5 Ways to Decide if Your Business Needs a Mobile App

In the digital era, a mobile presence is critical for businesses to attract, retain and communicate with customers

With so many consumers now using their mobile devices to interact with businesses, it is imperative that companies are properly set up to meet customers' needs. The questions many business owners ask when deciding whether to go mobile is whether to create a dedicated app for their brand or develop a website that is mobile-friendly.

Michael LaVista, CEO and founder of Web application development firm Caxy, outlines five steps to take when choosing which way to go:

• Unless the product uses a phone feature — such as the accelerometer, GPS, contacts or push notifications — then you don't necessarily need a mobile phone app.

• If a business is determined to take advantage of the phone's capabilities, then it must consider its audience when designing a mobile app. If a business's budget is limited, it may need to choose just one platform, such as iOS, Android, Windows or Blackberry. This might require some market research about which devices a business's customers typically own. There are some tools, such as PhoneGap, that allow businesses to develop for multiple platforms at once, but there are trade-offs with those. Read more...