Technology has come as a blessing in disguise in making our lives peaceful and happy. The advancement of technology has opened up floodgates of opportunities for entrepreneurs and has effectively brought fun & innovative ways in the way we do our daily chores. The limitation of communication or the physical challenge to move our jaws and lips to generate sequences of words has also been successfully overcome by mobile apps. Wonder how? Ohh, yes, there are speech therapy apps now available on Google and Apple’s Playstore. Are you excited to leverage technology for developing a speech therapy app? Here is your best read. Do share your views on the blog, and if you are convinced with the concept of speech therapy app development, ring our number.
Speech is for communication; if you face trouble communicating, you feel limited. Speech makes us eligible to interact socially and grow to outshine in the circle. However, people facing speech and language challenges like aphasia, articulation difficulties, non-verbal autism, learning disorders, or physical disabilities need help to convey their needs. And there comes into the picture, a speech therapy app.
Speech therapy app development is a pragmatic way of resolving the speech difficulties an individual faces. Speech therapy apps are a great entry in the healthcare sector and a panacea for people struggling with the challenge. In this article, we will share details of speech therapy app development, its importance, and the cost to develop speech therapy applications.
What is Speech Therapy? Why is it important in current times?
Speech therapy is a process of treating communication difficulties in adults, teens, and kids. Patients suffering from communication difficulties along with Aphasia, Apraxia, Dysarthria, Lisping, Speech Delay, Stuttering, etc., can have therapies using a speech therapy app.
It can be a short as well as long process depending on the patient’s interest and nature. A person who is suffering from strokes or autism might take longer to get cured with speech therapies.
It was quite surprising to know that almost 5% of kids aged between three to seven go through a speech disorder. This disorder usually lasts for a week to 12 months, depending on the kid’s condition. Also, there are nearly three million people who suffer from stutter.
All these numbers are sufficient for you to consider building a speech therapy app.
Coming to the importance of speech therapy:
- First and foremost, speech therapy aids in communication. It’s like giving a voice to the ones struggling with it. Speech therapy apps can also assist individuals in learning a language.
- People undertaking speech therapies can enhance their social and vocabulary skills. They can feel confident participating in social events and be more open about their life.
- In the same way, speech therapy can also help in reading which is again an important part of effective communication.
- It reduces dependency and helps patients understand what others are saying.
- In all, speech therapies can bring positivity to one’s life, eradicating frustrations and disappointments.
What do speech therapy apps involve?
Speech therapy involves various activities like picture identification, book reading, talking, language games, and sound exercises. The application helps patients learn various letters and pronounce words in sequence to form a sentence.
It depicts the tongue and jaw movements that help patients in pronouncing words. Speech therapy apps help in increasing awareness, and patients can effectively use language for communication.
Some of the popular speech therapy apps to take inspiration from are:
Speech therapy apps use various technologies like voice recognition and machine learning to provide a convenient way of learning a language, signs, and gestures. Most popular speech therapy apps include,
Splingo:
A great app to encourage children to learn and listen to a language in a fun way is offered by Splingo. This app has an interesting concept of aliens and spaceships that enhances children’s interaction. Splingo is one such app that focuses on nouns, verbs, prepositions, and adjectives learning. The sessions are designed at various levels to entertain kids of various age groups. The complexity of the levels goes high with the increase in the age group. Level 1 starts for children older than 18 months, level 2 for children aged between two to three years, level 3 for children of age three to four years, and level 4 for children older than four.
Speech Tutor:
Another interesting concept of speech therapy that uses 2-D animated movies is offered by Speech Tutor. The 2D animated movies let the patient know the sound of language without the use of the tongue.
The app consists of around 132 animations, and users can select each from the list to view the video. Speech Tutor also provides tips from licensed speech and language pathologists. The app is available on iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. This is also a great app to take inspiration from for developing a speech therapy app. Also, the business model for the speech therapy app Speech Tutor is interesting. It charges $19.99 for one screen and $49.99 for two screens, an SLP-friendly screen, and a parent-friendly screen.
We will not go into the details of more speech therapy apps but would name a few for your knowledge.
- Conversation Therapy;
- Articulation Station;
- Naming Therapy;
- Little Bee.
What features should be included in speech therapy app development?
A speech therapy app needs to be designed by experts. An expert who has knowledge of the healthcare industry, the norms, and the mobile app development process. If you have hired mobile app developers, make sure that they guide you in the right direction. Talking about features, the necessary features of the speech therapy app are:
Seamless onboarding:
Show instruction and slides wherever necessary to guide users for an effortless onboarding experience. Design a registration form that asks minimal but important questions required for users to have a good speech therapy experience.
Voice recognition feature:
A specially designed speech therapy feature by speech-language therapists is this feature. The therapists input audio and visual inputs to boost kid’s efforts in learning a language.
Rewarding system:
Speech therapy might take time which can lessen down the patient’s interest. However, a rewarding system will encourage patients to keep learning & practicing more.
In-built payments:
If your app facilitates in-app purchases, you need to incorporate payment gateways allowing a seamless transaction from the app itself. Again, your prospective app development company will help you in deciding which payment gateway is best for an app of this type.
In-built chat & call:
Users using the speech therapy app may face difficulties while communicating with the trainer. Allow them to chat or call the speech therapy experts directly and gain necessary guidance.
Customer support:
Your valuable users may face problems while using the app at any time of the day. If you can’t resolve the issue instantly, you are compromising on the application’s brand name. Hence, offer them customer support services and guide them through the solution.
In-app videos:
You can include a video feature to explain to users about certain difficult pronunciations and sentence formation.
What platform can you target for speech therapy app development?
Speech therapy is an advanced concept offering many benefits to the users & entrepreneurs. You can target platforms such as iPad, Smartboard, Chromebook, Computer, Android, iPhone, and more.
How to monetize your speech therapy application?
There are multiple ways in which you can generate revenue by building your speech therapy app. Say, for example, you can launch a freemium model or opt for an in-app advertisement to generate money. We have talked about each of the monetizing ways in detail in one of our blogs. Please read it for your easy reference.
What is the cost to develop a speech therapy app?
With all these advanced technologies and features incorporated, you might be wondering that speech therapy app development cost will break your bank. But, don’t worry about it. Speech therapy app development is a low-cost affair that can be accomplished within a budget of $25K.
However, this estimate may vary from app development company to company, their location, hourly rates, total working hours, UI/UX design, number of platforms you target, features, etc.
You may consult us with your expectations and how you can outshine entirely amongst the competitors.
Wrapping Up:
Mobile app development and the mobile app design process is an interesting concept to dig into. If you have a keen interest in articulating your own app, please get in touch with us. We will explain every single step in detail so that you can be an equal participant in the process.
Our industry experience and skills will give you room to think of innovative and out-of-the-box implementations of the app. Thank you for investing your time reading this. All the best!