What factors to consider while building a real-time messaging application?

Things To Keep In Mind While Developing A Messaging App

Let’s find out ways how to build a perfect messaging app with low apps development services budget in 2021.

Amyra Sheldon

Published in

Chatbots Life

8 min readDec 30, 2020

factors to consider while building a real-time messaging application

Developing a messaging app is one of the smartest ideas for an entrepreneur. You must be thinking why I am saying so? But, the reason is simple as the “messaging app” has proved to be a powerful source of communication among people as well as businesses.

In fact, the popularity of these messaging apps has reached its peak during pandemic times. This time has realized the importance of having such apps in our life. Covid-19 has already brought a great revolution in the digital world, and so is the messaging apps that helped people to be connected & also gave them the power to fight with this situation.

Before developing a messaging app, you must go through some valuable insights.

The following stats show tremendous growth in the demand for “messaging apps”:-

As per Sensor Tower, India(excluding Chinese apps) is the leading market for messaging apps downloads in Q2 2020, with nearly 7 billion, followed by the US with around 3.75 billion, and Brazil with 3 billion.

As per App Annie, Facebook Messenger was the most downloaded app of the year 2019, followed by WhatsApp and other messaging apps.

According to Telegram, it has reported 1.5 million new users daily in April 2020.

As per Sensor Tower’s Q2 2020 stats, messaging apps were the most downloaded & used apps.

According to the Business Insider report, messaging apps posses 20% more monthly active users as compared to social networks. It has increased the demand for mobile application development services.

As per The Wall Street Journal, approx. 36% of users are using messaging apps via two or more applications on their smartphones.

According to the same source, the count of users using the WeChat is expected to grow at $15.65 value by 2020 & Facebook’s every user will be going to worth approx. $5.

TechCrunch also presented its report by saying that the Facebook Messenger has reached over 1.2 billion people till now.

With approx. 1.3 billion WhatsApp users as of now, The Wall Street Journal announced WhatsApp to be the largest messaging app in the world. It accumulates 175 million active users daily through its status sharing.

From the above stats, it is clear that messaging apps are going to become full-fledged business tools in the coming years. WhatsApp & Facebook Messenger to pioneer in the messaging app market in 2021. They will be the most used customer service channels.

The following notes will help you in developing an amazing messaging app.

For an enterprise mobile app development, the cost is the foremost thing to be taken care of at first. An average mobile app costs nearly $5k to $55k and further depends on the features, frameworks selection, functionalities you want to add in a particular app, technologies used and the skills of the app development team.

Hence, there are some important factors to consider during the development process of a Messaging app. Let’s discuss all such factors one-by-one here:

1) Selection of the right tools & frameworks

There are a wide variety of tools, open-source frameworks and programming languages present in the market to lower down the messaging app development cost. By taking advantage of SDK tools and free-to-use code libraries, you can switch to third-party plugins in-app customization process. These are some of the most common but useful mobile app development tools that can help you create an amazing messaging app.

Some famous apps are named here: Telegram like Alpha, Corona, AppGyver, ViziApps, Appcelerator and many more.

2) Security on top priority

Security comes first when you are developing a messaging app as it involves two or more parties when a conversation begins. Secured encryption is a must in order to keep the conversation private between two parties. There will be no third party access with end-to-end encryption, and only the respective communication parties could read the exchanged typed messages.

Moreover, it is a must-have feature for all communication apps & it’s their duty to ensure high security while there is communication between the people or businesses. It ultimately diminishes the chance of data fishing by any third party.

3) Compatible with multiple platforms

A messaging app you are going to develop in this modern era should possess cross-platform compatibility, especially when it is your business messaging app. So, you can launch your messaging app, which can run smoothly on various operating systems including windows, android or iOS/mac.

To leverage this benefit, you can also hire mobile app developers who can develop your app through leading mobile app development technologies viz. React Native, Flutter, Xamarin etc.

However, choosing a cross-platform app development is completely your choice. Cross-platform compatibility gives you extreme success as it reaches a large audience of both iPhone users and android users as WhatsApp did in the past.

As stated above, “With approx. 1.3 billion WhatsApp users as of now, The Wall Street Journal announced WhatsApp to be the largest messaging app in the world. It accumulates 175 million active users daily through its status sharing. ”

WhatsApp first started from an iPhone app to Android then. Likewise, choosing a cross-platform environment would be a wise decision.

4) Features/Functionalities to add

This is the most crucial factor to consider while developing a messaging app. IT can affect both the overall app development cost and the leading success of your business app in the market. These are the features & functionalities that decide how your target users will take your business app.

First ensure to add all essential features like media sharing, voice message, video calling, user login, contact card sharing, live location sharing, beautiful emojis etc. Then, if you have a good budget, can go for advanced features like custom emojis, advanced filters etc.

Must-have features to create a messaging application:

Instant messaging
Authorization
Importing Contacts
Location tracking
File Sharing
Video Calls
Channels
Cloud Synchronization

But, if you are strict with your budget constraint, then it is OK to stick with basic features in your messaging app because an app developed with a smart idea, right technology, trending tool & cool methodology can make you win the race too.

5) Avoid In-app monetization

If you want to take your messaging app very far in the race of success, then, it would be good to avoid any In-app monetization strategy. You should create an app which is entirely free from all types of advertisements. It will not only deliver an excellent user-experience but will retain your users for long.

Hence, try to avoid In-app monetization strategy if you want to become a next super hit messaging app with awesome user experience.

6) Interactive user interface of the app

UI/UX plays an important role in the success of your messaging app. It is the only factor which attracts users at first. More than 90% of people will go for your app after looking at it once. If you have used awesome interface with good graphics, then, it will the first step towards the success of your business app.

So, don’t compare on the designing of your app as it will the first expression which can lead the success of your messaging app in the market. You can hire a top mobile app development company who provides dedicated mobile app developers. They will use excellent designs, icons, styles & colours to provide 100% customer satisfaction for your app.

7) Keep the documentation of your app idea

Protecting your app idea with a legal system is always recommended while developing a messaging application. But it can be crucial to preserve & protect your app development idea before creating the actual app.

“Success cannot be achieved on the first try, and the development process often involves many attempts, failures, improvements, and partial progress. “

Legal documentation can save your app idea. You may even need to save your attempts to a document for a time before they can be reused for future success. This is how an idea works and gets the best results.

Keep documents simple, concise, and sharp in a way that you can better understand. It will help you for future reference. Write down all your scenarios and use cases, all the combinations of layouts and widgets and colours.

List of popular messaging apps in the world (2020)

Conclusion:

We can definitely conclude that “Messenger marketing” is going to become a Buzzword in the upcoming years. This is because messaging apps have revolutionized communication between people & businesses.

Hence, it is a wise decision if you are going to invest in messaging app development in 2021 but remember to consider all the above factors. It will not only bring high revenues to your business but also give you a global recognition in the world.

For this, you can also contact a dedicated full stack mobile application development company to get such app developed in less time with no extra efforts.

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