A Complete Guide To Custom Web Application Development: How to Find a Dedicated Vendor

Web apps are here, there, and everywhere, we use them every single day (like for example, Gmail, Google docs, Twitter, Slack, etc.). For consumers, this means convenience, while for businesses – a new world of possibilities: you have a platform, market, and audience – everything you need to give life to your ideas. In this article, we’ll give an overview of what exactly web apps are, their benefits, and the steps of custom web application development. Let’s fall in folds!

“Web app” is a mixture of 2 terms “website” and “application software”. Consequently, it possesses several distinctive features from both these digital products. To put it in a nutshell, a web app is an application that performs tasks on a web browser just like websites.

Users can get access to the web apps no matter what devices they use without any restrictions on the hardware specifications, provided that their devices have a connection to the Internet.

What benefits do web apps give to businesses?

Web apps give businesses an opportunity to reach a larger target audience base using an expansive range of platforms, without a necessity to build separate versions of the applications for all distinctive devices.

What is more, the coding for web apps is usually less elaborate in comparison to the code written for application software. The reason for this is that web apps do not require additional effort from the company to make them compatible with a large number of devices. This also helps save a great amount of time and resources for developing other core business areas.

What is a custom web app?

While all web apps can be built to provide a customized experience to users, custom web apps are tailored for a certain market, audience, or business needs. Custom web application development focuses on learning the needs, using the technology that best fits them, and developing a unique solution to solve the specific problems.

When there is a need to find the right web app company, it becomes quite complicated to evaluate and find suitable web application development services that your business requires. Thus, to make this process manageable, you need to be aware of the four major categories, which can organize the services and projects companies deliver to their clients.

Template-based web apps

These apps may not exactly be created by a web application development company in its general sense, but rather by a company that has an extensive variety of web templates (which is a collection of HTML-formatted web pages). CSS and HTML are used to create such websites. The greatest advantage is that pretty much anyone has an opportunity to create a website without the developers’ assistance.

Custom web application

Some development companies are entirely focused on custom web application development. That means that they develop a website from scratch depending on your requirements and specifications. The process of development is quite complicated, as it requires deep market research based on your target audience and business industry, developing targeted features, and creating design assets.

Custom website development is more expensive and takes more time to be built. Nevertheless, custom website development is an awesome alternative for established brands and global enterprises who are seeking an opportunity to provide a unique experience to their customers.

E-commerce web apps

The E-Commerce web apps are developed via pre-existing platforms or custom work. The software development companies they are created by can build a whole variety of e-commerce platforms, construct payment gateways, and perform many other E-Commerce functions.

Full-cycle development company 

A full-cycle development company is managing the entire web application development and typically will have different divisions for development, design, management, and quality assurance. Besides, they can create not only a website but also a mobile application and attach exclusive features, all of which demand extra maintenance.

So, what are the main steps of custom web application development?

1. Define an idea and major requirements

Every successful product development process sets in motion with establishing an idea, and there is no exception for web apps. The definition of your idea is a crucial step in the way of web app development because the idea offers a solution that can address the existing problems of potential customers.

It is supposed that businesses should carry out a detailed analysis on the target audience, market, and competitors to confirm if the idea is really feasible. With the defined idea in place, the following step is to establish the goals and objectives for the web application development project.

2. Decide on the design

It’s of utmost importance to create a template of how the web apps look before the start of the technical development. The designing of the structure and layout of the web app can enable businesses to avoid many challenges in the later stages.

The structure sketch doesn’t have to be too complex and hard to create. It is enough for it to present a transparent understanding of the elements that are situated on the app screens, the speed that users flow from one page to another, the common interactions on each page. Another key moment is to pay undivided attention to the UX/UI design and think through how everything will look and work in detail.

3. Choose a reliable team

One more important thing to note is that your web app development project will get great benefits from the assistance of a reliable dedicated custom software development team. The input from experts is worth its weight in gold as it prevents your project from getting sidetracked during the development process while guaranteeing a higher success rate for the end result.

Sometimes, it can be smarter to choose an outsourcing team for your project in order to get access to a larger talent pool as you are not limited by your geographical position and focus on the core for your business matters, while the team is working on software development. What is more, it gives you an opportunity to scale your team up and down as needed effectively and is becoming a very popular and beneficial approach during the pandemic.

To choose an experienced team for your web application development, you can read reviews from other customers, ask for case studies and success stories in your specific industry, conduct technical interviews and interviews checking their command of English, and ask to solve some complicated engineering problems. Even more tips on how to choose the dedicated team for your software development can be found in your article.

4. Start technical development

The technical part of web application development includes a mix of front-end and back-end technologies. Before starting the web apps coding, it is crucial to choose what technology stack to use, since there are actually a number of programming frameworks and languages that can be used in web app creation, and certain technologies have their own strong and weak sides in the development process. You can find more information on how to choose the right tech stack for your web application development in our article.

5.  Test

Testing gives you an opportunity to be sure that the web app once launched to the market will operate as it was intended. Generally, testing is done on several aspects: the functionality, usability, security and load testing, as well as the overall performance of the web app.

There is a common saying for each web app development team: “Never leave testing until the last minute.” What is more, the testing stage must be conducted in tandem with the development stage.

6. Manage post-deployment maintenance

After the web app has been tested and is considered to be bug-free, businesses can start launching their web apps to the market, attracting customers, and making the web apps more visible and searchable on the online service.

But after the launch, the job doesn’t stop. Frequent monitoring is an indispensable part of the app’s success, as it helps to scan for problems that may hinder the user experience.

To sum it all up, a web app is a product that inherits its features from both website and application software. For successful web application development, it is suggested that you have a concrete understanding of how the web app answers to your business objectives, plus a broad overview of the whole web application development process. What is more, a reliable team with proven competencies also plays a great role in bringing your web app idea to life. To make sure your web application will bring unbeatable benefits to your business, check the list of steps that each web application development process should include and choose the right tech stack, as well as a dedicated development team that will help you all the way.