Category: How-To

We live in a fast-changing world that brought a considerable amount of stress humans didn’t face before. Thus, to reduce daily stresses and improve our mental health, we should apply modern technologies, including meditation mobile apps.

At the same time, the example of the Headspace app, with more than $100 million annual revenue, shows that the niche of so-called “self-care” apps is quite profitable. Moreover, a Statista report showed the meditation market in the U.S. was estimated to be worth around 1.21 billion, and now is predicted to be worth 2 billion by the year 2022.

The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health reported that 18 million U.S. adults (8%) use meditation to improve their mental health, since it  is a working method to improve  attention, mental health and increase creativity and other benefits:  

To give you an idea of how to create your own meditation app, we have gathered tips on how to develop a profitable and scalable app, its essential features, and app MVP estimation. 

WHY CREATE A CUSTOM MENTAL HEALTH APP

Steps to develop a Headspace app clone

To succeed in meditation app development, you need to go through the stages described below. 

Step 1. Decide on your business idea 

Before hiring the app development team, you need to clarify the concept of your app, i.e., decide on the app type. Currently, there are the following types of relaxation meditation apps presented on the market: 

Guided meditation apps. Such applications include a playlist of pre-recorded guided meditation tracks, divided by topics like anxiety or stress-reduction, SOS meditations, and so on. 

One example of such an app is Headspace. The app welcomes new users with short animations of meditation techniques explained and provides a library that includes numerous meditation courses, as well as short meditation lessons.

[Source: Techsoup Canada]

Mindfulness morning meditation apps. As a rule, such apps include a list of relaxation sounds or even mantras to meditate on. Another app feature is a timer to track the meditation sessions’ length and information on breathing exercises. 

The most popular mindfulness meditation app is Calm. Apart from the features, we have described above, Calm users receive access to sleep stories, customizable sound settings, mindfulness reminders, session history, and Calm online communities on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

[Source: App Store]

Meditator network apps. As for average social networks, such apps for meditators are aimed at creating communities of locals where users can share their experiences with others. Such apps have groups on different topics, an FAQ section for beginners, and even geolocation features to find other meditators nearby. 

Insight Timer is a network app for meditators that includes all the features described above. Insight Timer has a library of podcasts with mindfulness experts on neuroscience, psychology, and teachers from the University of Oxford, Harvard, and Stanford.

[Source: Insighttimer.com]

HEALTHCARE APPS DEVELOPMENT: TYPES, EXAMPLES, AND FEATURES

Step 2. Select the right approach to UI/UX

If you consider developing a meditation app aimed at helping people with anxiety, stress, and depression, you need to be selective when it comes to the app’s design. After analyzing meditation apps like Headspace, Calm, and Insight Timer, we gathered the following design tips: 

• Avoid bright colors. Instead, use a more natural palette of pastel shades.  
• Do not use too many design elements at once. Overloaded patterns distract app users from their initial goal – to get rid of stress. 
• Use animations instead of text. Animations work best for welcome screens, meditation technique explanations, and updates on the user’s progress stats. 

Step 3. Choose the mobile app platform

If your budget allows, you can pay for the development of apps for both Android and iOS. But if your budget is limited, you need to select the platform carefully. Android and iOS users have different demographic profiles. Thus, you need to choose the app platform depending on the information about your target customers, their preferences, location, level of income, education, and so on. To find out more, read our article IOS vs. Android app development. 

The alternative approach is to develop a cross-platform app using React Native, Flutter, or Xamarin programming languages. The drawback of such an approach is that the app should not support native OS features, as authorization via Apple ID. 

HOW TO MAKE A MEDICAL APP IN 2022: THE ULTIMATE GUIDE

Step 4. Consider Gamification for user engagement

To gain the first thousand app users is not a big deal; you can do this using marketing campaigns and an active social media presence. The plan is to encourage people who downloaded your app to use it daily. Otherwise, users will delete your app, and your monetization strategy will fail. 

To avoid this situation, think about how you can use gamification in your app beforehand. For instance, you can integrate gamification elements, such as points, to motivate app users to listen to meditation sessions each day and make progress. After each meditation session, users receive points and collect them to unlock the next level of the meditation program. 

[Headspace gamification example]

Step 5. Use the MVP model

If you want to validate your business idea on a meditation app without spending a fortune, consider creating an app MVP, an app version with minimal functionality. In this way, you will not only save money but also analyze user behavior to add the most demanding features during the second development stage.

In building a meditation app MVP, we strongly advise avoiding sophisticated features, such as in-app payments, chats, and video streams. Instead, your meditation app MVP might include: 

• Registration and sign in
• User profile with progress stats
• An introductory course in the form of a short video or animation 
• Limited library with pre-recorded meditation sessions   
• Gamification for entering a new meditation level

Now it is time to find out how much a meditation app will cost. 

HOW MENTAL HEALTH CHATBOTS HANDLE STRESS?

How much does an app like Calm cost?

Unfortunately, there is no single answer to this question since the app costs consist of the number of features and OS platforms, the development team composition, and the hourly development rate. However, we can estimate how much time our development team needs to make a meditation app MVP. 

To make this info easier to perceive, we have split the estimation in hours into crucial app blocks:

Feature/Screen	Design	FrontEnd	BackEnd	Android/iOS
Create/edit/delete categories of meditations			6
Gamification	12	6	32	6
Home screen	8	16		12
User registration, login, pass recovery, log out	16	40	32	40
User profile( edit )	6	16	16	16
Public user profile page	8	16	4	16
Library			8	16
Library Management				32
Animation				40

To receive a more precise estimation, use our project cost calculator. 

Also, take into account the following essential components of the app development process:

• QA from 50 hours
• BugFix from 20 hours
• Project Management from 40 hours
• Project Documentation from 30 hours

To sum up, the meditation app development cost starts from $30K per platform. 

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST TO DEVELOP AN APP: DETAILED FEATURE BREAKDOWN

Development of meditation mobile app: things to consider

Before hiring an app development team to create apps like Headspace, you need to consider vital elements for further app monetization, scaling, and adding advanced features. So, what are these elements to consider before building apps like Calm?  

Architecture 

While your app MVP will include only a limited amount of pre-recorded meditation tracks, their number will increase in the future. To avoid issues related to mobile app scaling, we recommend developing mobile backend services using cloud solutions, such as Google Cloud. In this way, you receive a scaling architecture for sharing and processing data from multiple users and storing large files. Moreover, such an approach has the following benefits:

• Reduce on-device data storage
• Synchronize data across multiple devices
• Send notifications and messages
• Minimize battery drain

Live Streaming

The number of meditation mobile apps increases each year. To stand out from the crowd you should give your users additional value. Thus, consider a live video streaming feature as a unique selling proposition (USP) of your meditation app. 

Luckily, you can empower your app with broadcast-quality live linear stream across iOS and Android devices using:

• Google Compute Engine, Cloud Storage, and Cloud CDN for infrastructures 
• Anvato SDK for high-performing live streaming 

In this way, you can integrate a live streaming feature in the existing mobile app back-end on the Google Cloud platform without extra costs. 

As a Google Cloud Partner, we are ready to help you with mobile app backend services and live streaming solutions provided by Google Cloud, so do not hesitate to contact us. 

WHAT TECH STACK TO CHOOSE FOR YOUR PROJECT

Monetization strategies

There are several business models used for mobile app monetization 

Subscription	Most apps of this type use this monetization model. When the user downloads the app, one receives from one to two weeks as a free trial. At the end of the trial period, the app user should buy a paid subscription to continue using the app or receive access to a more advanced app version.
In-App Purchases	With this model, your app users will pay you to unlock premium content, such as specific session packs or paid features like video streaming with a meditation mentor.
Pay Per Download	The paid app is the least popular monetization model for meditation mobile apps. Still, apps like Buddhify continue using it. The logic is simple – to download your app, users should buy it in the App Store or PlayMarket. Here you need to consider that both platforms charge transaction fees from 25 to 30% of the app’s cost.
Ads	You can charge other businesses cost-per-click or cost-per-mile for running ads on your platform. However, this monetization model works only for apps with a significant amount of active users.

Closing thoughts

Mobile apps may be used, not only for distracting you with endless push notifications but also as a guide to a more happy and mindful life. 

While the market of meditation apps is new, it has to encourage earning potential.

By using our tips on how to create a meditation app, you can create an outstanding mobile app that will meet user expectations.  

Imagine that you came home on Friday evening and are suffering from an awful stomach ache. What would you do? Put up with the pain for the rest of the weekend? This what may happen in a world without doctor-on-demand platforms. Thanks to telemedicine applications, you can schedule an appointment with a doctor, receive a consultation, get a receipt, and even pay for such a service. 

If you consider developing a doctor-on-demand mobile app, this article is right for you. Below, we highlight the main benefits of telemedicine apps, talk about the best telemedicine solutions, and list the main features of such an app. 

But first, let’s find out why there is a need for telehealth apps. 

STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE ON MOBILE APP HIPAA COMPLIANCE

Why there is a need for doctor-on-demand app development

As we have said, telemedicine bridges the gap between patients and doctors. But why does such a gap exist? Let’s see. 

Need for telemedicine app from the patient’s perspective

A survey conducted in 15 major cities in the U.S. showed that new patients need to wait 24 days to get an appointment with a physician. For this reason, one of three patients said they have gone to the emergency department to avoid delays and the inconvenience of visiting their physicians. 

• 82% of patients agreed that developing technologies should make the process of receiving healthcare as accessible as hailing a taxi or ordering food 
• 77% of them want to contact their physician via text messages 
• 69% of patients prefer virtual appointments with their physicians using a mobile device over offline visits. 

WHY CREATE A CUSTOM MENTAL HEALTH APP

Need for telemedicine app from a medical professionals perspective 

At the same time, doctors are faced with the following challenges that telemedicine apps may solve: 

• The daily pressure of cutting costs
• Complying with regulations
• Maintaining a regular operation
• Time mismanagement off their schedule impacts their work-life balance

In a nutshell, telemedicine mobile apps are a win-win for both doctors and patients. That is why the market size of telemedicine apps is expected to reach 40 billion dollars by 2021, according to a report from Statista. 

Now let’s find out what benefits such digital health solutions bring. 

HOW TO MAKE EHR/EMR EPIC INTEGRATION WITH YOUR HEALTH APP

Benefits of developing a telemedicine app 

Like Uber, Airbnb, Lyft, and other on-demand service applications, telehealth apps allow providing better health service at lower costs, which result in the following benefits: 

Flexibility. Using doctor-on-demand-mobile apps, medical professionals receive more control over their working hours as well as the ability to respond to emergencies more effectively. 

Extra revenue. Such mobile doctor apps allow medical specialists to generate additional revenue for after-hour care, as well as the ability to see more patients, compared to office face-to-face appointments. 

Increased productivity. Doctor-on-demand mobile apps are more accessible for patients to get to, which minimizes wasted time due to traffic and other issues, thus improving the treatment outcome. 

Related readings:

Calmerry Online Therapy Platform

Healthcare App Development 

BuenoPR – 360° Approach to Health

Orb Health – Сare Management As A Virtual Service

How does a doctor on-demand mobile app work?

Each telemedicine app has its working logic. Still, the average flow of doctor-on-demand apps goes like this: 

• To receive a consultation from a doctor, a patient logs-in to the system creates an account, and describes their symptoms. 
• Next, depending on the user’s health condition, the app searches for the most suitable medical specialist nearby.
• After finding a doctor, a patient can schedule a video call via the app using a built-in calendar.
• During the video consultation, a doctor communicates with the patient, asks about health conditions, recommends treatment, assigns lab tests, and so on. 
• When the video consultation ends, the patient pays for healthcare service using a built-in payment gateway and receives receipts with prescribed meds and doctor’s recommendations. 

[How does telemedicine mobile app work]

HOW TO MAKE A MEDICAL APP: THE ULTIMATE GUIDE

The most popular doctor-on-demand mobile apps

If you are considering developing a doctor-on-demand mobile app, you need to be aware of similar apps currently presented on the market and their features. To save you time and effort, we have gathered telemedicine applications below.  

ZocDoc telemedicine platform

ZocDoc, a mobile doctor app, is available in all the U.S. and serves 6 million patients every month. ZocDoc, includes appointment scheduling, reminders about upcoming appointments, search for a doctor using integrated Map, and others. 

DoctorOnDemand

Doctor OnDemand is a telemedicine application for health care that provides patients with video appointments, messaging, and even receiving prescriptions. The platform counts 1,400 state-licensed physicians across the U.S. The core features of this mobile app include online video appointments, search for a necessary specialist, appointment scheduling, patient data storage, a built-in payment gateway, and integrated maps with local pharmacies to buy prescription drugs.

WHAT IS AI IN HEALTHCARE?

HealthTap

HealthTap is both an app for iOS, Android as well as a website for virtual meetings with doctors. HealthTap users receive such features as online video consultation, secure in-app messages, payment gateway, and so on. 

Now that you are aware of the industry leaders and their features, it is time to select the essential functions for your doctor-on-demand mobile app. 

Healthcare Apps Development: Types, Examples, And Features

Essential Features of telemedicine mobile app

When developing a telemedicine app, consider these features for your app’s MVP:

Telemedicine app features for patients 

The patient side of the app should include the following features 

• User sign-in 

When a new user logs in to your app, one needs to create an account with information about chronic conditions, as well as provide information about age, sex, and insurance. 

• Search for a medical specialist 

When the patient wants to find a necessary specialist, one uses a search with geolocation to find the nearest doctor available to book an appointment. To make your app compliant with medical regulations, we suggest you integrate the Google Maps platform via a third-party API that determines the patient location and nearby pharmacies before a video consultation begins.    

• Video appointments 

Video calls are an essential feature of any mobile telemedicine app. Video calls connect patients and doctors and enable live communication. However, you need to consider using HIPAA compliant telemedicine solutions to keep your app safe from data breaches. Thus, to keep the app users’ information safe, we recommend using ready-made third-party API for video calls, such as Daily.co. 

• Payment gateway

After the consultation, a patient pays the doctor for the service provided. To achieve this, you need to integrate a payment gateway via API. In one of our previous articles, we have already described the process of payment gateway integration to an app. To learn more, follow the link. 

• Doctor review 

Once the patient has received medical treatment from a doctor, one can leave reviews and tell about the experience and rate the doctor.  

THE APP SOLUTIONS – CUSTOM HEALTHCARE SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT COMPANY

Telemedicine app features for doctors 

• Doctor Panel

Such a panel is a part of the telemedicine app for doctors, integrated with electronic health records that contain information about patients, drug prescriptions, and a calendar with scheduled appointments. 

• Manage appointments

Once the patient finds the necessary medical professional, one needs to book an appointment via the app and place information about health conditions and medical records, if required. The app should automatically manage time slots and show when one or another specialist is available. 

• In-app messages 

To allow patients and doctors to send secure messages within an app, exchange prescriptions, reports, and x-rays, you need to pay extra attention to the technical solutions you will choose. All the information mentioned above belongs to patient sensitive data and needs to meet telemedicine regulations. Therefore, consider using GDPR and HIPAA-compliant messaging platforms, like Q-municate. This technological solution could be integrated into your app via REST-API or SDK. 

If you are still in doubt about whether to develop a telehealth mobile app for your health organization, just take a look at the statistics below. 

With this in mind, let’s see how to develop a doctor-on-demand mobile app 

HEALTHCARE CYBERSECURITY: HOW TO PROTECT PATIENT DATA

How to develop a telemedicine app

Below, we describe the step-by-step process of developing a doctor-on-demand mobile app. 

Step 1. Ask mobile app developers for a quote

For this step, you need to fill out the contact form or mobile project cost calculator and tell us as many details about your telemedicine software as possible. 

Step 2. Create the project scope for a telemedicine platform’s MVP 

Our business development manager will get in touch with you to sign an NDA, clarify project details, and create a project brief. Then, our business analyst and project manager will show you a list with app features for the project’s MVP, generate the project mock-ups, and prototypes.

Step 3. Enter the development stage 

When the MVP project scope is agreed upon, our team will break the app features into small user stories that are easier to implement. Next, we start developing the code, test it, and conduct bug-fixing iteration by iteration. 

Step 4. Approve the app’s demo 

When the app’s MVP is ready, our team will show you the result during the project demo. If you are satisfied with the results, we upload the project MVP to the app marketplace and start implementing more sophisticated features. 

Step 5. Launch your app on app marketplaces

When all the app features from the project scope are implemented, we run the final product demo and give your app the project-related data, including databases, access to app stores, mock-ups, and designs. Finally, your doctor-on-demand mobile app, with all the features available on the app marketplaces, is ready to serve your users. 

WHAT IS FEMTECH IN HEALTHCARE

The APP Solutions Experience: Success Story

A White Label Telemedicine Platform – Case Study

The client is the owner of a medical center in Berlin, Germany. After the COVID-19 outbreak, he faced the need to provide patients with a distance communication solution to decrease the number of offline visits, while enabling doctors to monitor vital patient health data and streamline communication with a laboratory. 

After working with us, the client received a white-label telemedicine platform with advanced features that took us two months.

The while-label platform brings benefits to both types of users:

Medical professionals can exchange files with patients via secured live chat, send, and receive laboratory tests in a more streamlined way. 

Patients can receive high-quality medical services in the comfort of their homes, schedule appointments with doctors, attend medical meetings online, get receipts for medication, and medical treatment plans with a daily schedule. The app also allows patients to pay for medical services online. 

Get ready for telemedicine app development

Telemedicine mobile applications improve the lives of both patients and doctors – while patients receive medical treatment in the comfort of their homes, medical specialists can provide medical treatment more effectively, while getting paid for a consultation immediately. 

To start the development process of your doctor-on-demand mobile app you need to shape your business idea with a monetization strategy, think about the app design and app layout, as well as HIPAA-compliant solutions to use.  

What our clients say 

We are living in a fast-changing world where things that were condemned yesterday have become tomorrow’s trends. This trend applies to the usage of marijuana, legalized in 33 U.S. states and forward-thinking countries such as Canada, Germany, and Israel. Thus, being allowed for medical and recreational use, medical marijuana is entering the business mainstream. But despite increased demand for medical marijuana, only a few licensed dispensaries provide users with on-demand medical marijuana online delivery services.

If you are interested in developing a marijuana app, similar to UberEats for ordering food, you are in the right place. 

In this article, we share essential business and monetization strategies for a medical cannabis on-demand delivery app, essential features, and a development guide. 

But before diving into cannabis delivery software development, let’s take a glance at medical marijuana market statistics. 

To enter this rapidly developing market with your cannabis delivery mobile app, you need to make additional preparations, listed below. 

OUTSTAFFING VS. OUTSOURCING VS. MANAGED SERVICES: DIFFERENCES AND BENEFITS

How to start a delivery service for cannabis like Weedmaps and Eaze

If you want to launch your cannabis delivery mobile app and make a profit without breaking the law, you need to do the following: 

Know government regulations 

Bear in mind that marijuana is illegal in the majority of countries. Thus, check your government policy for cannabis on the link. 

• The U.S. government decriminalized cannabis for medical purposes in 37 states, three territories, and the District of Columbia in 2022

• Canada officially decriminalized marijuana in 2018 for both recreational and medicinal purposes
• Western European countries such as Netherlands, Germany, Czechia, and Greece decriminalized medical marijuana for personal use 

If your government has legalized the medical use of marijuana, you can move on. If not – try to implement another business idea. 

Get a license 

To start selling Marijuana online you need to get a license or permission from your government. Consider that you will need to get different types of licenses to distribute, sell, or cultivate cannabis, which takes time.  

For example, let’s take a look at California, where medical cannabis was legalized in 1996. On the website of The Bureau of Cannabis Control, you will find different types of licenses, including Retailer, Distributor, Microbusiness, Testing Labs, and Cannabis Event organizers. To receive each type of license, you need to fill in about 14 documents. Luckily, you can save time and apply for a permit through their Online Licensing System.

If you are a Canadian citizen, you need to receive a license from the Canadian Health Organization. Consider that a cannabis license has different classes and subclasses that determine in which activity your business falls. The main license classes include: 

• Standard cannabis cultivation
• Micro-cultivation
• Nursery
• Sales for medical purposes
• Standard processing
• Micro-processing
• Analytical testing
• Research

To find out more, visit Cannabis Licensing Application Guide on the link. 

[Cannabis classes and subclasses of licenses, source]

Choose business models and monetization strategy for a marijuana selling app

There are two primary business models you can implement for your online medical marijuana delivery business. Each of them has a monetization strategy. 

Weed delivery app for a single dispensary 

This option is for those who are already growing marijuana and have enough stock to sell. In this case, you will need to develop a marijuana dispensary app with order delivery tracking. You can manage your product list from the admin panel and fill orders without third-party service providers. 

As for the monetization strategy of your mobile app, you can charge an extra fee for order delivery and run paid aids of related products. As your cannabis delivery business grows, you can invest in the development of delivery services.     

HOW MUCH DOES AN ON-DEMAND MOBILE APP COST?

Medical cannabis delivery marketplace

If you do not cultivate medical marijuana but want to launch a cannabis delivery business, you can develop a marijuana delivery marketplace. The best examples of such cannabis delivery apps are Eaze, Weedmaps, and Leafly. These apps allow users to find the nearest dispensary, order weed online and get same-day delivery. 

Such medical marijuana software includes different types of users: 

• Dispensaries that list products via  merchant accounts
• Buyers who can find the nearest dispensary via GPS, order products, pay for them in the app, and get the product delivered to their doorsteps
• Couriers get notifications about approved orders, see the list of orders to be delivered and deliver orders to customers. 
• Admin panel where you can manage users, monitor order activity, and analyze user behavior via analytics. 

To monetize your medical marijuana delivery app, you can apply the following: 

• Charge fees on every order made via the app 
• Provide paid promotion to cannabis vendors
• Run advertisements of cannabis-related products 

Key Features of a Uber-style marijuana delivery app 

Your cannabis delivery app will perform as a marketplace with different types of users. There should be a buyer app, a merchant app, a driver app, and an admin app. Below we share essential features to add to each user panel. 

Features for Buyers 

As a buyer, your app user should sign up to your app and verify the account through documents and a doctor’s receipt. Next, the user can find the nearest store via GPS, search for products, read product details, set the delivery address, place an order, and pay online. Thus, from the point of view of the buyer, the app should include the following features: 

Registration and identity verification	Before accessing the app’s content, the buyer should sign in to your app via email, phone number, or social media profiles such as Facebook or Twitter. Next, one should verify their identity via I.D. and upload their doctor’s receipt for medical marijuana. For this purpose, integrate ID.me SDK, a physician identity verification solution.
Product search and filters	Each marijuana user has personal preferences on cannabis type. Thus, to make buyers find products, your app should include different product categories and advanced product search with various filters.
Shopping card	Once the buyer finds the product, one adds it to the shopping cart that includes product description, order total, and estimated delivery cost.
In-app payments	To place the order, a buyer should pay for it via the built-in payment gateway. Based on our experience of marketplace development, we recommend Stripe as a payment solution. Such a payment gateway integration allows you to receive the commission from each order.
GPS order tracking	Integrate maps to allow buyers a live tracking of their order delivery. As a geolocation solution, we suggest using Google maps SDK. We did this integration for a couple of geolocation projects where Google maps solution has proved to be effective. As alternatives, you can choose another technology from the order tracking SDKs list.

Features for Sellers

If you allow unlicensed merchants to sell cannabis via your app you will be breaking the law. Thus, you need to secure your app from illegal activities. To achieve this, provide a merchant account only for sellers who upload their legal license for cannabis distribution. As for other seller account features, we suggest the following:

Profile	After the seller sends you a legal permit, one receives a merchant account. Here, a seller can edit their company description, address, contact info, photo of a store, and so on.  In this section, the user gives payment information to receive money from each order.
Product catalog	To list products, merchants should give a detailed product description, upload a photo, and set the product category. Also, dispensary managers should update the status of cannabis availability.
Order management	In the Order Management section, sellers will see the history of filled orders and manage the status of new orders.

Features for drivers

A driver is a middle man between the buyer and the seller, responsible for delivering the order. Thus, to avoid credibility issues, the delivery person should verify their identity. Only after the admin verifies user documents can the delivery person receive an account. 

Profile	Here, the courier can edit personal information like name, phone, email, and bank account details.
Tasks	In this section, the driver receives new tasks and manages order status. This might be En Route, Arrived, and Order Delivered. A driver gets information about the order number, buyer’s name, delivery date and time, and delivery address.
Maps and navigation	GPS navigation shows drivers the exact stores and customer’s addresses, as well as suggests the best route. This section may also include estimated time and distance to the destination.

Admin panel features 

The admin panel is an essential part of a cannabis delivery mobile app. Here, you can manage app users, approve order delivery, receive payments, and much more. The admin panel of a mobile app should include the following elements: 

Dashboards	On the dashboard, you can see user activity in real-time. It shows the number of active orders, the number of drivers that deliver them, and the total amount of payments conducted via your app.
User management	In this section, you receive documents for new app user verification, give verified users access to accounts, track order history, manage notifications, and so on.
Product management	As an admin, you can manage a product catalog of all merchants, edit product information and images, delete products, manage product categories.
Order management	In this section, you manage the order fulfillment process. The order management section shows orders pending to be picked, orders currently in progress, updates from drivers on the order delivery, completed orders, and payment status.

Medical Cannabis Delivery App Development Cost

While calculating cannabis mobile app development costs, consider that you are going to develop a two-sided marketplace with three different types of app users. To build a marijuana delivery app that works correctly, the development team should create complex project architecture, which might be costly. 

Our advice here is to use a ready-made CRM system for Admin Panel features. Also, we emphasize that the marijuana delivery app development takes both time and money. Thus, it is better to develop the project’s MVP first. The project’s MVP, which stands for Minimum Viable Product, contains only essential features to validate your business idea without spending a fortune on development. 

In the table below, we estimate the number of hours our dev team requires to build an Uber for weed delivery. 

	FrontEnd	BackEnd	Android	iOS	FeatureScreen
Architecture, DB			32	16	16
Login signup, pass recovery	4		8	8	8
User profile	4		8	16	16
History	4		4	12	12
Google Maps integration				12	12
Product list	16		16	24	24
Product page	8		6	16	16
List of dispensaries and shops	8		16	16	16
Seller profile	8		8	16	16
Shopping card	24		32	40	40
Payment	8		24	32	32
Delivery Page (Info about the delivery)				6	6
Integration with CRM		80

In a nutshell, the cost to develop an Uber for marijuana starts from $60k per platform and takes 6 months to implement. Consider that the estimated project cost is due to change. It depends on your project requirements, the number of features, the number of mobile platforms, and so on. 

Custom cannabis app development steps

 To be on the same page with the development team, you should be aware of the app development stages. Here is how we deliver mobile projects at The APP Solutions:

Step 1. Sign NDA

Right after you send us a project request, your sales manager schedules a call to find out more details about your Uber for weed app and submits a Non-Disclosure Agreement, which protects your intellectual property. 

Step 2. Start the inception phase 

After we receive your project requirements, we make rough project cost estimates and then confirm the results with you. Next, we start the project inception phase to gain a better understanding of your project architecture, tech stack, and so on. 

Step 3. Approve technical documentation and app prototype

We send you the main deliverables of the inception phase that are tech documentation and design prototype. Next, we make a more detailed project cost estimate and start the next step. 

Step 4. Enter app development stage 

Using technical documentation, we break down your weed app into smaller user stories, prioritize them, and our developers start building your app. We implement the project’s MVP scope first, send you weekly reports, run MVP demo, and enter the second development stage. 

Step 5. Receive app project-related databases 

After the final project demo, you receive all technical comments concerning the projects, databases, access to app marketplace accounts, and so on. 

What our clients say 

Related reading:

AI in the logistics industry 

How to develop Uber for trucking 

How to develop an application like Uber 

HYPR taxi app development case study 

As a woman, I want to wear makeup and keep my skin healthy. As a project manager, I want my team to create industry-relevant solutions that solve customers’ business challenges. What’s the point? 

Not so long ago, I participated in a brainstorming session with other development team members. A skincare brand owner hired us for the Inception phase. So, we needed to suggest relevant solutions to the business disruptions COVID-19 had brought him. 

After two-hour discussions and liters of coffee, we finally came up with a conclusion – we would integrate artificial intelligence and machine learning applications into his online store. We communicated this idea to the client, and he agreed. 

So, I decided to write this article because the client’s case is a mixture of my main passions – beauty products and intelligent technologies. Using the client’s business challenges as an example, I’ll tell you how COVID-19 has changed the face of the beauty and cosmetics industry. I’ll also describe how intelligent technologies can turn the beauty industry gaps into gains. 

What COVID-19 has changed in the beauty and cosmetics industry? 

The industry of beauty and cosmetics was one of the most rapidly developing markets. In 2017, the beauty industry revenue was worth $474,179 million, and experts from Statista predicted the beauty industry to reach a market value of $571,696 in 2023. 

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But then, the pandemic came. As for 2020, the beauty industry revenue is estimated at $483,338 million, compared with $504,501 million in income received in 2019.  

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And there are co-dependent reasons for the beauty market fall: 

Global lockdown. Governments restricted the work of offline stores and shopping malls. For established beauty brands, such a limitation wasn’t very stressful because they already had operating online stores. But for indie brands with retail stores located in one region – such a situation was a disaster. 

No consultants. As a result, the lockdown left beauty brands without an opportunity to provide a personalized skincare experience to their customers. But, personalized suggestions of skincare products keep customers ( including me) from using products that don’t suit our skin type. 

Face masks. Even after governments opened shopping malls and other public places, some issues remained. Here is one example. You can attend offline beauty product stores. But how can you try a new lipstick while wearing a mask? Selling beauty products offline became challenging also because the virus can travel from one person to another via breathing. So, trying lipstick after someone had breathed on it could infect you with the coronavirus.   

Less income. Since beauty consultants couldn’t recommend products to customers offline, upselling and cross-selling also decreased. In contrast,  online beauty retailers, who integrated AI-powered product recommendations before the pandemic, significantly gained from these technologies. In current circumstances, product recommendation via AI is the single available method to upsell and cross-sell beauty products online. 

Late delivery. Closed borders complicated the provision of skincare and beauty products to warehouses. In contrast, online beauty brands with excess product stock faced decreased demand from customers. Many of them lost their jobs due to retrenchment or bankruptcy and weren’t ready to spend their last savings on makeup. In this case, beauty brands met the need to quickly distribute makeup products with a short shelf life to profit.  

In a nutshell, the pandemic impacted the whole beauty industry ecosystem – from shipment to distribution. Luckily, we are living in the age of intelligent technologies. So, let’s see how machine learning and AI in the beauty industry can smooth things over. 

Related reading: 

NIOXIN Consultation case study 

Top 5 Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning applications in the beauty industry that confront COVID-caused disruptions 

Before digging into details, let’s quickly clarify some basic terms:

• Artificial intelligence, also known as AI, is a sub-niche of data science. AI algorithms are smart enough to behave without human intervention. Artificial Intelligence algorithms have a wide range of applications – from AR filters in Instagram and Snapchat to self-driven cars and voice assistants. 
• Machine learning is a branch of artificial intelligence. Machine learning algorithms leverage different learning models, depending on a particular business use case. In this way, machine learning apps can automatically improve through experience. Netflix and Spotify adopted machine learning to provide users with more personalized content suggestions. 

Over the past years, both ML and AI algorithms have penetrated the beauty and cosmetics industry. Experts predict spending for AI in the beauty industry will grow to $7.3 billion by 2022.

Here are five major beauty AI applications cosmetic brands adopt:

• Augmented reality apps for virtual makeup try-on
• Dynamic content personalization
• Voice assistant for product recommendation 
• AI-powered beauty product search
• Demand and supply forecasting tools

Such well-known brands as Coty and Shiseido already leverage artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies to adapt to the new normal and keep customers engaged. 

Let’s find out how intelligent technologies work in more detail. 

1. Augmented reality for virtual try-on 

Augmented reality is a technology stack that enables adding virtual images to real-life photos. Augmented Reality technology powers Instagram and Snapchat filters. But how does AR work? 

• The intelligent algorithm detects the buyer’s face by analyzing 100 focal points to find facial borders.
• The AI algorithm analyzes data points around facial characteristics to map the makeup on one’s face.
• AR adjusts digital objects to the size of the face and overlays them to a photo or video, so artificial items fit perfectly.

In terms of beauty products and skincare, Augmented reality enhances the online shopping experience with the ability to try lipstick and eye shadows virtually and even see the result of anti-aging creams by detecting wrinkles, spots, skin texture, and dark circles. 

The pioneers in AR applications for beauty products were Perfect Corp and Modiface. Software providers used a combination of augmented reality deep learning and computer vision technologies for a virtual try-on before it became a mainstream trend.

Perfect Corp has been on the market since 2014. The company Beauty SaaS – in-store consultation, a mobile SDK, WeChat mini-program, and listing your products in our award-winning app, YouCam Makeup. Such beauty brands as Yves Saint Laurent, L’Oréal Paris, MAC Cosmetics, and Macy’s used Perfect Corp technologies for customers to have a virtual try-on experience. 

Watch the video below to check out how you can try various shades of makeup for the eyes, lips, and hair using your smartphone, create your look and even download results as you use it as a reference for your makeup artist.

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As for Modiface, it started in 1999 at Stanford University when one student-initiated research on automatic facial analysis. The student’s name was Parham Aarab. He continued his research on face processing algorithms at the University of Toronto, and only in 2006 Parharm founded ModiFace Inc.

In 2018, L’Oreal acquired ModiFace and used its technologies for an AI makeup app with augmented reality in cooperation with Facebook. Using Modiface, you can virtually produce products with a smartphone camera and then move to the product page to make a purchase.

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2. AI-powered dynamic content personalization

Personalized is one of the most promising applications of artificial intelligence in the beauty industry. As Tapestry research firm’s study shows, shoppers spend 80% of the time in the pre-search phase, while only 20% of website visitors add products to cart and checkout. 

This means if you shorten their journey by providing them relevant items in the first place, customers are more likely to buy them. 

There are several ways to use AI in the beauty industry for dynamic personalized content:   

• Capturing and digitizing product, content, and customer data
• Tagging and organizing data into easily usable structured formats
• Optimizing costs through data-driven decisions

Lazada, one of Asia’s leading marketplaces, adopted a dynamic personalization and the result was inspiring. The marketplace increased customer engagement by 101%, overall revenue per visit by 9.4%, the overall conversion rate by 11.5%, and customer retention by 35%. 

3. Natural Language Processing for total makeover product recommendation 

Natural Language Processing (NLP) is a sub-niche of Artificial Intelligence. NLP combines linguistics, data science, and AI algorithms to enable computers to understand human language. The difference between NLP-powered applications and simple chatbots lies in data input and output. 

While simple chatbots engage closed questions with “Yes” and “No” answers or simple commands, you can communicate with NLP apps more naturally and receive relevant non-pre-defined answers. 

Beauty brands utilize Natural Language Processing technology for smart digital assistants that suggest products in a more personalized way. Since voice-driven beauty services work best combined with visuals, beauty brands target such apps for devices with screens. “Let’s Get Ready”, an NLP customer assistant by Coty, is a vivid example. The application was created for Echo Show, Amazon’s first Echo devices with screens. 

[Artificial intelligence makeup suggestions]

Coty, a multi-brand beauty corporation, launched “Let’s Get Ready” in 2018. By using the app, buyers can create personalized makeup, hair, and nail looks for any event. 

The app has the following workflow: 

• The app asks for details about your look preferences, hair, eye, skin color, and the event you are attending, to get started. 
• The app creates your profile, used by Alexa to recommend curated looks, visual tutorials, beauty tips, and recommended products from Coty’s consumer beauty portfolios. 
• The app then offers you a personalized total makeover look from over 2,000 combinations of makeovers using Coty-owned brands products (Max Factor, Bourjois, Clairol, Rimmel, and Sally Hansen). 

You can check out suggested makeovers on a built-in screen and ask Alexa to order beauty products via the “Shop the Look” feature. 

4. AI-powered beauty product search

Providing personalized skincare and makeup product recommendations online is challenging. However, AI search algorithms simplify this task. AI search engines don’t look like a simple search bar. Instead, such algorithms interact with buyer information during a short quiz. 

One example of an AI-powered search algorithm application is My Beauty Matches, an online marketplace. The website lists over 400,000 products on skincare, makeup, and body care. 

• My Beauty Matches offers a quiz for new website visitors. With the quiz, the AI algorithm collects information about skin type and condition, hair structure, and preferences in fragrances. 

• The algorithm analyzes your data, finds relevant products in the database, and displays personalized product recommendations. 

Maybe this is how beauty consultants will look in the future? 

5. AI beauty supply and demand forecasting

The pandemic made product shipment even more complicated due to closed borders and quarantine measures. Such a situation caused significant disruptions in the import of food, industrial products, and the beauty industry. 

We already described why AI is useful for effective supply chain management in our previous articles. Now, let’s see how beauty brands use AI applications in demand forecasting software. 

Machine learning algorithms are the leading tech solutions for supply and demand prediction. ML algorithms analyze historical data and make predictions of sales and shipping volumes. But, supply chain apps can predict future demand in another way. 

Predictive analytics create forecasts when historical data is no longer valid. Predictive analytics algorithms analyze the combination of external factors, including weather, seasonality, and public holidays to predict whether you need to order more red lipstick for a holiday season or not. In this way, predictive analytics help beauty businesses to adapt to changing demand conditions. 

NARS Cosmetics, a beauty product brand from France, leverages demand forecasting applications and customer data to learn more about their customers, skin tones, and other preferences to build new products. 

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Shiseido, a Japanese multinational personal care company, is another beauty brand that keeps an eye on demand forecasting. As for November 2020, the company is looking for demand planning specialists in the New York area to forecast their inventory in-house. 

[Source]

Using machine learning and AI in the cosmetics market

Adopting artificial intelligence and machine learning has become more critical for beauty retailers in the past six months. Cosmetics brands should remain proactive and continue investing in technologies because this is the best time.

People are bored of sitting at home with no ability to travel, so why not entertain them with virtual try-on or AI product search? 

Even well-established cosmetics brands doubt their supply chain and leverage data analytics to have information to rely on. Thus, you can’t be too careful about staying relevant to your consumers and balancing your product stock.

Next step 

Do you work in the beauty industry? Are you interested in developing artificial intelligence technologies? 

By leveraging AI technologies, we can help you to innovate faster so you can crush your competition.

What our clients say 

Related reading:

Biudee Personalized Skincare App Case Study

Nioxin Client Consultation App Case Study

If you think that flying on a private jet is accessible only for celebrities or bankers with at least a billion dollars in their accounts, you are wrong. Thanks to an on-demand business model, a luxury private jet is at your fingerprints. Also, private jets are becoming popular among wealthy Millennials and young entrepreneurs because they want to eliminate discomfort and stress from their travels. Thus, those born in the mid-1990s to early 2000s are expected to be the essential users of business aviation in the coming years. 

At the same time, the market of private jets is expected to grow from $24.7 billion in 2019 to $36.4 billion by 2030, making a flight-sharing app a killer tech startup idea. 

In this article, we describe how Uber for private jets works, the app’s essential features, and app development cost. 

But before hiring private jet charter app developers, let’s find out what problems Uber for private planes solves. 

Why is there a need for a private jet booking app?

As said before, Millennials will be the primary target audience of private jet providers for the next few years. To provide them with the most appropriate service, you should know that Millennials value their time, often travel for work, conferences, meetings, and appreciate flexibility. Also, they expect shared private jet services to be as user-friendly as Airbnb or Netflix. 

At the same time, to book a private jet, Millennials need to choose among the following options: 

• To book a flight through a third-party broker, which requires time and does not suit unexpected flights
• To book a share in a jet, i.e., fractional ownership. In this case, you can only use your share for a particular number of hours that may run out, and you would not be able to make the flight. 
• To buy a membership card and use it during a specific time. If you don’t use these hours within a specific period, all unused hours expire. 

Therefore, conventional means of jet chartering do not meet Millennials’ needs. 

At the same time, an Uber for charter flights app solves all the listed issues. 

How do apps for private jet share work?

To build your Uber for a private jet app, you should be aware of the app’s essential components and booking options. As an example, we take Victor, the first app for chartering private jets, launched in 2011. 

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• After you register in the app, enter the point of departure and destination to book a flight
• Now you can see all the jets available, together with instant pricing and estimated length of the flight 
• You can pay for a flight using a build-in payment gateway 
• After the app processes the payment, you receive a push notification that your jet has been reserved successfully 
• If you want to dine on your favorite sushi during the flight or take your nine dogs on board, you can ask for additional services in the FlyVictor Concierge section. 

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XO app, powered by JetSmarter, is another mobile solution for chartering private jets. The app offers unique jet booking options, including: 

• Private Fly is for when you want to book the whole plane
• Shared Charter to share the flight cost with other passengers you invite
• Fly by the Seat to find and book a single seat, or create a crowdfunded flight 

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Now that you know how an Uber for jet app works, let’s learn how to make it profitable. 

Monetization strategies for an On-demand private jet app

There are two basic pricing models private jet booking apps adopt:  

1. Subscription is the business model of choice for XO and Magellan Jets apps. To receive access to flight-sharing services, app users should buy a monthly or annual subscription. For instance, Magellan Jets annual card for 25-hour costs from $108,750. 
2. Pay-as-you-fly is another payment model used by JetVictor and Private Jet apps. App users pay only for hours spent during the flight. The cost of one hour starts from $2,800. 

Since jet booking services do not own plans, they perform as a middleman between customers and jet owners. Charging transaction fees is the essential monetization strategy of Uber for jet apps. 

• JetVictor charges a 10% fee per flight and empty legs booked via the app. 
• XO app charges passengers’ $395 service fee per flight. 

How to develop an Uber for private jets: essential features

What features do you need to include in your jet booking app? 

• User registration 

Once the user has downloaded the app, one should enter their email and phone number to create a user account. 

• Flight search 

To hitch a ride on a private plane, the user should enter the number of passengers, one’s location, point of destination, departure, and arrival date and time. Next, the private jet app will show all available flights with costs. 

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• Booking and payment 

The user can book a flight in the app and pay using PayPal, Stripe, or other payment gateways. 

• Push notification 

Your app should send push notification to inform your app users about changes of flight, and status. 

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How much does a private jet booking app cost? 

The cost to develop a private jet sharing app depends on the number of features, third-party integrations, the complexity of the app’s UI/UX design, and other factors. To give you an idea about a jet booking app cost, we created this table with a project estimated in hours. 

FeatureScreen	Functions required	Back-End	Android/iOS
Project Setup		12 hours	8 hours
App development
Login signup	Registration info Phone Number Login SMS verification in Sign Up	32 hours	24 hours
Profiles	Edit user profile Change credentials Change password	16 hours	16 hours
Google Maps integration	Google Map API integration Define the user’s location and show the nearest airport for private jets	8 hours	8 hours
Push notification	Inform user about changed order status	32 hours	16 hours
Flight booking	Create booking Booking confirmation by email	24 hours	12 hours
Payment getaways	Payment systems integration	24 hours	80 hours
Project Documentation	Technical specification Installation and deployment instructions Development documentation		30 hours
QA	Test all app’s features  Create bug reports Conduct re-testing  Conduct regression testing		50 hours

In a nutshell, to create a jet booking mobile app, developers need from three to four months per platform. The estimated development price of such apps starts from $70K. To receive a more detailed project estimate, use our project cost calculator.  

The APP Solutions tips for a private jet app like Uber 

Before starting the development stage, take into account that you need something more than making an XO or JetVictor apps clone. As experts in developing on-demand apps, we want to share tips to make your app successful. 

Smart Pricing Algorithm

The pricing algorithm is a sanctum sanctorum of all on-demand services, shrouded in mystery. Since you will gather transaction fees from each jet booking, you need to create an AI-powered pricing algorithm that will automatically add your commission to the total flight cost, while keeping prices competitive.  

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API integration

From the developer’s standpoint, such applications perform as deal aggregators, similar to KAYAK. Thus, to show current flights you need to integrate the app’s back-end with jet provider databases via API. We recommend the following APIs of private jet booking services:

• Tukijets
• PrivateFly.com
• Stratosjets

Jet interior preview

High-quality images might not be enough to provide your users with more details about the jet’s interior. Thus, to win a competition, consider empowering your jet booking app with 360°panoramic images, 3D preview, and even Augmented Reality. In this way, you will not only fascinate users with the interior of planes but also increase the credibility of your private plane sharing services. 

The business jet industry will remain profitable for the next several years. To receive a profit from booking private jets, consider developing an on-demand booking app. To stand out from the crowd and meet the high standards of Millenials, you need to make your booking service streamlined and easy to use. If you have an idea for your Uber for flights app, you can receive additional consultation after filling in our contact form. 

What our clients say 

Read also:

• How to Develop a Luxury App for Boats and Yacht Chartering

Thanks to the on-demand economy, we receive numerous services via the mobile application, eliminating long waiting and paperwork. Popular in the food ordering and taxi-hailing industries, on-demand apps are also relevant for luxury yacht charter, which is extremely popular among wealthy Millennials. Yacht chartering businesses should concentrate on building streamlined and user-friendly yacht rental apps to meet the demands of young millionaires.

If you consider adopting a mobile strategy for your yacht chartering company, you should be aware of the industry leaders’ best practices, as well as app development steps. 

By the end of this post, you will know how to develop a luxury app for superyacht brokerage, have insight on essential app features, and the development costs. 

But, before digging into the yacht charter app development guide, let’s figure out why the standard yacht chartering process no longer meets luxury customers’ demands. 

The problem in the luxury yachting industry

An Allied Market Research report revealed that the luxury yacht market is a fast-growing industry expected to reach $10.20 billion by 2025 from $5.70 billion in 2017. The main industry drivers are the increased disposable income of customers and millennial buyers, who prefer yacht chartering over yacht ownership due to high costs. Also, Millennials expect luxury yacht chartering services to be as convenient as their favorite on-demand apps, including Uber, Airbnb, and Netflix. 

At the same time, to charter a yacht via a broker, you need to wait at least several days to find out about prices, and over two weeks to actually charter a boat and sign all the necessary documents and agreements. As a result, yacht chartering businesses that still communicate with clients in an old-fashioned way are losing millennial customers. 

If you want to keep your yacht-chartering business afloat and meet the expectations of wealthy young-adult travelers, an on-demand yacht finder app is a must. Using the app, your customers can find, book, and even pay for a charter within minutes, avoiding long waits and other inconveniences.   

Related reading:

• AI in the logistics industry 
• How to develop Uber for trucking 
• How to develop an application like Uber 
• HYPR taxi app development case study 

To build an outstanding luxury yacht charter booking app you need to have a clear picture of what the on-demand service model is and how it works. 

On-demand yacht booking app to connect yacht charters and yacht owners 

On-demand applications perform as a middleman between customers and service providers, allowing them to make business transactions in just a few minutes. 

In recent years, we have seen how the on-demand business model has revolutionized many industries. For example, Uber, a taxi-booking app, has completely changed the way we book a car. Now, you can hail a taxi in a few clicks in your mobile app, get the estimated trip cost and length, and even track the location of your driver via GPS.

This on-demand business model also fits the luxury yacht chartering industry. But, instead of taxi-hailing, where time matters, your yacht chartering app should be focused on visual representations of boats and their characteristics, additional luxury services, and social proofs. An app that completely nailed it is Ahoy Club, a leader in the superyacht chartering market.  

A bit of information about Ahoy

Ahoy Club is a digital marketplace where seekers of luxury marine adventures can find the best superyacht from 3,610 yachts in a quick and less costly way. At the same time, luxury yacht providers can list their boats and receive absolute control over charter scheduling and pricing. 

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The idea of such a service came to Ian Malouf, Ahoy Club founder, when he found that the yacht chartering process is cumbersome and slow, and no longer meets the needs of modern customers. To solve this issue, he decided to “make the chartering experience quicker, more informative and more fun” with the Ahoy Club app that allows you to “book a yacht in less than three minutes and save money.” And his idea paid off. Currently, the Ahoy Club app offers users luxury yacht chartering at all destinations worldwide. 

How Ahoy works

To charter a luxury yacht as a user, you need to sign in on a mobile app, select your member type, destination from 154 countries, departure and return date, the number of guests, yacht type and size, and a charter plan. 

Next, the app will show you the search results with available yachts for rent. You can compare and choose the best option for your marine adventures. To book a boat for luxury leisure you need to send a request to the yacht owner. 

Once the yacht owner approves your booking, which might take up to 48 hours, you will receive a transparent and independently recognized digital contract. Due to this contract, you pay a 25% deposit with your bank card via a build-in payment gateway. The next step is to discuss all the trip details and additional services with the yacht representative in build-in secure messenger and pack your bags for the most fantastic holiday ever. You need to pay 25% of the Charter Fee, the remaining 50% of the Charter Fee plus the Advanced Provisioning Allowance, the Security Deposit, and Additional Charges before the charter starts. 

After you’ve enjoyed your holiday, you can leave a review and rate luxury services received, the yacht, sailing crew, and the Capitan.  

To list your superyacht as a yacht owner, you need to sign in to the app as a yacht owner,  Capitan, Yacht manager, or Broker. Next, provide all technical characteristics of your boat, including the yacht’s name, length, year built, number of guests, the port of registration, and your country. 

Don’t forget to include high-quality images of the yacht, cruising regions, destinations, service type (one-day booking or only long-term cruise), and add additional amenities, such as jacuzzi, gym, cinema room, etc. Once you’ve listed your superyacht, you can manage booking and voyage schedules, set instant prices, and even promote your yacht in the app’s Targeted Marketing platform. 

Monetization model

To earn money, Ahoy Club applies a usage-based model and charges small fees and commissions on each charter made through the app and every yacht listed, including: 

• Payment Handling Fee in an amount of 1.5%, charges on each charter total deposited or refunded via the app 
• Central Agent Fee. The app charges 5% on each yacht listed by an agent on behalf of the owner
• Commission, a fee Ahoy charges owners on any yacht booking made via the mobile app. There are two main types of such commissions – 15% of the Charter Fee on yachts that are less than 24 meters, and 4% on a yacht more than 24 meters. 
• Software Charge, a 3% Charter Fee paid to Ahoy by the yacht owner, for providing digital services

Now that you know how to earn money with your yacht booking app, let’s take a look at the essential yacht app features and development costs. 

Steps to build a luxury yacht charter app

Below we list the essential stages of developing a great yacht rental app. 

Step 1. Analyze the luxury yacht booking app market 

By analyzing your competitors, and knowing their strengths and weaknesses, you can shape your project vision, mission, and monetization strategy. 

Step 2. Hire yacht booking app developers 

Once you have a vision of your project, you can start searching for developers of mobile apps with experience in on-demand services and ask them for a quote. 

Step 3. Create technical documentation of your Airbnb for yacht app

Technical documentation is a must for a successful boat charter app since it includes the app’s back-end architecture, user stories, technical solutions, and third-party integrations, as well as a detailed project estimate. 

Step 4. Start building boat rental app MVP

Before developing a feature-rich boat rental software, try your business idea by launching an app Minimum Viable Product with only essential features, and find out whether it is popular among users. 

Step 5. Empower your boat sharing app with advanced features 

Once users start chartering luxury yachts via your app, it is the right time to add more advanced functions to your Airbnb for boats and provide them with a more convenient booking experience.

Private luxury yacht charter app: essential features

Yacht charter booking software performs as a marketplace with different user roles, including a charterer, yacht owner, and an admin who manages operations between both parties. Thus, your yacht chartering software will consist of a Charterer app, a Yacht owner app, and a web app for the Admin panel. Below we list essential features to include to the MVP of your yacht charter booking system. 

Charterer app

A charter app aims to find the best yacht via search, book it, pay a deposit to the yacht’s owner, and leave a review about the luxury yacht services provided. 

Thus, essential features of Charterer app’s are: 

• Log in via email or social networks such as Facebook, Linkedin, or Twitter 
• Yacht search with geographical regions, prices, number of guests, and charter plan (Weekly Charter, Day Charter, Specials, or All-Inclusive)
• Filters to allow users to find the best option according to cost, size, and location, year of manufacture, etc. 
• Schedule booking section where users can request the charter of a chosen yacht
• Built-in payment gateway integration via API for seamless money transfer between charterers and yacht owners via PayPal, Credit/Debit Card
• Rating and reviews to allow charterers to share their experience on luxury traveling 

Yacht owner app

In this app, yacht owners, or other members of the yacht’s management team, should be able to provide as much information about their boats as possible, manage yacht bookings, receive deposits, and communicate with clients. 

Thus, the yacht owner app should include: 

• User verification to find out about the user’s role in the yacht management (yacht owner, crew, yacht manager, etc.)
• Yacht listing, where the user puts info about the yacht, including name, country, the port of registration, size, type, etc. 
• Setting fees. Users can set prices on a specific period based on the yacht’s type, size, length of trip, etc.
• Approve or dismiss charter to show chartеrers whether your chart will be available on the requested period or not
• Schedule charters to show booked yacht charter dates via the in-built calendar

Admin panel 

In this web application, you, as an Admin of yacht chartering marketplace, can manage all the transactions, both charterers and yacht owners, see the number of booked charters, number of declined charters, and other information of your app. The essential features of an Admin panel are: 

• Dashboard to track crucial metrics of your app such as the number of users,  number of active deals, and number of deposits paid, etc. 
• Yacht listing management to edit yacht descriptions, add images, approve user reviews, etc. 
• User management to verify the user’s role in the yacht crew, resolve disputes, approve user profiles, block suspicious users, etc.
• Reporting and analytics are vital to keeping track of your app’s most active users, most popular destinations, yacht types, etc. 

Advanced yacht chartering app features to consider 

Once you launch your app’s MVP and start  attracting yacht owners and charterers, you may want to empower your app with the following advanced features: 

• Built-in messenger allows app users to communicate within an app on the trip details, entertainment, menu, etc. 
• Price comparison so charterers can check trip costs and choose one that fits their budget
• Weather checker, since the weather could be a reason to postpone a trip due to dangers in a storm or rainy seasons
• Cloud solution integration to keep all the information about your customers, deals, and prices on a secure cloud, while maintaining your app’s infrastructure on scalable virtual machines, and handle the massive traffic load. For this service, consider only Certified Cloud Platform Partners. 
• Online concierge is a chatbot that will help you to reduce customer support costs by providing automated answers on FAQs, necessary information about luxury yacht etiquette, safety tips, etc. 

How much does an on-demand yacht chartering app cost? 

So, how much does an on-demand app cost? Mobile app projects that include several types of users are the most difficult. Also, remember that you are going to develop two separate apps (one for the charterer and yacht owner), managed by one web-based Admin panel. Such a project requires, not only senior-level app developers but also time and money. Thus, to give you a clear idea of the app’s MVP project scope, we have gathered and estimated essential features in hours. 

FeatureScreen	Functions required	Design	FrontEnd	BackEnd
Architecture			12	24
Design	Development of UX/UX Design components	40
Yacht owner’s profile	Personal info Edit profile List of scheduled events	8	16	20
Charterer profile	Personal info List with preferences Booked charters	8	16	20
Search for a yacht	Choose yacht model Apply filter Send a charter request to the yacht owner	16	24	32
Charter request confirmation	Approve charter request Cancel charter request		16
Messenger	Charterer and yacht representative can send text messages	16	24	40
Payment	Third-party API integration such as Stripe or PayPal	8	4	40
Feedbacks and review	Rate yacht owners Rate yachts	10	20	20
Admin panel	Dashboard Catalog Management  User Management Booking Requests			64
Project Documentation	Technical specification  Installationdeployment  Instructions, development documentation			118

On average, to build yacht booking mobile apps, our developers will need from six months, which costs from $60,000 per mobile platform. However, the price is subject to change according to the feature list, the number of users, business requirements, etc. To get a more precise cost of a yacht booking app, use our project cost calculator.  

Streamline yacht chartering leveraging boat reservation software

New times call for new technological solutions, especially in providing luxury services. Since tech-savvy Millennials are the primary target audience for a super luxury yacht chartering business, the only way to meet their expectations is to develop a streamlined and mobile-friendly luxury yacht booking app. In this way, you will make the exclusive lifestyle more accessible, while receiving considerable revenue from a commission-based monetization strategy. 

Think it’s time to develop a luxury mega yacht chartering app? We are here to help. Fill in the contact form to ask for a quote.

 What our clients say 

Have you ever faced a situation when your freight brokers spend too much time checking the load board, your driver’s truck is broken at the mid-way point to a warehouse, while some of your truckers drive empty? It sounds like a nightmare for all logistics business owners. Such situations occur because the logistics business is very segmented and consists of several departments – warehouses, fleet, and delivery management. Also, the absence of visibility across logistics departments results in profit loss due to empty miles. In its empty miles research, FreighWaves said on average fleets drive 20% of empty miles or so-called deadhead trips, which reduce logistics businesses’ income. 

To make your logistics company work properly without losing income, you need to manage warehouses, ensure maximum truckloads, and track driver locations, while providing ultimate transparency across all departments. 

PREDICTIVE ANALYTICS VS. MACHINE LEARNING: WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE

The solution is logistics mobile app development that makes the work across all departments visible and predictable. 

After reading this guide, you will be aware of the essential logistics app types and how to develop a logistics app for your business. 

Essential reasons to create a mobile app for a logistics business

Logistics businesses need to integrate mobile application strategy to their workflow in order to receive the following benefits: 

Eliminates paperwork 

Logistics mobile apps provide instant access to a company’s database with freight accompanying documents, avoiding inconvenient paper order forms and service orders.  

Reduces delivery time and costs

Thanks to fleet management mobile solutions, you can schedule freight delivery, predict fuel expenses, and reduce empty miles. 

Optimizes dispatches and routes

Mobile solutions for warehouse management with built-in databases and barcode scanning features improve freight dispatching, while the delivery scheduling function gives you the option to choose the best way beforehand. 

Provides control over vehicle tracking

You can achieve more coordinated shipment and accurately predict the vehicle’s dispatch time by an integrated GPS tracking feature to a driver’s logistics app.

In a nutshell, you can leverage mobile technologies to automate routine tasks, manage dispatched inventory in real-time, and provide visibility across all departments, thus decreasing empty miles and increasing profit. 

Related reading:

• AI in the logistics industry 
• How to develop Uber for trucking 
• How to develop an application like Uber 
• HYPR taxi app development case study 

Develop a logistic mobile app step-by-step

We often meet customers who ask us to give an estimated cost of the logistics app development without knowing the app’s type or its main components and features, which makes the estimation impossible. Thus, before getting in touch with mobile developers, you need to select the app’s type. In addition, you need to be aware of the development phases to be on the same page with your dev team. 

To give you an idea of the app development process, we gathered essential logistics app development stages. 

STAGES OF LOGISTICS MOBILE APP DEVELOPMENT

Step 1. Select the Type of a Logistics App

Since logistics includes several departments, logistics apps also vary by purpose, end-users, and the feature list. At this stage, you need to decide which app’s type you are going to build and select one among the following: 

Fleet Management Mobile Apps

If you have an excessive fleet, you need to track the information about each vehicle and maintain them in time. A fleet management app will help you to record, manage, and store all the information about your trucks. With such transport logistics software, you can track vehicle maintenance history, service costs, fuel consumption trends, and other essential metrics to give you deep insights into your total cost of ownership. Fleet management apps include a driver’s app where the user updates information on the vehicle and an Admin web-based app where you can assign the user’s role, track statistics of your fleet, scheduled maintenance reminders, and so on. To find out more about the fleet management app’s feature list, let’s discover Fleetio Go, a typical fleet management app. 

[Source]

Fleetio Go, a part of Fleetio Manage logistics management software, helps drivers to update information, track their fleet, and access fleet data anytime, anywhere. The app’s most essential features are:  

• Real-time inspections submissions (DVIR) and issues reports
• Barcode scanning for streamlined data updates 
• Digital gallery with photos, docs, and comments
• Integrated GPS for vehicle tracking 
• Submission of Work Orders

Logistics On-Demand Mobile Apps

Vehicles do not always drive fully loaded, and if your drivers have extra space in their trucks, they can take some extra fright for the delivery. If you want to increase the income of your logistics company, consider shipping on-demand mobile app development. 

On-demand delivery logistics apps connect company-owned vehicle drivers and shippers who need their cargo to be delivered. Thus, the app consists of a carrier app, shipper app, and an Admin panel. Now, let’s find out how such apps work. 

• Shippers post a freight request with cargo destination, origin, load, weight, size, and cost
• The platform notifies the nearest driver, ready for immediate pickup, who accepts the shipment request  
• Once the driver picks up the freight, shippers can track the vehicle location via build-in GPS, receive real-time updates and alerts on the delivery progress 
• After the driver delivers the cargo, the platform notifies the shipper about successful delivery and automatically sends an invoice for payment

To earn money, shipping an on-demand app charges a software service fee based on the delivery’s total. 

HOW TO BUILD A FOOD DELIVERY APP LIKE UBEREATS

To learn more about logistics on-demand mobile app features, let’s take a closer look at the Cargomatic Driver app. 

[Source]

Cargomatic is targeted at company-owned truck drivers who want to accept additional shipments during delivery routes. The Cargomatic Driver app’s essential features are: 

• GPS tracker to determine the driver’s location, suggest nearest shipping requests and show driving directions 
• Offers section, where the driver can view app shipping requests nearby
• Order page with information about the shipment origin, destination, size, weight, etc
• Built-in messaging to discuss all the details with the shipper
• Jobs with a history of completed orders, new shipping orders, and their status
• Digitized documentation, where the driver takes a picture of the bill of lading, the POD, and inputs the name of a representative 

Warehouse Mobile Apps

If your logistics business owns a warehouse, you need to ensure that all shipments will be delivered to the right origin within the stated time. At the same time, tracking, managing, and updating the status of hundreds of deliveries in real-time is almost impossible. To digitize the management of your warehouse, consider barcode scanning app development. Such applications are empowered with third-party APIs to recognize various barcodes and integrate with your warehouse database to update information in real-time. Also, barcode scanning apps eliminate expenses on barcode scanners, reduce human errors, and increase your warehouse employee efficiency thanks to bulk barcode scanning. To find out more about the essential warehouse management feature list, let’s take a closer look at the Logistics Plus Mobile Warehousing & Transportation App.

[Source]

Logistics Plus Mobile Warehousing & Transportation App improves warehouse management by streamlining the receiving process, checking details, and tracking domestic and international freight. The essential features of this logistics management app are: 

• Barcode scanner to read barcodes using a mobile device’s camera, and update the warehouse database within minutes
• Integration with resource management software (ERP) so warehouses and logistics businesses can track freight being shipped in and out 
• Shipment Tracking for finding a particular freight by the shipper, consignee, or PO#, and its status 
• Current Position to find out about shipping geolocation, speed, navigation status, times of departure and arrival, and ETA at the final destination.

Once you have enough information about your logistic mobile app and its feature list, it is time to find mobile app developers and contact them.

Related reading:

HOW IS AI REDEFINING THE LOGISTICS & TRANSPORTATION INDUSTRIES

Step 2. Quote from logistic mobile app developers 

At this stage, your goal is to consider not only technical expertise but also communication between the team and yourself as the client. But why does it matter? While there are hundreds of thousands of good developers, the project’s success directly depends on excellent communication among team members where soft skills are essential. 

Where to find the best mobile app developers:

• Clients review platforms, such as Clutch or GoodFirms
• Professional social media networks, like Linkedin 
• Technical blogs where industry leaders share useful tips with their clients 

Also, check out our previous article where we shared tips on hiring mobile app developers.  Once you select the best mobile developers, you need to get in touch with their sales representatives, usually via the website’s contact form.  

Step 3. Sign NDA and explain your business idea

Once your request is answered, a sales manager will schedule a call to receive more information on the project. However, there is no need to share all the details about your logistic app with people who are not yet your technological partners. Thus, a sales manager who respects your business idea will send you an NDA (Non-disclosure agreement). However, if you have strict deadlines, ask to sign an NDA before the first call. Now, tell the sales manager what logistics app you are going to build, its features, users, and so on. The sales manager will send this information to business analysts, who will roughly estimate the costs of your app.  

Step 4. Receive a rough app estimate

A rough estimate of the app’s cost is not the final cost of your project because there are many tech details and requirements to be clarified. Thus, avoid companies who claim to develop a comprehensive logistics app for ridiculously low costs. 

Compare a rough estimation from mobile app developers, including timeframes, technologies, team composition, their hourly rate, and choose your winner. 

Step 5. Launch the discovery (inception) phase

The discovery or inception phase lasts from one to three months. During this period, your development team will come up with questions concerning the app’s business logic, functions, end-users, and the way they interact with the app, to create a project specification. A project specification, or technical documentation, is a document that describes project goals, all possible ways users will interact with the app (user stories), what the app will do in each case, the list of technologies, and architecture. 

Another deliverable of the discovery phase is an app’s prototype. The prototype is an interactive design of several screens that visualize the main app’s design elements. On the link, you can try our app prototype. 

At the end of the discovery phase, the team will run a demonstration of the app’s prototype, send you the project specification, prototype, final estimate, and wait for your feedback. 

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST TO DEVELOP AN APP: DETAILED FEATURE BREAKDOWN

Step 6. Build and launch your logistic app’s MVP 

Before developing the feature-rich app, the team will create an app MVP (minimum variable product). The MVP is the app’s version that includes only essential features required to prove your business idea. To build an MVP,  the dev team will do the following: 

Create an app MVP development plan 

Using the project specification, the team prioritizes the app’s features and creates an MVP roadmap. The project roadmap is a document that includes all MVP user stories and iterations for their implementation. 

Start the development phase

The team starts to implement user stories according to the development plan. At the end of each iteration, the team will send you the report, and each month they will conduct a demonstration to show you a ready-made part of the app. 

Release the app’s MVP on marketplaces

Once the MVP of your logistic application is done, the development team runs the final demo and releases the app to Apple Store and Google play for public access. At this stage, you receive entire access to your app, the database, the app’s code, and other project-related documents.  

Step 7. Empower logistics app with advanced features

After you receive feedback from the app’s users, you and your development team will decide what advanced features to build next. For this stage, consider adding such advanced logistics app functions as:

• Build-in messaging 
• Digitized documentation
• Changeable shipping order status 
• Digital gallery with freight images 
• History of completed shipments 
• Real-time inspections submissions 
• Barcode scanning API integration 
• Third-party payment gateway 
• Logistics optimization software

OUTSTAFFING VS. OUTSOURCING VS. MANAGED SERVICES: DIFFERENCES AND BENEFITS

The APP Solutions experience in logistics mobile app development 

We delivered two projects for customers from logistics domains. 

Transprolog Monitoramento, a logistics company from Brazil, hired us to develop a mobile logistics platform with GPS and message for drivers, and integrate it with a ready-made web-based app for logistics managers. 

To meet the client’s goals, we empowered a mobile app for drivers with the following features:

• Build-in messenger to communicate with shippers via text and voice messages, send them images and videos
• Order management to change the delivery status via the app 
• GPS integration 

Our team delivered the project within a tight timeline, and the client received the app after three months. 

Heavy Haul Route is another mobile app we developed for the logistics segment. Initially, the client needed a route planning app for long-haul truck drivers that offered the best route, and reduction in fuel expenses, to avoid getting off-route tickets and hitting bridges. Apart from coding, the client also needed a team to create the app’s design. 

After working with us, the client received:

• UX/UI design for all app’s screens
• Maps service integration via API 
• Advanced user data security measures 

WHAT TECH STACK TO CHOOSE FOR YOUR PROJECT

Leveraging mobile technologies in logistics and transportation management

In a nutshell, logistics management systems can improve performance across all your departments, from the warehouse to vehicle maintenance. To develop an outstanding mobile app for your logistics business, follow the steps we have described in this guide. 

If you are considering logistic mobile app development and still have questions, we are always here to help. 

Let’s play a game? The expected time to read this article is 9 min. But you can finish it sooner, right? Check what time it is now and start reading. We Promise the prize at the end will be worth taking the challenge. Go!

So, mobile apps…

Today, the mobile app market is enormous, and the numbers from Statista prove that: on Google Play, you can find apps totaling $2.5 million, Apple App Store – $1.8 million, Windows Store – $669 thousand, and  Amazon App Store – $489 thousand. In total, we have a number of $5,5 billion in mobile apps! For business owners, both exciting and disturbing at the same time!

Thus, it’s getting more and more challenging to create a mobile app that will stand out from other apps, be interesting for users, and kept on the shelves like a  favorite toy. Yes, users are quite spoiled children – so many toys in the stores to play with – no chance for boring toys to survive.

[Source: Mambo]

As a result, offering boring apps to users will lead a business owner, not only to a loss of user interest but, of course, the impossibility to involve new users and their money. In the end, we come to an unexpected mathematical equation:

No users = no reviews, comments from them = no leading positions in searches = no new downloads = no success.

But don’t be so quickly disappointed. There is a way to transform an app and achieve all your business goals in a much short period of time.

Interested? Keep reading so you don’t miss an opportunity that will really work for your app!

What is Mobile App Gamification and Why This is What You Need

According to research conducted by a neurology scientist, Matthias Koepp, adult brains release the hormones dopamine and serotonin while playing games and taking challenges. They feel that internal accomplishment that makes them happy, full of energy, and the motivation to continue and move to another level. This answers the question of why people desire to and actually play more and more. 

In real life, it’s harder to experience these emotions because for this to happen you need to achieve bigger goals. Emotional triggers are what returns us to one source of happiness – games – and we can be happy again and again.

So here we go – to the games or it would be better to say ‘mobile app gamification’.

Mobile app gamification is a marketing concept based on the use of such game techniques as rewards, progress display, leaderboards, competition, and social interaction. As people are more inclined to fulfill tasks when they know that at the end a reward will be waiting for them, mobile app gamification is a guide that leads you directly to the user’s production of dopamine and serotonin hormones.

Mobile App Gamification Benefits

Turning the user experience into playing a game can significantly increase the users’ engagement and encourage them to interact with the app more often. 

The possibility of winning influences the user’s behavior even more than we can imagine. But nothing negative here: this works both for a user and business owner as both of them are reaching their goals. In essence, a user is happy to accomplish a task and is rewarded for that, and a business owner has revenue growth and a delighted client who is likely to bring new clients to the app.

Gigya says that mobile app gamification can boost interaction with an app by one third, the number of comments rises by 13%, shares on social media by 22%, and content discoverability by 68%.

So,  what will you as a business receives from mobile app gamification: 

• A constant social presence without putting in any effort
• A leading positions in searches
• Growth of engagement with your app
• Active users on social media
• More and more positive reviews
• Increase in the number of new users who are your target audience, who are ready to start using your app right now

and one more important thing:

• Happy users whom you helped to make their lives better every day.

[Source: Mambo]

How gamification works

A user should accomplish a particular task in an app, and for this, one is pleased with different rewards. In this way, a user feels like a superhero who is struggling to succeed in something, and in the end, it is an enjoyable experience because everyone wants to win.

Let’s move to the practical issues and find out how to actually gamify an app.

There are different techniques of app gamification you can use, but your success depends on your imagination and how good you know your users. We give you insights, you turn them into the cherry on top of your app gamification strategy, ok?

Rewards

[Source: Forbes]

Remember being given a new toy for getting a good mark at school? That motivated us to study even those subjects we were not interested in as we knew that in the end, we would have that desirable present from our parents. Yes, it was hard to achieve, but the happiness we felt when we had finally got the prize couldn’t be compared to anything. More importantly, we are rewarded in both ways: an excellent mark and a reward for our success.

That works even now: we’re still those kids who are too lazy to do important things even while realizing the scope of their importance for us, but a possible reward is what encourages us at least to try. And when we try, the desire to get more and more increases.

Providing your users with rewards for the frequency of using an app, purchasing goods, accomplishing personal goals, participating in quizzes, competitions, sharing posts with their friends, and inviting them to join the app, will not only help to keep their interest in the app but increase their interest continually. 

What kind of rewards can there be: 

• Сash rewards – money is a never-changing motivation for everyone
• Digital goods that can be exchanged for real goods – this will give customers a chance to choose what goods inspire them more to fulfill tasks
• In-app currency to spend inside the app that will promote more purchases as a result  

In other words – anything that has value for your target audience. But avoid useless prizes – they are just a waste of time and money for a business. Identify exactly what will make users come back to your app again and again, and offer it to them. Yes, simple to say but hard to achieve, but we know that you will find the answer, or you can always ask us.

Progress Display

[Source: TrymyUI]

It’s important to see how far we have moved towards our goal, and what improvements we can see right now. This inspires us not to give up and do more. 

If we’ve succeeded, we want the whole world to know about it, that’s why we post on social media so much and share our results with others. Recognition is a huge need for every human being. And it actually works for business presence and promotion.

Leaderboards

[Source: Dribbble]

Improving ourselves is the right motivation, but often it’s not enough for users to stick to the goal. However, when talking about comparing our achievements with others, that becomes much more interesting and tempting for us to participate in the ‘race’ and prove who is the winner.

People love competitions, and they love to win. They’re striving to have the highest scores, and when they see someone’s above them in a leaderboard, they start to do everything to be in 1st place. That’s human nature.

Competition

[Source: Snake battle]

Your business can help people to fulfill this immutable desire to be the best while really becoming the best. Everyone benefits here – business has higher conversion and user activity, and the user has his/her need to win satisfied and a reward for their efforts.

Social Interaction

[Source: SaaSquatch]

Moreover, people are inclined to challenge their friends and compete with them, so involving new users is guaranteed! 

Successful examples of gamified apps

Starbucks

[Source: Zinrelo]

Starbucks is a coffee giant that offers a loyalty system to its clients.

Used technics:

• Progress display of your purchasing frequency
• Rewards for each order in the form of stars which can be exchanged for material prizes later

Duolingo

Duolingo is an educational app for learning foreign languages.

Used technics:

• Progress display of course completion in the form of a percentage
• A reward for actions – an internal currency called lingots 
• Competition – voting for the best  translation
• Leaderboards with scores based on learning achievements
• Social interaction with friends on Facebook

Fitbit

[Source: Modrsk]

Fitbit is a fitness app for the completion of different kinds of sports activities.

Used technics:

• Progress display while filling in a circle of your physical activity
• Rewards for walking a certain distance every day. Different badges for different distances.
• Social engagement – to find friends or invite them
• The possibility to compete with your friends in sport
• Challenge yourself with original tasks

Todoist

[Source: Todoist]

It is a tracker that allows controlling the completion of both daily and business tasks.

Used technics:

• Rewards for tasks – karma points (a user can also go minus if deadlines are missed)
• Progress is shown in a number of unlocked levels
• Social shares of a user’s karma on social media

SmartyPig

[Source: Philip Schriver]

This is an app to manage user finances and help them to achieve their financial goals, for example, to save money for a new car. 

Used technics:

• Progress bar to see how much money is saved and how much is left.

What to Remember: Risks and Challenges

Despite all the advantages of the gamification of an app mentioned above, you, as a current or future business owner should always remember that it is not a one-way working panacea that guarantees the success of your business. It might work, and, at the same time, it might not work. 

So, it’s vital to consider all possible risks and challenges that can prevent you from reaching set business goals. To be entirely sure you’re investing your money and time resources in the right direction, we encourage you to contact the App Solutions and leverage our expertise. 

And here are some tips that are taken from our practice to show you how to get the best of app gamification and build a successful mobile app gamification strategy:

• Set clear goals and monitor their status

If you decide to implement a solution, then you’re doing it for some purpose. Know your purpose from the very beginning, keep it in mind, and follow a plan or your actions won’t bring the desired result. Shape your app gamification strategy while focusing on both your needs and the needs of your users. Remember that you both need benefits. 

• Identify your target audience, learn it and always analyze

Even a well-developed gamification app strategy won’t work if it’s not developed based exclusively on your target users’ needs and interests. In this case, you will simply hit the wrong target. 

Data is what helps you to find out who is interested in you, how he or she behaves, why something is happening in a certain way, and how to make it play for you. 

• Find what has value for your users and integrate it into your app

Even if we’re sure that something will definitely work because we like it, it doesn’t mean our users will share our opinion – they have their own likes and dislikes. 

So here it’s important to discover what your users want the most, what will become their biggest motivation to complete the task, what will make them use your application, and not others. 

• Keep it simple 

Probably, it’s the biggest mistake to think that you have to rebuild your app entirely to make it gamified. That’s not always the case. If it works well, adding some unique gamification features to it will be enough. 

Don’t confuse both yourself and your users with complex systems, techniques, and approaches. The rules of the game you’re offering to other people should be easy to get and follow. You don’t want to make your users irritated, right?

• Keep it entertaining

The success of your app gamification is directly dependent on the user’s experience while using an app. The more playful and enjoyable it is, the more delighted your users are.

It often happens that, in the beginning, an app attracts a lot of users, but then, the app gets more and more boring and predictable and has nothing new to experience. So, users have no motivation to explore it further. 

To avoid this, build your app gamification strategy in a way users can be entertained throughout the whole game, not only at levels 1 and 2. They shouldn’t know what is coming next, but be curious to discover it by themselves.

• Encourage users to share

All people want likes and shares. So does a business. Make your users proud of the achievements they’ve accomplished with your app, and they will say ‘thank you’ with shares on their social profiles. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram – communicate with your audience everywhere.

• Hear your users

Pay attention to what your users are saying; what they’re complaining about and what they’re complimenting about your app. This will give you a clear picture of what to improve, change, or keep.

The Game is Not Over Yet

Remember that game we started in the beginning? Congratulations! It’s almost at an end.

The point here is to see how gamification works as an example, influences your behavior, and how it can make a usually long and boring to read article fun, entertaining, and simple to finish. 

You’ve been challenged, you’ve won, and now, you get a price – knowledge of how to gamify any activity and achieve much better results than could be reached with a traditional approach. 

Now, imagine what scale of feedback you can get with mobile app gamification. Inspired? We’re here to implement your most creative ideas. Just contact us here.

Today, the word “bot” is no longer associated with science fiction. Now, chatbots allow you to book a ticket or accommodation, order food, or even pay for your order online. 

Chatbots are currently used, not only in e-commerce websites, but also in social networks, like Twitter, Facebook, and, in particular, the Facebook Messenger platform. Why? The reason is simple – instead of calling customer support, over 65% of online shoppers will message a business. Also, 53% of shoppers are more likely to buy from a store they can message. And, Facebook reports on a host of data only proves that trend. Reports show that every month Facebook business pages are exchanging over 2 billion messages with customers.  

But why is it important? Let’s see. 

If you do not want to get left behind but rather be ahead of your competitors in online retail, you should be able to communicate directly with your clients. And, to make such communication even more useful, consider adopting chatbots for your e-commerce business. 

In this article, we will look at the most successful e-commerce chatbot use cases and go through a step-by-step guide on how you can develop a perfect chatbot for your online store. 

But first, let’s see what the benefits are of using chatbots in retail stores. 

Key benefits of using e-commerce chatbots

Around 80% of online businesses are planning to use chatbots by 2020. 

The reasons why this digital trend is up and running lie in the following benefits of chatbots for e-commerce: 

Improved customer engagement

As we have said, modern customers prefer sending messages to businesses rather than making phone calls. But, to keep customers engaged with your business, you need to respond in time. In fact, according to Harvard Business Review research, a five-minute delay in answering a customer query decreases the customer engagement rate, and a ten-minute delay reduces this metric by 400%. Chatbots for retail businesses respond to potential buyers’ queries immediately, thus increasing the customer engagement rate by 54%. 

Drive sales 

A chatbot could be integrated into your website or shopping app. By providing customers with immediate responses, shopping chatbots significantly drive sales to your online store. The recent Ubisend report shows that 40% of consumers want offers and deals from chatbots. Also, online shoppers are willing to spend more than $400 on an online store powered by a chatbot. 

Reduce customer acquisition cost

As you may know, Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) is a metric that shows how much money you spend to attract one customer, and the lower the CAC, the better. Chatbots reduce CAC since they offer engaging and instant conversation on your online store; thus, customers stay longer on your website. Moreover, chatbots for retail and e-commerce sites provide customers with personalized product recommendations and, as a result, increase chances to convert website visitors into customers.  

Decrease customer support costs

If a potential customer is interested in your products, one may ask for a more detailed product description. Statistics show that answering simple questions is relevant to 55% of online shoppers, and 64% of online shoppers prefer 24/7 online support that can not be provided by a real person. Here chatbots are handy. By integrating a simple FAQ chatbot, you can decrease customer support costs by 30%. But to answer complex queries, a chatbot should switch the customer to a human agent. 

Build Loyalty

Customer loyalty, also known as customer retention rate, is another metric that chatbots can improve. To build loyalty among existing customers, consider integrating instant chatbot, and always be in touch with your target audience, provide them with customer service and relevant product recommendations. 

Streamline sales funnel

By using an e-commerce chatbot, customers can identify the product they want, find it in a matter of clicks, and buy more seamlessly. Thus, chatbots have become a new sales channel for online retailers. 

Top 5 most successful e-commerce chatbot use cases

Let’s see the most successful examples that show the use of chatbots in retail by famous brands. 

Order automation 

How many steps do you need to take for ordering, for example, a pizza via a website? The answer is at least five – select a pizza you want, add it to the shopping cart, go to the shopping cart to complete your order, fill in the delivery address, and pay for the order. Chatbots can shorten this process to just two steps – you need to give a chatbot your order details, share your location via GPS, or put it manually. Sounds incredible? That is actually how a Pizza Hut Facebook Messenger chatbot works. Moreover, the company launched a Twitter chatbot that decreases the ordering process to just one action- sending a pizza emoji in direct messages. After the launch of Facebook and Twitter chatbots, Pizza Hut increased digital revenue by 75-80% and continue to receive 50% of its orders from these digital channels. 

Personal product recommendations 

When customers are visiting your online store to buy a particular pair of jeans, they spend some time in the product catalog to find the exact pair they are searching for. Such a buying process may become an irritating experience, especially if your online store has numerous product categories. To avoid this, online retailers integrate chatbots to help buyers in selecting products that perfectly meet their needs, just as Aerie, the clothing and lingerie spin-off of American Eagle Outfitters did. The company integrated a chatbot for Kik messenger, developed on the Pandorabot platform. To learn more about style preferences, the bot shows online shop visitors two images of clothing or lingerie. Then, the bot customizes the item recommendations and offer more relevant products. As a result of such integration, AEO chatbot acquired twice as many users across all social channels. 

Conversational marketing tool

Do you like Nike sneakers? What if you can put any image on sneakers to customize them in the way you want? That is what Nike did in their conversational marketing strategy to promote Nike AirMax Day. The company developed a  Nike StyleBot for Facebook Messenger to enable fans to style their shoe design, using previously uploaded versions for inspiration, and sharing the results with friends via Facebook Messenger. Such a conversational marketing campaign brought the company 12.5 times higher click-through rate (CTR) compared with their other campaigns, and four times higher conversion rate that their average marketing campaign.

Chatbots for shopping assistance 

To receive relevant product recommendations at an online store is a great experience. But what if a chatbot can suggest the whole outfit to you? That idea inspired H&M to create The Official H&M Chatbot. The main goals of the H&M Chatbot are to streamline mobile shopper’s customer experience, help them to search through outfit possibilities, and guide them directly to an online store to complete the purchase. To receive a personalized look, the customer provides the chatbot with gender, style, and the total price for all items. Then, if the shopper likes the outfit, one can save it to archive, buy all items at the H&M online store, or share the look via social networks. By using a chatbot, the company facilitates impulse buys and decreases the shopping cart abandon rate due to streamlined sales funnel. 

Personalized 24/7 customer support 

While a human agent can not be around and answer all the customer’s queries, chatbot nails it. An example is the Twitter DM chatbot created by the Etsy marketplace. The company’s chatbot has clear call-to-action buttons that provide shoppers with more personalized customer service, fixes problems immediately, and helps in finding more information day or night. Despite any issues that may have arisen, in this way, Etsy managed to build a strong relationship with clients which encouraged them to return in the future. 

How to create a chatbot for an e-commerce store 

If you want to build one for your online store, follow the steps of the chatbot development guide, described below. 

Step 1. Define the bot’s goal 

What do you need a chatbot for? Should it answer user questions, offer discounts, or promote new products? To decide on your chatbot functionality, you will need to communicate with your customer support, sales, and social media teams. To give you an idea of how you can use a chatbot, we have selected the most widely spread use cases of chatbot in online retail:  

• Send notifications and reminders
• Work as digital assistants
• Handle online transactions
• Collect customer data and user feedback
• Advertise and broadcast
• Conduct market research
• Entertain and educate users
• Automated customer support
• Streamlined business processes
• Give personalized recommendations
• Provide access to information
• Upsell products and services, etc.

To build a chatbot for a retail business, we advise you to be selective and wrap your ideas with certain limits, i.e., the number of functions. In the beginning, empower your chatbot with one or two simple tasks and analyze how the bot works for your business. You can always add more sophisticated functions later. 

Step 2. Select the chatbot type

When you are done with the functions of your chatbot, you need to choose its type. Nowadays, there are two main types of chatbots: 

• Pre-scripted or rule-based chatbots are the simplest type since they work on the basis of predefined answers. Use such a chatbot if you need a solution for solving simple tasks, like customer service bots, to answer users’ questions. 

• AI-based chatbots are more advanced than the previous one. By using AI (artificial intelligence) and NLP (natural language processing), such bots can understand user input and answer with relevant non-pre defined answers. You can even empower your bot with an NL (machine learning) algorithm, so the bot can learn from each interaction with a user and remember one’s preferences. Still, AI chatbots require pre-launch training; thus, you need to hire chatbot developers. 

Next, consider where you will use your chatbot since it will impact the technical solution. You can develop a chatbot for the following channels: 

• E-commerce website 
• iMessage or SMS 
• Social networks such as Twitter, or Slack 
• Messaging apps, including Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Telegram

If you need to use the same chatbot in both your online store and Facebook Messenger, you can create an omnichannel chatbot that will work across several channels. 

When you know your chatbot use case, its type, and channels, you are ready to select the platform to build your chatbot. 

Step 3. Choose your platform

Below we have gathered the most popular platform for building an e-commerce chatbot. 

Unless you want to create a custom e-commerce chatbot, you can select the most suitable platform that varies on the bot’s complexity. 

Best platforms for simple chatbots 

	Chatfuel	Botsify	Flow Xo
Target platforms	Telegram  Facebook Messenger	Facebook Messenger  WhatsApp  Instagram	WhatsApp Web Facebook Messenger Slack Telegram  Twilio SMS
Price	Free with basic features;  Chatfuel Pro ($30/month) with advanced features is also available	Free  Basic ($10/month),  Premium ($30/month) Business ($50/month)	Free Standard ($19/month)
Description	Chatfuel chatbots work on pre-defined coded rules and serve clients accordingly. The Chatfuel builder platform has drag-and-drop feature which makes  it the ideal platform for beginners who want a chatbot to perform basic roles.	Botsify provides users with its custom templates for travel, restaurant booking, etc. along with drag-and-drop functionalities.   Anyone can create bots effortlessly without writing a single line of code.  Even the free version comes with 20 templates.	Flow Xo offers templates and tools to create and test the functionalities of your bot with a built-in test console.  The bot can connect with your customers over voice and chat.

Best platforms for AI chatbots for e-commerce

	IBM Watson	Microsoft Bot Framework	Wit.ai
Target platform	Facebook Messenger WhatsApp  Instagram	Website  App Cortana Microsoft Teams Skype  Slack Facebook Messenger	Website  App Cortana  Microsoft Teams  Skype Slack  Facebook Messenger
Price	Lite (USD 0)  Standard ($0.0025 (USD) per API call)  Premium (price not disclosed)	Standard channels (Free) Premium ($0.50 per 1,000 messages)	Standard channels (Free) Premium ($0.50 per 1,000 messages)
Description	IBM Watson is the platform for AI chatbot that can handle complex conversations.  It can process around four terabytes of data and is hosted on a cluster of ninety IBM Power 750 servers, each of which uses a 3.5 GHz POWER7 eight-core processor. Chatbot developers can leverage a wide range of technology frameworks, including: Node SDK (Software Development Kit)  Java SDK  Python SDK iOS SDK  Salesforce SDK  Unity SDK  to make IBM Watson with different platforms.	Azure Bot Service provides a scalable, integrated connectivity and development service to help developers create intelligent bots that can engage users across multiple platforms.  The development tools are provisioned with the Microsoft Bot Builder SDK, which .NET and Node.js developers can access and use to create an engaging talking bot.  The SDK also includes an emulator for debugging your bots, as well as a large set of sample bots you can use as building blocks. The cloud-based service is globally accessible across 141 countries, and bots can communicate in multiple languages including:  English French  Italian  German  Spanish  Japanese  Korean Chinese.	This NLP-powered chatbot builder offers resources to create engaging, scalable chatbots to serve different purposes.  Wit.ai learns human language through every interaction and leverages the community to evolve and improve further. Chatbots with Wit.ai support 50+ languages, and developers have the flexibility to use any of the available SDKs, including:  Android,  iOS,  Cordova,  HTML,  JavaScript,  Node.js,  .NET,  Unity,   Java And other.

When you know what bot-building platform you will choose, it’s time to hire chatbot developers and start building your bot.  

Step 4. Create a chatbot MVP

You can create a simple bot with a DIY platform within several hours. But to develop an AI chatbot is far more difficult. However, to find out whether a chatbot suits your business needs, you do not need to spend a fortune on its development. We recommend launching such projects as MVP (minimum viable product). For chatbot MVP, we suggest only pre-scripted answers. To understand the project scope, check out our estimation of the MVP of a Facebook Messenger bot for e-commerce product recommendation. 

FeatureScreen	Functions required	BackEnd
Architecture		12 hours
Customization for agents	– Logo – Agent Name	60 hours
Connection to Data Server API		16 hours
Switching between a chatbot and human agent	– Switch between Human Agent and Chatbot	32  hours
Gathering of data from user	– Type of product – Color – Size – Material	32  hours
Data transfering to API, receive results	-The chatbot search for relevant products in your online store database	16  hours
Search Results	– Show search results	8  hours
Show more variants	-The chatbot shows more relevant products from the selected category	16 hours
Chatbot Management	– Define questions and answers	40 hours
Total		From 232 hours

In our experience, the cost to develop a chatbot MVP varies from $3,500 to $5,000 and takes from 2 to 6 months, depending on the bot’s complexity and the number of integrations. 

Step 5. Launch your chatbot

After your development team has created a bot and ensured it is without errors, it is time to launch it on your e-commerce website. Now you need to pay extra attention to how the chatbot interacts with clients and ask them for feedback. You may also ask users what features they would add to your chatbot. After gathering all user feedback, bring them to your development team to prioritize features to implement during the second e-commerce chatbot development stage.  

In a nutshell

More and more people want to communicate with businesses via messengers, and online retail is one of those industries that can receive a significant profit from this trend. Therefore, to keep the most effective communication with users, increase sales and engagement, and build loyalty, a chatbot is a must. Various use cases and successful e-commerce chatbot examples show that chatbots for the retail industry are a win-win for both sellers and buyers. 

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Chatbot integration with a website or mobile app is a win-win strategy for both your business and your clients. Why? Firstly, thanks to various use cases, chatbots can increase revenue by up to 25%, lead generation to 9.5%, and improve engagement with clients by 35%. Secondly, your customers receive a better UX experience of finding and ordering goods or services, paying for them seamlessly, and more. Are you ready to integrate a Chabot into your business strategy? Great! But the question is, “Whether to build a custom-made Chabot or use a Chabot building platform”?

Let’s find out. 

Below, we have gathered the main chatbot types, their usages, and a comparison of custom vs. platform-build chatbots. After reading this article, you will know exactly what kind of chatbot you need. Depending on its type, you will know whether you need a custom chatbot or platform-build solution. 

Main types of chatbots

A chatbot is a computer app that mimics human behavior during a conversation with a real person. But, the degree of chatbot’s humanity depends on the complexity of the technologies behind the app. Now, let’s look at the Chabot types in more detail:

Type 1: Scripted/Quick Reply Bots

Scripted is the simplest type of chatbot. Such chatbots are powered with decision three hierarchy and communicate with people using predefined scripts via a set of questions or buttons. Such scripted chatbots are the slowest medium of getting the user to their desired value. 

[Burberry scripted chatbot] 

Type 2: AI Chatbots

AI chatbots are more complex than scripted chatbots and include two subdivisions: 

• Chatbots with Natural Language Processing 
• Content Enable Chatbots with Machine Learning 

Now, we will take a closer look at these types:

Natural Language Processing (NLP) chatbots can understand, analyze, and prioritize questions according to their complexity. NLP chatbots are programmed to recognize particular keywords. Then, such chatbots respond appropriately with a non-pre-scripted response. More advanced NLP can even understand your message intensity, i.e., whether you are asking a question or make a statement.

[Booking.com NLP chatbot]

Content Enable Chatbots. Powered by Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence, Content Enable chatbots are the more advanced type. ML chatbots learn from conversations that happened in the past with a specific user and grow over time. Examples of such chatbots are Siri, Alexa, and AI versus, created and taught by our team, ISD GmbH, and Hoskhod agency. To learn more about this project, read the full case study.  

Now, let’s look at how you can use a chatbot for your business. 

Chatbot use cases

You can use live chats and chatbots for multiple business areas, including customer support, streamlined payment, shopping assistants, and even healthcare assistants. Many marketers agree that such chat options are here to stay as automation continues to make advances. Now, chatbots can cover the following usages: 

FAQ assistants

Chatbots, in most cases scripted, can perform as live FAQ and process over 80% of support queries. It means that the customer can ask them questions and receive an answer. But, to create such a chatbot, you need something more than integrating FAQ section materials into a chat interface. FAQ chatbots should also be able to ask follow-up questions and connect the user with a real person if needed. 

Such chatbots are used for both websites and mobile applications, and one example is the “Kate” chatbot, a mobile app digital assistant, developed by Geico insurance company. App users can ask Kate questions, via both voice and text, and receive answers about billing and basic policy.

Navigational botsshopping assistants

Navigations bots help website or mobile app users search for specific information such as blog articles, a particular website page or product, via a conversational interface. You can use the navigation chatbot to direct customers to the most relevant product. Firstly, the user tells a chatbot what product one is searching for. Next, the navigation bot shows the user all the products that match the user’s request and sends links to those items. To achieve this, the chatbot back-end is integrated with catalog and service-side API. Still, such chatbots are something more than navigation menus. Shopping assistants can even adopt changing messages and themes, send holiday greetings or information about an actual sale. 

Shopping assistants are widely used in the clothes and fashion industry. An example is the H&M bot on the KiK platform, which understands user style preferences, gives personalized style recommendations, and even builds an outfit. 

Healthcare assistants

Chatbots help clinics and hospitals save a considerable amount of money. In the healthcare industry, chatbots can perform as online receptionists, nurses, interns, or even assist with a patient progress report, assess drug interactions, and check post-op recovery. 

Besides, chatbots can make medical diagnoses faster, as MedWhat chatbot does. Thanks to the ML algorithm, MedWhat chatbot provides users with increasingly accurate answers on questions concerning medical diagnoses. Besides this, thanks to machine learning, the bot learns from each interaction with a patient. MedWhat bot expands existing medical data using a vast volume of medical research and peer-reviewed scientific papers. 

Recommendations and Booking agents

In industries like hospitality and traveling, chatbots can be used as personal traveler assistants or virtual concierges. In this way, customers receive 24/7 online support, which impacts customer loyalty and satisfaction. You can integrate such chatbots into a website, and even a Facebook Business page, like the SnapTravel agency has.

Using the SnapTravel Messenger bot, travelers can find the best accommodation that meets their preferences and budget. This bot is powered by Artificial Intelligence and works as an aggregator. You need to enter the dates and city you want to go to. Then, Snap bot analyzes offer from Expedia, Priceline, and other travel websites, to come up with the best deals. After selecting the best option, the user can book accommodation right through Messenger. 

Lead generation and retention bots

Chatbots might also be a part of a content marketing strategy and generate more leads from social media or websites. Besides this, a retention chatbot could activate your old leads by sending them sales alerts or relevant updates as TechCrunch Messenger chatbot does. It informs subscribers about stories on relevant topics. To achieve this, users need to subscribe to sections, authors, and topics on the TechCrunch website, and then the bot sends news articles, and other updates, right to the user via Messenger. 

Transactional bots

This type of chatbot is much different from other use cases on this list. The main goal of transactional chatbots is to simplify user experience and provide a convenient and quick channel for completing a particular action. Transactional chatbots allow users to place new orders and repeat purchases and even conduct an online payment. 

An example is Pizza Hut’s bot that helps users place orders for pizza and other meals via Twitter or Facebook. The bot also informs customers about recent promotions and answers FAQ questions.

Have you selected a perfect type and usage case for your chatbot? Great!

Now, let’s find out whether to build a bot with a builder or make a custom bot from scratch. 

READ ALSO: NLP Business Applications

Platform-based chatbots

Chatbot platforms allow you to make your own chatbot by yourself. While some chatbot-building platforms have a simple drag-and-drop menu, others require a degree of technical knowledge. Now, we’ll take a look at the most popular platforms for building chatbots, their capabilities, and price policies. 

	Flow XO	Chatfuel	Azure Bot Service
Complexity	Simple	Medium	High
Where to use	·       Facebook Messenger ·       Slack ·       Twilio SMS ·       Telegram ·       Website	·       Facebook Messenger ·       WordPress ·       Shopify websites	·       Website ·       Mobile app ·       Cortana ·       Skype ·       Slack ·       Facebook Messenger
Main features	·       Simple questions answering ·       User answers validation ·       Switch between a chatbot and live chat ·       Accept payments ·       Build-in templates	·       Online chat ·       Payments ·       Call button ·       Switch between a chatbot and human agent ·       Support integrations via JSON API	·       Natural Language Understanding ·       Open-source SDK ·       Native integration of Azure Cognitive Services. ·       Any type of bots: from a Q&A bot to your own branded virtual assistant
Costs	·       Standard Plan – $19 per month Add-ons: ·       5 bots or active flows – $10 per month ·   25,000 interactions- $10 per month	·       Free – up to 1000 Subscribers ·       Pro – from $15 per month ·       Premium – from $199 per month	·       Free – 10,000 messages/month ·       Premium channels- $0.50 per 1,000 messages

So, what are the advantages of bot-building platforms?

• Chatbot builders are handy for developing simple or even sophisticated chatbots for any business
• You can integrate your chatbot to most popular messaging platforms, such as Messenger, Telegram, Skype
• Some platforms allow integrating a chatbot right to your website or mobile app
• You can connect your chatbot with third-party services such as payment gateway 
• Chatbot-building platforms are cheap or even free 
• By using a platform, you can set your business logic of chatbot behavior

At the same time, chatbot building platforms have some disadvantages:

• You can only create a chatbot with simple logic. For more complex chatbots, you will need  help from developers 
• Chatbot-builders’ tools may not always help you achieve your desired results.
• If you are not a tech person, you will need more time and effort to make a chatbot. However, there is no guarantee that the chatbot will perform well.

Building a chatbot from scratch

If you want to create a sophisticated chatbot with your own API integrations, such as a shopping assistant, booking agent, or healthcare assistant, consider developing a chatbot from scratch. You can create a solution with custom logic and a set of features that ideally meet your business needs. Such chatbots work as a server-side application that implements chat features via its own API. To create your own custom chatbot, you need to hire a development team for chatbot development services. If your chatbot requires the integration of Natural Language Processing, the development team will use Opennlp or Nltk NLP tools. In this case, consider that NLP will perform as a separate service.  

Below, you can find our feature list of a custom chatbot MVP for a travel agency with estimation in hours. 

FeatureScreen	Functions required	BackEnd
Architecture		12
Customization for agents	Logo Agent Name	60
Connection to Data Server API		16
Switching between a chatbot and human agent	Switch between Human Agent and Chatbot Return, Forward functions for user	32
Gathering of data from the user (Search for hotel, tour, full package flow)	Dates Number of adults Number of Infants Meal Hotel stars	32
Transferring Data to API and receiving results		16
Tour Proposals	Show search results	8
Show more variants		16
Admin Panel
Admin Login		8
Chatbot Management	Define questions and answers	40
Total		From 240 hours

In our experience as a chatbot development company, developing a custom chatbot starts from $4000 and takes from 240 hours of coding. 

By developing a custom chatbot you will receive the following benefits: 

• You can integrate complex and unique functionalities to your chatbot
• Your development team will provide your bot with excellent user experience, as well as helping you to find the right technical solution for your business needs. 
• The development team will conduct tests of your chatbot to ensure that it is bug-free.
• After the bot release, the development team will provide you with technical maintenance and further bot improvement. 

However, there are also some drawbacks: 

• Developing a custom chatbot takes more time and costs more than developing a bot via the building platform. 
• To develop such a solution, developers will need to create service infrastructure and hosting, which also takes time. 

Now, let us compare developing a chatbot with a platform and a custom solution. 

Platform vs. Custom: Chatbot development comparison

	Platform	Custom
Initial cost	While some bot development platforms are free of charge, others will charge a fee: ·   Monthly ·   Per user ·   Per transaction basis	The cost will depend on: ·   Experience of the developers ·   The number of developing hours ·   Bot usage case ·   The number of platforms required ·   The number of chatbot users ·   The number of third-party integration such as an online store or a CRM ·   API integration
Planning	You can simultaneously plan and build a chatbot using a flowchart-like or drag and drop interface	Here, you need to consider the integration of a chatbot with:   ·   NLP ·   Analytics ·   Payments ·   Subscriptions ·   Integrations ·   Platforms All elements will work together, which increases both chatbot complexity.
Build Time	By using ready-made templates, you can integrate a simple chatbot in messenger in less than 30 seconds.	The chatbot building time depends on ·   Number of developers ·   Number and complexity of features ·   Number of integrations
Testing	You need to test the Chabot on your own. You can receive support on Chabot testing via a test/development chat within the platform.	The developing team will conduct the bench of the test to ensure that your bot operates correctly.
Maintenance	You can make changes and integrate new scenarios on your own without coding.	Only developers can make changes in the bot code.

What to choose: platform-build or a custom chatbot?

There is no single answer since the solution will depend on the complexity of your chatbot, its’ usage case, number of integrations, and so on. 

Chatbot builders suite for developing:

• FAQ bots
• Transactional chatbots 
• Navigation bots
• Lead generation bots

Besides, you can use chatbot builders if you are in a hurry, have a tight budget, and need simple functionality. However, even platform build-solutions may be complex and apply MLP, AI, and machine learning. For such cases, you need to hire a development team to set up and teach the sophisticated chatbots for you. 

Custom chatbots are great in the following use cases:

• Shopping assistants with AI and machine learning 
• Healthcare assistants 
• Medical diagnoses bot
• Hospitality chatbots and personal concierge
• A bot with catalog and service-side API integrations

In a nutshell

Chatbots vary in the level of their complexity, usage cases, and industries. Still, with such great diversity, you can find the option that will ideally meet your business needs. To achieve this, you need to answer the following questions: 

• What is the purpose of the chatbot?
• Where will you use it: in a messenger, website, or app?
• How complex should it be?
• How many features should it have?
• Do you need to integrate it with third-party services, such as analytics or payment gateway?  

After answering these questions you will have a clear idea of whether to build your own custom chatbot or use a bot builder. 

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