Using Functional Prototyping to Cut Development Costs in Startups

It’s a no-brainer — nowadays, user behavior is changing faster than ever before. People are adapting to emerging technologies like Artificial Intelligence, discovering the power of crypto & blockchain, and searching for ways to make their everyday lives easier.

And companies that want to stay relevant to their target audiences have no choice but to accept the changes and adapt their business model to the audience’s needs.

According to the study conducted by Forrester, a good user interface while browsing the company’s website may increase the conversion rate by up to 200%, while a richer user experience can increase it by up to 400%.

So how do people define a good user experience, and how to create a UX tailored to the target customer preferences?

Focusing On Cost-Effectiveness

Digital marketing, partnerships, and content creation are important. But Venionaire Capital states that the key to retaining and finding new customers is providing an excellent customer experience, and every startup Founder can agree.

And creating a seamless user experience while staying cost-effective is a great challenge that not every team can execute.

“Startup is about cost-effectiveness. We can’t afford to try on the live product and rebuild everything, so we started searching for solutions that would help us save time and budget during the application development process. After careful research, we have decided to implement functional prototyping.” — Edi Titov, Joiner Founder.

Relying on Prototyping Instead of Bug Fixes

The story of Joiner started in Kazachstan when the Founder, Edi Titov, who was supposed to attend his friend’s wedding for a little over a week, stayed there for four months as the first COVID-19 pandemic wave hit. Staying in a new country without having friends around can be challenging. Edi saw the need for an international, easy-to-use, free application that allows you to see what people around you are doing, make new connections, and get to know the country’s pulse through curated experiences.

After bringing the team together, the idea came to real life through the prototypes in Figma. From the basic interface to the key components of the application, the team has worked on creating a prototype that would allow people to use the application and get the initial concept of what Joiner is about.

The live prototype allowed test users and the team to try out the application’s features, identify what works conveniently, what needs to be simplified or calls for improvement.

After confirming the app’s final design, the prototype was handed to the developers’ team for coding. The active prototyping allowed having a real product that has 95% of the same user interface and experience as it was in the prototyping stage, avoiding development issues and bugs. Only a few small details were updated, saving time and resources for the whole team.

The Importance of Prototyping

Once the first users got their hands on the actual application in the testing stage, they loved the seamless experience achieved by using prototyping instead of jumping straight into the coding and testing.

Due to this approach, the Joiner team can work more efficiently, develop the new features faster & bring the community application that redefines how they meet new people and join events.

We want to thank everyone for participating in the testing program, following our journey, and patiently waiting for the official application release. You are the driving force! We are ready to accept up to 500 application testers-early adopters that will receive exclusive benefits once the app is live worldwide.

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