Mobile Application Development – K2B SOLUTIONS – Web Design & Mobile Apps Developement

The best ways to improve your app visibility

k2B Admin — Tue, 19 Jun 2018 10:27:36 +0000

Nobody wishes to have their app developed and get them hidden. Rather people try to display it or even promote it that their users could find them. Making it visible to your audience involves a lot of effort these days. They can either be organic or artificial. Improving app visibility artificially may be simple and fruitful for a few days, but organic results last forever.

In this post, let’s see some of the best ways to improve app visibility among users. The following techniques are literally tested and proven to be result oriented ones.

Let’s Get Started!!!

Ratings:

Ratings are the most valuable thing that every user expect before he/she could download the app from the app store. It is because every user wants to know how the product performs. A review from the existing user could help it in a better way.

Most businesses do not consider it more important as they think reviews are no way a benefit to their business. But the fact is your app review could play a lot better than what you expect. Businesses fear reviews because of the negative comments that they might obtain. In reality, we do not neglect chocolates because of the poor quality brands. Rather, we prefer high-quality brands. The same is applicable when it comes to reviews.

Here are two simple ways through which you can obtain reviews that can help improve your app visibility,

– Reward users for their reviews:

It is something hard to rethink the entire process, rather you could make use of the opportunity to trigger them to post in positive reviews. If you are application is a game, you can offer your customers reward points. These rewards motivate them to add a review to your apps. If your application something different you can make use of the strategy but with some different rewards.

– Include “Rate our app”:

Have you come across a “Rate our app” pop up when you install an app from the store? You definitely would have. Many of us ignore it. But this is a real way of improving your app visibility. You can allow your new users to identify your app and how good it performs by following this technique.

Let user’s review your app:

Apple introduced an app review method in 2014 and that became the best way for users to review a product before their purchase or usage. So by using this technique, you can allow your customers to completely recognize how your app works. This improves trust on the product that you launch.

On the other hand, people suggest their friends about the products that they have already experienced good out of it. In case, if the customer is not satisfied they neglect the product. So it is good to share your product with your customer that they find it more comfortable to decide on the product or app. It checks your confronts.

Test your in-app behavior:

The foremost question that rises about your applications is, “how is it performing among your customers?” Most of us are so much eager to know the performance of our product and that is why we happen to check them with the help of analytical tools.

These tools are not just meant to check the interaction of the product or app, it also helps you find what type of audience are interested in downloading your app, what are the expectations of your audience? On what basis they download your app? which age category shows more interest in downloading the app? and many other queries falls under this category.

With the help of an analytical tool, you will be able to analyze all the above-mentioned queries and that may help you to confirm whether your app serves all these requirements of your targetted audience. By this, you will be able to meet around 20% of your audience’s requirements and come up with a product that completely satisfies them. Further, you can compare it along with your competitive apps to enhance the performance of your application that it may excel in the competition and conquer the visibility of the audience.

Showcase your application:

This is something really more important. Many businesses assume that boarding their application on the store is more than enough. They think the description and the review column has a lot to do with the app and its visibility among the customers.

The assumption is not going work. It is really important to have a website and a banner for your application. A recent analysis has stated that a website is an online hub for an app and it can help customers to approach the website in case if they have any queries about the app. The app website should completely have the description of the app, screenshots and complete review video of the app. This helps your user to visit the website on any doubts. You can even give away the latest update of the application on your website. This may add some more credibility to your application and your business. For example: Hope you have come across Apple’s smartwatch banner, this helped the company to publicize not only the product but also its functionalities and other stuff about the watch. The same technique is recommended for a better investment in the product.

Make your app viral:

Have your heard viral circle? It is for the most part a promoting strategy to welcome your application clients to end up its advertisers. I wager you’ve found out about viral recordings on the web, which means everyone was discussing them. Be that as it may, an indispensable circle is more confused, let me clarify.

Viral circle application showcasing system:

Welcome your application clients to end up its advertisers.

When you publicize your application, your displaying materials use phrases like “Please download the application here,” “Look no further, download yourappname here,” and so forth.

This is positively not a viral promoting. If your application is setting off a reaction from customers like, “This is to a great degree cool application, so I better prescribe it to my friends!”, this would be viral yet not a viral circle. Regardless, if your application customers understand that by sharing your application they improve their own particular association, this is a viral circle.

On the off chance that your application clients realize that by sharing your application they enhance their own particular experience, this is a viral circle! >> Click to tweet

As the self evident truth, there is a recipe that portrays the Viral Coefficient. It would appear that this: VC = N x P1 x P2, where:

VC remains for a viral coefficient

N – the normal number of your application clients who are welcomed by every dynamic client of your application

P1 – the extent of welcomed clients who join and end up dynamic clients (which means they really do what you need them to: make an in-application buy or buy in to your administration, for instance)

P2 – the extent of dynamic clients who welcome other individuals.

In light of the qualities for N, P1, and P2, VC can be either more than 1, equivalent to 0 or under 1. On the off chance that your application’s Viral Coefficient is more than 1, arrange a gathering—your application is really turning into a web sensation! In the event that it’s equivalent to zero, you’re in a bad position, there is no popular circle occurring. Return to the planning phase and see what you should change in your viral methodology. Presently, if it’s short of what one, remarket your substance, and screen the circumstance intently.

Here is the manner by which you can actualize a viral circle. You should get ready for your application improvement organize. Fundamentally, you can pick one of the three noteworthy approaches to make a viral circle without gambling a dismissal by Apple.

Expanding application downloads:

Plan your application’s viral circle in the improvement structure.

Beat my scores:

This is the way that works the best for recreations, and it has very basic structure. After clients introduce your amusement, they accomplish some level in the diversion and get a specific score. At that point they send their own records to her companions and test them to beat it. Their companions get a pop-up message on their cell phones or tablets and endeavor to address the difficulty. As you may figure, these companions will take after a similar way and test different companions.

Assistance from companions:

By and by, this procedure works extremely well for diversions. This time as opposed to testing others, you make a barricade in your diversion or a troublesome level. At that point you give players the alternative to request assistance from companions.

Hop the line:

This technique works for any sort of application. You set up a line for individuals to get your application ahead of time of your application discharge. At that point you give them an alternative to bounce up in the line on the off chance that they share their line number and a message about the application on their online networking channels. This is a basic and exquisite approach to get the message out about your application before its discharge and get natural downloads. Allowed this technique will work just for brilliant applications. Look at to perceive how this procedure worked out for well known Mailbox application.

Making a viral circle enables you to develop your client base in a brief time frame and spares cash on costly CPI crusades by getting downloads for nothing. Ensure you track KPIs inside the application and each internet based life channel you’ll be utilizing to perceive what particular message or picture drives the most commitment.

Wrap up:

If you have planned to build an application for your business, you should definitely plan for its visibility among your customers and in order to help you out at such circumstances, we have introduced a few techniques that are essential for your app’s visibility.
In case, if you have already developed an application and found that there is no user interaction, you should definitely follow these strategies to make your application viral among your customers. Never miss one as these strategies are proven to be the best one to improve user interaction.

How to build a perfect PRD for your mobile application?

k2B Admin — Thu, 31 May 2018 04:51:27 +0000

Mobile apps have turned out to be the important aspect of most businesses. Understanding the need for mobile application development for businesses, business owners have started to rely on development companies. There are both established and grooming industries that seek the help of mobile app development companies.

While approaching the companies these industry owners fail to convey the exact expectation and the need for their business. This eventually results in delivering the wrong product. In order to avoid such circumstances, it is always good that the requirements are carried out in an effective manner which is through a document.

Providing a PRD would highly help developers to come up with the exact or at least a mere product. In case of any misassumption, the document can be used to clarify the doubts.

What is PRD?

PRD, product requirement document is an essential way to convey the business requirements to a mobile app development company. The document is also called the product specification document that outlines the complete requirement of a business and helps the development team from conceptualizing the content till the final stage of the product.

Now, let us have a detail view on processing the document.

What information do you need to prepare a PRD?

The business which is looking out for a mobile application needs to include the following in the PRD,

1. Business requirements
2. Technical requirements
3. Presumptions
4. Limitations
5. Submission

Business requirements:

The business requirement should be in a manner that it serves both the company and the user. Only when the business requirements are shared on the document the outcome of the product would be clear. The business requirements are meant to typically outline the product. Make sure to include the following in the document,

What is the purpose of the app and what do you expect from?
Problems that you face and that you wanted the app to resolve?
What is the vision of the product?
What are the existing aspects? what more you need? Is it an existing app or a fresh new one to be created?
How your app should serve?
What is the business model?
Are there any guidelines that the developer needs to follow?
Is it possible to reach you instantly?

Technical requirements:

The technical requirements outline the technical needs of the product to obtain the desired functionality and features. Make sure to input the following specifications to your PRD.

On what platform do you wish to run the application (iOS or Android)?
What versions of an operating system should it support?
What current services, servers or databases you use?
Do you need maintenance? Or do you need support in future?
How long do you want the app to process before an overhaul?
Do you have developer account credentials?
Is there any existing provisioning profiles?
Do you have any other credential that is required or any that is existing?

Presumptions:

The presumption is an expectation of the product. There are assumptions about the product which are based on the knowledge, experience, and the existing information. This includes the following,

The assumption about the user
Business assumptions
Technical assumptions

Limitations:

The limitation can be determined as the days that the team has to work for. Likewise, it includes scope as well as the budget. They may also include risk maintenance, resources, and quality requirements.

Submission:

On the submission of your PRD to the app development company make sure that your document includes all the technical assets and information of the app which is required for the app store submission. Declaring all these requirements in advance would make the submission process an instant one.

This may vary based on the app stores that you submit. Depending on the requirements we have phrased a few important assets and information to include for App store and Google play store.

Common assets:

Icons of recommended sizes (iOS: @1x @2x @3x images | Android: mdpi, hdpi, xhdpi, xxhdpi)
Splash screens of approved sizes (iOS: @1x @2x @3x images | Android: mdpi, hdpi, xhdpi, xxhdpi)
Screenshots incorrect sizes, in required languages
Description for the app in required languages
Search terms in required languages
List of supported devices and OS versions

Apple app store:

iTunes account access
Company/Entity Name
App Store app listing name
Keywords
Bundle ID / SKU
Demo account for reviewers
Description
Support URL
Marketing URL
Privacy policy
App category
Copyright information
Contact information
App icon (1024×1024)
App Store distribution provision profile
App Store distribution code signing identity
Screenshots (correct sizes based on devices)

Google play store:

Google Play Developer access
Store listing name
Paid/free
Short description
Full description
App icon (512×512)
Feature Graphic (1024×500)
App type
App category
Content Rating
Contact Email
Privacy Policy
Screenshots (accurate sizes based on devices)

The above-mentioned are the requirements for submission of the app on stores. You should also consider the following things while phrasing your product requirement documents.

The requirements document should be high-level. As the product is likely to change and evolve as a new information.
Do not indulge too many details and make sure that your product requirement document is flexible.

At the same time, do not be less. This might make your document under-specified. Always try to run the document with your developer team to make sure that nothing is overlooked.

Never fail to develop a document without inputs. Your team holds years of experience and insight and you definitely need to take advantage of it.

The biggest reason behind mobile app requirements document is to provide a foundation for a successful outcome. Sketching out your business and the requirements, constraints, and submissions will help your team get your project a flight. There are chances that your development team could come up with queries in spite of a well-framed PRDs. At such circumstance, it is good that you answer them or you can even add the answers to the document but make sure that doesn’t lead to miscommunication.

Wrap up:

Furnishing a perfect PRD depends on how good you follow the above-mentioned steps. These steps are just an ideology that we have come up with to help our customers or clients. Getting them well-framed is based on how you understand your business requirements.

As stated you could be more clear in delivering a perfect PRD or you might even fail. In order to avoid shortcoming, it is required to run through the document with your development team before you get them submitted.

Strategies You Need To Be Aware Of While Creating Mobile Apps

k2B Admin — Mon, 22 Jan 2018 12:27:31 +0000

Mobile apps are the perfect way of delivering your business idea to your customers. Around 3 million apps are currently existing in the market. Developing an app for your business is undoubtedly a brilliant idea that you would prefer.

By developing a mobile app you are now able to reach a wide audience. But the only drawback that hits most of the businesses is the right approach. Most enterprises fail to choose their right developer nor they fail to concentrate on the essential part of the mobile app. Either of this definitely occurs. To overcome this, I have framed a list of things to concentrate while developing a mobile app. On following these strategies for developing a perfect mobile app one can definitely be a successful mobile app developer.

Beware of these mistakes:

Stuffing features:

A familiar term “Feature rich” Is often used by most developers who add an excess of features just to grab the attention of users. This is where they fail to understand that the core functionality is lost, making experiences tough. This obviously makes the app heavier, increasing the cost and app development time. Rather, developing an app that holds fewer can help users to concentrate on the core features and improves the functional value of the app.

Failing to concentrate on target audience:

Customers are the kingpin of any business. You develop an app to satisfy your customers and allure new ones. And that is why it is required to develop a customer-friendly app. Make sure that you are creating an app that your end-user can interact better. A well-furnished mobile app with a unique customer experience will gain you more users.

Missing social media links:

People are fond of social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc., to make your mobile app more interesting among users you need to have social media links. This could avoid people from undergoing long registration processes rather enhances the overall user experience.

Avoiding analytics:

Analytics provides the appropriate data on user engagement and also provides the information on in-app behavior. The information includes daily and monthly users, the rate of detention, duration of a session and much more. This information could help you with understanding your user expectation and their requirements.

Bad user experience:

In spite of having a perfect app idea, if you fail to render it with a good user experience then the entire show would be a flop. Always try to remember the key factor while designing an app. It is obviously the SIMPLICITY. Create an app that is perfectly outlined and user-interactive. This helps users to navigate within your app in a matter of seconds. Also, confirm that your app is responsive to all devices without the flexibility issues. You can even refer from the leading apps to know about the UI trends.

Neglecting feedbacks:

Most of the times app developers fail to notice the review from their clients or users. This badly affects the growth towards success. It is good to collect all relevant information and feedback from customers and get them fixed in your app. Regular or frequent updates might create good impressions. So make sure that you redesign the app with proper feedbacks, trends and make it a better experience for your users.

Web page references:

Many apps are designed with a misassumptions that “mobile apps are an extension of a website”. This has lead to failure of app designs. Apps are meant to deliver a different and a unique value when compared to a website. So, user-experience should be well optimized for a mobile interface. It is a destructive idea if a company decides to follow website pages on designing a mobile app.

Avoiding intense testing:

Testing is the most important session that every new mobile app should undergo before its launch. This is done in order to know whether the app is free of bugs and technical obstacles. This can help with improved app performance and efficiency in delivering a fine user experience. Make sure that the app is well verified by third-party experts and try to involve experts in the testing process of app development.

App imitation:

As recommended earlier it is good to refer a leading app but copying or imitating them completely makes no sense. Every app is unique and holds a distinctive set of features. If you are trying to copy the exact features of an existing app then you will have to lose your uniqueness. To avoid this issue, you need to make an analysis of qualitative data that meet your customer needs and expectations. With this data, you can build a perfect app that can excel your business.

Make sure that you are not performing any of the above-mentioned mistakes. On avoiding all these you could possibly create a unique and a distinctive app for your business. Your app is the one that carries your business to the next level. Make sure that your app is rendered properly to your audience. When you fail to do so then you are declining your business growth by yourself.

Final word:
To make sure that you are developing an excellent and an efficient app, you can seek the help of a mobile app development company. Experts from the company can guide and insists you on techniques and technologies of latest trends. This may help you build an efficient, flexible and a user-friendly app. Do let me know your success stories.

All You Need To Know About Mobile App Trends To Kickstart 2018

k2B Admin — Wed, 03 Jan 2018 04:30:01 +0000

Hope it was a good start for you all this 2018. Wish to add some more flavor to make this New Year a better one with mobile apps. As there is increased use of mobile devices day by day, developers are trying to bring more and more advancements in Mobile Applications Development that engage users in a better way.

In this post, we are going to have a look at some of the mobile app trends before we kickstart 2018.

Let’s get started!

Mobile App Trends In 2018:

Accelerated Mobile Pages:

We all know that accelerated mobile pages are already trending and many have started to make use of it in a better way. So I decided to add it at the top of my list. AMP pages are one of the latest projects of Google in collaboration with Twitter. AMP is a sliced version of the HTML which is intended to fasten the loading time of mobile pages.

This indeed makes developers to build beautiful and lightweight mobile pages. The open-source tends to improve the publishing technology and increases the performance of web contents.
Augmented Reality Surprises Users With Its Performance:

This isn’t something new! We have experienced it right from 2016 when Pokemon go was introduced. But still, why I tend to write this? It is further expected to play better in 2018. You wouldn’t believe, even your purchases would be a better experience without having the necessity to visit stores.

Isn’t that amazing? Yes, brand companies are trying to implement this technology in order to make working and inspecting products a better experience. The same is expected to happen in online shopping. People could check their products and know how it looks and feels in reality. Eager to use this technology? Hold your expectations, 2018 is ready to surprise you much more with augmented reality.
Blockchain:

People have misunderstood that blockchain is something under bitcoin. But it is nowhere related in a way people have assumed it to be. The blockchain is a technology that is highly related to protection and security system. This technology is an unalterable ledger that records company information, which is listed as blocks.

Data tyrants find this technology to be something strange and scary as they fear that it may discharge the scope of data tampering. A legitimate business can still gear up by offering a minimal access to the blockchain.
The Bang Of Business Bots:

Business bots were something that was an elementary source which later turned up to be a wild revolution in the recent days. On analysis, it was around 2.3 million Android applications and 2.1 million on Apple’s store. But how many have engaged chatbots to make a better UI/UX services in their application? Maybe a very few.

Apps are improvising on user experiences, yet there is something required more than that. Things have to change better like playing with heartstrings, which is completely dependent on applications that need to be upgraded with perfect bot observation.
Lazy Loading An Emerging Technology:

An interesting trend that is expected to have emerged this year is lazy loading. The slow loading images could prevent users from opening the entire post and not allowing them to stay on the page for a long time. Further resulting in increased bounce rate. This is where lazy load images could help you with.

Technological experts have witnessed that with lazy loading, images load only when their turn on the page arises. Else, the page does not overload.
Cloud-Based Apps:

In spite of devices becoming more efficient and smart, people always tend to install applications that holds more gigabyte storage on devices. This is now replaced by cloud-based applications.

CISCO VNI global forecast (2015-2020), have analyzed that 90% of mobile traffic would be driven by cloud-apps within 2019 globally. And mobile cloud traffic will improve by 11 times with compound annual growth rate of 60%. Cloud-based apps exclusively attract enterprises as they are intended to resolve the data security issues essential in BYOD (Bring Your Own Device). It is always a concern for corporates to secure data in regards to employee devices that are insecure. Thus, the entry of cloud-based technology could guarantee companies on data security.
Internet Of Things (IoT):

Internet of things is not an untold story or an unfamiliar technology. Moreover, it is something that is highly practiced by most manufacturers. The integration of internet of things and mobile apps has improved significantly and indeed influences sectors such as education, automobiles, and healthcare.

On the other hand, analysts have also predicted a major change in the internet of things. Things that are existing allows managing Arduino Or Raspberry Pi on your smartphone. In this year there are lot more expected in the development of the internet of things.
Artificial Intelligence:

Apple’s Siri has gained a lot of attention from its users. The voice assistant has now turned to be a live assistant. Artificial intelligence is expected to have more impact in all other areas. As of now, enterprise companies are the ones that have so far invested in artificial intelligence, but this year it is going to be completely different.

At the same time, a recent report from International Data Corporation (IDC) states that AI market would experience a revenue growth of more than $47 billion by 2020. As the contention for AI-chips have increased globally and it is expected to be integrated with smartphones in the mid of 2018.

Final word:

It is really amazing to get in touch with you all at the very beginning of this year. As I had so much to convey on the important mobile trends of 2018. With these advancements in the mobile apps, life is going to get much better and easier. I suppose this information is much more enough to leave you inspired and help you work on your own mobile app. What do you think?

Mobile Applications are Renovating the face of Technology and the Modern World

k2B Admin — Wed, 18 Jan 2017 07:22:03 +0000

In this expanding technology boom, the wireless networks are leading us in every aspect of life. Just envisage the way mobile devices manage our lives and how they do. Nearly 72% of the people around the world own a smartphone in which nearly 90% use it for finding necessary information. The convergence of the wireless industries has made the situation where people are expecting a lot out of their mobile phones. So, mobile applications have become more popular as their usage is increasing predominantly across mobile phone users.

What is an Mobile Application

A mobile application or mobile app is application software developed to run on handheld devices such as mobile phones, tablets, personal digital assistants and enterprise digital assistants. Mobile apps are downloaded from different application distribution platforms to target devices such as Android, Blackberry, Windows phone and iPhone. Sometimes, mobile apps can be downloaded to desktop computers or laptops. Both free apps and apps with a price are available in the app store.

Mobile apps are generally provided for information retrieval and general productivity, including email, weather information, contacts, etc. The explosion in the number of mobile apps led to the creation of a large number of review and content curation sources such as magazines, online app-discovery services and blogs.

Enhance: How mobile apps play a huge role in improving your business standards?

The Need for Mobile App Development

Do you think mobile apps best fits only for branded companies? Well, then you should understand that you need to be one among them. Yes, mobile apps are a part of business development. Do you think how? Then let me answer you with some of the key points on the need for mobile applications.

Reach Your Customers At All Time:

Android applications have turned out to be something that engages people to an extent these days. People have become so crazy about applications and especially 70% of them are android app users.

You could take this chance to get your business into their hands. It is very simple to get it done. Find the mobile app development service provider or specifically an android app development company and get your business a new look. This could grab your customer’s attention.

Develop a Marketing Channel:

Apps not only provide general services but they are even capable of gathering information. The biggest benefit of using an application is,”It provides the information that your customers require”. Get your customers notified even on the simplest updates of your company. This makes them more comfortable with the services you provide.

Build Your Brand:

As it is told earlier, mobile apps could pay much better to the services you provide. You get a special notice from your customers. In spite of the competitive group around you, you get your special attention through the mobile application.

This is how biggest brands make it up with their success stories. Don’t you wish to take part? Then seek the best service from an app development agency for better results in your business.

Major Mobile Applications:

The mobile apps are available for various platforms such as iPad, iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Nokia, J2ME, Palm web OS and many more.

iPhone or iPad apps: The demand for iPhone and iPad applications is rapidly increasing and creates the necessities for businesses to think beyond personal computers. Around half a million iPhone applications are available in the apple app store and the estimated number of apps downloaded from apple app store was 20 billion.

Android apps: Android Market, also called as Google Play, is an international online store developed by Google mainly for Android devices. There were around 700,000 apps are available for Android devices and 25 billion apps downloaded from the Google Play so far.

Windows apps: Microsoft provides Windows Phone Store for users to download apps for their Windows Phone. There are more than 2 million apps available in the Windows Phone Store as per the record in October 2016.

Blackberry apps: The BlackBerry App World application distribution service provides a multitude of apps for the Blackberry mobile devices. When compared to Apple app store and Android market, the BlackBerry App store is the only store getting more revenue per app. The BlackBerry App World is reporting that there are 3 million downloads per day and the overall downloads are around one billion.

Add to your knowledge: Businesses Think SaaS Model Web Applications To Be The Best For The Future. Is It So?

As mobile application users want more fascinating things in their mobile phones, the demand for the innovative applications is extremely growing. The booming usage of mobile apps offers terrific opportunities for mobile application developers and it also supports businesses to grow. In short, we could say that we are in a year of mobility and hence the necessity of mobile phones and the mobile apps that advance mobile accessibility is tremendously increased.

Author-bio: K2B Solutions, the top-notch web design company in India, have expertise in PHP, Android, iOS, eCommerce, WordPress and more technologies. We have a very good expert team of qualified professionals who provide customized and quality web and mobile app services to our global clients.

Intel XDK – A new kid in the list of top mobile app development frameworks

k2B Admin — Thu, 20 Oct 2016 09:12:56 +0000

With the increase in the number of mobile phone users, the demand for interactive and innovative mobile applications is rising steadily. This requirement increase made the mobile app development market work day and night to fulfill the needs of the users/customers. Many app developers are focusing more on cross-platform mobile application development as this process reduces the turn around time (TAT) of the app development. So, what is cross-platform application development? It is a technique of writing a single code for an app that runs on all the leading mobile operating systems like iOS, Android, Windows and more.

Reading this article will help you get the answer for:

What is native, web and hybrid app?
What are the benefits of adapting to hybrid apps?
What is Intel XDK?
What are the features of Intel XDK?

What is native, web and hybrid app?

Clients and sometimes even the amateur developers get confused with the terms: Native Apps | Hybrid Apps | Web Apps. It is a huge responsibility of every app developers to know the difference between these apps.

Native Applications – These applications are specifically designed and developed run on a particular platform i.e. an app that is developed to run either on iOS or Android or Windows etc. They take advantage of the all the platform features using which they can work offline.
Web Applications – These apps are nothing but websites that are developed to behave just like how native apps perform. Web applications are run by web browsers and are typically written in HTML5 and CSS3.
Hybrid Applications – Hybrid apps are a combination of both native and web applications. These apps are developed using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and that’s why people normally misunderstand this as a web application. They are made available on the platform specific stores from where they can be installed and used.

To summarize, Native and Hybrid apps are installed in an app store from where they can be accessed whereas the web apps are the mobile-optimized website that looks more like an application.

What are the benefits of adapting to hybrid apps?

Hybrid apps are native but their contents are web-based, and they reap the features of both the native and web apps. Some of the benefits of developing hybrid apps are:

Many web developers prefer hybrid apps as they don’t have to have any native language knowledge and they can use the existing web development expertise.
Hybrid apps offer very generous features, feel, and animation without any limitations.
In general, hybrid apps are multi-platform i.e. they run on all devices irrespective of the platforms like iOS, Android, Windows, etc.
Hybrid apps are easier to maintain, faster and easy to develop.
Developing hybrid apps eliminates direct interface with device drivers using plugins and APIs.

What is Intel XDK?

Intel XDK is a software application used to build cross-platform mobile applications using HTML5. Web developer considers it to be the best fit for them as it offers multiple features to create an innovative and fully-functional mobile app. Intel Corporation claims this software to be the one solution for IoT applications and mobile apps development. Using the Cordova framework – the framework used by the PhoneGap application – Intel XDK runs HTML5 in mobile applications. This mobile application development software is a new kid and is different from rest of the pack as it includes the complete range of tools that supports everything from development to testing and debugging.

Intel XDK comes with ready-to-use app templates built using “App Framework” which is a JavaScript framework supported by Intel Corp. The themes developed by this framework is supported by iOS, Android, Tizen, Windows, and Blackberry. Intel XDK also supports jQuery mobile, Topcoat UI framework and Bootstrap 3. With rich feature set and clean development workflow, Intel XDK is becoming the developers’ favorite for developing high-end cross-platform mobile applications.

What are the features of Intel XDK?

Here are some of the most exciting features that make Intel XDK stand out from the crowd of cross-platform app development framework:

App developed using Intel XDK can be used by almost every platform starting from the iOS, Android, Windows, Blackberry to Tizen.
Intel XDK comes with a drag-and-drop user interface (UI) builder that makes creating interfaces easy.
This development software supports multiple UI framework like App framework, Ratchet, Bootstrap 3, Topcoat and jQuery mobile.
It supports Cordova plugin that is also used by PhoneGap. This feature opens a wide range of Cordova plugin features.
Intel XDK IDE offers a very clean and easy-to-use interface using which designing, developing, testing and building an application is made easier.
It comes with app debug and profiling options for testing app on different device configurations.
Code generator and demo apps are an added advantage of using the Intel XDK software.

Intel XDK is proving to be the best cross-platform mobile application development software as the features and support are awesome.

Take your mobile application concept to market with the Sencha Touch

k2B Admin — Tue, 27 Sep 2016 10:27:56 +0000

The world is immersed in a new era called as the mobilegeddon where everything is depending on a mobile device and related applications. The demand for innovative and useful mobile applications are rapidly increasing making the mobile application savvies more focused on building the application that meets the requirement of every user. Mobile application development frameworks are growing in number as they are helping the developer to achieve what they wanted to develop.

Reading this article will help you know about

Sencha Touch, a cross-platform mobile application development framework
Advantages of using Sencha Touch compared with other frameworks
How to get started with Sencha Touch?

Sencha Touch – Redefine the way you develop apps:

Mobile application development is equally important as that of the HTML5 based website or web application development. What happens when web development coordinates with the mobile apps development? The possibilities are becoming wider with the help of cross-platform app development frameworks. Creating a native mobile app is not that easy as it needs an in-depth knowledge of languages like Objective-C for iOS and Java for Android. Sencha Touch is a mobile application development framework used to develop cross-platform mobile apps with intuitive User Interface (UI).

Sencha Touch was designed to help web developers create a cross-platform mobile application using the HTML, CSS and JavaScript knowledge they have. It is similar to Ext JS JavaScript framework which is a developer-friendly framework. Sencha Touch is said to be the only framework that offers optimal solutions to the developers to create fast and impressive mobile applications that work on iOS, Android, Kindle Fire, and more. It comes with lots of creative and useful components that work efficiently on all types of mobile applications.

Why is Sencha Touch said to be the best?

Many enterprise companies have started preferring Ext JS over Angular as it started promising many advancements and user-friendly components. As a developer if you are looking for developing a cross-platform mobile application, then Sencha Touch will be your perfect bet and here are some of the major reason to justify using Sencha Touch over other frameworks.

1. Customizable User Interface (UI):
User-friendly UI will be a major factor when it comes to designing and developing a creative and useful mobile applications. An innovative and fully-functional user interface makes the users use the applications again and again. With lots of widgets and easy-to-use APIs, Sencha Touch offers loads of customization options to help the developers to craft an intuitive mobile application.

2. Components:
Ext JS has one of the largest components libraries when compares with any other framework present today. With a single code base, the Sencha Touch components offer solutions to the developers to create an application that fits on desktops, smartphones, and tablets. The components are used to build mobile applications that have the native look and feel.

3. Speed and Flexibility:
Users don’t care about on what platform the application is developed or what type of coding is user to develop the mobile app. All they need is an application that works at great speed without any hassle and also an app that is responsive on devices of various sizes. Sencha Touch uses the hardware acceleration to improve the performance of the developed application. Another major advantage of using Sencha Touch to develop an app is that it is flexible not only during the use but also during the development as it can be broken into elements like logic, interface and data management.

4. Data Management and Security:
Sencha Touch offers an efficient performance by splitting the data management into smaller packages like writer, reader, proxy, and store. Data security is a vital factor when it comes to mobile applications as most of the users store their personal and professional information on their mobile. Sencha Touch offers high-grade security to all the applications developed.

5. Infinite Scrolling Grid:
Sencha Touch has an unusual feature that most of the other framework doesn’t have, the infinite scrolling grid. It allows the developers to group various attributes for easy retrieval.

The advantages of using Sencha Touch is never limited to the above mentioned and has many features that are not available in other frameworks.

Get started with Sencha Touch:

Getting started with Sencha Touch is toned down into the following simple steps.

Download the Sencha Touch framework from their official website.
Extract the contents into the root folder of the development server
Using a WebKit browser like Chrome or Safari, open the example and start developing your first mobile application using Sencha Touch.

Next month on K2B Solutions blog:

Why Mongo DB is still considered to be the best?
Everything about Google Realtime API and how it is going to change the face of future
Why mobile apps over web apps? Top 7 reasons to make you clear

With the new Ionic 2, redefine the way you develop mobile app.

k2B Admin — Fri, 05 Aug 2016 09:46:48 +0000

The mobile market is on the rise since the introduction of Smartphones and its predecessors. The increase in the usage of smartphones led to the high demand for the app that helped the users with simplifying the task that they do or follow every day. The demand for mobile applications has carved the path for many aspiring techies to step into the feet of the mobile application development. Mobile applications are now categorized into two major as

Native mobile application
Hybrid mobile application

Native apps are the best when it comes to core and complicated functionalities, but hybrid application becomes the suitable choice for people who prefer to have a single application that runs on all the mobile platforms like iOS, Android, Windows, etc. Since hybrid applications became the ideal choice for many people, the development framework used to program these applications got the attention. One such advantageous for developing hybrid mobile apps is Ionic. It became a familiar framework for many developers as it gave everything a programmer needed to develop a complete hybrid mobile application. This framework is a complete open-source SDK built on top of Apache Cordova and AngularJS. It uses develop hybrid mobile applications using HTML5, CSS, and Sass. Ionic is one of the successfully praised development frameworks, and even many mobile apps development companies use this to develop hybrid apps.

Read our previous article to know more about hybrid development frameworks.

Ionic 2 – The successor of the programmer’s favorite framework:

Ionic, being the world’s best cross-platform framework for developing mobile applications, increased the pressure on the Ionic developers to program a better framework that has the most advanced features. Ionic 2 was developed to enhance the efficiency and the performance of the framework that gives the freedom to the programmers to develop an app without any hassle. It allows the developers to develop apps with simplified code and makes possibilities to build a bespoke mobile apps that competes with the other best and robust mobile applications in the market.

Significant differences between Ionic and Ionic 2:

Ionic 2 framework is same as its predecessor but is built on top of Angular 2, a popular framework used for developing advanced web applications. Here are some of the major differences between the two.

Built on top of Angular 2: Angular 2 is different from its predecessor in some functional parts of coding. It has the useful features in the table functionalities and also is speedy when compares with Angular.
TypeScript: Ionic 2 allows using TypeScript, a superset of JavaScript. This offers the ability to use the advanced features if using JavaScript. And also, it enables statical type checking and control flow analysis.
Support for Windows Universal platform: The UWP became the first class passenger in the Ionic 2 set.

Reasons why Ionic 2 is better that Ionic:

Ionic 2 is still in the beta version and has many bugs that are under development. But, many programmers consider Ionic 2 to be better that Ionic and here are the top reasons that justifies the consideration.

Structure and Organization
Navigation
ES6 Syntax
Template Syntax
Just JavaScript
Building
Tooling

Ionic 2 is showing prominent signs of being the best cross-platform mobile application framework and the developers using Ionic are switching to Ionic 2.

Important List of Hybrid Frameworks for Budding Mobile Application Developers

k2B Admin — Mon, 25 Jul 2016 12:37:08 +0000

Mobile applications development industry is going crazy as a result of the increase in the number of smartphone users around the globe. The increase in the demand has directly increased the demand for mobile application developers. Native developers always love to work on native code, but when it comes to business, native development becomes tricky as the codes have to be written for different platforms like iOS, Android, Windows, etc. It is tricky because the developers have to hard code and end up building the same app with different library sets. That’s creepy, right? Yes, of course for the development business.

To get started with mobile application development, you don’t have to be an expert with native coding as the mobile development industry is offering the various offering for the intermediates and experienced HTML, CSS and JavaScript developers. Unlike native apps, mobile apps developed in web platforms can support multiple mobile platforms.

What is a hybrid mobile application?

In simple words, the hybrid app is a simplified and mobile version of a website written in web languages like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. The major advantage of the hybrid mobile app is that they can be used on any mobile platform like iOS, Android, etc. In simple words, hybrid applications are a combination of both web and native applications. Some of the highlighted features of hybrid applications are

Integrates with the device’s file system
Can function even if the device is disconnected
Integrates with web-based services easily
Acts as an embedded browser for the betterment of the access to dynamic online content

List of Best Hybrid Mobile Application Development Frameworks:

Most common question that arises while choosing hybrid mobile application development is “Why hybrid apps are prominent?” The answer is simple. It offers a secure environment for the developer to code an application that runs on any platform. Below are some of the best hybrid apps development frameworks for the ease and comfort of designing and programming.

IONIC
IONIC is popular among many developers as it is straightforward and easy to use and also, it is said to be on of the most powerful and promising HTML5 app framework. To develop rich, user-friendly and interactive apps, IONIC has every UI components as it is developed using SAAS. It uses AngularJS to power applications as AngularJS has two-way data binding, APIs, interaction and backend services.
Intex XDK
Developed by Intel Corp., Intel XDK is a cross-platform application tool used for developing hybrid mobile applications. It comes with some templates to help the developers get started with and also supports frameworks like jQuery mobile, Topcoat and Twitter Bootstrap. This awesome framework also allows a live preview on the connected devices. Developers believe it to be the best and the easiest development frameworks.
Sencha Touch
Sencha Touch is said to be the all-in-one hybrid mobile applications development framework for developing apps for platforms like iOS, Android, and Blackberry. The best part of this excellent framework is that it provides native look and feel across all mobile platforms. The official page of Sencha Touch comes with samples that help the programmers to develop applications with ease.
PhoneGap
One might think that PhoneGap is ODD in this list, and it is of course not. PhoneGap is not a framework but it is used for packaging and releasing an app. It is based on Cordova, an open source mobile application development framework. As said earlier, the PhoneGap takes the raw code and wraps it based on the required platform. It is popular among the world of mobile applications developers.
Mobile Angular UI
Based on Bootstrap 3 and AngularJS, Mobile Angular UI is an HTML 5 based framework used for creating interactive mobile applications. Here are some of the main features of Mobile Angular UI framework
- AngularJS and Bootstrap 3
- Bootstrap 3 has switches, overlays, and sidebars
- Angular-route, angular-touch and angular-animate is available

Looking To Simplify Devices And Apps Management ? Go For Microsoft Intune

k2B Admin — Mon, 18 Jul 2016 07:05:09 +0000

The World is moving into a mobile space where the devices are getting advanced and helping everyone in almost every task. Companies are now upgrading their system with the concept of mobile devices or bring your device (BYOD) where the employees are provided with a smart device, or they can even bring their personal devices. When this happens, the cloud computing becomes the major player in the market, and that is what happening now as the small and mid-level companies have just into the cloud computing space for major turnovers.

What is Microsoft Intune?

Enterprise mobility management (EMM) is acting as the key factor for many corporate businesses to make stable process and create secured environment while on the go. Microsoft, the tech giant recently entered into the enterprise mobility management category to help corporate achieve maximum security. Microsoft Intune in an EMM software used by companies of all sizes from small, medium to enterprise companies.

Initially, Intune was used as a system to manage desktop applications and in later stages, it was refocused as a mobile or portable system management tool that began to push Microsoft Azure operating system (OS) skeptic. In simple words, Microsoft Intune is a cloud-based tool used for managing desktop and mobile devices that allow the companies to provide authorization to its employees to use company’s applications, data, information and related resources. This tool plays a significant role in the companies that deployed BOYD concept.

Microsoft Intune in a component of Microsoft’s enterprise mobility suite (EMS) that helps in improving the user productivity while securing the data and confidential information of the respective organization. It restricts access to Exchange email and OneDrive that acts as a threat to data and information theft.

Reasons to Use Microsoft Intune:

Google and Amazon have always been the leading player in the cloud space race and the recent offerings from the Microsoft with tools and services like Azure, Office365 and Intune have pushed it to the top spot in the cloud computing race. Many Windows Intune users have reported that this tool will be the priority cloud-based application which business can adopt and use. Here are some of the major reason to choose Microsoft Intune as your enterprise mobility management (EMM) tool.

Multiple accounts: Microsoft Intune is a cloud-based tool, and it can be used from anywhere. It has a multi-account console that offers a detailed summary of the current status of every linked user.
Better tracking: Intune has an administrative console that offers an insight into the hardware configuration and the software installed on the Intune-manages personal computer (PC). It helps in finding the unwanted application installed that might be a threat to the data and information breach.
Hassle-free reporting: Unlike any other tool, Microsoft Intune reports software and licenses report along with the update details. All reports can be exported to THML or CSV file for further investigation.
Central security policies: Microsoft Intune is not integrated with the active directory, but it allows the admins to monitor and distribute security policies to Intune-Connected computer and mobile devices.
Malware protection: The Microsoft Intune tool uses the same Microsoft Malware Protection Engine that comes with the Microsoft Security Essentials (MSE). This tool protects the organization’s data, and information from the viruses and even spyware while sharing the same with other MSE users.

Even though Microsoft Intune is a standalone tool, it uses the support of other Microsoft products like Office 365. It is easy for organizations to use Intune when they are already using Office 365.

Company-bio: K2B Solutions, the top-notch web design company in India, have expertise in PHP, Android, iOS, eCommerce, WordPress and more technologies. We have a very good expert team of qualified professionals who provide customized web and mobile app services to our global clients.

iBeacon Vs Eddystone: Transmission war between the small yet powerful devices

k2B Admin — Mon, 19 Oct 2015 07:33:46 +0000

Stores and businesses are competing very hard to satisfy their clients and customers and they are also implementing the current technology launches to keep things updated in business. Beacon has become one such system that – in recent times – serves every industry starting from travel to retail.

What is a beacon?

Beacons are transmitters that use Bluetooth low energy (BLE) technology to transmit tiny packets of information to the nearby Bluetooth enabled devices (Smartphone, Smartwatches, etc.). The transmission distance depends upon the device, and it varies from 50 meters to nearly 120 meters. Now, there are two major beacons namely,

iBeacon
Eddystone

iBeacon – Apple’s proud device:

Launched a couple of years back in the Apple Worldwide Developers Conferences (2013), the iBeacons were used initially in Apple stores (United States) to trigger in-store offers to the customers. Later, many other retailers started deploying this system for their stores. The information transmitted by the iBeacon has the following so that the system can identify the information accordingly.

Universally Unique Identifier (UUID)
Major ID
Minor ID

Eddystone – New in the beacon space:

Everyone was expecting Google to enter into the world of beacon, and it acted little late when compared with Apple Inc. A couple of months back – in July 2015 – launched Eddystone, an open-source, cross-platform device. It was inspired from and named after Eddystone Lighthouse on the British coast. Google also introduced a new feature called Ephemeral Identifiers (EID) that continually changes the identifiers. Because of EID, the Eddystone cannot be cloned resulting in higher security.

iBeacon Vs Eddystone – The cold war:

Beacons does the same thing – transmitting data – irrespective of their manufacturers. Both, the Apple’s and Google’s beacon have similarities and also few differences that make one better than the other. The following are the difference between iBeacons and Eddystone

iBeacons only work on iOS devices whereas the Eddystone can work on both Android and iOS. Google play services have the Nearby API that Eddystone can use and the came can be invoked via a library on iOS.
Eddystone supports multiple data packets and they have initially started with two for advertisement namely Eddystone-UID and Eddystone-URL. But, iBeacons supports only one data packet for advertising.
iBeacons doesn’t offer any options to monitor the device condition while the Eddystone has a third type of packet called Eddystone-TLM as it is a telemetry to inform about the device’s health status.
iBeacons are easy to implement whereas the Eddystone is flexible, but little complicated to code as it sends many types of data when compared with iBeacons.
Eddystone is open and available on GitHub for manufacturers and developer to help, contribute and comment on it. iBeacons are not open source and the changes stay in the hands of Apple.

Now, Google’s Eddystone is turning out to be the biggest competitor of Apple’s iBeacon and started changing the face of Beacon games. Many mobile apps are being developed to support both the beacons and even mobile app development companies are inserting their fingers to help people and organizations gain a lot from this tiny yet powerful device.

Important hacks to improve mobile app reviews and downloads

k2B Admin — Tue, 06 Oct 2015 13:10:18 +0000

Mobile apps play a vital role in the business of all sectors. Not only in business but also in people’s day-to-day life, they act more important to carry everyday tasks. Say for an example, Social Media apps like Facebook has now become an important app in almost every single mobile as it helps people stay connected while on-the-go. Likewise, many other apps act as an important key to people’s day-to-day activities.

Now, you have developed a mobile app for your business and also launched it in App Store or Play Store. After a couple of days, you come in and see only a dozen downloads. Worried and thinking of promoting it to increase the total number of downloads. Now, you start investing few dollars in social media promotion and start sharing it with your friends and family. You come back after a couple of months, and you see only a few downloads less than 500. Thinking what went wrong?

What went wrong?

You started doing it right, but there are little tweaks to make things happen. Social Media promotions all alone never work as it is just a medium to promote your app, and it is not the only medium to promote your mobile app. And overflowing social media promotions might result in creating spam bombs in your friend list.

How to increase app downloads? – Simple hacks

We – as a web and mobile apps development company – studied the top apps in the major play stores like App Store and Play Store along with their promotional behaviour. As a result of this study, we now list few simple hacks that are sure to improve the overall download of your mobile app.

Video presentation

All the major mobile application stores accept the video of your app that can be displayed on the app page. Videos are vital as it shows how your mobile app works and also improves trust in the users trying to download the app. But, while doing a mobile app video, make sure you do it professionally and with utmost standards. You can either hire a professional video editing company or a well trusted and reputed freelance video editor. Apptamin is the best example in offering app videos and few others like Sandwich Video, Explainify will also do good when it comes to app videos.

Take it to press

Content plays a vital role in almost everything. When it combines with the most powerful medium called the press, it becomes more powerful than before. You don’t have to search individual press to submit news about your app launch. Rather, there are many other platforms like PRWeb or MarketWired that helps you reach the potential press with your app release content.

Mobile app screenshots

The screenshot makes the user look at the design of your mobile application. A clean and crisp screenshot that looks professional can make users believe your app before they install. The first screenshot should be more appropriate to your application as it will the first to impress your user. For example, if the application is related to any child assistance, then use clear images portraying a child.

Discounts to impress

Offering your app for free or at a discounted price are likely to influence the users and sometimes it turns into liable downloads. CPI (Cost Per-Install) campaigns might come handy when combining it with the discount strategy. MagicSolver, Leadbolt, Tapjoy, etc. are ad networks that offer CPI campaigns and they are worth spending money. There are many app deals sites like daily deals site that help promote you app along with the steal deals.

Now, you have learnt few hacks that help you implement few processes to make app downloads successful. The most important thing to be on top of App or Play Store searches it to have better and good number of reviews. Reviews help a lot to rank yourself top and also allow the user to read the opinions of other people who used your app. Thinking how to get app reviews? The following are few tricks to improve your app’s review.

App review plugins come handy

There is a saying that,”Ask and you shall receive”. Apply the same to get reviews for your mobile application. The easiest way to grab reviews is by asking the users when they are in your app i.e. through a pop-up message prompting users to rate your app. There are many iOS and Android plugins like Appirater, Helpshift, etc. available in the market that can be installed to make users review your app. You should be careful with when the prompt should pop in as users might feel uncomfortable when it is popped up at the very first when the user opens up the app. This might result in bad reviews indeed.

Contest and direct support improve reviews

To acquire more reviews, you can use an old-school technique called contests. Start conducting contests or giveaways on popular forums and app review blogs like Touch Arcade. The winners can receive anything like iTunes credits, gift vouchers or any other like these. Running contests will impress the users and allow them to leave a positive review about your app.

If you want a good review, then the best to get is to have an awesome customer support and that to a direct chat support. The direct chat support helps the users to interact directly with the support team to sort any issues related to the apps. When this goes well, users believe your app and the related team. As a result of this, your app is sure to have many positive reviews.

These hacks and tricks are sure to be a game changer when it comes to app downloads and reviews. The result of the above tricks would be much better than any other as it helps your app and your business grow.