At Dogtown Media, we specialize in mobile app development, grounded with expert knowledge in the internet of things, fintech, medical tech and user interface design. We are determined to take on your next project and create an app that will help your business grow.

Clutch, a company that publishes unbiased reviews of B2B companies, has featured us once again in a recent press release of top California mobile app development companies.  We’re excited to share that we have been featured highly in their directory list of the top mobile app developers in California. This honor adds to our previous recognition as a top California Mobile App Development Company on DesignRush.

Clutch’s ranking algorithm takes many pieces of information into account when displaying companies on their directory pages; the most important part of Clutch’s ranking algorithm is client reviews. To date, we have received over 20 positive reviews. Our clients aren’t shy to share their successes with Clutch:

“Dogtown Media developed a solution for a project considered impossible to do in the tech world.”

“They were extremely responsive and supportive and I never felt like I was working on anything on my own.”

“Their work has made my life easier by automating features in the app that I was doing manually.”

In addition to our feature on Clutch, we were also mentioned on their sister-site, The Manifest.  We are pleased to announce that we were listed as one of the top mobile app development companies in the world on The Manifest.

Here at Dogtown Media, we are ready to improve your business by creating vital apps that will allow your business to access your consumers at all times.  Our team will work directly with your business to assess how to stand apart from competitors as well. We look forward to taking on your next project!

Each year, Clutch publishes a press release naming the top service providers within certain industries. We’re proud to announce that Clutch has named Dogtown Media among the world’s leading mobile app developers this year.

We’ve also been listed on Clutch’s sister website, The Manifest, a B2B news website that helps buyers through the process of selecting a vendor. Manifest also ranked Dogtown as one of the top app development companies in the world.

Founded in 2011, Clutch is a Washington, D.C.-based research firm that leverages unparalleled market insight to determine the leaders across numerous industries. With unbiased case studies, industry trend analysis, and business market comparisons, Clutch’s data-driven platform allows clients to find and connect with top-tier companies who can solve difficult challenges.

Clutch’s directories adhere to this meticulous, data-centric approach; it’s organized to list the most credible firms first. Credibility is gained by attaining client testimonials and market presence. Essentially, the directories allow potential buyers and clients in need of partnerships to visualize their different options with a holistic perspective of each company.

Check out some of the reviews we’ve received so far below!

Webdam is a digital asset management software company. We re-developed their platform from the ground up. Here’s what they had to say:

“Dogtown Media’s work was a massive improvement from the previous app version and received high praise from customers… They were extremely responsive and supportive, and I never felt like I was working on anything on my own.”

We also got the opportunity to help the University of Oklahoma improve its app with more student-centric functionalities and geolocation capabilities. Here’s their feedback:

Another client required an app for the University of Oklahoma. Here’s what they had to say:

“Dogtown Media’s expert team inspires confidence throughout the project by communicating clearly from the start. They bring creative ideas to the table at a reasonable value… Their work has made my life easier by automating features in the app that I was doing manually.”

The past few weeks have been surreal for Dogtown Media. Recently, we made the Inc. 5000 list of the fastest growing companies in the United States for the second year in a row. Not long after, we were honored again by being included on Clutch’s list!

Both are incredible awards we couldn’t have imagined attaining when we first started developing in L.A. in 2011. We’d like to give a big thanks to Clutch, Inc., our team, clients, and community — none of this would be possible without you.

From humble beginnings as a mobile app developer in Los Angeles, we’re extremely proud of the work we’ve accomplished so far and we’re also very excited to see where the future takes us. We can’t wait to create more amazing mobile experiences for the world to enjoy.

If you have an idea but don’t know where to begin, reach out anytime — if you can dream it, we can build it!

Growth on a Global Scale

Since San Francisco-based App Annie only analyzes new installs of apps (excluding re-installs, updates, and re-installs on new devices), the growth is considerably massive. All in all, smartphone users downloaded 27.5 billion new apps total on Android and iOS in the first quarter of 2018.

Google’s Play Store led the growth, accounting for over 19.2 billion new installs, with the largest market growth in India, Brazil, and Indonesia. Apple’s App Store hit over 8.2 billion new downloads, with the largest growth in the U.S., Turkey, and Russia.

Still Much More Potential

Even though Apple’s users have spent more money with in-app purchases, Android is catching up there too. App Annie counted money only from paid apps, in-app purchases, and in-app subscriptions (excluding revenue from advertising, third-party offers, or m-commerce (i.e. Uber or Groupon)).

Gaming experienced major market growth, with games like Fortnite and PUBG Mobile launching high-quality gaming apps to supplement their major console versions. Mobile shopping also saw a big growth, as retailers continue investing in their own apps to drive mobile purchases.

The Play Store alone had its largest growth in music, audio (like podcasts), and entertainment apps; Spotify, Pandora, and Slacker were among the popular picks. Apple’s App Store saw the most growth in health and fitness apps, but who’s to say those New Year resolutions won’t drop off as the year goes on? We’ll have to wait and see if in-app subscriptions for tracking calories and weight loss maintain their strong growth.

What apps have you downloaded recently? It’s historically been difficult to persuade consumers into delving back into the App Store unless they’ve bought a new phone recently. But these numbers suggest that this could be changing.

Augmented reality (AR) has come a long way from being a subject only discussed in social circles of the San Francisco developer community. With the help of Pokemon Go, AR broke into the mainstream spotlight. But while everyone’s excited for its future, many are wondering — where does it go from here?

Some Very Real Obstacles

AR is quickly becoming the main driving force of the AR/VR market. But there are a few obstacles impeding its growth into a major platform for the mass market. Separated from other technologies, AR has no dedicated device that affords us a substantial battery life and dynamic connectivity to integrate with our day-to-day lives.

Sure, there are headsets, but these are either limited physically by an actual cord or a limited battery life. Because of these limiting circumstances, AR has remained as a sort of niche in the developer community. Even when the tech aspect is put aside, it’s easy to see why organizations and businesses haven’t given it much thought: monetization remains an elusive accomplishment.

Game of Phones

Before Pokemon Go, the concept of using a phone for AR had not yet entered the mainstream. After the game’s release, it became apparent that mobile phones fulfill some of the requirements for the AR industry to flourish. Of course, it didn’t fit the imagined goggles we were so sure would be the main vessel to experience AR through. But phones did provide decent battery life and the much-needed connectivity for AR to be adaptable.

Both Google and Apple recently released AR development kits, ARCore and ARKit, respectively. Couple this with the fact that the latest smartphones place a larger emphasis on AR capabilities than previous iterations, and it sounds like AR is well on its way to tackling the lack of a development community. But in reality, these efforts are laying down the foundation for a developer community to form.

The probability that this community becomes a reality actually depends on, you guessed it, money. With the wild success of Pokemon Go, it makes sense that most for-profit ventures into AR development focus on gaming. It’s one of the only “tested” markets for AR, new content can be easily accessed by the masses, and many different apps can be made in this category. This, in turn, opens the opportunity for an actual AR app economy to form which in turn drives more development… you get the picture.

Money Drives Development Drives Money

Whether you think AR is a novelty or not strictly depends on your view of its current position in the technological ecosystem. Of course, AR has made its debut in a few other mobile arenas, like retail and real estate. But until another monumental success like Pokemon Go occurs outside of gaming, this niche will keep on driving AR until another breakthrough happens. Branding is one of the most promising venues for AR to grow in; the impact that AR could have by providing unique experiences is hard to quantify, but it gives businesses invaluable assets: your attention and memory.

Regardless, dedicated AR adoption is still quite a ways off. Exactly how far off depends on where the money and following tech talent go; when the perfect balance of viability and profitability is struck, then and only then will we see dedicated AR break out of its current novelty status as gaming hardware. Until then, if you want to see the future of AR, look no further than your app store.

Every year, the Washington, D.C.-based research firm Clutch releases their findings on the best mobile app developers in various major markets. The criteria include the company’s specific areas of focus, experience, client satisfaction, industry recognition, and market presence. Clutch’s analysts perform highly detailed client interviews to really get a feel for what each app development company brings to the table. To make the Clutch top ten is a big distinction, a sign that you’re doing the kind of work that clients love. This year, Dogtown Media is honored to make Clutch’s list as one of the top ten mobile app developers in Los Angeles.

There’s some stiff competition among L.A. mobile app developers, so everyone at Dogtown Media’s offices is really proud to rise above the rest of the pack. We take every element of app development seriously, from concept, UX and UI design, and coding to monetization, marketing, and distribution. That’s why it’s such a thrill to be recognized for our technical know-how, customer satisfaction, and dedication. With a nearly even split between projects for small business, midmarket, and enterprise clients, we have experience developing apps on a variety of scales. But no matter how big the project is, we always approach it with the same amount of attention and passion.

According to Clutch analyst Amber Dewey, “The leading companies in our research have proven their ability to handle projects of any size and complexity, and create impressive mobile apps and custom software solutions that help push each client’s business further, whether it be internally or in the marketplace.” That sounds about right. While Dogtown Media is glad to be hailed as one of the finest mobile app developers in the city, we’re not going to rest on our laurels. We’re going to keep up the hard work so that we make next year’s list too.

If Twitter is the poster child of angry users and poor monetization attempts, Instagram is the opposite — a massive mobile app startup that’s somehow perfectly balanced monetization and user experience.

That balance in on display currently as the company just launched “shoppable tags,” which allow select brands to display purchase information embedded within tags directly in-app.

The feature is a clever way for Instagram’s iPhone app developers to get their toes wet with in-app sales without intruding on the expected user experience. Like user tags, the “shoppable” data only pops up if a user single-taps the photo. Just like user tags, the information is displayed in a simple, clean word bubble overlaid on the photo. Scrolling away or clicking elsewhere removes them.

Like Facebook’s Instant Articles, the benefit here is obvious: lightning-fast load times. The current system of loading a separate browser window for product information (from the single allowed hyperlink in a brand’s profile) is far from ideal for users who increasingly expect to be able to shop on Instagram.

Instead of allowing more links in photos (which would surely unleash a deluge of spam), Instagram’s app development team is opting to retain control over who does and doesn’t get to sell on the platform. For now, that means it’s only available for a few corporate brands. In the future, the feature will be available at a price for those who wish to use it, and also will allow products to pop up in the feeds of users who don’t follow an account.

Facebook was successful at easing users into the idea of sponsored posts on the Facebook platform, so it’s likely they’ll be able to repeat that success with Instagram (Facebook acquired Instagram for about $1 billion). For Instagram app users accustomed to seeing sponsored posts and ads, shopping items will almost be an improvement so far as usability goes.

Sources close to Instagram report that a “save” feature will also be introduced, allowing users to bookmark products for future browsing and buying. Again, the curatorial aspect of this window-shopping concept is a perfect match for the poised, toned-down brand identity that made Instagram such an enormous startup success story. NYC iPhone app developers who want to turn social platforms into major revenue would do well to observe how the engineer in-app shopping very closely.

Short answer: anywhere from $25,000–500,000.

Long answer: building an app is like building a house. Who is it for? Bricks or beams? What’s the neighborhood like?

Tree houses and penthouses are both “houses,” but serve radically different purposes at radically different price points.

The team here at Dogtown has launched over 100 mobile app projects for startup founders on three continents. As startup entrepreneurs ourselves we know that pricing is at the top of the mind for every founder.

In this post, we’ve compiled everything you need to know to make a ballpark development estimate and take your app idea to the App Store.

How much will it cost to bring your app idea to life? Read on.

Understand: apps are more than just products

A wise mobile app developer once said that the difference between a native app and a “naive” app is only one letter.

A stumbling block for so many startups in the app industry is the drive to build a complex, feature-rich “final product” right away. The fatal flaw here is the eagerness to skip over testing, validation, fundraising, and other critical early-stage startup processes that improve the potential success of a new venture.

Building an end-to-end mobile product is like building a bridge — It requires researchers to test whether or not it should be built in the first place, surveyors to examine the surrounding area, architects to design the structure, and developers to bring it to life. Finally, and most importantly, you need a team to ensure the structure can meet the demands put upon it as traffic increases.

While commonly thought of as products, the fact is: successful apps aren’t just products; they’re full-fledged tech companies in their own right.

Understand: apps are built in stages

Before you takeaway a price range for your app idea, it’s important to be familiar with the idea that app development proceeds in three stages: prototype, beta, and minimum viable product.

Each end product, or “deliverable,” serves a different purpose and comes at its own price point. Successful apps like Uber and Twitter go through iterative phases, like the metamorphosis of a caterpillar. (But instead of a butterfly, you get Tinder.)

Prototypes

Prototypes are essentially previews, built to display the look and feel of the app’s functionality without the back-end architecture needed for a full release.

Beyond offering invaluable user testing, the big value proposition with prototypes is that they demonstrate your vision to investors. In fact, getting significant funding without one is practically impossible. San Francisco iPhone app developers pitch investors for capital every day, and those who have a “sample” product to show off always fare better.

Prototype pricing is easier to predict than other stages of the process since they don’t require database architecture and feature functionality. Generally speaking, a mobile prototype can be built for as little as $5,000 using lean UX principles. Note that costs can climb according to the scope of the project.

Just to be clear, a prototype doesn’t have full functionality. It has the bare minimum functionality to act as a “proof of concept” and get investors on board.

Beta versions

Beta versions of mobile apps feature a polished front end alongside a functioning back end and basic functionality.

Beta versions are critical for gathering early “soft launch” analytics and user input while the startup is still young and nimble.

Additionally, beta users are highly valuable. The exclusive feel and close relationship forged by communicating directly and implementing user requests creates “brand evangelists” with high sharing potential when the app reaches its official launch date.

When it comes to pricing, the variable with beta apps is the back-end code, with complexity varying to large degrees from project to project. Beta app development usually costs around $50,000, going up significantly for complex apps like social networks and financial apps.

Minimum Viable Products

A minimum viable product (MVP) is a flawlessly coded and rigorously tested app with non-essential features removed.

MVPs have a laser-focus on the core features of an app, making your product more approachable for new users while keeping costs down on second-tier features that might not justify themselves in the long run.

The biggest cost for MVPs is creating code that can handle heavy use without sacrificing speed and precision. Most startups budget between $120,000–500,000 for developing an app up to the launch date.

What you’re paying for with an agency

At this point you’re probably thinking: where are all these funds going?

When you work with an agency, you’re tapping into the experience of not just one person, but a team of specialists with broad experience launching apps similar to yours. The price of admission includes a wide variety of skill sets:

• UX/UI designers
• Front-end developers
• Back-end engineers
• Account manager
• Product manager

That may sound like a lot of horsepower, but trust us — it takes coordinated talent to launch products that succeed in the crowded, competitive markets of the Apple App Store and Google Play.

Questions to ask yourself first

Not scared off by the price tags? Good. The rewards for a well-executed app are huge.

…But before you drop us a line to chat about your idea, ask yourself these questions:

1. Who is your target audience?
2. What problem does your app solve for your audience?
3. What are the core features that can solve that problem?

If you have clear answers to these questions, you’re ahead of 90% of entrepreneurs and ready to take the next step with your app idea.

Alternate approaches

The vast majority of apps that succeed on a broad scale are produced by dedicated development teams, whether in-house, at a mobile studio, or some combination of the two. That being said, there are alternative paths to consider:

What if I just build it myself?

Silicon Valley lore is full of stories about “genius coder” wunderkinds like Elon Musk who built wildly successful services like PayPal on their own with little more than caffeine and determination. Stories like these unfortunately give many budding newcomer mobile app entrepreneurs the idea that they can succeed on passion alone. The fact of the matter is that development has become significantly more complicated and demanding since the “good ol’ days.”Today’s users don’t just expect products that work; they have to work beautifully, look amazing, and evolve quickly to keep up with their needs. Making the cut takes a stellar team and stellar strategy on top of a passion for the app’s purpose.

What if I outsource the coding to India/Philippines /etc.?

The cult of the Four-Hour Work Week makes outsourcing work outside US borders look attractive. The danger with creative and technical work like app development is that so much can get lost in the process when startups try to use a “sweatshop” production style. Apps that cut corners to reach the app store simply can’t compete in a crowded market.As a rule of thumb, only approach agencies that can display a stellar track record through portfolio, awards, and testimonials. That doesn’t mean you have to stay domestic, but keep in mind the barriers communication and time differences make if your perfect development team happens to live on the other side of the world.

What if I cobble together my own team of low-cost freelancers?

It is possible to make a final product using a temporary team of freelancers. However, agency-quality products rarely come out of this setup, and it generally requires much more time. Part of what’s included in an agency product is years of experience, not to mention dialed-down project management.

Freelancer-driven app projects are notorious for showing up at the doors of agencies as “rescue projects,” ultimately incurring higher costs for the client.

The “secret sauce” of successful mobile apps

Regardless of cost, apps that succeed on a large scale all have three things in common: passionate founders, detailed strategy, and humble beginnings.

There’s nothing that can’t be solved by a great app idea perfectly executed. The first step takes incredible courage, but the rewards are great for those who invest in their app dreams.

By-products are a huge problem in the global economy, on both the large and small scale. Six hot dogs in a package and eight buns in a bag? Chances are the leftovers get wasted. A plane crosses the Atlantic with ten empty seats? You can practically smell the money burning.

Basecamp co-founder Jason Fried wrote a fascinating meditation on the subject of by-products, or “leftovers,” way back in 2009. His suggestion that the mobile app development industry wasn’t fully leveraging the “leftover economy” turned out to be absolutely true — some of the biggest unicorns of the startup world that have emerged since then function by helping their users monetize things they already have lying around. Rideshare startups like Uber and Lyft, for example, monetize your extra car. AirBnB helps users monetize their spare rooms, or rent an apartment while out of town.

The sharing economy may be becoming a crowded space, but there’s still room for at least a few more unicorn-level mobile app developers following similar models. The thing that will separate the merely-successful from the uber-successful, however, will be this attention to the question of leftover resources.

Whether or not the economy continues to slump into a recession in coming years, users always love to monetize things they already do. When times are tough, it’s necessity. When times are easy, it’s thriftiness. On a more abstract level, social networks like Facebook and Snapchat are driven by a similar impulse — the desire to be “discovered” or validated, just for being yourself and sharing in a public place.

By-products aren’t limited to mobile app users, however. Toronto iPhone app developers are as guilty as software developers everywhere of overlooking opportunities to monetize their own in-house by-products. From documenting the design process to help other designers (Getting Real Web App Guide) to standardizing in-house programing frameworks (Ruby on Rails), the possibilities for monetization are frequently overlooked.

“Value-added marketing” is a big buzzword in the mobile app development community these days. The concept of placing end-user value above all else is buzz-worthy for good reason: in the post-advertising mobile ecosystem, generating sales has less to do with exposure and more to do with gaining trust than ever before.

…And the best way to earn trust from your potential customers? Simple: help them solve a problem.

Some digital services take this ethos to the extreme, building customer trust and industry authority for months or years before even attempting to monetize their product. Take the iPhone app developers at Service, for example. In spite of being in business for over a year at the time of this writing and maintaining an office with multiple full-time employees, Service’s founder cites no plans of monetizing in the immediate future. Instead, they’re busily pursuing their mission and building a rock-solid brand identity in the customer service space. When it comes time monetize, they’ll be in an excellent position to blow past less trusted competitors.

What Service and similar San Diego mobile app developers are doing is game-changing because it goes against the typical “sales funnel” approach to marketing digital products. A traditional sales funnel starts wide with potential customers, gives some value for free with as much automation as possible, then tweaks to maximize signup rates. The sales funnel working best for small startups in the current mobile app ecosystem, however, is literally turned upside down, targeting a small group of potential customers with an extremely high quality of service — with the assumption that, if the product or service is good enough, they will happily spread the word to their friends. This approach works especially well for small-scale startups for two reasons: first, it’s much cheaper than a traditional marketing campaign. Second, it providing value up-front usually ties into the company’s core mission much more than an ad campaign.

Should every mobile app developer start changing their marketing strategy? Not at all — this isn’t a universal strategy. It does, however, level the playing field for small customer-service oriented mobile app developers in a tech ecosystem increasingly dominated by major players like Google and Facebook.

We get dozens of messages a day asking the same question: “will my app idea succeed?”

The answer is actually simpler to find than you might think, but there’s a catch: iPhone app development companies don’t know the answer. Sure, NYC mobile app developers can make an educated guess based on the successes and failures they’ve seen in the Apple App Store. We can even help you figure out if your business plan is scalable, or if the code required is technically feasible. But at the end of the day, The only way to validate your app idea is to ask your target users.

Luckily, getting in touch with your target audience is easier than you might think. Here are some tips you can follow to start validating your app idea for free:

1. Define the problem your app solves

Before your mobile app development team starts coding, make sure the problem your app solves can be summed up in one or two clear, simple sentences. Validating your app idea will require that you get on the phone with actual people — and those actual people won’t care about your app idea. They will, however, care about solving their problem. (And if an app developer can help them, all the better.)

2. Determine how to contact potential users

Where you find target users will vary depending on your service. Developing a FinTech app for bank employees? Get on LinkedIn and do a search. Targeting taxi drivers? Call a taxi company. Wherever you find them, you’ll need a list of at least 50–75 contacts.

3. Get them on the phone and ask questions

Depending on your crowd (particularly for tech companies/mobile app developers/startups), it’s often better to send an email first. Be honest about what you need, and above all don’t waste their time on small talk. Here’s a starting point:

Hi [name],

My company is doing research about [specific problem] in [target market]. Could we spend 10 minutes on the phone with you at [specific time and date] to ask some questions? We aren’t selling anything and would really value your opinion.

4. Figure out what’s wrong with the current solution

Once you’ve got them on the phone, try to tease out three things:

1. Do they experience this problem regularly?
2. What is the current solution, and what is painful about that solution?
3. Is the problem important enough to pay for a solution?

5. Use the data to draft a feature set and business plan

After talking to a few dozen potential customers, you should have a pretty strong idea of whether or not anyone will pay for your app idea. Plus, you’ll have a wealth of data to share with your mobile app developers when you start building out the features and business plan. It doesn’t have to take long, once you have a road map.

And the best part? You didn’t pay a penny to get your answer. (Well, outside the coffee you drank powering through those phone calls.)