A Tale of Three Mobiles
November 5th, 2015
Mobile App, Mobile Website and Mobile Responsive Website
The discussion of all possible aspects, pros and cons and pitfalls of “App vs. Web Development” has been flooding the developers’ community for several years, and yet does not seem to subside. What makes this topic so prolific? The answer is unexpectedly simple: it’s the ever-increasing users’ needs, demands and wishes.
We have joined this discussion earlier in the article "Native or Cross-Platform: Which to Choose?" with a detailed overview of existing solutions. Let’s make our choice for today users’ mood.
First of all, due to constant increasing of PDA device performance, the mobile version of the website has become a must these days. The key point here is that in many cases the user won’t even use the desktop version of your site (although that may also depend on the service you provide). Therefore, you should keep user experience with your mobile website as positive as possible if you want to keep the user. It’s up to you whether it will be a duplicate mobile version or a responsive website design. It should also be taken into account that numerous Wi-Fi access points and the internet provided by mobile operators allow to opt for the latter.
Once you are safe and sound with your website accessible equally easily from PC and smartphone/tablet, the question arises whether to go on and develop a mobile app for your service. Again, opinions differ so much on this point that you may feel at a loss. But the solution is quite simple: just be honest with yourself and answer the question “will the user want to have an icon of your app on his/her home screen?” The more precise question would be whether s/he would need to use it on a regular basis. If the answer is “yes”, you should go on with cost estimation for your app and work further in that direction. Otherwise, then you probably need either to think of making your service vital for the user or to give up this idea and concentrate on gaining popularity within the web and social networks.
There can be no one-size-fits-all solution, and The Tale of Three Mobiles seems to be ever going. But we can make the choice that is optimum “right here, right now” and win over the audience by catering to its needs and wishes.
Make your optimum choice with us – get a detailed case study for your service (project)!
