It can be one thing to sketch out an app idea on a piece of paper and completely different to make a thriving app business out of it. There are only a few handfuls of apps that actually make a mark in people’s lives and find a place in their handsets for the long haul. Very often, we see budding app businesses with a magnificent vision of the app product that they firmly believe in, but a horrifying absence of an objective approach.

We at Promatics, are a team of seasoned app development professionals. We have served numerous business clients with well-tailored app products to capture their target audience in the most effective ways. Over the years, we have learned that the best bet an app business has it to build an app product or service that meets customers’ needs.

In the post ahead, we attempt to explain the process of how you can tailor your app idea to fit the desired market:

Step 1# Product/Market Alignment: The Concept of Target Market Analysis

In order to tailor an app idea to make it fit into the desired market, it is important to conduct an initial analysis of your app’s target audience. After the initial review, businesses can work on a raw app concept and hone it into a real opportunity to generate sales and extract profits. A product/market fit canvas can be described as a table that features columns for customers and products, respectively. The product column elaborates on how an app fits the markets as described in the customer segment.

A canvas can bring out the strengths and weaknesses of an app idea, highly the scope for improvement. It can be used to build a buyer persona during the pre-launch state of the app and to find the competitive edge of the app later on. Even during the beta testing stage of an app, the canvas can be used to discover critical metrics for the app product to work out an adequate business strategy.

Discover the potential of app products and leverage on the opportunities to explore new market niches for it!

Step 2# Find the Market Gap

Very often, businesses come up with app ideas that replicate other app ideas in the market or the ones that are not doing a great job at solving the problem. It is best to study the competition at the idea stage that can help them refine their own app ideas. Study metrics like pricing, app experience, USP, ideal buyer, etc. for the game in the market. Configuring the market gap will help you tailor your app idea to be the perfect fit for your target audience and work wonderfully in your favor.

Step 3# Begin with a Minimum Viable Product Only

Chaos is undesirable, and when it comes to app products, it can be a deterrent to the engaging app experience. While most fresh startups assume users will love their product, they enthusiastically build on various platforms, make elaborate marketing plans, and lay waiting in hopes of shiny revenue without much validation at all. Sometimes, they integrate gamification, social networking, and even e-commerce into their app products in hopes of garnering maximum profits out of it. The rule, however, dictates: Never push a ‘too much’ product to the market by offering multiple functionalities, as the chances of users ending up confused are higher in such cases, which can lead to high abandonment rates.

Begin with a minimum viable product and then build off it later on after knowing what exactly a user thinks of it. This is how businesses can succeed in bringing a well-tailored app to the market. Save the branching out and introducing new features for later stages and focus on the core functionality, to begin with.

Step 4# Remain Flexible to Fit into the Demands of the Desired Market

Given the intense competition, market recognition doesn’t come easy for an app product. If you are a business that intends to take the leap ahead but is blank on how-to, let ‘flexibility’ be your big-ticket to fame. Flexibility might as well be your competitive edge in a market that’s flooded with options for a target set of audience.

Offering your target market well-tailored app experience also means catering to what they precisely require. Allow your customer’s certain liberty to choose what they want. Be it features, prices, or versions, a certain degree of flexibility never goes unappreciated. Flexibility guarantees a ‘personalised’ experience for users, which is likely to be a hit with customers.

Step 5# Analyse a Customer Journey in Great Detail

After narrowing down on your target customer type, you must study the customer journey closely to unearth the things they want and need when they discover, use your mobile app. Such knowledge will help you prioritize these “moments that matter.” These may be their pain points, and focusing on these may fulfill their needs or solve their problems. Analyze the customer journey to figure out what your customer values and then work on proving your value in the first ten minutes of their usage journey. Seek direct input or suggestions from supporters or prospective customers. This will help you develop new iterations of the initial app offering. Spur your app into a new avatar on the basis of feedback from the followers. It’s best to stay attuned to customer expectations.

Step 6# Perform a SWOT Analysis from a Competitor’s Perspective

As you work incessantly to offer a product that is better than everything else in the market, take time out to “step into someone else’s shoes.” This gives you a completely different view of the market and the customers you intend to serve. Conduct a SWOT analysis from your competitor’s perspective. After enlisting the basics like strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and strengths move on to consider what actions you should take to beat your competitor. Working on your own inadequacies helps in making your application more compelling than the competitors.

Step 7# Choose an App Platform that is Fit for Your Desired Market

Pick out the app platform that caters to your target audience in the best possible ways. Primarily, you need to understand the differences between the Apple App Store and Google Play Store. It is common knowledge that iPhone users feature a large chunk of high-income groups. However, Android users across the globe outnumber iOS users. Additionally, it is far easier to develop an app for the Android platform, given the limited restrictions and barriers. Comparatively, the iOS store allows developers to build apps quickly and in a cost-effective manner.

Figure out which kind of device does your target segment prefers and leverage that to build your app product. Some businesses decide to develop apps on both platforms simultaneously. To escape the gigantic budget requirements that spring up in case of developing two distinct apps, they often settle for hybrid apps. Hybrid apps work on both Apple and Android devices and are based on a single piece of code.

Step 8# Understand Current Needs of the Target Segment and Foresee Future Ones

Adequate research helps you learn about the needs of your customers. Spend time with customers doing initial research, analyze where competitors fail to solve problems, and focus on major emerging trends in the industry. While you build a product that succeeds in solving a significant pain point that a customer faces, it’s better to keep a long term perspective and have a view of the direction in which the industry as a whole is moving. This way, the app product you offer is likely to be a better offering for your target segment than what they already use.

Conclusion

It is important to tailor an app product to make it into a perfect fit for the desired market. Such understanding stirs the developers in the right direction and helps them gain a competitive edge. Our team of seasoned professionals helps businesses bring their app idea to realistic fruition by following all the steps detailed above. We work with businesses of all sizes and from all kinds of industries to bring app products to the market that are instant hits with target segments. We hope these tips help you iterate and adjust the app in accordance with the needs of your target audience.

We welcome app ideas, redevelopment projects, and collaboration opportunities for app development in all the streams. If you have any queries or doubts about our processes and practices, feel free to write to us, and someone from our team will get back at the earliest.

market fit

How to Tailor your App Idea to Fit the Desired Market