In case, you are in the process of developing an app, it’s crucial for you to validate your app idea to understand if you have a product that will make a difference in people’s lives. Moreover, app idea validation is a crucial step of knowing if your app is worth investing or not.
Since everyone relies upon multiple applications for day-to-day life, when we talk about today’s marketplace, there are thousands of apps or more already available and the number is constantly growing. So how will your app idea stand out in this intensely competitive space?
How is your app idea going to help people solve their problems and provide value out of their investment? Or if you have an idea, which you think is good enough to provide value, what is the next best step or Way to Validate Your App Idea?
Well, in this article, all of your above queries are answered in-depth and hence, keep on scrolling down to read how.
App Idea Validation – What, Why and More
App Idea Validation is a crucial stage your project manager takes you through (no matter what software development project it is), which must not be taken for granted in any scenario when it comes to your product or app development and for gathering the potential sales. Moreover, Validation term is defined as recognizing or affirming something that is valid or worthwhile or valuable enough for investing your time, energy, especially money.
And hence, through this step of App Idea Validation, you would want to make sure you are developing a product, which is worth the value of people’s time or energy or money.
What are the Stages or Strategies to Validate Your App Idea?
In order to start with the validation of your app idea, here are a few queries mentioned-below, which play a very significant role in coming up with a business plan. Moreover, you will be able to go through the actual process of app creation with the right choices or options, which will be beneficial in the long run for the overall business.
So without further ado, let’s dive into these queries right away starting with your potential users.
Who are your Targeted or Potential Buyers?
Well, the understanding of your potential buyers or targeted customers is really important while you are in the process of developing your app. You won’t certainly put or invest a huge amount of money, time or energy into a product or app or something that people won’t be interested in buying in the first place. Moreover, the early product adopters can provide you with a fair idea on what’s working and what’s not, and what changes could be done for specific audience via feedbacks.
In order to make people invest in or download your application, it’s crucial that you target the right people depending upon what your app has got for the specific audience. Not everybody downloads just any app, which they don’t even need. Apart from that, apps are downloaded or invested in when there is a need to do so.
And hence, finding as much information as possible about users through analysis and then targeting the potential buyers will help in sustaining your app in the long run.
Does your App Solve User Problems? What problems do they face?
As I mentioned earlier, the actual process of product development largely depends on how much it is needed and by what people, what problems do people have in combined and how could your app be useful in providing a solution for a specific majority dealing with the same or similar issues on a daily basis. For example, if we talk about the Facebook app, it was built for people to stay connected with each other no matter where they were years later.
And hence, there are so many apps such as Netflix or other, which have been specifically created to solve some problems that the majority of the audience was initially facing. Coming to my personal experience, I don’t get any value out of watching daily soaps on TV, which I get out of Netflix by watching a hell load of useful stuff like documentaries, web series and more depending upon my own preferences at any time of the day.
Apart from that, market validation via Facebook, Quora, Twitter, Google surveys, etc. could help you in getting user feedback to understand their problems better and provide them with the exact solution with your app, which they are looking for at other places.
So it’s all about putting your time, money as well as energy into something and getting the required value and use out of it. And if your app has an idea behind, which is made to specifically target a problem and relieve pain, you are good to go.
Read Also: Best 20 Mobile App Ideas to Consider in 2020 for Start-ups
What Solutions can you Offer for your Customer’s Problems?
Once you figure out the problems your target customers are going through, it’s now time to start working on developing a solution, however, you will have to make sure the solution you are planning to provide is way better than your competitors in the marketplace. And hence, it’s equally crucial to keep an eye on what offer your strongest competitors are putting up in front of the customers while you are in the process of validating your app.
Understand the difference between their and your product. It could be cost, certain features, design or anything. Moreover, apart from the competitor’s analysis, user feedback (good or bad) is something that is powerful enough to provide you with perfect validation results.
SWOT Analysis of your App
In order to get success in any of your business, it’s crucial that you have the complete knowledge of your product, which includes the analysis of its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT). Moreover, this analysis of your product will help you stay in the game for a longer period of time.
What’s your Plan of Generating Revenue?
It doesn’t matter if a business or product is big or small, it has to generate revenue to stay longer in the marketplace. Apart from the investment that will be required before starting with the development of the app, it’s crucial for it to sell enough to its potential customers to create enough revenue, which could be done via multiple ways such as:
- eCommerce app in order to sell products,
- In-app purchases,
- In-app advertising,
- Subscription-based apps (such as Netflix),
- Paid app downloads, and more.
- Moreover, your competitor’s analysis, will help you select which out of the above or the combination of these would be the best option to monetize your app and earn revenue.
Have you planned to Use Metrics? Which ones?
Knowing how well your app performs (apart from the user star ratings) is a crucial task and a little difficult one because no matter how hard you try, you can’t be sure about the revenues it will generate. The use of metrics in the app validation largely depends upon factors such as the app’s revenue model, target customers, type of app, etc. and it can change with the change in these factors. However, there are a few metrics that have been acknowledged globally, which include the following:
- The satisfaction of the user
- Retention rate
- he average revenue per user
- Session length
- Hours of use per month
- Number of active users
Mind Mapping
So you are done with your app idea evaluation, what you should be doing next? Well, the very next step now is to develop a mind map.
Moreover, a mind map is a result of sorts, which is a flexible process and hence, during coding or design, modifications can be done easily. Moreover, a good example for it is agile methodology or lean methodology used by companies during the app development process, which could include the direction or division of the process into iterations or organized visualization for boosting the overall execution speed.
MVP or Minimum Viable Product
Development of an MVP or Minimum Viable Product, which is not a completed product and consists of least required features for testing it out, is the very final as well as the core step for the process of validating your app idea. With the required functions as well as usability, it doesn’t require a huge development cost and is perfect as a final step of app idea evaluation and validation in the market.
Final Words
Although validation is crucial for mobile app development, it is a continuous process considering the updates and modifications required during the various stages. However, the validation of an app idea can save you a lot of money in the long run.