All successful Apps avoid these points

With millions of apps on the market, you have to make your first impression count.

It doesn’t mean it has to “stand out” make on-boarding experience unforgettable for first-time users.

If you want your app to succeed on the competitive app space, then know what really drives off a user so you can avoid app failure.

1. Ad Clutter

Consumers don’t hate ads; they hate badly executed ones.

It is apparent that ads do help generate extra revenue. However, if they are irrelevant, exorbitant, intrusive, creepy, and unpolished; then, you are at a cost of losing a user. 

Tip: Take advantage of mobile users’ unique advertising preferences. Implement ad-filters, good timing and offer a reward or incentive for in-app ad engagement. This way you are killing two birds with one stone. Plus, users won’t feel interrupted with their app usage.

 

2. Notification overload

Push notifications is a double-edged sword important for app engagement. Avoid providing meaningless, irrelevant and constant app notification. This will only increase notification disablement and user abandonment said Robi Ganguly, Apptentive.

Tip: Only provide users with relevant and important notifications. It should have a feature to filter the notifications on the basis of importance and personal choices of users.

Studies have shown that annoying messaging is among the top reasons for app uninstalls.

Intelligent messaging, in contrast, significantly boosts retention. The difference comes down to context. It’s not enough to deliver the right message; you need to deliver it to the right person, via the right medium, at the right place and at the right time.

It’s also important to recognise that, no matter how hard you try, you can never please all of your customers. You can’t control how your customers react, but you can control how you respond. Take each complaint for what it is – a gift – and use it to improve the customer experience moving forward. Identifying why customers are leaving your app is one of the most beneficial pieces of feedback you can have as a developer, and the one that has the greatest impact on retention, loyalty, and revenue.

71% of all app uninstalls are triggered by a push notification! http://www.gridnorthdesign.com/articles/annoying-notifications/

 

3. Ugly app syndrome

Poor user interface or badly designed apps are unsatisfying for users. Overemphasised creativity is also not exempted. User interface is like a joke. If you have to explain it, it’s not that good. App features need to convey its function straight to the point and should not frustrate users. Small detailing such as text alignment, wrapping, filling, font selection, lack of contrast, complicated icons, incompatible display and unresponsive design can make or break a user’s experience.

User experience design (UXD or UED) is the process of enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty by improving the usability, ease of use, and pleasure provided in the interaction between the customer and the product.

 

4. Desperate appeals

“Please rate our app” begging for ratings and reviews / Rate and reviews begging prompts are just inevitable in every app or became a commonplace. We get it, these feature influence how your app ranks in search results, and can affect downloads rates. Once is enough, twice is too much but multiple pop ups are just insane! If its really enjoyable people would most likely rate it. But according to study, most users ignore this because apps are expected to work in mint condition anyway. Worse case you would do is implemented coercion, in order to proceed or access certain features within the app. This only bothers and vexes the users which may result into a 1 star rating.

Users can get annoyed when asked to follow the company on Twitter or ‘like’ it on Facebook several times. Similarly, prompting users to give positive ratings for the app can help push downloads. But pushing the envelope too hard can result in losing customers.

Some apps even force users to rate their app before they can continue using it. Popping ‘rate this app’ or ‘follow us’ requests randomly can be annoying for users.

For example, Uber prompts for a rating when the user has successfully completed a trip. Or a gaming app can thoughtfully place the rating or follow us request when a user has unlocked a new level. There are best practices in asking for reviews and ratings that can help build traction for your mobile app.

 

5. Battery hogging

No matter how cool your app is if it’s going to take too much of a phones batter life it will more likely get deleted because users take their phone battery life seriously.

Infamous spinning loading wheel

Be imaginative and make your app engage the user, even when its doing background work.

 

6. Lengthy registration processes

The most annoying thing about an app for a first time user is entering login details. Users absolutely hate entering their login details to use the app. If you have a laborious registration process, you will most certainly lose a fair chunk of users halfway through the login process at best. Mobile phones aren’t type friendly and you want to minimise making the user type as much as you can. Use the Facebook or Google SDKs to login and register, which will reduce it to a two- click process. If you must have your own login, make the process as easy as you can; two or three details at the most.

According to a survey conducted by Appiterate, 68% of users said they hit delete because they found the registration process too cumbersome.

Registration is a good way to access personal information of users for future customisation needs. Asking for needful details during the registration process is understood but sometimes mobile app developers ask for details that aren’t directly related to the app’s main functionality.

This will simply irritate the user and can result in instant uninstall.

Social logins do bypass the long registration process but users don’t want the app to post on their walls, get access to their contact list, share or like something on their behalf – so be careful about that practice. Collect only as much information as is necessary to deliver an experience to the user, not because you require the data for your own uses.

 

7. Persistent bugs

62% of users delete a mobile app because it crashed/ froze/ displayed an error. Users have a low tolerance for buggy apps – only 16% will try a failing app more than twice.

So if your app is too slow to launch or freezes often, there are chances your app won’t sustain on a user’s phone for long. Similarly, apps that use too much of phone’s memory or consumes a lot of battery, prompt users to uninstall the app.

 

8. Free apps which ask money for everything

Your app was free when the user downloaded it, but then every feature inside the app is paid. Too many in-app purchases without enough value in the free app, can be harmful.

Users might be willing to pay an additional fee for premium services, but they expect the essential functionality of the app to work without a purchase.

Mobile app developers shouldn’t get too greedy and mislead the users by giving the app for free and then doubling up on the in-app purchases. Greed isn’t always good, and certainly not in this context.