Things to look for When Hiring A Good Mobile App Developer – TekRevol

THINGS TO LOOK FOR WHEN HIRING A GOOD MOBILE APP DEVELOPER

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On This Page:

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General Tips For Hiring A Mobile App Developer

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Tips For Hiring A Freelance Mobile App Developer

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Tips For Hiring A Mobile App Development Company

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How Much Does IT Cost To Hire a mobile app developer Per Hour?

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General Tips For Hiring A Mobile App Developer

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Tips For Hiring A Freelance Mobile App Developer

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Tips For Hiring A Mobile App Development Company

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Common Mistakes You Should Avoid

Whether you’re a real estate businessman, a restaurant owner, or in the logistics business, mobile app development is becoming the industry-standard, with leading businesses getting their own apps developed to improve their customer experience, customer support, and to make their businesses much more accessible.

According to this VentureBeat article, 77% of brands are looking to invest in in-app advertisements with an estimated ROI of 41%. To get similar results you should know how to find an app developer.

For businesses, this is an opportunity to leave their competitors behind and capture a larger market share within their industry.

But before you get into mobile app development, you need to know how to hire an app developer.

In this article, you will find the answers to the following questions.

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How to Hire A Mobile App Developer?

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What qualities make up a Good Mobile App developer or Mobile app development company?

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How Do You Identify The right Mobile App Development Partner For your Business?

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How Much Does It Cost To Make An App?

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How to find an app developer?

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What Are Common Mistakes You Should Avoid When Hiring A Mobile App Developer?

Now, let’s take a look at some general tips that you should remember when hiring a mobile app developer or a mobile app development company.

General Tips For Hiring A Mobile App Developer Within app development, you can choose between a freelance developer and a mobile application development company.

Regardless of this decision, these are 3 key tips for hiring a mobile app developer.

Follow these 3 tips to hire your mobile app development partner.

Look At The Portfolio When you hire a mobile app developer, it’s important for you to look at their portfolio. A freelance mobile app developer or mobile app development company’s portfolio is the best way to gain insight into the quality of their work and their experience.

By checking their portfolio, you can identify whether they match your standards in terms of quality or not to better inform your decision of hiring a mobile app developer.

Check Their Communication Skills Unless you have the development team sitting right in front of you, their communication skills are going to play a huge role in how smoothly your project is handled. Whether you choose local app development or outsource mobile app development, you should always analyze the ability of the development team and the project manager’s communication skills. This includes how clearly they communicate and how prompt they are with their email replies.

This will help you identify the mobile app developer or mobile app development company that will give you the best consumer experience and not create a hassle out of your app development project.

Assess Their Transparency Standards Before you lock down your mobile app developer, it’s crucial to understand how much they prioritize transparency. Whether you choose a freelance mobile app developer or a mobile app development company, you should inquire about their transparency measures.

Most reliable teams use Project Management tools such as Jira or Asana to provide their clients with absolute transparency at every stage of the process, from design and development to submission on the play store.

This is one of the biggest factors that you should take into account when you’re looking to hire an app developer.

Tips For Hiring A Freelance Mobile App Developer

Since freelancers are a one-person or two-person team in most cases, how you assess them is also different from how you generally assess a company that provides the same services, which in this case is mobile app development.

Here are the 3 tips you can follow to hire a freelance mobile app developer for your business app.

Look For Previous Work In The Industry Mostly consisting of a one-person team, freelance app developers offer less diversity in terms of the industries in which they have successfully developed mobile apps.

To understand if they’re a good fit for your project, it’s always a good habit to ask for an industry-specific example of their work to see if they understand the requirements and nuances of your industry and your target audience.

In most cases, a good way to hire an app developer is by vetting industry experience. If you’re looking for an e-commerce mobile app developer, then check if the developers you have shortlisted have had experience with e-commerce mobile app development or not.

Sometimes, this may not be true. For example, you might find a developer with industry-specific experience, but perhaps their apps haven’t been successful. Here, you have to subjectively assess your choices to find the best fit for your project.

Look For Freelancer Profiles On Upwork, Freelancer, And Fiverr.

If you’re looking to hire a freelance app developer, you can also check out their developer profiles on platforms like Upwork, Fiverr, and Freelancer.com.

Their profiles will give you incredible insights on the kind of experience you can expect while working with the developers, the quality of their work, the quality of their service, and their overall client satisfaction.

These can be found in the form of reviews, stars, ratings, and recommendations. Be sure to check them out to make the best decision regarding your mobile app development project.

Analyze Expertise Unless you’re a technical person yourself, you might need to research this or look for help from someone who understands mobile app development.

When hiring a freelancer, you should look into their expertise with regard to platforms, technologies, and languages.

For example, if you’re looking to hire an iOS app developer, then you should know the answer to this question, “Objective-C vs Swift – which is better for iOS app development.”

Based on this, you should look for a developer who develops apps for iOS using that programming language of your choice and can use modern technologies that go hand-in-hand with the project’s description and requirements.

Moreover, you should also identify if the freelance developer knows how to design the UI/UX of an app, or are they just a developer? Because for mobile apps, the UI/UX designing is essential, and for that, one must know how to wireframe, design, and prototype an app, let alone perform Quality Assurance Testing (QAT) and User-Acceptance Testing (UAT).

Tips For Hiring A Mobile App Development Company

Mobile app development companies are made from a combination of different teams, such as design, development, and project management. In order to hire the best mobile app development company out there, you can follow these 4 tips to help you with the process.

Look For Client Testimonials There are plenty of mobile app development companies out there. One Google search, and you’ll find hundreds of them claiming to be the “best iPhone app development company” or the “top android app development company in the US.” The truth is, you can’t take these claims on face value. This is why, every time you go to the website of a mobile app development company, check out their testimonial section.

Client testimonials are the best way to identify the quality of service a company provides. Generally, mobile app development companies will provide complete mobile app design and development services, app maintenance services, API integration services, and much more.

These client testimonials will help you identify the “best mobile app developers” from the others who only claim to be it, without providing true value to their customers.

Test Previous Apps They’ve Developed If you really want to dig deep into the quality of a company’s work, you can identify from their portfolio an app that functions closest to your idea.

You can download that app from Google Play Store or Apple App Store, and download that app to identify if the quality of that app is good enough for you to hire the mobile app development company behind the development of that app.

Test the app for functionalities, smoothness, the User Interface, and the overall User-experience of the app to make up your mind about hiring mobile app developers.

Assess Their Team Structure And Resources The difference between hiring a freelance mobile app developer vs mobile app development company is that the freelancer is your developer, and also your point of contact.

In companies that develop mobile apps, there are project managers that handle client discussions and act as a point of contact.

Despite not having a direct link to the development and design team, you can still ask for their credentials, expertise, and previous work. This can help you identify if you have senior developers and designers assigned to your project or junior team members.

This small difference can have a huge impact on your overall app quality, so make sure you get the development team that you pay for.

Conduct A Cost Analysis Cost is perhaps one of the biggest factors within the decisionmaking process. The biggest mistake you can make is to think of the cost as “more and less.�

Think of your cost as an investment. The cost of mobile app development can vary dramatically depending on the mobile app development company you hire. Based on their quality, their geographical location, and per hour rates, this cost can vary.

While apps can cost a lot to get developed while making this decision, it is also important to know how much can an app earn. Juxtapose the investment with the amount of money your app can make and assess the company that can help you develop the app that achieves your financial targets, rather than simply choosing the most expensive or the most cost-effective one.

How Much Does IT Cost To Hire A Mobile App Developer Per Hour?

The answer to how much does it cost to make an app isn’t straight-forward. It depends on the qualification of the resource and their geographical location. So let’s analyze the per hour cost of hiring a freelance mobile app developer vs. the per hour cost of hiring a mobile app development company.

Freelancer According to Accelerance, the average hourly rates of specialists in the US, Latin America, Europe, and Asia are as follows.

Title

US

Latin America

Europe

Asia

Mid-Level Developer

$132

$30

$35

$24

Sr. Developer

$154

$45

$45

$30

Lead Developer

$176

$50

$45

$30

UI/UX Designer

$79

$40

$35

$25

So if you’re looking to hire a freelance mobile app developer, the chart above can help you identify the cost you will incur upon yourself in the process. Now, these are average prices, and you can find people working below or above these ranges in all the regions.

Hourly Rates Of Mobile App Development Companies Worldwide Mobile app development companies charge for the total number of hours they spend developing an application from start to finish. This includes planning and scoping, designing, developing, and testing an app.

There is a massive difference between the costs of hiring a mobile app development company from region to region. You can take a look at the chart below to figure out the region that best fits your app development budget. iOS Development

Android Development

($/hour)

($/hour)

North America

$150-200

$168-250

Australia

$110-150

$110-150

EU,UK

$50-125

$70-150

South America

$35-120

$30-110

Eastern Europe

$25-110

$35-120

India

$15-75

$10-60

Indonesia

$11-75

$10-70

Pakistan

$15-75

$10-70

Region

At the end of the day, you will find qualified mobile app development companies both in the US and abroad, if you choose to outsource your mobile app development. Evidently, mobile app development companies are more expensive, but they also provide a team of specialists who are responsible for the individual tasks that they are experts in rather than a team of one or two who perform all of the tasks.

This allows them to be more dynamic and creative in solving problems, designing a top-notch UI, and deliver the best user experience for the users of your mobile app.

Cost Of Hiring An App Developer Based On Application Type?

When you hire a mobile app developer, the cos can also change based on the nature of the application and the features that are required to be integrated. Here’s a list of different types of applications and how much it could cost you to hire an app developer for such an app.

Type of application

Details

Basic App

Templates, payment merchant,

Development

listing, menu.

Hours

Hours

Rate

(iOS)

(Android)

(Avg.)

80-160

80-160

$75-125

Database app App Backend admin panel, stored on 150-200 170-220

$75-125

server,

Messaging app

Messages, video and audio calls, 500-800 600-1000

Development

encryption, groups

Social networking

Profiles, instant message,

app

backend admin panel,

Game App Development

$80-125

300-500 500-700

$90-150

Single-player/Multiplayer, 3D

800-

$100-

animation.

1000

1000-1500

Moreover, you can also identify the cost of mobile app development by understanding the average cost of specific features and functionalities that are most commonly found within apps. The chart below provides an estimated cost of

250

most commonly found app features that you might be interested in.

Features

Estimated Cost

Login

$1,200 – $2,000

CMS Implementation

$1,000 – $1,800

E-commerce solution

$2,500 – $5,000

File uploading

$1,000 – $1,500

Profile completion

$1,000 – $1,300

Payment Gateway Integration

$700 – 1,200

Profile editing

$2000 – $3,000

Search

$500 – $900

Basic messaging

$5,000 – 7,500

Push notifications

$1.200 – $1,500

Features

Estimated Cost

Basic admin panel: User management

$3,500 – 6,000

Admin Panel: Analytics

$2,500 – $5,500

Admin panel: Payment management

$1050 – $2350

Admin panel: Push notifications

$450 – $840

Based on these estimates, you can figure out the best possible option for your mobile app development project. Be it a freelance mobile app developer or a mobile app development company, these figures will help you identify the ones that you can afford, and whether you want to choose local app development or outsource your app development.

Now that you understand how to hire a mobile app developer and the cost of hiring an app developer, let’s take a look at different platforms where you can find mobile app developers, be it android or iOS.

Where Can You Find An IOS App Developer?

There are plenty of specialized iOS communities that you can look through to find skilled iOS app developers. Though it’s important to know that the market demand for iOS app developers is huge, which is why they are also a bit pricey. So before you hire an iOS app developer, make sure your app is the best fit for the Apple market.

To look for iOS developers, you can leverage communities such as MacRumors, iPhoneDevSDK, Stack Overflow, and iOS developer forums.

You can also look through Upwork, which provides a monthly ranking of top iOS developers and their rates, alongside ratings for you to choose from.

In order to identify if the developer you like is worth their rate, you can look through their community contributions, blogs, and their GitHub contribution and code repositories.

You should also ask developers about the libraries they work with, the technology stack they employ, the programming

language they are experts in, and a suggested feature list for your idea to identify if they are the right fit for your project.

Where Can You Find An Android App Developer?

For Android developers, you can look through platforms such as Upwork, Freelancer, Fiverr, and Guru. You can also look for leads in Google Developer groups to find Google Certified Android App Developers.

Although most Android development is Java-based, the Java vs Kotlin debate is one that might interest you. So if you’re looking for a Kotlin-based mobile app developer, then you should hire one with that specialty.

Much like with iOS, the inquiry process to assess the expertise of an Android developer on these forums is similar.

Developers should have a clear knowledge of the libraries that they can use for your project, the APIs they will need to execute every functionality you require, the process of submitting an app to the play store, and the ability to develop apps that are compatible with different Android OS versions and different screen sizes, for a great app experience.

These aren’t just plus points; these are app development essentials that many developers that you will find on these platforms won’t have.

When hiring an app developer, you should be able to assess these things to choose the best app development partner for a great end product and a high ROI for your business.

Common Mistakes You Should Avoid Thinks of this as your “not-to-do-list.” Forgetting these key points can cause significant damage to your app, it’s potential, and its success. For your business, missing out on any of these can be a huge mistake, one which you should avoid when hiring a mobile app developer or a mobile app development company.

Not Signing An NDA At the beginning of what most companies call the “research” phase or the “discover” phase, you should sign an NDA with the developer or the development company. This is to ensure that your idea isn’t stolen if the deal doesn’t go through.

You should be signing a Non-disclosure Agreement (NDA) before disclosing information about what your idea is, what you need, and what you’re trying to achieve. NDAs can be signed in both B2B and B2C exchanges. You can demand the service

provide an NDA to you, which for any top app development company is generally a standard practice, so they should have one ready on the go.

Once you sign the NDA, you can move forward with the discussion about your mobile app development project.

Not Negotiating A Favorable Payment Structure Getting an app developed is a huge investment, and you should never pay a huge amount at the top. The payment structure of an app development project should be broken down into tiers, which are more favorable to you and ensure transparency.

Take a look at this example of an app development project breakdown.

Stage

Payment (%)

Initiation Fee

$20%

Document And Scoping

20%

Alpha Phase

20%

Stage

Payment (%)

Beta Phase

20%

Launch

20%

By negotiating for such a breakdown, you ensure that you are never scammed, you get the quality of app development that you paid for, and you can afford the cost of app development without financially restricting yourself significantly since some of these phases can stretch out for a month or two.

Hiring The Least Expensive Developer Or App Development Company Sometimes, people take cost as the most important factor and just choose the cheapest offer they get from a developer or a company.

While this isn’t necessarily a bad idea, it is definitely an approach you should generally avoid. Think of your choice more in terms of value for money, expertise, and quality. Cost alone should never be the deciding factor.

This is because even if you get an app made for a very low cost if it’s not up to the required standard, the money you spent on it is going to be wasted because the app won’t perform well in the app store.

Not Establishing A Clear Scope Once you have a feature list locked down, payment terms decided, and you’ve secured the services of a mobile app development company or freelance app developer, it’s time to create a Scope of Work(SOW) document.

This document entails the budget, timeline, feature list, app flow, design references and creative brief, and any and all limitations of the development, including third-party APIs that need to be bought.

This document becomes the basis of your development and ensures no confusion, backtracking, or mismanagement from the decided scope of the project.

The lack of this document can make things appear convoluted, and memory-based and that can lead to disagreements and problems. To avoid any such unfortunate circumstances,

always create an SOW document, the creation of which is the project manager’s responsibility.

Not Taking Into Account App Maintenance Services When hiring an app developer, you should always keep in mind that the job doesn’t end once the app goes live on the Google Play Store or the Apple App Store.

In order to keep your app up and running and optimized, you need App maintenance services. Generally, the cost of app development services can vary depending on the project, but it averages around 10% of the original cost of app development per month.

So for example, if your app costs you $40,000, app maintenance services will cost you $4,000, for which you can hire either the same app developer or another one. This is a consideration you should add to your list of how to hire a mobile app developer because often people leave this for the end, and that’s a mistake you shouldn’t make.

Keep app maintenance part of your list, so that you can plan for it, discuss it with the app development partner you choose, and budget accordingly to have long-term success with your app.

A Final Checklist For Hiring App Developers In order to successfully hire a quality app development partner for your business, you can follow this checklist to make sure you make the right hiring. 

Research on your app’s requirements, platforms, and languages.

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Sign an NDA

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Conduct thorough expertise analysis by following the tips mentioned above.

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Create a Scope of Work document for your project

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Set a Budget And Timeline

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Agree upon a favorable payment structure

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Set a budget aside for post-launch app maintenance services This checklist should help you make the right decision and guide you about how to hire a mobile app developer.

For your business to succeed, it’s not just enough to have an app developed. You have to ensure that the app is of great quality, has modern functionalities and features that are revolutionizing the industry, and provides a user experience that gives your app a high user-retention rate.

This will gives your business the competitive edge it needs to evolve from a market force, into a market leader, and for that knowing how to hire a good mobile app developer is essential.