Developing iPhone Apps – how to get it rightJune 28th, 2010
Parker’s Car Pricing Guide was a Top Ten Grossing App – and Top Twenty Paid App – in the UK App Store. It was also featured by Apple on iTunes – giving the App a very healthy sales boost!
We believe that a healthy portion of this success was due to the simple, polished, fun design of the App. I hope that others can benefit or take inspiration from the process that we followed, which is detailed below.
1. Application Definition Statement
The Application Definition Statement is the most valuable part of the App design process. It is a single sentence that describes what the App will do, who it is for, and what will differentiate it from its competitors. Its role is to keep a focus on why somebody would use your App.
“Parker’s makes it simple for the average car buyer to choose the best deal, wherever they are”
2. Concept
Once we had created our ADS we spent some time thinking through our basic concept. Apple categorises iPhone Apps into three distinct types, of which we chose to place Parker’s in the third:
1. Immersive
2. Productivity
3. Utility
Parker’s primary usage scenario is in a high pressure situation – allowing the car buyer to respond to a pushy second hand car salesman – so the App needed to enable fast access to a complicated database of information (price by manufacturer, model, year plate, mileage and options).
