Mobile Design and Development

Chapter 5. Developing a Mobile Strategy

I’ve been trying to stay positive and paint mobile design and development in a positive light. Before I let you in on the secrets of the mobile field—getting into all the dirty details, pitfalls, and frustrations of the medium, and how to solve them, or in some cases how to sidestep them—I want you to remember how important mobile development is to the future. It is the greatest communication and information medium of our time.

You will be tested. In fact, you should expect your explorations into mobile to be some of the most challenging moments in your career. Never give up: it is worth every minute of frustration, and with a little practice, I think you will find it highly rewarding work that transcends just mobile apps or sites.

It starts with developing a mobile strategy. By the phrase “mobile strategy,” what I mean is “how much time, effort, and money it will cost you.” Have no illusions: mobile design and development don’t come cheap. If you target only one platform, you might possibly see success with relatively no risk. However, once you start attempting to scale that strategy, you will quickly find yourself exponentially increasing the amount of time and effort required to be successful. With the wrong strategy, it can be hard to justify and even harder to monetize the costs of mobile.

Of course, there are workarounds, but if you come from the world of web products or traditional software development, some of the choices you will have ...