Thursday 29 October 2015

Strategies You Must Adopt To Improve Mobile Banking

Right from businesses, to organizations and now even financial institutions are embracing mobility in a bid to improve user engagement, and boost conversion. In fact, mobile banking has become an integral part of almost every financial institution in the last couple of years. However, they still find difficulty in providing banking services and innovative mobile solutions together.

However, using the following latest mobile strategies can help you in shaping your financial institution:



1. Streamline Your Payment Process Using Effective Mobile Payment Tool

Long gone is the time, when person to person payment was handled informally. With the continuous rise in the development of new mobile devices, users who own a Smartphone or tablets can make or receive payments quickly, even on the move. According to Forrester, “the mobile payment market will increase up to $90 billion by 2017.” And so, it is very important that your institution is utilizing mobile payment tool that helps streamline the traditional personal payment system.

For example, you can make use of PayPal to facilitate users with the ability to make payments via mobile. This will eventually help you boost user engagement rate, which eventually will help in increasing your customer base.

2. Personalize Your Customer Experiences Via Mobile App

By providing users with plenty of products and services can help you give a competitive advantage in the industry. Thus, several financial institutions are making efforts to provide solutions that help increase their customer’s satisfaction level. This is why many banks today are not just offering traditional banking services via mobile app, but are also trying to market their products and services (like car and home loans, health insurance, etc.) through the app.

However, keep in mind that many other banks are also making use of mobile application to expand their reach to a wider customer base. Therefore, you must develop an app that can provide best personalized experience for users. Luckily, you can find several renowned Android app development companies and other app development firms that help develop unique and profitable applications tailored to meet their client's specific needs.

3. Save Your Time With Mobile Wallet

Thanks to mobile wallet, you no longer have to go through the hassle of managing cash, debit and credit cards. Though, debit cards ad credit cards made people opine that they can move cashless and still enjoy making payments, the increasing usage of mobile seems to have disrupted this flow. Put it simply, the advent of mobile wallet has replaced the traditional wallet. Though, going cashless may appear the new trend, but in the distant future payments will be made using digital technology such as Apple Pay or any other mobile wallet services.

The current generation is already making use of this mode of payment, which has helped in increasing its popularity. With mobile wallet, you won't have the fear of losing your credit and debit cards, and their information (including discount coupons and utility programs), since everything can be stored directly on your mobile wallet. Despite of the advantages mobile wallets also raise security concerns. And so, using any mobile wallet service is going to a potential opportunity as well as a challenge for banking institutions.

4. Make Financial Transactions More Comforting Using Wearable Technology

Possibly, you may choose to follow the same strategies that your competitor may be using to improve their user experience via mobile banking. However, in order to stand apart from the competition, instead of doing the same things like your counterparts, it would be much better if you’ll embrace some latest technology. Current generation users enjoy using wearable devices, and thus leveraging it can provide you the opportunity to deliver great customer experience.

Wearable devices such as smartwatches and others when connected with your app, helps in delivering financial information on the move. Although wearable devices are still considered new, but their market is projected to grow, up to US$8 billion by 2018. In fact, some well-known banks in Spain are making use of Google Glass wearable technology. So, opting for such a technology will definitely place you in a good position as a financial enterprise.

5. Focus on Reducing Risks Associated With Security and Authentication

With increasing security vulnerabilities, security has become a big concern for almost every financial institution. According to the Norton 2013 Report concerning cybercrime, it was concluded that inaccurate authentication methods were the primary reason that caused maximum mobile fraud incidents. And, the worst part is that consumers aren’t taking any proper measures to protect their information against attacks those devices. For instance, people don’t bother using strong password for verification, making it an ineffective way to access critical financial information. Remember, not being able to take correct security measures in the banking sector can result in huge loss. Thankfully, biometric identifiers can help banks in dealing with such authentication challenges.

For example, you can use fingerprints to identify an authenticated user. In fact, using fingerprint for authentication is an easy and user-friendly approach compared to password since it saves you from the hassle of remembering it.

Conclusion

Nowadays, almost every business to financial institution is facing tough competition. If you run a financial institution, then it becomes crucial for adopting mobile strategies and trends that can help you run efficiently and effectively. Besides, using latest mobile trends will help in growing trust among customers and help increase ROI. Most importantly, using the mobile solutions effectively will help make the banking experience as smooth and seamless as possible for yourself and your clients.

Wednesday 21 October 2015

Ways to Create Brilliant Mobile Apps, The Easy Way

Many organizations and businesses are leveraging mobile apps to expand their reach to a wider target audience base. In fact, according to a latest report mobile users spend 52 percent of digital media time on apps. These factors clearly suggest that having an app can help in business growth. If you have planned on creating an app model, then the next thing you need to consider is choosing a suitable platform for developing your mobile application.

But there is nothing to fret, as mobile app development does not require you to become a proficient coding professional. As a matter of fact, you can easily develop your own app even with little and basic knowledge of popular web technologies such as JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. Also, you can choose to hire Android app developer to get your job done. Here, in this article, I will make you learn about a few excellent ways to build a mobile app without having to write overly complex and lengthy code.



Android and iOS remain to be the two most dominating app platforms. While you can choose to create an app using any one of these platforms, Android will prove a better choice if you want to publish the app quickly. That's because, the Android app store imposes less restrictions on publishing a mobile application compared to Apple. So, now that you have decided to create an Android app, you might be worried about writing code.

Bring Professionals on Board

You can easily find an app development company that can help meet your app development needs. However, be sure about selecting a company that is highly recognized in the industry for providing versatile services in terms of developing an app. Having years of experience in the field and continuously working on varied mobile application projects, help the Android application development company deploy results-driven solution that gives you a competitive edge over the competition.

Use a Tool to Build Your App

Another excellent way to come up with a mobile app is to make use of a tool for building the app. Fortunately, there are several tools online that gives users and developers alike, the ability to develop mobile applications in no time and without having to write lengthy code. Two excellent tools you should consider for building your app are:
  • App Press: This is a web based app creator that helps build Android, iPhone and iPad applications. The best thing about this tool is that does not require you dirty your hands with coding. Moreover, it can be used by designers as well for creating apps with good looking visual assets with its Photoshop-like UI – that helps assemble the screens using layers. Another great aspect about the tool is that it supports Amazon cloud-based service, and thus allows sharing app data without much hassle.
  • Appy Pie: This is yet another great tool for building an app, however, you are required to sign up for an Appy Pie account to use this tool. It helps in creating highly innovative app in a simple to follow a three step process that initiates with choosing a suitable app category, building the app and publishing it. Appy Pie can be used to build apps for different categories, including Business, Restaurant, Real Estate, etc. You can use this tool for building Android, Windows and iOS apps.

Conclusion

Are you looking for a code-free way to build an Android app? Well, then the above mentioned points will certainly help you accomplish your needs in the best and most efficient manner possible.

Friday 9 October 2015

Developing a mobile application: The legals

By December 2015 , the app penetration in US is touted to reach 85%. Conventional trends suggest that app usage is directly proportional to the number of smartphone owners. Therefore, with rising number of smartphone users, app penetration is not surprise. App development and distribution however, is not a cakewalk. Knowledge on the legal aspects is imperative for every organization.
We list some of the most important legal nuances involved in dealing with iOS / Android application development company.




Signing up NDA with your vendor
The most important aspect is to sign a Nondisclosure Agreement (NDA) with the vendor. As the vendor is now legally bound from going public with your data and business secrets, your business is safe. Otherwise there is always a risk that they may divulge important details to your competitors.

IP Ownership and copyrights
An app development process involves a series of smart aspects such as functional descriptions, wireframes and documentation. Paying attention to minute details in the step by step process is imperative. This provides the scope to sue the vendor in case the app is unable to fulfill your requirement. Moreover, you must clearly define the IP ownership of your app as the app vendor writes the IP address for you.

App development contract
The contract must clearly define on the SOW (Scope Of Work) by the vendor (as well as you). It should have details of the resources, how many app developers will they hire/assign for your project, what the vendor will bring to the table etc. A good measure would be addition of a secrecy clause along with others such as post sale service (and it’s tenure) etc. This ensures maximum protection at your end.

Intellectual property rights
Since your app has access to business data and secrets, you must have intellectual rights of the app. To top it all, these rights curb unauthorized access to crucial things such as source code, documentation, images etc.

Protecting yourself
You must have the knowledge of rules governing the app development, distribution and usage of the country you are launching your app in. Different countries have different rules. Moreover, you must cater to Google’s / Apple’s precise requirements in order to avoid removal from app store, or app suspension.

Setting out the legal terms
The client and app vendor must decide on things that directly influence the future development and app usage after it’s delivery. Some of the legal terms that are a must to include:

Usage terms: You must put forth some do’s and dont’s as the working basis of the app. Legal implication in the event of breach also have to be stated here.
Privacy: You must outline the nature and scope of data collected from your users and through the application and the possible uses for avoiding future legal implications. This data can be date of birth, location etc.

Terms & conditions: This is a very essential aspect. You absolutely have to disclose the financial charges associated with usage of your application. And this must be a voluntary step.
Disclaimer: In the event of unavoidable circumstance like app malfunctioning etc., you must secure immunity from the law of land.

It is important that you know of these rules before even setting out for mobile app development as once you've launched it, modifying it as per the rules can be difficult and resource intensive. A good idea is to hire an app developer who has experience and knows Google and Apple quite a good measure. Moreover, you must join hands with a good legal representative in order to avoid complications later.



Thursday 1 October 2015

Best Tips To Build A High-Performing Android App

With millions and millions of Android apps already listed on the Google Play Store, finding a niche for your Android app is definitely a challenging job. Well, it takes a lot of time and efforts to build an Android app that performs outstandingly on all renowned app stores. If you're serious about Android app development and want to build one that's able to gather applauds from users across the globe, this is a post which will tel you all. Here, you'll find some high-end, easy-to-follow tips on creating an excellent Android app that is par excellence.
  1. Know the Android market inside out
Before your kickstart with the implementation of your cool Android app idea, it is beneficial to study the Android app market. You must study the app development approaches followed by renowned Android application development companies. Plus, you also need to know the techniques for executing complete monetization of your app in addition to the things that matter to you when it comes to choosing between instant profit and a larger user base. Be sure on whether you want to release freemium gaming apps or the usual messaging apps.
  1. Get on with designing flexible layouts
Since Android is running on a wide majority of screens, it is advised to design flexible layouts that can easily stretch so as to fit the app content to the screen of the device that's being used for viewing the app. You must use “wrap_content” and “fill_parent” inside the layout XML under situations wherein you want your app's content to adapt to the screen size in an automatic format.




  1. Restrict the app screen count to 2 or 5
The key to create a successful Android app is to keep things as simple as possible. Talking in a straightforward way, you must make it a point to keep the app screen count to 2 or 5. Doing this would not only make your app load faster but would even encourage the users to explore the complete app within minimum amount of time. Prior to working on your app design project, get on with finding an accurate answer to the question “What purpose would my app actually solve?”
  1. Offline experiences shouldn't be ignored
Apps that receive maximum love from users are the ones which render an awesome user experience even in the offline mode. Therefore, as an app creator, you must give a thought to the question as to how your app would be performing in the offline mode. You should eliminate any bugs/errors that might interfere with your app's offline performance.
  1. Localization of the Android app is a must
An app that's readily available in the regional languages has greater chances of getting accepted by a global audience. By localizing your app's user interface, it becomes easier for you to 'woo' an international audience instantly. Hence, make sure to specify a configuration language along with a region qualifier that would automatically switch your app to the device's locale language.

Conclusion

Hope my simple Android app creation tips would add charm to your app development ventures and enable you to come up with a truly stunning Android app that creates new records at the Google Play Store.