Mobile app developer in Palm Beach CountyEarn the Spot on the Home Screen
Epic Wolf is a West Palm Beach agency that plans, designs and builds mobile apps for businesses in Palm Beach County and beyond, and tells clients plainly when a mobile website or web application would serve them better. A mobile app is software installed from the App Store or Google Play. It is worth building when customers or staff will use it often.
Mobile app development
Most businesses that ask for an app need something smaller. An app has to be found in a store, downloaded, kept and opened again, and people keep very few. If customers deal with you twice a year, a fast mobile website will serve them better and cost far less to build and maintain.
An app earns its place when use is frequent or the phone itself matters. Members of a club in Boca Raton booking courts and dining every week. Boat owners at a marina checking service and fuel. Field crews logging jobs with photos where coverage is poor. Loyalty for a restaurant group with locations from Delray Beach to Jupiter. In those cases the icon on the home screen is the product.
The build is only part of the project. Apple and Google each run a review process with their own rules, accounts have to be opened in the company's legal name and every update goes back through review. We plan for the stores from the first day, because an app that cannot be approved is not finished.
What it includes
App or web decision
A frank assessment of whether the need calls for a store app, a web application or a better mobile site.
Feature scope
A first release limited to what users will do most, written as screens and actions.
Interface design
Screens designed for thumbs, small type sizes and one-handed use, tested on real phones.
iPhone and Android builds
Apps for both platforms where the audience calls for it, with one shared back end.
Back end and admin
The server, database and staff admin screen that the app depends on.
Store accounts and listings
Developer accounts opened in your company's name, with store pages, screenshots and privacy declarations prepared.
Review and release
Submission to Apple and Google, responses to reviewer questions and a staged release.
Updates and support
Fixes, operating system updates and new versions handled under an ongoing plan.
Send us what you want the app to do and who would open it every week.
We will tell you whether it belongs in the app stores or in a browser and what a first release would include.
What to know
The rules behind mobile app development
- Apple verifies the company first
To enroll in the Apple Developer Program as an organization, Apple requires a legal entity with a D-U-N-S Number and does not accept DBAs, fictitious business names or trade names. The legal name is shown as the seller on the App Store. The person enrolling must have authority to bind the company.
- A wrapped website will be rejected
Apple's guideline 4.2 on minimum functionality says an app should include features, content and an interface that make it more than a repackaged website, and that an app which is not particularly useful, unique or app-like does not belong on the App Store. That is the test to apply before budgeting.
Source: Apple: App Review Guidelines
- Privacy policy and account deletion
Apple requires every app to link to a privacy policy in its store listing and inside the app. If the app supports account creation, guideline 5.1.1 says it must also offer account deletion within the app. Both need to exist before submission.
Source: Apple: App Review Guidelines
- How payment has to work
Apple's guideline 3.1.3(e) says that when an app lets people buy physical goods or services consumed outside the app, it must use purchase methods other than in-app purchase. Digital content and subscriptions fall under Apple's own in-app purchase rules. The category your sales fall into shapes the whole checkout.
Source: Apple: App Review Guidelines
- Google Play needs a business identity too
Google Play requires a D-U-N-S number to create an organization developer account and says an account for an organization cannot be created without one. Open the account as the company, not under an employee's or a developer's personal name.
Source: Google Play Console Help: Required information for a developer account
- Data practices are declared in public
Google requires all developers with an app published on Google Play to complete a Data safety form declaring how the app collects and handles user data, and a privacy policy is required to complete it. Apple likewise requires privacy details, including the practices of third-party code, to submit new apps and updates.
How the work runs
Test the idea against the stores
Before design, we check whether the app has a reason to exist beyond a website and how its payments and data will be treated under Apple's and Google's rules. Some ideas change shape here, and that is the cheap place for it.
Release a first version to real users
A limited app goes to a group of your customers or staff through the stores' testing channels. What they open, ignore and ask for sets the roadmap.
Launch and keep it current
We handle store review, publish and then maintain the app as phone operating systems change. An app is a commitment, so support is planned and priced from the beginning.
Questions
Mobile app development questions answered
Build a mobile website unless people will use it often enough to keep an icon on their phone. Websites need no download, are found through search and cost less to maintain. Apps suit frequent use, push notifications, offline work and features that depend on the camera or location. A useful test: if a customer would use it less than monthly, they will not install it.
You need an Apple Developer Program membership in your company's legal name, which requires a D-U-N-S Number. The app needs a privacy policy, privacy details declared in App Store Connect, a way to delete any account it lets people create and a demo login for Apple's reviewers if it has account features. It also has to offer more than a website in a wrapper.
Usually yes for a public audience, and not always for an internal one. Customers carry both kinds of phone, so releasing on one platform leaves part of your audience out. For staff tools, the company can standardize on the devices it issues. Building for both does not mean paying twice, since much of the work, including the back end and design, is shared.
Your company should. Apple displays the account holder's legal name as the seller, and both stores tie the app, its reviews and its users to the account that published it. If the app is published under a developer's account, moving it later requires a transfer and cooperation. Enroll as your own organization and grant your developer access as a team member.
Expect ongoing cost every year the app is live, driven by four things: store program memberships, hosting for the back end, updates required by new operating system versions and store policies, and fixes or features your users ask for. An app that is never updated eventually stops working well or falls out of compliance with store rules. Budget for upkeep when you budget for the build.
Keep reading
Go deeper before you decide
- Website vs Web App vs Custom SoftwareHow to tell whether your business needs a website, a web app or portal, a CRM, a mobile app or custom software, and when to buy instead of build.
- What Does a Website Cost in Palm Beach CountyPublished market ranges for a business website plus what drives the price: page types, content, ecommerce, integrations, software and ongoing costs.
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