Application development is an essential task in business, but this job requires a lot of time and money for ideation, development, testing, launch, advertising, etc. and small can’t meet them all with limited resources. Against that background, a lot of businesses are starting to invest in mini app and run it on a parent app, which is the solution to give customers a more compact app experience with low investment cost as well. more rational. So what is mini app? Find out with Tech Town right in this article

What are mini apps?

Mini App (sub-app) is used to describe small applications (usually 2 – 4 MB) running inside a super application (such as e-commerce platforms, e-wallets, …) , allowing use without having to download, update or do anything from the app store. This combination provides users with a wide range of features and services without having to use a bunch of different apps.

Thanks to the mini app, businesses can focus on developing their core services and providing the best experience for the platform’s customers, while still inheriting all available technologies. provided by the supplier.

Mini app is predicted to be a commercial trend in the future, it helps to remove barriers between developers and businesses, creating favorable conditions for scaling and increasing sales.

Advantages of Mini App

No registration fee

The owners of super apps like WeChat, Alipay, Grab… all allow other brands to join their platforms for free. That’s why they have to pay for in-house IT teams or outsourced units to develop mini apps.

Save time

Not as complicated as native apps or hybrid apps, mini apps have a simple framework system, code and APIs (application programming interfaces), helping developers to develop mini apps quickly without spending too much time. much time and cost.

Access to a large user ecosystem

The release of mini apps on super apps will help businesses reach millions of existing users from that super app platform. In addition to an abundant customer base, businesses can also take advantage of the utilities available in the super application ecosystem such as online payment, delivery, advertising, …

Enhancing user experience

The capacity of mini apps is much smaller than native apps and hybrid apps, so these apps provide a very fast and smooth user experience. In addition, from taking advantage of the aforementioned super-app ecosystem, users will have a seamless user experience from product selection, purchase, payment, order tracking, support, and complaints. , accumulate vouchers,… only on a single platform.

Improve omnichannel shopping experience

Mini app gives customers a great shopping experience, going beyond the interface and fixed features of the super app platform. Thereby promoting customers’ purchasing decisions / using services more effectively than any other solution.

Effective customer care

The mini app’s diverse customization capabilities allow businesses to easily add optimal customer care features such as accumulating points, redeeming incentives, vip customer cards or even automatically celebrating customers’ birthdays. row.

A good start to the process of building your own e-commerce website

Take an example of the process of participating in e-commerce as follows: Business on social networks → Business on e-commerce platforms → Mini app → Simple website and app → Complex website and app. In particular, the mini app is a perfect stepping stone for businesses to adapt to the technology infrastructure, ecosystem environment and strategize for effective online business scaling projects.

Disadvantages of Mini App

No database

Releasing a mini app on a super app means that businesses have to accept the loss of their customer data into the hands of the platform owner, because all source code and data are stored on the servers of the super apps.

Not showing all the unique features of the business

Although the mini app is an enterprise’s own app, if you want to join the super app’s ecosystem, you must comply with a number of standards such as frameworks, APIs, UI Components to synchronize with the interface of the parent application. That makes the user experience more consistent, but otherwise doesn’t represent the brand’s own identity. 

In short, mini app is an effective first step for businesses that want to participate in the e-commerce market by taking advantage of the advantages available from super apps. The above disadvantages are reminders that businesses need to recognize and accept trade-offs before making a final decision.

Types of mini apps

Here are 3 types of popular mini apps that businesses can choose to invest in:

•     Mini App on Social Platform: allows businesses to design and build on popular social networking platforms such as Facebook, Twitter. This is also the platform chosen by many businesses in the current period.
•     Mini App on e-commerce platforms: Similar to social platforms, owning a mini app on e-commerce platforms has become a relatively simple and quick thing for businesses. Currently, most e-commerce platforms have their own website for the purpose of adding knowledge and helping businesses more when creating mini apps.
•     Mini App on financial applications: Super-apps for e-wallets and payments are greatly helping businesses deploy their own mini-apps on their existing platforms. Through that, businesses can quickly reach millions of users of financial super applications.

Hope the information that Tech Town has just brought will be useful for your business.

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