Why business needs and enterprise mobile app development
In the past decades, the global economies have become increasingly interconnected, with businesses world over continuing to see stiff competition from local and international firms, and the pressure to replace their current products with more desirable versions at a relatively lower cost. During the same period, the role and demand for an enterprise mobile app developer have continued to grow, which is largely driven by the mid and large-sized businesses looking to enhance efficiency and streamline their critical processes.
But why do you need an enterprise mobile app as a business owner?
In this article, we are going to look at the enterprise mobile app development market in general, the different types of mobile enterprise apps, and their benefits to businesses.
What are enterprise applications?
An enterprise application is any software or application that is used by a business to help solve and streamline their enterprise problems. It is typically designed to interface with different aspects of business operations in a single database, app, and user interface. Along with that, an enterprise application can be deployed across multiple networks, all without compromising the established security and administration protocols.
Source: Allied Market Research
According to a recent report conducted by Allied Market Research, the global enterprise application market is projected to hit estimated revenues of $213.43 billion by 2020, which is a CAGR of 7.4% between the years 2014 and 2020.
A different report by Statista shows a projected revenue of $195B in 2020. This is against a CAGR of 10.9% between 2020-2025, which will see the market volume of the Enterprise mobile app development market reach$326B by 2025.
In terms of spending, Statista’s report further forecasts that the entire enterprise app development market spending will reach $462 billion by 2020. This amount is relatively higher compared to other IT segments like data center systems and hardware devices, which is a clear indication of the brighter days ahead for enterprise mobile apps.
Different types of enterprise application software
There are many types of enterprise mobile applications, some of which can be customized to meet specific business and customer needs. But for purposes of this article, we are going to look at the five major ones. They include;
Customer relationship management (CRM) systems
Customer relationship management systems help organizations to increase the efficiency and productivity of the sales departments. As an entrepreneur, using different CRM functions like sales opportunity management, it becomes easy to learn more about the customers’ needs, their buying behaviors, and the prevailing market conditions. Used together, these insights allow your business to enhance and adjust its sales forecasts and marketing plans.
According to Nucleus Research, investing in CRM software has an average ROI of $8.71 for every dollar spent. This is impressive, considering CRM systems are easy to integrate into the existing system without the limitations of traditional marketing methods.
Other impressive attributes of CRM systems include compatibility with mobile devices, automated sales process workflows, single databases, and mass email communication. Combined, all these features allow employees to access, compare, update, and share data, hence increasing their overall productivity.
Enterprise resource planning
Another type of enterprise mobile apps under the enterprise mobile app development banner are enterprise resource planning (ERPs). Basically, these systems help integrate business processes in production and manufacturing, sales and marketing, finance and accounting, and HR. Any previously fragmented info from all these processes is stored in a single, unified, and comprehensive data repository, where the different departments can utilize it to make informed decisions.
Along with that, ERP applications can also be deployed to support various administrative and operational tasks, such as creating timesheets and accounts payables. Still, they can be customized to meet the demands of different businesses, irrespective of their industry of domain.
Supply chain management (SCM) systems
If your company is looking to better manage the relationship with your suppliers, hiring an enterprise mobile app development company to develop a supply chain management (SCM) system should be on top of your priority list. These inter-organizational systems cut through the organizational boundaries, and facilitate and automate information flow between purchasing firms, suppliers, distributors, and logistics companies. As a result, it becomes easy to not only share important information about orders, production, and inventory levels but also makes the sourcing of raw materials and their consequent delivery more efficient.
Business intelligence (BI) systems
Business intelligence is increasingly becoming a necessity for businesses looking to remain competitive. BI apps, will help your company to quickly develop actionable insights by leveraging data streams from different business processes like sales, marketing, production, and manufacturing.
With these insights and metrics, it becomes easy to pinpoint areas that need improvements, as well as keep track of your Key Performance Indicators, ultimately making your organization more effective at what it does.
Enterprise asset management (EAM)
EAM software helps come in handy in keeping track of all the physical assets that your company owns along with overseeing their lifecycles. The primary goal of EAM systems is to maximize the lifespan of the physical assets, ultimately boosting your revenues. Asset management can come in the form of tracking maintenance intervals and compliance to standards.
Other key features of EAM systems include:
- Vehicle maintenance.
- Maintenance management.
- Materials management.
- Work orders.
- Maintain, repair, and overhaul.
Benefits of enterprise mobile applications for businesses
There are multiple benefits of using Enterprise mobile apps, and this is pegged on the specific solutions, as well as the experience level of the enterprise mobile application development company you choose to go with.
With that said, there are some universal positives associated with using enterprise application solutions. They include;
Increased productivity
Increased productivity is one single-most prominent benefits of using enterprise software solutions. Most of these programs offer unlimited automation functionality covering most business processes and instant real-time data updates and visualizations, all this without human intervention. As a result, employees can spend their valuable time on the core tasks, improving the company’s bottom line.
Customer retention
According to a study conducted by Harvard Business Review, a 5% increase in your customer retention rate can help boost revenues by up to 95%. The same study also indicated that businesses can spend up to 25 times more in acquiring a new customer as opposed to retaining an existing one.
Having an enterprise mobile app, CRM software in specific, can help boost retention and generate new leads. Other programs like ERP software also contain functionalities that can help in this aspect as well.
Development of actionable metrics & insights
Using the data visualizations and custom reports that are generated from enterprise mobile apps, businesses can identify bottlenecks within their internal processes & workflows, which helps improve efficiency and their probability of success.
Minimize clerical errors
One of the biggest downsides of manual data input is that it is prone to clerical errors. This greatly reduces productivity as it calls for companies to dedicate a significant amount of manhours to clean up the system. However, the automation of enterprise software systems helps lessen typo errors and duplicate entries, meaning you get to work with accurate insights as well as redirect your resources towards more productive tasks.
Final thoughts
In the past few decades, the number of online buyers and sellers occupying the digital marketplace has seen unprecedented growth, and the line between brick-and-mortar and online shopping experience getting thinner by the day.
As such, brands and businesses looking to be seen as market contenders need to offer their online customers the same level of comfort and support they would typically offer in a brick-and-mortar shopping experience.
Enterprise mobile apps help increase productivity, make better and informed business decisions, and facilitate the provision of comprehensive customer service. With 75% of Fortune 500 companies indicating they are already using an enterprise app or considering doing it, the future of enterprise applications and enterprise mobile app developers is undoubtedly bright.
