Mobile App Development Process – Step 7 Maintenance and Support

In this digital era, the demand for mobile apps is increasing continuously. As a business owner, launching user-centric apps has become more than necessary to expand the global reach. But the real challenge begins just after the launch. Yes, we are talking about app maintenance and support. Many companies are unable to perform it correctly or face issues while including it in their mobile app development process. That’s why our experts have come up with this complete guide to help you achieve all your post-launch objectives in a hassle-free way.

In this blog, we are going to discuss the ideal app maintenance process, security strategies you need to consider while approaching it, proven factors that define the overall cost to maintain apps, and much more. But first, let’s understand what is app support and maintenance in detail. 

All about Mobile App Maintenance and Support

Mobile application maintenance is one of the most important app development stages where developers take the necessary steps to ensure that the app is bug-free. This stage primarily focuses on multiple aspects, which include fixing potential errors, improving existing features, updating functionalities, etc., to match the users’ expectations.

Why is it Important?

Users tend to immediately uninstall a particular app if they don’t like it or get a poor experience. But a good app support strategy can help you overcome this challenge seamlessly. Here’s what you can do with dedicated application maintenance services in place. 

1 Complete App Monitoring

Closely observing the component-level performance of your mobile app will become easy. The maintenance and support services will help you monitor hosting and third-party payment, server, analytics, app crash, app feedback, etc. You can also keep an eye on security reviews and foster app store management.   

2 Facilitate Latest Upgrades

You get the privilege to focus on frequent app updates that are compatible with multiple devices and operating systems. You can introduce the latest versions, support new library versions, work on operation level upgrades, improve app interface, perfect existing functions, optimize app performance, and so on. 

3 Redesign UI/UX

Your developers can monitor the existing UI/UX experience, user suggestions, and ratings of a particular app store to find the areas that need modifications. They can observe the most-used as well as neglected design elements parallelly to bring the best to the table. This helps in offering what the users exactly need or expect. 

4 Identify Potential Errors

One of the most important reasons to invest in mobile application maintenance services is to eliminate bugs and vulnerabilities. Timely maintenance of your app can help you identify the cause of app failure and enhance code quality. Your developers can avoid frequent downtimes and suggest quick fixes accordingly.

5 Integrations and Enhancements

Extend the needed support to manage your enterprise applications. Your developers can integrate new features and functionalities as required. Migration script and backend server modification, release plan and management, performance enhancement, continuous testing, and app porting are some other benefits to look forward to.

6 Provide Optimum Security

Often cyber attackers find loopholes in your app and use business-critical data to their benefit. With app support services, your team can offer end-to-end encryption and lessen the impact of this data breach. It helps to keep an eye on malicious activities or any other unauthorized intrusion and safeguards your mobile app.

Various Types of Mobile Application Maintenance

Understanding application maintenance types can accelerate your mobile app development process like never before. Let’s take a look at these types to help you build a robust mobile application maintenance strategy. 

1 Emergency Maintenance

This type of maintenance is designed to address unwanted, unexpected, and unpredictable app errors. It deals with emergency issues and prioritizes quick bug fixes to provide a seamless user experience.

2 Perfective Maintenance

In this type of app maintenance, user requirements and preferences are of utmost importance. It involves tracking user preferences, for instance, which features are most loved by them so as to come up with the best-suited solution.

3 Adaptive Maintenance

The process of tracking necessary changes in an app to keep it up and running with the changing times and technology trends is known as adaptive maintenance. It is performed in accordance with your hardware and software environment.

4 Preventive Maintenance

It outlines all the possible factors to provide dedicated app support by eliminating the occurrence of errors. It reduces app complexities and focuses on maintainability via documentation updating, code optimization, and code restructuring. 

5 Corrective Maintenance

With this type of maintenance in place, your team can keep a check on recurring bugs and other problems related to app performance. You can also fix issues related to design, coding, and app logic quickly.

Mobile Application Maintenance Process

Now that you know all the basics of app support and maintenance, let’s move forward to understanding the process that can help you take full advantage of your app maintenance activities. We have divided this process into 8 simple steps as follows:

Step 1: Identification

The first step is all about identifying the modifications and necessary changes. Before offering alterations for the requests raised, you need to classify those alterations as per your maintenance activities. This step can be easily automated or manually performed by your development team. 

Step 2: Analysis

The next step in your mobile application maintenance and support process is to consider the practicality and utility of every verified modification request. You need to analyze and plan the changes you want to incorporate into your app. The analysis should include validated changes or input.

Step 3: Design

This step helps you define the new architecture and design elements for your app. It is determined according to the results and findings of your analysis. Your developers get enough room to develop a survey or test app with an aim to improve the security and safety of your user base.

Step 4: Implementation

This is one of the most important steps where your new app architecture is implemented. In a nutshell, the coding is done and programs are run simultaneously. It involves the addition of the evaluated specifications concerning features and functionalities to your app support system.  

Step 5: System Testing

After successful implementation of codes and specifications, your developers need to conduct exhaustive system testing. With such internal tests, they can decide whether this implementation is appropriate or any further changes are needed to satisfy the maintenance activity. 

Step 6: Acceptance Testing

When you are done with your internal system testing, it is now time to test it for acceptance. This step is also known as a dry run test and is performed to check if the additions are working properly as per the modification requests. If not found satisfactory by third-party users, iteration is required.

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