode where you can accommodate to these sudden types of changes & requirements. Getting the right product is what you can decide at the moment!

As you see, it’s not possible to predict many changes that are rather abrupt in nature, you need to be prepared, alarmed. How? Adopt a flexible and highly scalable architecture to your application. The architecture should be loosely coupled where components can be easily plugged & played. This is called Modular Architecture that ensures changes will impact only onto a specific module that can be modified without interfering with the functioning of other modules.

2. Coping with Evolving New Technology

There’re plenty of technologies out there, which one have you adopted? For instance, AI is commercially being deployed in almost every industry due to its high capability of doing data-driven tasks. Your competitors are moving from a traditional n-tier application architecture to a modern Micro services architectures (MSA). What about your application? Will you join this race of competing or see how your organization will be benefitting from the technological adoptions that you will settle for?!

The bottom line is – no need to try every technology rather align your IT teams with the business sides and understand the short & long term business objectives and then, plan accordingly, which technology adoption could help you achieve your goals. Moving to CLOUD is a viable option if looking for some bigger growth opportunity as you can try and test new software in a cost-effective manner and then scaling this as per your needs!

3. Moving to the Mobile Platform

Do you know that mobile has become the platform for more than half of all the web traffic today? As per a recent survey by DataReportal, 5.15 billion numbers have been the unique mobile users making up to 66% of the world’s population .So, getting MOBILE with your APPLICATIONS  is not a mere empowerment but necessity!  If you don’t, your company might lose relevance.

You should be careful while creating a perfect interface because good user experience is very critical to mobile apps. It means, users should not get disappointed due to broken apps bearing overlapping layouts. Be focused on testing part in order to get the right fields and layouts thereby fitting well onto the mobile format. Experts’ consultation is strongly recommended!

4. Cyber Security

 SMBs are the favorite targets for hackers and cyber criminals. It should be a matter of great concern for your application because you don’t have enough budget or technical or personnel expertise as compared to enterprises, to defend your system. As per Verizon- 2020 DBIR, 74% of the total data breaches of SMBs do involve external threat-actors .Adopting security best practices is the only solution before you.

In order to combat the above threats, you should periodically conduct Application Vulnerability Tests that ensures that your application, server, back-end services are secure. Stay alert, stay safe!

5. Big Data Significance

Digging your customers’ data is critical for identifying trends and newer business opportunities. You can collect their data from customer purchases, e-mail lists, social media, etc, that helps you get insight into your customers’ tastes and preferences. Data analytics tool such as HADOOP and BIG DATA can help you out.

However, you have a choice while choosing your Big data application – On-Premise or Cloud-Base. It is recommended you go for Cloud-Based Software because that gives you more scalability and easier management of things.

6. Budget Constraints

You need to go for software purchases, hardware upgrading, providing your IT team with training in security best practices, all these involve huge investment. Chances are that you may go beyond budget that will hamper your business goals. Then what to do?

Adopt best practices in mind to ensure that your budget does not get blown at all. Three things –

• Invest on technology that gives you high efficiency and productivity. Prioritize.
• Go for leasing while upgrading hardware for your application system. It eliminates upfront costs.
• Maintain your IT assets record /inventory that is regularly updated. You can plan your budget well in advance.
   

7. Resource and New Skills

Finding the right resources is an uphill task. You have to see whether they match your requirements with required technology skill-sets, have adequate experience and fall within the bracket of your approved budget.

You can give them opportunity to wear more hats across the application development system. Re-skill and up-skill your present resources rather than going for new hires unless very urgent.

So, by now you must be clear how timely and wisely adoption of relevant technology and tools can ease out your daily tasks as a responsible IT App Development Head in your organization. Getting deeper to your role, understanding your core challenges and optimizing solutions, planning & implementing IT goals, all of them substantially contribute to the overall success of your organization. Interested to get more insights into your challenges and solutions? Discover how Fusion Informatics can help you. Reach us at sales@fusioninformatics.com

Read Also – Top Mobile App Development Companies in India

In today’s world, with the increased use of smartphones, mobile applications have unique features, and thus, selecting the right mobile application development company is important for the success of the application. Mobile apps have become a crucial tool for any company as they attract the attention of customers. According to a survey by Clutch, 42% of small businesses had a mobile application and 30% of them were planning to build it in the future. All SMEs wish to have an application but they need to do proper research before picking the Best Mobile Application Development company for their app development needs. 

Here are 8 factors that you should consider: 

1. Do thorough research

If you wish to develop an application that resonates with your audience, you need to do research on consumer demands, preferences, and the current and future expected trends. This detailed research and analysis of the market will enable you with all the insights on how apps are trending according to today’s requirements. You can go through all the customer reviews of the popular apps to get an insight into the interests and preferences of your target audience. 

2. Identify your Target Audience

This brings us to the second most important aspect you need to consider. Your target audience, i.e., the user base usually decides the success or failure of the application. It is imperative that you identify the right audience base for your application. Conducting surveys, deploying tools, and browsing through online forums help in understanding the market better. 

3. Select the Right Platform

Android, iOS, and Windows are the most popular platforms for Mobile Application Development. You can always begin with one platform and then later expand to the other platforms. While choosing a platform for your application it is necessary to look for your target audience, pricing strategy, and application features so that you can proceed to build an application that is either of the native or hybrid types. 

To make things clear, let us explain what are native and hybrid apps. Native Andriod applications usually use languages like Java or Kotlin and native iOS use Swift or Objective-C along with the guidelines of a specific platform. Whereas, hybrid applications are web applications built with languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. 

4. Consider the Design Aspect

Application development companies usually focus on creating designs that are intuitive and straightforward. You need to consider these pointers while you are designing your application:

• The flow of information: The flow of information should be seamless and natural. The interaction between the user and the app should appear as though they are conversing with a human being. 
• Avoid Unnecessary Elements: Try to omit any kind of unnecessary elements that will pose as a distraction for the users. 
• Limited Notifications: It is surely important to notify your users about any new offers or changes in your app, but you do not need to spam them with notifications. This may lead to any kind of drastic step by the user. 
• Minimum input fields: Try to keep only on user input. Providing multiple user input modes can be confusing for the user and they will end up being frustrated and may abandon the app. 

5. Decide the Technical Features

You need to decide on the technical features you wish to include in your app. You have the flexibility to offer either a simple version for your basic users or an advanced version that includes all the complex functions for your high-end users. 

6. Allocate Budget and Time Frame 

Application development can be impeded by several budgetary constraints. Therefore, it is important to estimate your total budget for developing an application and allocate it to the various stages of development. The complexity of your app determines the cost of the project. The second aspect you need to focus on is the time frame required for the development. You can set deadlines so that you deliver the project on time. 

7. Consider Maintenance and Security

This is one of the major aspects you need to consider when you are looking for a company that is developing your application. The application needs to be updated regularly and bugs should be removed as they appear, content should be refreshed timely and user analysis should be performed periodically to know how the app is performing. The second most important aspect is security where you need to collect, manage, and secure whatever data you possess from the beginning of the development process. 

8. Identify Monetization Potential of the App

Mobile applications play many roles for your company where it ranges from creating revenue directly to boosting your brand presence. They may also indirectly help you in the various stages of the sales funnel. 

To enable your brand/company to connect successfully with your users, it is important that you consider the aforementioned factors while developing a mobile application. If done right, you can convert your loyal customers into brand evangelists and get the maximum profits out of it. 

If you wish to develop an application for your company, visit here.

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About Instacart

Instacart is an e-commerce grocery website which was founded in 2012. Valued at nearly 8 billion dollars, it is one of the top fast growing companies in the USA. Since the USA has 60.8% and Canada has 61.8% of the working crowd, people find it hard to take out time for grocery shopping. This is where Instacart steps in. Instacart provides same day pickup and delivery services across the USA and Canada where these services are as fast as within an hour. It delivers to more than 85% of the USA homes and 70% of the Canadian homes. 

It provides the customers an option to make purchases over the mobile application or the website platform where they get to choose from over 350+ national, regional and local retailer partners. This order is then delivered by an Instacart professional at the customer’s doorstep. According to Statista, it is estimated that on Demand Grocery Delivery Apps will overtake brick-and-mortar grocery stores in about a decade. 

Why go for Grocery Development apps like Instacart?

Grocery Development apps like Instacart support the daily requirement of an everyday household. Also, with the increase of internet usage globally, people tend to do things that require the least effort, i.e., shopping online. 

Apps like Instacart majorly follow the Rule of 4 for a successful overall performance:

1. Global Reach:

Once your business is set up, you need to start with promotion amongst the masses. The idea of a grocery store is versatile and in this era of modernization, people are mostly dependent on technology for their work. Hence taking your business through a mobile application will bring about profit and an ever increasing customer base. As the company gains fame, more retailers will want to tie up with your organization. This will make sure that you have a strong seller base and you get a great number of clients. 

2. Fast and Hassle Free:

This online platform will be available 24×7 , thus enabling you to accept orders instantly and get delivered within the minimum delivery time. The advantage of taking this to a digital platform is that customers can place orders at any point in the day and meet with their requirements from the comfort of their homes.

3. Full Transparency

Buyers will be provided with complete transparency. Unlike brick and mortar stores where the price of grocery is negotiable, prices will remain the same as the MRP or less if a discount is applied.

4. Offers and Discounts

More customers can be attracted by offering discounts. This will ensure that you have a permanent base of customers. 

How do these apps work?

These apps work on the following conjunctures to meet with the essential needs of the customer:

1. Browsing Products

It is important that users have a hassle free experience while browsing on the application. To ensure this, the user interface needs to be fast and lag free and must be RAM optimized so that it is compatible with mobile phones too. This ensures that the users can place orders smoothly without any issue.

2. Easy Navigation and Recommendation

Navigability plays an important role in a grocery development app. Clients do not want to test the customer’s patience by making them search for a particular item in the pantry. Hence to overcome with this idea, the search bar provides an apt solution to the users to quickly search for the necessary item. 

The app allows them to view a recommended list of things according to their past purchases and interests. This results in a faster checkout time, thus increasing the efficiency of the application. Apart from this, a search bar should also have the option of filtering items so that a customer does not have to scan through a multitude of products.

3. Registration and Login

It is quintessential to maintain individual customer records to avoid any problem with the delivery system. The app allows users to set up their own individual records which adheres to all security standards. To increase the efficiency, the app should be able to keep a track of user preferences.

4. Tracking and Delivery

An efficient tracking system is provided to the customers keeping in mind the idea of transparency. This allows them to keep a track of the order and create an approximation of the delivery, so that they are present to receive it. 

So, how much does it cost to develop an app like Instacart?

The total cost of the grocery delivery app depends on various factors like complexity, the platform you prefer, the cost of hiring developers, the number of countries you want to target it for, app size and design etc. 

To build it on a single platform the price can be estimated somewhere between $10,000 to $30,000. Selecting a cross delivery app may cost much more than a single platform since new features will be introduced in the app. This would attract more customers and the price to build such an app can be estimated around $50,000. 

With an average price of around $35 per hour, the cost for building an app like Instacart will start at $62,000 and increase on the basis of new features and technologies being used.

Looking forward to develop an app like Instacart? Get a free quote here!

Final Thoughts

An app like Instacart helps users to make grocery purchases conveniently from the comfort of home. The process is very simple and the delivery is fast and reliable. It solves the problem of going to a grocery shop and bargaining for the prices by providing items at a minimum price after discounts. This enables the clients to have a vast customer base and thus creating an established product name in the market. 

Recently Corporate America unveiled the 2016 Software & Technology Awards Winners on January 18th, 2017 and we are glad to announce that Fusion Informatics Limited has been awarded as the “Best App Development Company 2016”.

Being an ISO Certified and Best Quality Mark Award winning company, Fusion Informatics Ltd has been in the business of premiere business and enterprise solutions provider for mobile applications, cloud based solutions, business automation solutions, smart and wearable applications, enterprise mobility solutions and Internet of things applications over 15 years.

Of the firm’s recently winning this award, Ashesh Shah the Founder and Director of the company said “What diversifies the firm and really makes it stand out is its professional staff and commitment to innovation.” He further added that at Fusion Informatics, all our team members have several years of expertise developing customized, fully integrated systems in a variety of industrial domains. In addition, Fusion Informatics has a well-managed administrative support staff to assist in meeting clients needs.

Ashesh outlines how Fusion Informatics aims to always stay one step ahead of new developments:

1) In order to remain at the very cutting edge of new industry developments, Fusion Informatics uses the most modern development tools and technologies available on the market today. Therefore, the firm remains at the forefront of innovation with the fast evolving software development capabilities and uses of latest technologies and programming tools.

2) Through our use of best practices for worldwide software development technology, as well as our rich pool of technical talent, more then 4000+ project delivery across all verticals, we deliver the predictable quality and extremely reliable solutions as reasonable cost.

Ultimately, Fusion Informatics would like to be premier, cutting edge technology solution provider for SMEs and enterprise clients. Through its dedication to quality and focus on continuous improvement Ashesh firmly believes that this aim can and will be achieved.