This is no longer just an attention-grabbing business model trend. Remote work has become a valid and feasible work model for employees and companies. Remote work now encompasses employees working out of the office, with a flexible and mobile schedule, and companies hiring professionals that are working remotely.
Companies have expanded services towards outsourcing services, and that they hire remote workers for, such as operational processes and product and software development services. For example, companies and employers can use this link to learn more about software engineering services for their custom software development services needs.
But why remote work? How has it impacted the workforce and employment movement?
Remote Work: Popular and Viable
Remote work has grown 44% over the last 5 years, and between 2016 and 2017 found a 7.9% increase globally. The top fields with the greatest number of remote workers are Computer and IT, Health and Medical, Sales, Education and Training, and Customer Service.
Multi-million dollar companies such as Toggl, Automatic, Buffer, Meet Edgar, Zapier, and Appen have been built and supported by remote work. Other companies like Dell, Invision, Git Lab, and Todoist have also found success with the outsourcing software development services and other organizational processes.
Software Development Services and Remote Work
In 2015, around 8% of
all the full-time computer programmers in the US worked from home. This
percentage has been growing steadily over the past couple of years. In the IT
and software development industry, many programmers find the benefits of
working from home are better than working in the office the entire day.
According to the State of Software Development in 2019, the major challenges encountered in software development are limited capacity and knowledge sharing. To address these challenges, the majority of companies allow their employees to do remote work. This then opened up the opportunity for outsourcing projects and business processes.
Advantages of Remote Work
Why is remote work so preferred by both companies and employees? Interviews with executives have shed some light on some of the advantages of the business model. And studies and market statistics have shown why remote work for software developers is the way forward with many a software development services company. Below are the major drivers we found as to why webmasters will find remote work as a business model beneficial, either as an employee or as an employer.
As an Employee
Increased work productivity. Studies have shown that working remotely leads to increased productivity for employees. Remote employees or those working on remote jobs are empowered to find the space and mindset that enables them to work optimally. Remote workers leveraging this freedom to choose when and where to work to work are more productive and able to accomplish more tasks, participate and collaborate better, and have a better disposition at work.
Increased mobility. Remote employees can work from anywhere. Remote jobs provide employees the benefit of being able to work anywhere that they are most comfortable at. The most popular place to work at, for remote employees, are at home in their home office, followed by working out of cafes or coffee places. Working remotely enables employees to be more mobile and spaces where they are most comfortable and most productive.
Improved work-life balance. Having a flexible timetable is the benefit that remote workers are most appreciative of. Remote work enables employees to spread out their time between work, time with friends and family, and hobbies, leading to a more positive work-life balance.
Individuals in the workforce that value experiences and personal growth over possessions find this highly favorable, especially in their work environment. This improved balance between work and non-work activities lead to less stress and more productivity for workers.
Reduced employee expenses. Because of its impact on their daily spending, employees are further encouraged to do remote work. Remote employees or workers that telecommute spend less on commuting, fuel, food, and car maintenance. An average worker usually spends around $10 a day just going to a from work, which accumulates to around $2,600 annually. Remote employees and those that work from home save on this expense and spend this money on better things.
As a Company
Improved employee retention. Remote work empowers employees to be more productive at home, in their own space, and enjoy the benefits of employment. Remote employees that are more than satisfied with their working environment engender appreciation and positivity towards their bosses and company.
Because employees are more satisfied with their remote work situation, they are more likely to stay with the company. With a company able to adapt to remote workers and provide their needed benefits, employees have more reason to stay and keep working for the company.
Increased workforce diversity. Employing remote workers opens a company to the opportunity to hire skilled professionals from all over the world. This approach enables the company to improve the diversity in their workforce by onboard remote employees that come from across different gender, ethnicity, and location, and abilities.
Take for example a software development services company, they can employ remote expert software engineers and software developers to build solutions for their clients. Or the company itself is remote and collaborates with other companies.
Reduced operational costs. Companies engaging remote employees in their workforce incur fewer expenses in setting up their office needs. Instead of physical offices and utilities, costs go to setting up tools and processes that would make remote jobs all the more efficient and effective. These costs are a lot cheaper to establish and maintain in the long run.
In the case of our software development services company example, in engaging the services of remote software engineers and software developers, this company can focus their operational costs in purchasing and maintaining communication, project management, and task tracking tools and software.
No business model is perfect. Remote jobs also have pitfalls:
Communication and collaboration can be a challenge to establish and maintain.
There can be difficulty distancing oneself from work and unplugging.
Employees may feel disconnected from work and life and experience loneliness.
Distractions from home or non-work environments can be a hindrance to productivity and remote employee time tracking and management.
But the challenges and pitfalls that may be encountered with remote work can be solved and improved. It makes for an effective working model and this is what is important. It has revolutionized work and the quality of work-life balance that employees can achieve. It has also provided companies and employers a viable and reliable means of increasing their workforce.
Remote work is not perfect, but, when done correctly, it is highly effective.
Editor’s note: This guest post was provided by Kateryna Boiko. She is a Marketing Manager at Mobilunity, Provider of Dedicated Development Teams with 9 years of hands-on experience in digital marketing. Kateryna managed to work with diverse industries and markets and now is keen on sharing unique cases with the world and coach on topics relevant to Web Analytics and Search Engine Optimization.
Any professional who works at creating, managing, or marketing a website understands how important digital assets are in their work. Digital assets are electronically stored data that come with the right to use, bring value to their owners, and are uniquely identifiable. Examples of digital assets include audio files, PDF white papers, graphics, photos, HTML documents, and presentations.
Web professionals can use these assets to help educate people on a topic, improve a company or organization’s digital presence, and market products or services online. However, as the number of stored digital assets grows at an organization, it becomes time-consuming and difficult for different web professionals to manage and retrieve assets.
A digital asset management (DAM) solution is a type of software that helps web professionals properly store, update, index, and retrieve their digital assets. The demand for dedicated DAM tools is expected to surge over the coming years, and recent research predicted the global DAM market to reach $8.1 billion by 2024.
Read on to find out the types of DAM available, the service models you can implement when using DAM systems, and some specific use cases of DAM software for web professionals. You will also get some tips and best practices for getting the most out of any DAM solution.
Types of Tools
There are three main types of Digital Asset Management tools; however, many enterprise solutions can be classified and used as any single one or as all of these types simultaneously.
Library asset management focuses
on building an organized digital library of infrequently changing assets for
easy storage and retrieval.
Production asset management meets
the needs of web professionals who need to collaborate on, control and use
digital assets that are frequently updated and revised.
Brand asset management entails
using and reusing marketing materials, logos, and other assets that help to
build brand identity.
Software Service Models
There are two main service models for implementing Digital Asset Management:
On-premise DAM solutions are installed locally on an organization’s servers. Everything is kept in-house and users typically access assets via the internal corporate network.
Cloud DAM solutions are hosted on external web servers and the software is accessed through a web browser via an Internet connection.
On-premise DAM systems are better suited for web professionals whose roles involve stringent data security obligations, such as people working in government departments and highly regulated industries. A cloud DAM is a cheaper, more flexible solution that can also facilitate the needs of distributed teams and remote workers.
Benefits of DAM for Web Professionals
Web professionals work in a wide range of roles, but here are some general benefits of DAM software for all web professionals:
DAM software reduces time spent
looking for assets, improves workflows, and facilitates quick repurposing of
digital assets. The result is greater productivity.
By building a central repository
of digital assets and using versioning controls, DAM provides asset consistency
and facilitates collaboration for web professionals.
DAM software tracks the usage
rights associated with assets, which can help reduce the risk of copyright
issues from improper asset use. For example, there might be restrictions in how
you use purchased stock photos.
Cloud and on-premise DAM software
typically come with access control, meaning you can secure your most sensitive
assets and make sure that the only people with access to them are those who
need such access to do their jobs.
Best Practices When Using a DAM System
DAM offers many benefits for web professionals but how you use your chosen tool can make a huge difference. Here are some best practices for getting the most from DAM software.
Metadata is Critical
Metadata is information about your assets. Your DAM software is only as good as the metadata you store with each asset. There is a balance between too much metadata and too little. You need to enter the most important information about every asset you wish to catalog because metadata is what turns a piece of digital data into an easily searchable and retrievable asset. You should also have a policy to enter metadata into the system as soon as you upload a given asset. Procrastination leads to an inefficient setup that makes it hard to find assets.
Specify Usage Terms
Assets rights issues can easily emerge when an asset has been stored without reference to its usage rights. For all rights-managed assets, it’s imperative to specify the usage terms in their metadata.
Leverage Analytics
DAM software often comes with advanced tracking and analytics features. You can use this information to your advantage, for example, marketers can identify the asset categories that bring the most ROI to your organization. You can also use the analytics to identify assets or collections of assets that are most frequently used and try to make such assets more easily discoverable.
Assign an Administrator
Particularly in large organizations, it is prudent to have a dedicated DAM administrator. This person can manage access controls for different users and ensure user roles and permissions are kept current. The administrator should also be responsible for creating and deleting users from the system.
Train Users
When you adopt a DAM system, it’s a good idea to set up a dedicated half-day of training that teaches different web professionals in your organization how to use your chosen software. If you avoid training users, they will need to learn on the job, which can lead to a lot of frustration and lost productivity.
Conclusion
The expected growth in the DAM software market reflects the growing influence of digital assets in the daily work of various web professionals from designers to marketers to website copywriters. Cloud DAM solutions have emerged as a lower cost alternative service model for DAM, however, on-premise systems are still the standard for professionals in government departments and highly regulated sectors.
Editor’s Note: This sponsored content was provided by Gilad Maayan (Developer Community Advisor) at Agile SEO.
It’s a symbol or object that communicates the company’s proposition about its products and services and differentiates it from its rivals. A brand encompasses:
Logos
Design
Advertising tone
Why website branding is important
Creating a strong brand for your client’s website can give them a distinct advantage over their competitors. With branding comes recognition. This leads to familiarity, which can earn a customer’s confidence and trust.
However, building this kind of loyalty may take time. A website visitor may need multiple exposures to the brand. So, put simply, by helping your clients deliver a consistent brand message, you can boost their chances of success. What is more, you will increase your opportunities of getting repeat business from them.
A website essentially serves to:
Sell products or services
Generate leads
Promote sales
Attract visitors or subscribers
Generate a healthy return on investment (ROI)
Through strong website branding, a company can deliver a clear message that achieves all of the above as well as building loyalty and trust from its customers.
To help your client develop effective website branding, follow these tips.
1. Color creates moods
Color is more than aesthetics; it can stimulate emotions and stir people’s subconscious in relation to the company’s brand. For example:
Red – symbolizes energy, excitement, energy, and passion. If your client is in the entertainment business, for instance, red will work well for their brand.
Green – symbolizes the environment, nature, health, money or profit. If you’re working for a hospital or clinic, using a pale green background would be appropriate for their site.
Orange – symbolizes fun and adventure. For example, detype.com uses orange liberally on its site from the background to headings, and links. As a web design company this indicates that it’s enthusiastic and outgoing.
Before choosing a color for your client’s site, consider doing some research about its effects and appropriateness to the brand. Also, remember that each culture may view the same color differently. So, you should check the target market’s reaction to the colors used in your proposed website design.
2. Brand personality
Injecting some personality into the website helps to zero-in or define what your client’s brand represents. One way you could introduce personality is using a character or persona to represent the brand. Twitter’s bird logo is a good example. People recognize the social platform’s mascot immediately.
3. Emotional connection
Creating websites that stir visitor’s emotions can help your client’s brand messaging. As you design the site, decide what kind of feelings or emotions you want visitors to experience? For example, DeType displays attractive imagery to showcase the creative talent of its web designers.
4. Uniformity
To make a brand memorable, you need to make the website design consistent. So consider keeping all the site’s colours, character, and emotions consistent on every page. Take a look at Skype’s website. Every page shows the same look, reinforcing its brand.
5. Reusability (code and visuals)
As well as using consistent visuals and layouts, you can reuse content such as style sheets or images. As the files are in the browser’s cache, this will consequently make your site load faster.
6. Make the logo highly visible
Considering placing the logo at the upper left corner of the site, since this is the spot where most visitors’ eyes will be drawn. Also, consider linking the logo image to the site’s page. As for size, ensure that it is big enough to be noticeable, making it at least the second or third object visitors see on the site.
7. Promote the benefits
Visitors won’t stay long on a site if it fails to grab their interest. It will only take seconds for them to find out if they have come to the right place. To convince them to stay, tell them what benefits they can get from using the brand’s product or service in a few succinct words. The best location for this message is next to the logo so that people can see it immediately.
8. Adopt and use the right tone
Even the website’s language can strengthen a brand’s appeal to your target market. For example, there are various tones and combinations of tones you can adopt:
Formal voice for a site catering to investors
Informal and fun voice for young audiences
Friendly voice with related industry jargon for a tech-savvy audience
Also, be mindful that some words can have different meanings, depending on the audience. Take the word ‘engine’, for example:
A Mechanical Engineer will describe an engine as “a device which converts fuel or heat energy into mechanical energy”. A Computer programmer, however, will associate an engine as being “software which generates source code in order to create automated processes.”
9. Make the site stand out
Creating a website brand won’t create any impact or differential if it is the same as other competing sites. As a designer, you need to include elements that will make your client’s site unique. After all, by making the site stand out you’ll improve the brand’s chances of attracting visitors and making them return.
Conclusion
Building a strong recognizable brand, even for small business or personal websites, is a must in this digital age. This is especially important, given the short attention span of visitors and of course the sheer number of businesses that have an online presence.
Strong branding can instantly demonstrate the attractive advantages of your client’s brand, its key differences to competitors and its unique personality and character. Getting across all of this can help clients in a big way, to not just win over customers but beat their competitors.
As you can see from the tips covered in this article, there isn’t just one single route you need to arrive at a strong brand but a range of directions. So, keep these all in mind when you embark on successfully branding your client’s site.
About the author:
Sam Sayer is the Creative Director of DeType, a creative agency based in Kettering, Northamptonshire, UK. His company specializes in web design, branding, motion, UX, and online design.
There’s no doubt that the latest internet revolution is throwing a number of industries for a loop, and the real estate business is as affected as anyone else. Real estate web platforms like Zillow and Trulia provide potential renters and homeowners with a wealth of new tools for their search, offering an alternative to traditional real estate brokers and agents. But that doesn’t mean that everything is hopeless for real estate agencies. By adopting these technologies themselves and moving beyond the traditional real estate website, they can compete with these more disruptive approaches to how we shop for homes. But regardless of which areas these clients come from, it’s fertile ground for people with mobile app development experience. Here are some common mistakes you should avoid when building out a real estate platform.
Neglecting
the Search Interface
When you really separate the process of real
estate app development down to its component parts, it’s not that dissimilar
from building a traditional marketplace shopping app. For the majority of
startups trying to create a real estate app, the service itself will operate as
a third party provider connecting supply to demand. It’s a model employed in
countless industries today, but whether you’re operating an airfare shopping
service like Expedia or a more traditional shopping app like Wish or eBay, the
core objective is the same. You need to provide the users with the tools they
need to identify their needs and receive accurately and appropriately filtered
results.
That means that the search engine is going to
serve as the core of any real estate app, and the options therein are going to
be what causes it to sink or swim. Regardless of the platform, there are a few
fundamental filtering options that tend to serve as the core of the real estate
search experience:
The location of the property. Many buyers will come to the home shopping experience with some understanding of their ideal neighborhoods, and that means that in addition to a functional map system (which we’ll address below), a simpler way to sort homes by location is integral. This could be broken down into neighborhood names, zip codes, or both.
Listing and home types. Whether a user is
looking to buy, sell, or rent their property, their needs are going to be very
different. You may want to integrate the selling process using a different interface,
but that will depend on how deep is a feature set you want to create for
sellers.
The number of bedrooms. A single college
student will have very different demands from a family of four, after all.
Pricing. This is a fundamental variable in any
shopping experience, and a slider is the most effective way to make it work
within your app.
Those are just the fundamentals. A number of
other filters like the number of secondary rooms, available amenities, floor
space, and smart home features can greatly improve the interactivity of your
app. If you’re putting a particular emphasis on renting, additional filters
that cover policies like pets and smoking can be of great use as well.
Choosing
Only One Listing Type
The search filters only provide half of the
story for shoppers, and that’s why more in-depth listings are a necessary
component for any app. The two predominant visualizations in apps of these
types are maps and paneled lists, and most real estate apps that want to stay
competitive will make use of both, normally in conjunction with each other.
Listings allow your sellers or landlords to
put their best foot forward. Photos can make a huge difference when trying to
find a renter or buyer for a property, and that’s why it’s important to make
these options as interactive as possible. Setting standards for resolution,
size, and a format is critical here, as it creates a level of consistency with
your platform, and you’ll want to make sure that your retailers have access to
a simple interface that allows them to upload images easily, manage their
galleries, and edit the write up for their listings. On the other end of the
equation, the ability to like, bookmark, or favorite listings is a quality of
life component that may seem simple but is a practical necessity for apps like
these.
Maps might not offer the same dense level of
information as listings, but they help the user get a good frame of reference
for their prospective properties. Location is one of the biggest determinant
factors in the home shopping experience, and it shouldn’t be neglected.
Fortunately, the Google Maps API is easy to integrate into most platforms, and
there’s a decent level of customization that can be used to create your own
brand identity. Another advantage of implementing Google’s map function is that
it offers a street-level view, a useful choice for customers who don’t want to
rely on the listing galleries alone.
Used in conjunction with one another, these
two listing formats allow the users to shop how they want, and it essentially
creates two layers of immersion into the experience: a top-down view in the
form of the map and a more focused perspective in the form of the paneled
gallery.
Focusing
Exclusively on Buyers and Renters
If you’re a third party designing a real
estate app, it can be easy to look at the people trying to rent and buy a home
as your direct consumer. That would be a mistake. As the endpoint in the
transactional relationship, the owners and landlords will ultimately be the
consumers for your product, and appealing to them should be a top priority. You
should strongly consider putting a feature rich interface in for agents and
independent sellers.
Monetizing the option to place listings can be one of the best ways to keep your app in the black, but that means that you can’t lag behind the big names in the industry. A calendar constitutes the bare minimum here, and it should absolutely be a part of your infrastructure. If your agents and sellers can’t effectively share information on open houses and showings, your app could be dead on arrival. As with maps, there are a number of options that can be easily implemented via API here, from Google Calendar to Outlook.
But you should consider map functionality a
bare minimum here. Many sites offer priority advertising for premium customers,
and some even incorporate full-blown customer relationship management platforms
directly into their interface. Exactly how far you want to dig in here is going
to depend on the ambition of your app, but you should at least build your
application with the opportunity for expansion into CRM territory. Marketing
tools, landing page integration, and dynamic communications options like chat,
voice, and email are all reasonable goals to set for your app’s development
process.
In
Conclusion, Pace Yourself
Real estate apps may occupy a comparatively small part of the overall software marketplace, but they can be highly lucrative. As with any development cycle, coming in with a strong proof of concept and direct goals for development. By setting a blueprint from the start and determining how your app is differentiated from the variety of other services on the market, you can carve out your own unique niche. Just don’t neglect the fundamental necessities in pursuit of the next big thing.
Editor’s note: This sponsored post was provided by Victor Osadchiy.
Victor Osadchiy
Victor is a creative writer who formerly worked in the Ed Tech industry. By day, he’s a writer about app development for business. By night, he’s an online gamer and a big fan of Esports. You can find more posts by Victor on the Yalantis blog
The hype around voice search has been building up ever since it was introduced around a decade ago, from the time when users were required to dial in a number and verbally state their search queries.
Since then, various companies have made gigantic leaps in the development of voice-search, thanks to superior machine learning algorithms and the influx of data derived from search engines. Currently, the market for voice search has expanded into a multi-billion-dollar enterprise with the biggest players, including Amazon, Google, and Apple, all competing for a piece of the pie.
The profound impact voice search has on search engine optimization (SEO) means that it affects everybody and anybody on the internet. Professionals directly linked with the Internet, and digital marketing in particular, need to stay one step ahead of the curve to ensure they are ready when the tide changes.
Why Is Voice Search Important For SEO in 2019?
Amit Singhal, the head of Google SERP ranking team stated in 2013, that “the destiny of Google’s search engine is to become that Star Trek computer.” If anything, that explains the direction voice search has taken in the last few years, and where it is headed in the years to come.
As a component of speech recognition technology, voice search uses voice commands to perform online searches. The core idea behind it was the facilitation of the consumer experience; people would find it more convenient to speak – and let the computer transcribe the search query – than manually typing it in.
This simplistic view has been expanded upon through the gradual growth in technology. Innovation, such as personal voice assistants have proven revelatory for voice search advancement, offering the much-needed personalization and customization when catering to users’ queries.
Voice Search Is the Future
Such developments were the reason why back in 2014, Andrew Ng – the Chief Scientist at Baidu – was confident enough to predict that by 2020, 50% of all searches would be conducted through voice search.
As of 2017, 41% of online adults were conducting at least one voice search a day and the numbers have only increased since then. Voice search has already become the fastest growing search type, and the trend’s trajectory doesn’t seem to be fading anytime soon in the foreseeable future.
By January 2018, 1 billion voice searches were being carried out a month. These numbers aren’t surprising as people look for faster, more efficient alternatives to typed searching. While people can only type about 40 words per minute, they can speak 150 in the same amount of time.
As a web professional, voice search adaptability is a necessary accessory for your toolkit as you prepare to take on 2019. 58% of consumers are already utilizing voice search features to find information on local businesses. As the number of voice searches increases, businesses need to implement sound SEO techniques to reap the benefits i.e. increased organic traffic.
How to Optimize Your Website for Voice Search
Does voice search have any benefits at all? For sure. Don’t take our word for it, ask Amazon. A study reported that the implementation of voice search technology on its eCommerce platform resulted in $1.8 billion of the tech giant’s revenue in the last year – a figure that is expected to reach $40 billion by 2022.
Let’s face it, creating an attractive and relevant website can be a real challenge so outsourcing web professionals can be a great solution. However, they also need to stay relevant and continually grow to be able to deliver a valuable service to their clients. Here are some of the ways web professionals can optimize a website to maximize results derived from voice searches:
Focus On Featured Snippets
Appearing at the top of SERPs, featured snippets aim to present a concise answer to a user query. With this feature, Google aims to present the most relevant content at the very top of the user’s search result for a smoother experience.
In addition to ensuring high-quality content that justifies its relevance and quality to the search engine, you can go a step further and include a brief summary of the crux of your content above the fold.
The average voice search result is about 29 words long, so keep that in mind when devising content summaries. Additionally, long-tail keywords are a prominent feature of the “snippet” and should be included for added visibility.
Include Long Tail Keywords Using Conversational Tone
When optimizing your site for voice searches, it is imperative to keep in mind that the way we speak is inherently different from the way we write.
While typed queries are very short and concise, conversational search queries make use of more words. This translates to the emphasis placed on long tail keywords, which sound natural, and are more likely to be used in voice searches.
This helps in traditional SEO, and keywords that contain multiple words face less competition and hold a higher chance to top the SERP rankings. It might require additional and extensive keyword research, but is well worth it.
Additionally, the easier your sentence reads – the better it is for your SEO. We speak less formally than we type, and that means reduced wordiness. In fact, a majority of the voice search software conform to 9Th-grade reading levels. You could be writing about genetic engineering, but it should be written in a way that makes it easier to comprehend.
Make Sure Your Page Loads Fast
The reason why people use voice search is a convenience, and what convenience does a slow loading speed provide?
Not only does Google’s algorithm tilt towards websites that load faster, and as a result, ensure optimal user satisfaction and reduced bounce rates; it also benefits the consumer.
This is basic on-site SEO in action, with a special emphasis on mobile responsiveness. With Google Mobilegeddon causing mobile-responsive sites to rank higher, it is vital that your website is compatible with smartphones as well.
Faster page-load speeds are achieved through the utilization of images that are optimized, compressed files, and website caching, to name a few. People already use voice search widely, and its acceptance will only grow drastically in the future.
Conclusions
Those who take voice search into account in their SEO strategy already have an edge over other players. Voice search operates by narrowing down results, only catering to the top three. Companies that capitalize on voice search integration early on will benefit from higher content visibility, which will only keep increasing.
While it may seem ominous now, the future is clear: voice search will form the core of SEO, and preparing for it now will give you a competitive edge above others as they try to catch up in the coming years.
Editor’s note: this sponsored content was provided by Antonija Bozickovic.
Antonija is an internet marketing specialist at Point Visible, a marketing agency providing link building and digital marketing services. She has a great interest in digital marketing and a soft spot for graphic design. She’s never tired of searching for new inspirations, listening to her favorite music and creating digital illustrations.
Technology has impacted our lives on a larger scale, including our health. From doctors to patients, everyone has adopted the digitization of health industry. And this adoption has given rise to healthcare mobile app development. Undoubtedly, the demand for mobile apps in the healthcare sector is constantly increasing. Medical apps or mhealth apps have brought revolution in the way patients receive care and how patients communicate with providers.
Healthcare mobile apps made patients empowered to take their own, fully-informed medical decisions. It not only provides them with more knowledge but also increases patients’ involvement. Whether it is the healthcare provider or patient, mhealth app developers took the initiative to level the playing field for everyone.
Let’s have a look at how mhealth apps are transforming the healthcare industry.
With the help of mhealth apps, healthcare providers can cater to medical emergencies as well as offer enhance patient care. These apps are slowly becoming a significant part of the patient-provider lifestyle. It comes handy in a lot of medical procedures such as viewing blood reports and medical prescriptions, tracking patient recovery, and monitoring disease symptoms. Digital prescriptions allow providers to treat and monitor patients on the go.
Benefits of Healthcare Mobile Apps
Some of the biggest concerns of patients while accessing healthcare services are the cost of medical and health insurance and keeping pace with the technology. Healthcare mobile app development addresses these concerns and improves patient-provider communication. Even though health is a priority for everyone, but visiting hospitals frequently for regular checkups or follow-ups doesn’t count as a feasible option. Mobile technology brought relief to this problem. Here are some of the benefits of healthcare mobile apps:
Easy care access: mhealth apps let providers communicate with the patients in a better way. It reduces the distance between them and improves the patient-provider relationship. Mobile apps let patients take consultation over platforms and visit only as recommended. This will not only save patients and providers’ time but also cut a significant cost.
Improved patient engagement: The long queues outside the doctors’ clinic leaves a very limited time for providers to treat every patient warmly. In addition to this, it lacks the transparency of cost and quality. Healthcare apps work the best for patients, as it informs them if there is any delay in the appointment or they want to fix an appointment in the real time.
Additionally, mhealth apps are beneficial for working professionals and elderly who don’t get updates regarding upcoming doctor appointments or pill schedule. These apps work as an assistant for patients, reminding them to take pills and scheduled appointments as required.
No More Medical Fraud: With healthcare apps, there would be no more Medicare fraud. Often, patients get mislead by brokers present in the hospital who fool them saying that they will fix their appointment and charge a hefty amount to the medical staff. mhealth apps let patients access healthcare services without any mediator. Additionally, patients are also able to book their appointments directly with the doctor through the app and get genuine bills.
Round the clock service: Healthcare mobile apps offers 24*7 assistance to patients and providers. Generally, when patients are done with consultations, they are left with paper, prescribed medicines, and recommended treatment. This way, there are higher chances that patients may miss the key points mentioned by doctors during treatment.
In such situations, healthcare apps come as a handy solution. It can help patients remember even the minute detail and the important instructions from providers such as taking pills, checking side effects, and contacting a doctor immediately in case of emergency.
Role of mobile apps in the Healthcare Sector
When it comes to healthcare, it becomes mandatory for healthcare providers to make quick decisions and implement those decisions timely to save patients’ lives. An efficient IT infrastructure is necessary for the providers to make prompt decisions. Here healthcare mobile apps can ease-down the decision-making process.
Mobile technology has proven helpful for doctors and nurses. It enables them to check patients’ health records in the real-time and patients can monitor their health conditions too. It also helps policy-makers to further improve as well as create new healthcare programs.
Here are some tips to develop a Successful Healthcare Mobile App
Determine your target audience: Determining who you are going to provide your services is one of the most crucial factors to consider while developing a healthcare app. Explore as much as you can on your targeted user-base.
Understand the need/problem: Once you know your target audience, determine what problems they are facing and how can you solve it. There might be many apps available in the market that claim to solve the same problem but hardly people find those appropriate. As a healthcare app developer, you must provide a solution that offers an easy-to-use experience to your users and solves their problems efficiently.
Customize as required: Your solution should be customized as per patients’ needs. It should provide information to the users, specific to their queries and with which they can relate to.
Direct Communication: Your healthcare app should offer a direct communication medium between patients and their doctors as it helps patients understand their health state. The medium can be in any form: messages or email.
Earlier, it was necessary for the patients and doctors to be in the same place for the treatment. With the advent of healthcare mobile apps, this limiting requirement has been addressed and solved as patients can take consultation, book appointments and tests, and take proper follow-up virtually within the app. These apps are like a blessing for the people living in rural areas and face difficulty in connecting with professional doctors.
Key Take Away!
As you have learned about how the intervention of technology with healthcare gave rise to healthcare mobile apps, its benefits, and a few tips to build a successful healthcare mobile app. It is evident from the above discussion that the upcoming years are going to be great for the healthcare providers and patients as there will be better solutions and many options to choose from, in order to solve a problem.
Whether it is a patient or a healthcare provider, there are numerous advantages for everyone. If you are thinking about developing your own app then it’s the right time to do it. All you need is a skilled team of an experienced digital healthcare technology partner, medical app developers, and digital marketers.
Editor’s note. This sponsored content was provided by Ritesh Patil.
Ritesh Patil is the co-founder of Mobisoft Infotech that helps startups and enterprises in mobile technology. He loves technology, especially mobile technology. He’s an avid blogger and writes on mobile application. He works in a leading mobile app development company with skilled Android and iOS app developers that has developed innovative mobile applications across various fields such as Finance, Insurance, Health, Entertainment, Productivity, Social Causes, Education and many more and has bagged numerous awards for the same. You can find him on Twitter and LinkedIn.
