In Los Angeles the design bar is set high. Everyone in LA is in the movie industry, they know what great design looks like and they want things to look awesome. Beauty is simply expected; it is not a differentiating factor for Los Angeles apps or Los Angeles app development. Behavior matters far more than aesthetics.
Users judge apps in seconds. A single bad experience will cause a user to delete an app and never download it again.
In LA it is important to remember that you are always competing with Instagram and Uber in users’ minds. They’re looking at the apps that they use every day and comparing those apps to your app. That’s kind of unfair, but if you’re going to be in a market as big as Los Angeles you need to be prepared for the idea that people in the city of LA have high expectations for everything that they deal with in Los Angeles app development.
Eight failure traps
At LA apps we see lots of mistakes made with mobile applications. Most of them fall into the following eight categories:
Confusing onboarding — if I have to get a PhD to figure out how to get onto your app and how to use it effectively I’m not interested. Apps are designed to make life easier. If your onboarding system is too complex and too confusing people are going to delete it before they get even halfway through the onboarding.
Feature bloat — every day we see apps that have far too many features on them. Lots and lots of features that are used by one or two people and no one else. Be careful not to make your app so complex with features that it’s difficult to navigate.
Ignoring everyday behavior — this relates to the feature idea. If someone needs to use an app once in a while to do something great but you want them to use it every day, then the way that happens most effectively is to deal with how people are going to use your app every day, not on those rare occasions they need some strange feature.
Chasing downloads — downloads are one of those vanity metrics that most inexperienced app creators will talk to you about. Downloads are not nearly as important as longevity. You want people to keep using your app, not just download it and then delete it.
Building for applause — so often apps are built so that they can win awards or really impress people but they’re not functionally powerful. The best apps, the ones people use every day all day, are the ones that are most effective and useful in their day-to-day lives.
Weak retention thinking — when designing an app the most important feature to be thinking about is the features that are going to improve retention. Everything should be geared toward keeping that app on people’s mobile devices for as long as humanly possible in Los Angeles app development.
Slow performance — in Los Angeles in particular, but also everywhere else, if your app is taking too long to do what I need it to do I’m going to delete it. Particularly since there are very few truly unique apps in the world. There’s a really good chance I can use someone else’s app to do the same thing, therefore make sure that yours is quick and efficient.
Solving the wrong problem — this is a painful rookie mistake. So often we’ll see apps that are well designed and very attractive but do not solve the actual problem people have. Before you even begin the process of designing an app, make sure you are solving an actual problem.
What works in Los Angeles app design
The most important thing to do when considering designing an app in LA is to solve one problem clearly. Figure out what the one problem is that you want to address and fix that. Everything you do after that is a bonus, but that one problem is going to be what keeps your app on people’s mobile devices.
Make the app obvious to use. This really shouldn’t have to be said but it should be simple to understand exactly how to use your app to solve the problem. If it’s not intuitive no one’s going to use it.
Then watch real users closely. This is something lots of people never do. They won’t take the time to sit and look closely and watch what actual users are using the app for. Very often they’ll look at how they use the app and assume they’re normal. There is a really good chance that as the app designer, the person most associated with fixing the problem, you’re not normal anymore. Watch what real users are using your app for so you can figure out what you need to enhance or what you need to remove in Los Angeles app development.
The most important signals to track
The most important signal to track is retention, not downloads. You want to look at how long and how often people are using your app, not how many people downloaded it.
Look at daily use patterns. Figure out what people are using your app for regularly and then improve upon that.
Look for friction points. Just before someone deletes your app they’ll get stuck someplace. If you know where that place is you can fix what went wrong.
Conclusion
Usefulness will beat beauty every single time. When it comes to applications the more useful an app is the more likely it is to be retained. In Los Angeles app development you need to combine that with an aesthetically pleasing app, but start with useful and make pretty happen later.
This is an older article from RetailDive, but it still contains some excellent rules for your app launch: https://www.retaildive.com/ex/mobilecommercedaily/6-key-reasons-why-a-new-app-fails
It’s important to look at UX/UI when building, launching and judging an app: https://laappdevelopers.com/why-user-experience-ux-is-the-real-competitive-edge-in-modern-app-development/
FAQs
Why do beautiful apps still fail in Los Angeles?
Because users expect beauty as a baseline and judge apps primarily on usability and speed.
What matters more than downloads?
Retention and repeat usage over time.
How quickly do users decide to delete an app?
Often after the first frustrating experience.
Should apps have many features?
No, focused functionality improves adoption and long-term use.
What is the biggest mistake in Los Angeles app development?
Building something attractive that does not solve a real everyday problem.
