With nearly two million apps available in the app stores, building an app that is liked and accepted by users isn’t easy. Businesses considering mobile apps for their growth have to face serious competition to stay ahead of their competitors.
Marketing strategists and business owners often face issues in choosing features for apps. It becomes quite difficult for them to decide what features are necessary for their apps because of which they end up adding too many features to the app.
But this isn’t right. Stuffing your apps with too many features can annoy your users and turn them away from it. Here, in this article, I will discuss how to manage extra features of your app.
Add Features That Solve A Problem
All apps that are successful solve specific problems. Why would users access your app if it doesn’t serve a purpose? It’s quite obvious people get drifted towards an app only if it is capable enough to solve their problems and fulfill their needs. Most businesses make an app to solve a problem or to serve a specific purpose.
No matter what type of problem you’re facing, there exists an app that can solve it. Whether you want an app like ‘Amazon’ for online shopping, a social networking app such as Facebook to stay connected with friends, or an app like ‘Uber’ to hire cabs for your travel, the app you’re planning to build must solve a specific problem.
Developers address these problems and introduce features in the app that solve a definite problem in the most efficient, elegant, and user-friendly way. So, when you’re in a dilemma of removing extra features from your app, remember to choose those features which are crucial for your app.
Anything that your app does, has to support the ultimate business goal that you’re aiming to achieve through your app. Your app features should be streamlined with the problem that your app proposes to solve. For instance, if you are building a tool for remote connectivity of businesses and employees during the ongoing work-from-home norm, make sure that your app has just enough features to compete with already existing tools and, not too much to confuse your users.
Starbucks, the world’s largest coffee chain, became a standard exemplar when it comes to mobile ordering and payments. Starbucks added a new feature ‘Mobile Order and Pay’ in its app that allowed customers to place orders via the Starbucks app and helped them skip the waiting line.
Earlier, users had to stay in long queues for buying drinks and beverages. But, with this newly added feature in the app, customers can easily order online and take away their drinks from the counter.
Starbucks also enabled users to order via Amazon’s Alexa. This feature has also been integrated into Ford vehicles. The popular coffee franchise has rolled out a Siri-like assistant app for mobile that lets customers place orders by chatting or speaking directly to the phone.
The ultimate goal was to improve the speed and convenience of users to access the app. So, as you can see, the new features in the app were added to serve a specific purpose and to solve a user problem.
Prioritize Your App Features
Let’s continue our discussion on how to manage the extra features of your app. When you’re in the development stage of your app, you must carefully monitor and prioritize the essential features of your app.
Choose features that streamline with the purpose of your app. Focus on the priorities and identify the features that help add value to your app. Make sure to select features that are relevant to your app purpose. Ensure that the features that you choose are smooth and easy-to-use after the app launch.
One way of prioritizing features when your app features are extra is by splitting your plans into two categories: ‘essential’, and ‘desirable’. The features that come under the ‘essential’ list are the core features that support the purpose of your app.
The ‘desirable’ list of app features includes the extra features that you wish to add to your app. The list of these features can be as long as you want. How many features of this list you’d want to add to your app depends on the budget you’ve decided for app development.
This, ultimately, comes down to your own judgment, and analysis. Identify the likings and interests of your target audience. Then, carefully and consistently put yourself in your users’ shoes, and embed those features in the app as per your customers’ choice.
Here is a case study of the Netflix app that offers a personalized experience to its users. When it comes to rendering a smooth user interface, Netflix with its incredible features nails it. The app provides easy-to-use navigation to users.
The video-streaming mobile app has been completely optimized for users on their tablets or smartphones. The users can access its user-friendly features easily without any inconvenience.
At present, Netflix has one of the largest customer bases in the world. With over 15 million subscribers, Netflix continues to see a growing user base, as more people stream more than ever.
Look For Quality And Not Quantity
Here is more information on what all you need to do when your app has extra features. Once you’ve decided the essential features of your app, the problem of app features being “ extra” still may not get resolved.
Most entrepreneurs and business owners often make the mistake of adding too many features to their app. This leads to great confusion among users and adds inconvenience while accessing the app. Add simple and easy-to-use features in your app to render an incredible user experience.
Resist the temptation to fill your app with plenty of fancy and extra features. Instead, focus on adding core features to your app that would help you to achieve the desired end goals.
Moreover, adding too many features to the app can affect the quality and efficiency of your app. Pay special attention to quality instead of quantity. Do not put features just because other brands in the market are doing. Choose features that would add value to your app and help boost its user engagement.
Wrapping It All
The key to creating a successful mobile app lies in the features that you choose. You need to choose features that focus on solving specific problems. No matter, how excellent and extraordinary your app features are, you need to choose only the core features that are simple and easy-to-use.
By applying these ways of knowing how to manage extra features of your app, you can easily handle your app design and development when your app features are extra. Focus on the core features, add only those features that are relevant to your app, and prioritize your app features.
Focus on the quality and not quantity. Select the features that add value to your app and solve a specific problem for your users. Do a market research analysis and study the features of other apps prevailing in the market.