Helping our clients build successful web applications is extremely gratifying. Being able to listen and understand their business/technological problems and then help create a solution through intelligent software development and design can be extremely challenging. Our goal is to always build and design smart software fast. It helps that we have extremely talented web developers and an incredibly talented web design team. But most of the time, the real secret ingredient behind a project’s success boils down to the client. Clients that know their industry and business the best generally come to the table with more ideas, an outlined strategy, and desired goals.

If you’re thinking about hiring a web development team to help you design a website or software application there’s some fundamental things that you’ll want to think through prior to engaging developers.

Define the problem you’re trying to solve: What will your application ultimately do? How will it be better then a competitors site? How will it improve the lives of your customers, employees, and other users? Be specific and think BIG. The answers to these questions will ultimately work like a GPS throughout the planning and building stages. Anytime you’re unsure of whether or not you want to build certain features you can refer back to these initial questions. If certain features do not solve your stated problems then it will be much easier to table ideas that might take you off course of your initial road map.

Create an initial list of desired features: Once you have your vision detailed out by defining your goals for a project you can start deciding what features will help you achieve those goals. It’s always smart to create a full list of features that you think need to be implemented. This will work as a loose set of requirements, which is extremely helpful when you’re gathering quotes from design teams. Having a list of desired features will allow potential developers to properly estimate the time needed to build each feature. You can then set a budget and timelines. If certain features don’t fit into your budget you can decide which ones are critical for your success now and which ones can be implemented in later phases of development.

Pick your competition: Having a couple sites in mind that are in your industry but fail at delivering on some or all of their promises will not only help spur thoughts, but it can also give you some motivation. Don’t be afraid to take on the big guys. Just because a site may be dominant in your industry doesn’t mean you can’t carve out your own niche. If you feel a particular site fails at something, even if it’s a popular site, chances are much of their audience will agree with you. Knowing the competition also helps your development team stay on track with your stated goals and can help avoid making similar poor choices while developing your site.

Plan for phases: Facebook was around for several years before they completely changed their news feeds interface. Having an agile mindset will help keep momentum in the project. Perfectionism usually leads to a lot of imperfections. Planning for iterations allows you to decide on the few critical things that will help you achieve success now instead of trying to build the perfect application from day one. Be extremely biased on which features get built now. Every feature you add to scope adds time and money. Having a bloated list of unnecessary features is the quickest way to run a project into the ground.

Once you’re armed with defined goals, desired features, knowledge about your competition, and realistic expectations, your chances for success increase exponentially. Keeping a lean mindset throughout the entire life of your application will ensure that you don’t end up with a massive software application that no one uses. Google has developed hundreds of products, but their most used and most successful product is a white page with one text box and their logo.  Knowing what you want to accomplish and keeping it simple is the surest path to creating successful web applications.