Аutomation is a driving force for business growth. It improves efficiency, saves time and money, and frees employees to pursue more important tasks. While desktop software can offer all those advantages, mobile apps as an alternative is often pushed into the background. Automation provided by mobile applications can add the same value and cater to mobility as well. They can not only solve internal company bottlenecks but also widen the sales funnel and create a separate channel for brand awareness.

Automation via an app may be for you if you are experiencing one of the following stumbling blocks:

• Overwhelming number of routine tasks
• Administration consumes a lot of time
• A lot of wasted time due to employee daily commute
• Loopholes in functionality in available automation software, or lack of thereof
• Poor client communication because of lack of staff or no access to digital tools

How different are apps form desktop software when used for automation?

The main differences stem from the degree of capability for mobility and convenience of use. While software is the more popular choice, it can receive input only from stationary points, meaning that employees can access it from their workplace or home. For jobs that require more mobility, software may not be the best solution.

Mobile applications can automate without restricting staff mobility. They can be accessed from any point, thus they can become highly adaptable automation tools covering a wider range of processes in a business. In the least, they can be a valuable part in symbiotic relationship with any existing CRM system.

What can mobile apps automate?

Let’s briefly review the areas they can influence:

Customer service

Customer service can greatly benefit from app management. It can find use in services such as registration, payments, feedback, delivery, inventory management, and so on. A mobile app, for example, can have features that automatically categorize and arrange lists, send notifications, allocate important payment data to appropriate slots. It does this and much more without jeopardizing security.

Example: The restaurant business provides the most obvious example. A mobile application can automate sales, ease the delivery process, and provide customers with self-serve portal. On the other end, restaurant staff can expediently receive order details; while clients can receive benefits such as tracking geo-location of active orders and other perks.

Administration

Administrative processes benefit greatly from automation. Apps can be an excellent supplement to any existing software, adding mobility and uninterrupted access to administrative resources to the whole package. They can do their share by automating repetitive tasks. Apps can be linked with the main database and apply updates to it, either with a push of a button or automatically, keeping everything going at a higher efficiency.

Example: We can draw an example from healthcare. Imagine you have an app that schedules and organizes meetings between patients and doctors in local GPs and also offers alternative a communication platform for lighter cases. Such an app would save a lot of time on waiting and needless appointments.

Marketing

Mobile apps can be excellent automating tools not only for internal business processes but external ones too. For example, apps can automate the marketing spearhead such as advertising and various marketing campaigns, including mass e-mail and lead generation.

Example: AdCharge is an app that can be merged with other apps to show out-of-app ads to users after every incoming call. The unique concept, with better conversion rates, shows that automation via an app can also be an innovation in some fields – in this case, in mobile advertising.

Inventory management

In some types of work, on-site mobility for staff is key. Such is the case with stores, warehouses, shipping depots, and so on. In such cases, mobile automation solutions might be a much better choice. An app can help with keeping records of stock in order, shipping, restocking, schedules, and staff communication. Overall, it can increase the competitiveness of a company.

Example: Say you manage a large clothing store with lots of orders and a big number of items in your inventory. A mobile app can help optimize the whole model by tracking item count and automating the re-stocking process. It can also organize existing stock and process billing.

How can we help?

Speedflow provides development of personalized mobile applications that can help your business address automation challenges. Optimize your business with a quality mobile app tailored to the last detail!

To share your goals with us, write to info@speedflow.bg or fill out the form in our mobile app development page. We are eager to hear from you.

The future is bright for online business in Bulgaria. As a member of the EU, Bulgaria is on a track to digitalisation, perhaps doing it with shorter leaps than trend leaders but yet at an unseen for the country pace.

Pulse of the market

According to Statista, e-Commerce in Bulgaria is valued at $766 million — a figure expected to reach $1,176 billion by 2024. Yet, there are reasons to feel even more optimistic about the forecasts.

A few things need to done first, however. The latest studies show that only 65% of Bulgaria’s population has regular access to the Internet and 34% have made at least one online purchase in the last year. Perhaps a good explanation is that people are still coming to terms with online shopping as a viable alternative to retail.

Removing the roadblocks

Trust in online shopping is one side of the cube that needs to be put together. Worries about the security of transactions, unfamiliarity with electronic methods of payment and trust in the quality of online merchandise seem to be the main hurdles on the path to speedier growth. Once again drawing from Statista, 95% of online purchases were paid in cash in 2017. This dropped to 58% in favour of payment via cards and e-wallets for 2019. This shows that trust in online exchanges is increasing. However, more can be done to speed up the process. The question is who is responsible for what?

Internet providers, for one, can do their share by increasing efforts to improve internet access nationwide. Success in this will virtually guarantee bigger engagement in the sector. Second, developers will also have to play a role. Perhaps, their role will be dedicated to educating the public about payment systems, payment protection methods, data protection, and evaluation mechanisms that encourage fair transactions; and to building easy to use, modern e-commerce platforms that nurture further trust.

Speedflow’s role

Speedflow’s mission is to raise the trust and quality of e-commerce in Bulgaria through the provision of online trading platforms, which provide stellar user experience, transparency and guaranteed security. We do this by leveraging our coding mastery and understanding of business. Our solutions reflect the latest e-commerce requirements by the European Union.

Speedflow has over 15 years of experience in the web development sector and possesses a team of highly qualified professionals that can help your business grow.

Contact Speedflow at info@speedflow.bg to inquire about our online shop development service.

Outsourcing has presented a viable alternative to traditional recruitment and hiring of various services. Over the last decade, many companies have opted to rely on outsourced services to cut costs and upgrade their skills set. Outsourcing benefits business in a plethora of ways. Аnd yet, some companies will only feel the full potential of outsourcing when they recognise the pressing need to move towards a more digital business model.

Successful companies are at the mercy of technology. With continuous innovation as a marker for success, the need for newer and better digital solutions is only going to increase in the future. Services provided by tech-savvy outsourcing vendors, in such case, can become the vehicle carrying businesses across this widening ocean of digitalisation.

Say, for example, you are a fast food restaurant, and your competitor has adopted a new digital solution: a simpler way to order food. This will understandably put your business at a disadvantage, right? To respond, you will either need to hire a company to build you an equally good digital solution or use outsourced IT services to achieve the same goal. Not only will outsourcing be the more cost-effective option in this case, but it will allow you to establish a strategic partnership that will cater beyond your immediate technological necessity.

This example applies to many businesses that do not have the personnel to equip themselves with new technological tools. It is also valid for all levels of business. The main difference between staying competitive in the upper business echelons and the lower ones is the pace at which everything occurs. At higher levels, new ideas are generated more frequently, their application is more efficient and there’s richer collaboration with strategic partners. In other words, innovation happens at a more frequent rate, and its effects are felt sooner.

Outsourcing is the way to keep the wheels rolling and withstand the pressure of the high pace without losing the equilibrium between available technological resources and skills force. It enables businesses to respond quickly to challenges arising from competitor action and industry breakthroughs.

If you are one of those companies seriously considering joining the digital trend, you will need to look for an outsourcing vendor that can fulfil your requirements.

As a group of companies with more than 15 years of experience in IT, telecommunications and advertising, Speedflow has a track record for innovation to be a viable option for you. Speedflow offers outsourcing and outstaffing services in several areas: server applications, custom development of ERP systems, integration and API connections, customization, new modules and extensions, mobile application development, and web development.

By relying on Speedflow as your outsourcing partner, you will receive access to a pool of talented and experienced professionals, including a dedicated project manager, who will take care of the technological aspect of your business in a way that reflects your company values and goals.

To learn more about Speedflow’s outsourcing and outstaffing services, please write to info@speedflow.bg

Every year, the definition for ‘quality’ in web development undergoes transformation. Websites gain in functionality richness, engagement potential, and dynamism (i.e. vibrancy). As everything moves forward towards its more evolved form, the requirement for optimised user-friendliness remains a constant.

Over the last decade, Speedflow Bulgaria has occupied a front seat in web development. We have had the chance to witness, evaluate and integrate many of the emerging’new’ tricks into our work process. We have recognized that the needed knowledge and skills for quality web development piles up alongside emerging innovations each year. This is why we stay on top of the latest in web development.

This article will pinpoint 6 web development trends that are expected to preside over 2020.

1. Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP)

With visits from mobile devices surpassing those from desktop computers, the mobile-first approach is expected to plant firm roots in the web development process during 2020. We expect developers to put a strong emphasis on websites that support AMP. This also means that there has to be a transition from mobile websites to those with AMP. The differences between the two are minor, but, nonetheless, AMP is considered the better option as it helps sites load faster. In addition, Google boosts sites that support AMP.

2. Artificial Intelligence

AI is among our most-liked topics to talk about. Science fiction has contributed a lot to the topic and yet the divide between the most advanced of the AI concepts that are described by it and reality is still, well, bridgeless. Yet, we are not that far from what was once imagined. Times are as exciting as ever, perhaps even more so, technology-wise.

AI in web development raises similar questions to the ones normally revolving around it. Will it take jobs away from humans? Will it somehow cause a shift in the web development profession that we need to adapt to?

The consensus is no. AI is getting steadily integrated into web development, mostly as a way to spike websites’ productivity and efficiency, rather than take jobs away from humans. Examples of AI use in web development: chatbots, analysis of visitors, recommendation systems, and so on.

3. Single Page Application (SPA)

Single-page applications are web applications that have been responsible for website visitors’ smooth user experience process, mostly through economy of data transmission. Essentially what they do is they aid the users in their navigational efforts and provide them with the desired content without loading the whole page from the server after each action. This significantly improves the loading time of the page and minimizes interruption to the users’ website experience. We expect SPAs to continue to dominate web development in 2019 and to see them evolve, particularly in providing a smoother solution to overloading of JavaScript size.

4. Modular development

Efficiency is important in web development. The less time and money is spent on a project—the more everybody involved is pleased with the result. This is why modular web development will take precedence in 2020. Modular development is simply a web-development method of building a website from already configured components. This is why it is a faster way of creating websites. The difficulty with modular development, however, is presented by how separate modules fit among themselves and how that affects design. When the right balance is struck, web developers can produce stunning websites in minimum time.

5. Motion UI

Design is one of the most important aspects of a successful website. Motion in a site is used to ease user experience and affirm selected brand characteristics. In 2020, motion UI is expected to gain traction. Through Motion UI, web developers will be looking to find new creative ways to tell stories. And that’s something we encourage and adopt in our work too.

6. WebAssembly

WebAssembly, also called Wasm, is a binary format for a stack-based virtual machine. It is a relatively new language in the web development world, first appearing in 2017. It is the fourth language that can run natively in browsers, alongside Javascript, HTML, and CSS.

Wasm’s characteristics have led many to believe that it is better than Javascript and will replace it completely in the future. The verdict is still out on this one, but, by the look of it, it will be used more and more by web developers throughout 2020.

If you have a different vision about 2020’s most popular web development trends, please share it in the comments section. And if you are interested in modern and effective web development services, please write to info@speedflow.bg

With plenty of choices for web development available around, how can you be sure which company is the right one?

Giving every existing — or at least high-ranked — provider a ‘go’ is bound to be a losing strategy if you are hard-pressed by time or budget.

There’s always an element of risk involved when selecting a web development company – mostly because you don’t know how they work and whether you would ‘click’ with them.

Many who seek this service fall into the trap of delegating projects to providers that are good in several niches of the web development process but lack adroitness in others. As a result, they approach their projects in a fragmented way, which adds up to the creation of products, which lack a vital part for achieving the real-world goals that matter.

The best provider looks at the web development process holistically, applying multiple levels of expertise in each of the stages without losing touch with the nature and scope of the initial goals.

For clients looking to receive a website that is a natural extension to their offline business or for online start-ups, hiring a company that knows the nuts and bolts of business is perhaps the best option. A nose for how business works may be needed, a little bit, as it allows such providers to penetrate past your immediate online goals, align the whole web-development effort with what matters and to offer an even better way forward via a stellar product. Let’s call it free marketing.

Companies that employ developers, designers and managers who execute their delegated tasks with a clear image of the client’s bigger business target churn out better results and feedback, unsurprisingly.

The market is oversaturated with web development companies who are quick to complete a project without first dissembling clients’ offline targets to get a more detailed bigger picture. This, in the least, creates chaos, where the link between client and company is often severed, serving in the achievement of mediocre results at best!

In truth, only effort exceeding the expectations for each step can guarantee success.

It’s not a question of some kind of defected perfectionism but about coming up with a self-sufficient product that spawns new opportunities for growth.

Exceeding your expectations

One of Speedflow’s biggest advantages is its extensive business experience, backed by success in many sectors, including telecommunications, IT, publishing and others.

It employs people, who often opt to venture into territory beyond their specialty. This is especially useful in the business sphere – but not only – where being able to think on your feet in unfamiliar situations is a winning formula.

For you, the client, this means that you will work with a web development provider who understands your goals from the inside out and, who will pivot the whole work around them to create a product that exceeds your expectations.

While the rest of the team is engaged with your project, you will be treated to regular meetings – in a cosy office or over a live video conference – to smooth out the details that complete your vision.

Place your trust in Speedflow Bulgaria! Let’s go.

To share your website goals with us and take advantage of our holistic web development service, send us a message on info@speedflow.bg

To have keywords placed in the first 3-4 positions on the first page of Google is of vital importance for your website.

An SEO analysis can provide an accurate evaluation of the effectiveness of your business website. Thanks to this service, you can identify and address a number of weak links, which may be taking away from your website’s potency to rank well in the search engines.

By taking advantage of our free SEO analysis, you will discover details about:

• Errors in the code
• Links status
• Meta tags and descriptions
• Site speed
• Duplicated content issues

As a bonus, you will receive content strategy advice aimed at increasing engagement and targeting vital missing keywords.

If you want to identify your site’s weaknesses and get acquainted with the possibilities of improving its overall SEO punching power, take advantage of our service. Your brand will thank you for it later.

Count on Speedflow to raise the bar for your website. Ask us for a free SEO analysis by filling out this form.

For further information about our digital marketing services, write to info@speedflow.com

The offer is valid till the November 30th, 2020.

The Xmas festive period is just around the corner! And Speedflow Bulgaria has prepared some gifts for you! We are delighted to announce our special Xmas web development offers, starting from today.

We have devised 3 bundles, depending on your needs, goals, and budget: Economic, Standard, and Premium. The bundles are incremental to each other.

Our work process is rooted in your vision of functionality and design. Every package includes an integrated contact form, social media buttons and basic SEO work (code, text, and illustrations), as well as integration of a Google map.

The economic bundle is the cheapest one and is suitable for portfolio websites of 5 pages or less. We can deliver it in less than 5 days without compromise to the design. It is the most suitable for businesses such as blogging, vlogging, lawyer partnerships, GPs and/or traders of all kinds.

The standard bundle consists of up to 10 pages, with every page tailored to reflect each service your business is offering. It is suitable for small- and mid-sized businesses and can accommodate average-sized item inventory. It builds upon the economic bundle with Google Analytics integration, server optimization for site speed and 6 months of free technical support! We can deliver it in less than 10 days.

The premium package is designed to suit the needs of big businesses, with a large variety of products and services. It builds upon the standard package and offers more pages – up to 20! Every service or product page can be with a different design, according to the client’s vision. Besides the perks of the standard package, Premium offers sitemap creation for better Google indexing and the full 12 months of free technical support! Approximate time for delivery of this bundle is less than 15 days!

Take advantage of our Xmas web development offers and hit the New Year running!

The offer is valid only until 20 December 2019, so hurry up!

For inquiries, please write to info@speedflow.bg, and a member of our sales team will get back to you with the details.

The domino effect of digital transformation worldwide takeover is strongly felt in most areas of business. The more it spreads, the bigger the pressure on others to implement it, else they risk getting left behind.

Booking apps showcase this digitalization trend on a much smaller scale. They have already replaced telephone bookings as a simpler alternative that allows users to find and book a service or event and pay later. They are on their way to becoming complete platforms that realize the whole process with just a few taps on the screen.

According to data from Criteo, smartphone bookings account for almost 40% of the total number of bookings made in 2018—this has something to do with online bookings still being the preferred method for making a booking. However, for same-day bookings, almost 80% were made via a booking app and this says something: booking apps are on their way to the summit—and they will get there, if not today, then tomorrow.

One thing that still stalls businesses from expanding their channel by adopting apps for their booking needs is their development cost.

This article will break booking apps down to their features and give a rough estimate for each feature. This way, readers will get an understanding of how much it will cost them to have a booking app developed. Enjoy, comment below, and contact us for your app project!

I. Basic Features

1. Admin Panel

The Admin Panel is a mandatory part of a booking app. It gives admins the tools to manage their app and its users. A well-structured panel enables admins to manage payments, bookings, and notifications. They can also monitor all business operations processed through the app on their dashboard.

Development of an admin panel is one of the most laborious stages of making a booking app. It is the command center, so to say, where app owners can add or extract value from their service. A cheaper option exists to purchase and integrate a pre-compiled, third-party admin panel, which can offer a skeleton set of functions but not without its downsides. Such panels are fused together with third-party interest, which means annoying ads, lack of transparency and fees.

Development time estimation: 120-160 hours

Estimation: $4200-$5600

2. Notifications

Notifications play an important role in the transaction process for all sides involved. Without notifications, users can get confused about the status of a transaction or a booking, which can cause unnecessary complications to what should be a straightforward process. Ideally, users should receive confirmation about made or canceled bookings, payments or changes in the schedules of their chosen events. Additionally, notifications are useful on the admin side as well, for the same reasons.

Once again, this feature can be purchased from third-party sources and can be integrated into the app. However, the same concerns apply. They have quite a few disadvantages, including the need for a separate technical support channel and sometimes untested security. Notification systems built from scratch by our developers offer better security and business-targeted features.

Time: 30-40 hours

Estimation: $1000-$1500

3. Search engine

Barring the cases where organization of database entries and UX are impeccable, your booking app would benefit greatly from an integrated search engine. This feature allows app users to navigate your app content and find the places and services they want, and then make a reservation for them. The more complex it is, the easier the app users will orient themselves, however, at the price of additional costs for the development.

Consider the proportionality between the depth of the database and the price for the development of this feature. The bigger the database, the more accurate the search algorithm has to be to save users’ time—which, in turn, means more code writing and more skill is involved, affecting the final price. It’s all relative to your app’s content and user needs.

Or, in other words: Relevancy + Content + Native capabilities = Optimized search experience

Time: 20-40 hours

Estimation: $700 – $1500

4. User registration system

Registration enables the user to create and manage an account within the app. While not a vital feature, apps that offer user registration often perform better. Registration is valuable because it brings a positive impact to user retention. It can also strengthen marketing efforts for acquiring new users by making available information about already registered users.

The registration process can consist of one way of signing-in or several. At its basic form, users can register with just their e-mail and password. Additional options of registration can be integrated such as the use of social media account or other accounts. The more options there are, the smoother the registration process for users!

Once again, addressing the alternative third-party registration systems, the same previously mentioned disadvantages apply.

Time: 38 hours

Estimation: $1300 – $1800

5. UI/UX design

While an app with extensive, useful features can earn a great reputation among the more practical of us, a beautiful and practical design undoubtedly wins the hearts of all of us. This is why good developers spend a lot of time fiddling with the station to accommodate the right UX and UI design. Excellent design makes your app stand out, but it is not cheap. So, while you can also go for a bare-bones design, we always recommend pushing it one step further.

Time: 100-120 hours

Estimation: $3500-$4200

6. Payment gateway API

Some service providers still rely on old methods such as ‘book and pay on location’. They have the right to do that if it works for them. However, digital transformation is pushing for more simplified and quicker solutions. Sooner or later, they, too, will have to get on board or will risk being left behind. This is also true for payments, and, for apps, this means integration of a custom payment gateway via API.

Development of such a system is tricky and arduous. It can take up to 3 weeks depending on what functionality is needed and how long the non-development processes take (bank accounts, legal side, etc.). Cheaper options are available as well, as purchasing pre-made payment gateways, but, most often they initiate additional fees for every transaction or pester users with ads, and their security is a big question as with most such solutions.

Time: up to 120 hours

Estimation: $4200-$5000

The total cost of the development of a booking app with basic features thus ranges from $14900 to $19100.

II. Additional Features

In addition to the app mainframe, a number of smaller features can be integrated to make the app richer and more valuable to users. For example:

• Currency and language settings
• Visual Calendar
• Social media integration
• Review and feedback system
• Recommendations engine

With this, we invite you take the following test. Select the features you want for your app, fiddle with the combinations and receive a rough estimation for the finished product:

III. Booking App Cost Calculator

Do not be discouraged by the results! This is a very rough calculation. At Speedflow, we take into account all client’s plans and requirements and turn great ideas into stunning apps for competitive prices. Our professional team of Android and iOS developers are backed by talented designers, Quality Assurance professionals and others. Speedflow offers mobile app and web development, server solutions, web design and other services. To inquire about your app development project and receive a quote that reflects the price more accurately, please write to info@speedflow.bg

What makes custom PHP platforms ideal for businesses of all sizes? For one, they are scalable enough to allow companies to ride the wave of internet evolution without losing touch with their values and targets along the way.

PHP-based platforms attract businesses with their plasticine characteristics. They can be modeled into stunning, feature-rich websites that accurately reflect the nature of the specific business. Most of all, their development is cost-effective and time-saving.

We invite you to read our overview of the advantages of custom PHP development for businesses:

1. More cost-effective than platforms based on other programming languages

In the right hands, PHP development projects have amazingly quick turnaround. Along with this, such sites are cheaper to make yet at maintained high quality.

2. Rich in features and functionality

Custom PHP platforms are built around the vision of the customer. This means that customers receive a website with features and functions that streamline their business services.

3. User-friendly

Well-written PHP code makes websites easy to use for end-users. This quality is extremely valuable in e-commerce, where the end-user’s ability to navigate the website efficiently in order to purchase products and services is crucial.

4. Stable and Secure

PHP was developed in 1994. For over two decades now, thousands of amateur and professional programmers have dedicated their free time to patching up potholes, bugs and security weaknesses in the language. As a result, PHP-based websites are among the most stable and secure ones available.

5. Compatibility

PHP websites are compatible with the majority of browsers and operational systems. This means that they can be hosted on any server and viewed equally well on all browsers without the need for additional coding.

6. Integrable code

Custom PHP scripts can be integrated with other scripting languages or platforms, allowing for the creation of very dynamic websites that can be easily updated at any time.

7. Connecting worlds

PHP developers are adept at building from an end-users’ point of view. This is why PHP websites serve as the perfect bridge between businesses and their customers, increasing customer retention and revenue.

8. Economic maintenance

PHP websites require little effort to maintain and update. With the right technical support, such websites are always in line with the latest digital trends.

PHP is a language that delivers strong results in the hands of skillful programmers, or vice versa. It is important for businesses in need of PHP development to find a company with proven experience on the market. Speedflow has been operating in the web development field for over 15 years. Our custom-platform development services have helped dozens of businesses expand their scope and generate more revenue.

Choose Speedflow for your next custom PHP development project, and give your business an adaptable, cost-effective and resourceful online marketing tool!

To learn how we can help and receive a quote, write to info@speedflow.bg