5 Steps to find the right mobile app development company for my app

Finding the right mobile app development company in USA & India amongst thousands of companies is no easy task! You need to know what exactly to look for.
When I started off, I was also confused whether I go to an app development company or find a freelancer using Upwork or freelance or just hire developers in my company to build my app. After exploring every option, I arrived at a simple 5 step guide to choose an app development company for building my mobile app.

Step 1: Search using Trusted Sources

There are millions of sites that claim to help you find the right mobile app development company or partner, but based on my experience I have found Clutch.co, Goodfirms.co and theManifest.com to be the most reliable sources.
There are 1000s of providers listed, you can blindly pick anyone that is in the range of Top 100-200 from these app development company reference sites. Here you would get to know about a mobile app company’s size, pricing, history, clients, expertise and most importantly reviews.

Step 2: Positive 5 Star App Development Reviews

A company which gets consistent 5 star reviews from their clients must be doing something right. So default first to seek quotes from companies which have only 5 star reviews. Its the safest way to identify an app development company. Though, there are some clients who just don’t like to give perfect reviews, so don’t fixate yourself to a perfect rating but good ratings help. Use Google Reviews, Clutch reviews or other site reviews and not just the reviews on some app development company’s website.

Step 3: Ask for latest client references

The best way to confirm any assumption is to talk to any existing user i.e. in this case an app development client. But please ask for only recent client references, especially for the projects for which the app development company is claiming as reference links. Don’t just collect the reference, call one of the references. People are really NICE, so never hesitate to reach out. In your reference call or email, just ask for 2 Strengths and 2 Improvement Areas. Some clients even though give a 5 rating, have some insights into the way the app development company works and the improvement areas can help you understand if there are any quirks which do not match your operating style.

Step 4: Check links for last 3 app development projects

Always, I repeat Always!, collect links for 2-3 recent projects. It does not matter if a company has done 100s of projects, what an app development company has delivered recently is what matters. It tells:

• what best practices they are following
• what is the code quality and performance standards of the product
• what is the latest UI/UX practice they are following
• what is the app store and play store compatibility for devices

In Step 3, I told you to check for references, if they give you references for these recent projects, it would be much better because as I said “More Recent The Better”

Step 5: Validate Project Management & Delivery Approach – Agile & DevOps

Transparency is the best way an app development company can deliver. If someone says they are transparent in their delivery does not mean, they are! Ask them

• if they follow Agile Scrum Development practice
• if they will give you a demo every 2 weeks
• if they will ask you what features they should build every 2 weeks
• if they will send a demo version for you to test every 2 weeks
• if they will allow you to join their Daily standup meetings
• if they will send you weekly project updates

Agile Management is just one way to ensure an app development company is transparent. If you really want best in class ask for DevOps! DevOps is a practice to automate majority of your app’s development, be it:

• Automated one click deployments to dev, test or production
• Automated App testing or
• Automated server and infrastructure scaling

Knowing that a potential app development company is following the best practice just assures you that they got you covered.

Follow these simple rules, to find the right partner for you. If you want, I am open for quick chat over email or zoom call to guide you. After hiring 3 app development companies, then 3 free lancers and finally forming my own company there is a lot of experience or stories I can share ;). You can also hit us up on our website for more details.