Enterprises or businesses today must acknowledge and incorporate newer ways to drive efficiency and refine processes. The latest ever-evolving trends such as AI, Bigdata, cloud computing, Internet of things (IoT) automation, and cyber-security are everywhere.
Technology’s rapid pace and the trade-off between time and cost have influenced and often forced enterprises to pick up customized apps to run the organization's day-to-day business, making it easier for their workforce to deliver better.
These applications that have benefited enterprises in ways more than one are called “enterprise mobile applications”. This is different from other apps designed or app development for consumer needs. No doubt, with the increased use of smartphones, mobile app development has become one of the fastest-growing industries in the world.
Enterprise mobile application development
A glance at the app development climate around the globe is worthwhile. The bulk of the time (70%) people in the US spend on digital media comes from mobile apps. Let’s take another example. Dubai is becoming a hub of mobile app development.
The number of mobile users here is estimated to be around 9.3 million. Mobile app development companies in Dubai use the latest technologies like AI and cloud to offer the best in class service. As enterprises (>343 K) dot the bustling city of once desert land, the need for enterprise mobile application in Dubai has grown over time.
The clear advantage
A common example of an enterprise application is Salesforce which provides a unified platform for customer relationship management and offers seamless interworking within the organization’s marketing, sales, and service teams. Another one is Slack, a messaging system transforming the way organizations communicate.
So, whether it’s about keeping track of projects, increasing productivity, or simply simplifying processes, an enterprise mobile application is the right thing to go for. Depending on unique requirements, there are various popular applications to choose from. As businesses become agile, riding on enterprise applications that speed up and automate processes, brand visibility improves, leading to better ROI.
The buzz around Enterprise mobile applications
Add to it changing paradigms of work in the age of significant disruption. It is estimated that around 73% of companies will invest in enterprise mobility solutions as our daily lives get increasingly spun around mobile apps.
The Mobile Enterprise Application Market size was valued at USD 90.53 Billion in 2021 and is projected to reach USD 268.14 Billion by 2030. The expansion of cloud-based services, the exponential rise of mobile phone users, and internet penetration will be drivers of the global market in this segment.
Why should your business use an Enterprise mobile application?
1. Businesses become smarter: The way to more brilliant returns on business is achievable by introducing and using systems that bring in productivity by cutting down on less critical components and automating redundant processes. This does a lot to smoothen business operations and make and manage transactions.
2. Efficient information management: Business critical information should be accessible, retrievable, and based on principles of redundancy. Knowledge and information management should be accessible and flow unhindered across business verticals. Analysis and data modification to obtain optimal results should be as per demand. This is essential and has a direct bearing on business decisions.
3. Simplifying people management: Enterprise structural strength and success rests on efficient workers, cohesiveness through cooperation, and improving business skills. The perfect alignment of resource and business aims boosts efficiency. Businesses with customized in-house operations are better equipped to handle employee onboarding, progress, staff certification, verification, and other general HR processes that would otherwise consume time and effort.
4. Improved customer interaction: One of the biggest benefits for a business using mobile enterprise applications is altering how companies communicate with customers. The real-time access to insights and analytics facilitates a more dynamic two-way communication between the workforce at the forefront of the sales team and the potential customer, with the overall twin aim of customer delight and conversion suitably targeted. With changing customer behavior, necessitating quick business adaptability, enterprise mobile application becomes an important cog in the sales wheel.
Categories of enterprise mobile applications
A quick look into the different categorizations of enterprise apps.
Enterprise-level apps are often categorized based on the business purpose it serves. It is divided into-
1. Employee level- an app used by employees to manage communication and workflow.
2. Departmental level- These, as the name suggests, are best suited to monitor operational efficiency and aid in tasks within specific departments of an organization like marketing or sales.
3. Enterprise level- These categories of apps bind the whole business into a single unified network, right from the employees to the executives. Process automation and distribution of work with tracking facilities are achieved via this type of app.
Most apps we have listed ahead in the article would fall into one of the 3 categories mentioned above.
Let’s walk you through it. An example supporting the explanation serves best in understanding the jargon!
Different types of enterprise applications
- Enterprise resource planning (ERP): Used for routine activities such as accounting, procurement, project management, risk management and compliance, and supply chain operations and how employees must be distributed to carry it out. Example- Microsoft Dynamics 365 .
- Marketing automation: Helps in the identification of potential customers, automates the process of lead conversion into sales, and different other marketing tasks through proper scheduling. Example- Mailchimp .
- Automated billing systems: Eases the process of billing, which is often recurring, like invoicing and billing in the sales. For example- an email with an embedded link for easy payment options.
- Business intelligence: These apps collect and collate data from varied sources to throw up deep insights and actionable analytics critical to business performance. Microsoft Power BI and Tableau are good examples.
- Customer relationship management (CRM): It allows businesses to manage and nurture customer relationships and interactions, track communication, and provide insights to increase profitability. Example – Salesflare, which is a B2B sales CRM platform
- Call center and customer support: It facilitates access and interaction between customers and support over the call from a call center. Example- HubSpot's call center software.
- Messaging and collaboration systems: It enables interaction, messaging, and file sharing and brings teams together for better collaboration. Example- Microsoft Teams.
- Content management: Also called ECM, it is used to collect, manage, access, unify and store enterprise-level data and information. Example- IBM Enterprise Content Management
- HR management: It allows candidate management, tracks employee performance, provides feedback, and greatly reduces HR workload by automating processes to increase efficiency. Example- Oracle Taleo cloud, Keka HR .
- Enterprise application integration (EAI): It unites business application database and process workflows to allow seamless transmission and replication of any changes made to core business data in all enterprise applications. Example- customer insight data from the CRM can be used for targeted outbound marketing campaigns.
- Enterprise search: It allows the dissemination of data to the enterprise's internal user by collecting it from different sources, indexing it, and providing a search interface that would have otherwise been time-consuming and costly. Examples- Amazon CloudSearch, and Azure Cognitive Search.
- Project management tools: It helps enterprises meet project requirements offering ease of planning, scheduling, and execution, factoring in scope creep (costs, time, and resources) to ensure its success in achieving business goals. Example- JIRA, ITM platform.
Key observation
As evident, these enterprise apps are designed to address different areas of business. Most likely, if your business has a unified process, it can be safely said that an app exists for your business needs. These are known as off-the-shelf software. What if the existing ones fall short of your unique business needs? Well, you can always go building a custom app!
Must-dos when going for an enterprise mobile application!
What are your business goals, and how effectively would an app meet them? Also, take stock of your resource, especially the tools your business uses. How well would the new application integrate with the existing infrastructure to avoid significant interruptions? Can you leverage in-house expertise to craft an intelligible app? Or would it be prudent business sense to source it out? With such pertinent business queries answered, one can proceed toward robust app development.
We list here a set of steps to show you how to go about it
1. Neat evaluation and assessment of business goals the application will serve. It should include the expectations and requirements that would translate into application features.
2. Budgeting is another crucial aspect. The amount you allocate for the app's development needs to be figured out. This should be in sync with business requirements. It will help the development team keep your concerns in focus.
3. Write down your needs. This will sum up all the expectations and core functionality the app will meet. This will include its interaction with other apps, choice of platforms and technologies, use of APIs for third-party integration, security and data safety issues as the finished app would be deployed on employees’ smartphones and devices, and use of agile strategy influencing development phases. It’s better to work up a wireframe. All this will combine to produce a comprehensive strategy will clear-cut milestones, broken down into modular tasks with timelines.
4. Etch out the UI/IX. Take the services of an expert web designer to offer a delightful and seamless experience to end users. Pay attention to details. Include touch-points to impress and engage.
5. Go ahead with building the app and putting it to subsequent testing. The QA testing will address the stability and security concerns. Also, it’s important to incorporate feedback from employees who are also users.
6. Deployment and maintenance are the final act. Get the app installed on devices used by employees or let it out into the open market if customers (enterprises) will use it.
It isn’t over yet. Monitor the usage pattern and KPIs, and read the crash reports and complaint logs. Rectify the errors and cleanse the app's performance through these processes, which are often iterative in nature.
Choice of development partner
The very reason that the finished app will not be used by an individual but by an entire enterprise with clearly defined business outcomes makes it all the more crucial to pick a team of experts who know their task well!
Choose a development partner with a solid understanding of your business goals, in-depth expertise in delivering intuitive and scalable solutions, and offer value for money and time.
Innovation is the answer to unique business challenges. By adopting enterprise application, a business wisely chooses to remain ahead of the curve.
We at Proquantic are fully committed to offering the best solutions, backed by our team of experts who have built time-tested products. Let us know your requirements, and we assure you of a reliable, scalable application. Get in touch with our team today for a custom application.
