Vivek Sahani | AppSquadz Blog

Near Field Communication (NFC) in Mobile Apps Mending Payments System

With technological advancements, the daily activities carried out by the users are undoubtedly getting easier. Here we will talk about the modern technology named Wireless Sensor Network system, which was only possible due to the tremendous growth of Near Field Communication. This system uses smartphones to carry out an extensive array of recreation & business activities on all the possible levels allows users to conduct payments and transactions over mobile phones. With this, the requirement for smartphones that imbibe NFC is augmenting.

What is NFC?

NFC, i.e. Near Field Communication, is a wireless communication technology that via RFID readers and beacons lets users transmit the data among various devices that are located far away from one another. Since it is low energy and low-cost communication technology, it enables end-users to carry out the transactions without any nuisance. NFC focuses on customized communication by facilitating secured complex data transmission within the users in a less intrusive way. Along with this, NFC empowers retailers to magnify the in-store experience & knowledge too so that they cope with the endless competition.

Ease of use and time are two aspects that shape up consumers’ tastes & preferences. Buyers visit retail shops as they don’t prefer waiting for their orders to arrive at their doorsteps or they favor online purchasing as it is pretty handy. Furthermore, the chief purpose is to make it amazingly easy for end-users to complete the buying process of products/merchandise.

NFC applies electromagnetic radiations to transfer data within the devices, i.e. beacons or RFID tags that, in turn, assist users in bringing out the transactions hassle-free. In order to intensify the payment experience, a few numbers of markets across Asia, Japan, and Europe have started using NFC. However, there is still a room to embrace this technology and people are supposed to implement it extensively.

Benefits of integrating NFC in mobile apps

Offers augmented shopping experience to customers:

Zap tap employs NFC technology efficiently by connecting users to WebPages that highlight product/service data.

Enhances customer service

By taking away the hassles of paying at stores and performing productive processes, it enhances customer service. A single NFC tap from smartphones can resolve difficulties within a few seconds.

Added security

In case, your smartphone is robbed and you have added security to your wallet, the two-step authentication method prevents your money from getting fraud.

Improved convenience

For faster payments, NFC expedites up the payment method for the customers.

Cuts down the operational cost

With NFC, the operational cost is mitigated as the alternate payment processing system preserves money on paper and human resource deployment.

Implementing NFC for payment system

It is anticipated that NFC payment systems will be seeing an exponential growth soon. NFC has brought in a significant change in the retail sector since the moment Google launched NFC-oriented wallet payment systems. An NFC-oriented wallet payment system facilitates the users to carry out payment or transactions at retail stores with just a few taps on smartphones. In 2012, the retail sector attached NFC devices within commodity tags and ensemble stores with mirrors that are digitally driven to heighten customers’ experience. The innovation let them observe how each dress is crafted when they try it out facing the mirror. Multiple payment solutions can be generated that will affect the process of paying and make it easier at every NFC point with the assistance of NFC. Nowadays, numerous retail stores, petrol pump stations, and restaurants have adopted contactless payment system via smartphones.

NFC in mobile apps

As already said, the scope of mobile payment app has progressed at an exponential pace due to the massive growth of NFC infrastructure, and it won’t see a downfall shortly. These payments provide end-users with a profoundly gratifying experience as they are based out of extremely intuitive UI. This type of payment system will grow as there is a presence of different innovative components and many business prototypes which ensures the same. To be capable of making contactless payments, the users are must install the concerned applications on their Android phones. Various apps, such as Boon facilitate end-users to make non-contact payments. Once you are done with the download, you have to register yourself, and after that, you can carry out transactions efficiently in a short-term period. It heavily depends upon prepaid MasterCard and also presents users with a transparent vision of all the transactions and payments done. Additionally, the user may also scan the NFC tag to retrieve vital information, and all this is made secure with PIN protection.

Utilizing NFC effectively

Loads of departmental store in the US practice NFC to facilitate users and being informed of the latest styles and shades they offer. Besides that, it also enabled them to examine if the products are in stock on online platforms or not.

Bon-Ton implemented NFC in more than 30 stores.

Bon-Ton got positive feedbacks from customers, with the implementation of NFC in a few stores and users enjoyed the process of using NFC and discovered it beneficial. One more feature of NFC grabbed people’s attention to a large extent, and it was the ease of its usage.

Security concerns

Security has been the concern for the parties involved in the transaction irrespective of the mode of the payment. No matter what the mode of payment is, there are always security concerns, especially with electronic payment methods. So let us see what the serious concerns associated with NFC are.

Eavesdropping

Eavesdropping is a phenomenon which happens when someone intercepts and gets the data. However, this threat is least with NFC as the devices are to be placed closely to transmit signals, and these signals are hard to catch. The data is encrypted and decrypted with an approved device, in case of NFC based payments. NFC chips are not active always; they are only active when you want them to be active. It means when your phone is locked; the NFC devices don’t transfer data.

Data manipulation

It arises if someone attempts to corrupt or manipulate the NFC transmission data communication, yet this risk can be mitigated adequately with the use of secure channels.

Device theft

Once your device is stolen, then that person can make payments through NFC, and no encryption can protect you. Though this can be taken care of by some simple steps and one of them is to set-up a pass code. Devices having features like fingerprinting scan or lock help in eliminating the risk of NFC misuse.

Security measures

All the security mentioned above concerns is strictly observed and are dealt with appropriate security measures. The security measures stated below are inherent and made to provide that added layer of security.

Proximity

In NFC Technology, the devices must be connected inside 4 cm to communicate. Because of this proximity, it becomes hardened or impossible for cybercriminals to execute their attacks.

HCE

HCE, also known as host card emulation emulates the physical card. It saves the secure account information on the cloud rather than storing it in the device. Android Pay operates on HCE to perform protected mobile payment transactions.

Secure element

NFC runs within a safe part which is in the form of a tamper-resistant chip consisting of sensitive data in it. In NFC payments, the protected components are saved in the device, and it interacts with NFC-enabled receiver to perform the transaction.

Final thought

NFC technology is assisting many sectors for secure payment or transactions. Also, it simplifies the process of conducting a contactless payment. With NFC, users can keep their card information secures on their phones and pay in just a few taps on the smart phone’s screen or close to the NFC reader. It has not as yet adopted by many, but undoubtedly, it is going to achieve user acceptance at a more general level. If you are interested in developing an NFC based application, contact a reliable mobile application development company which can help you with the same.

Most Recommended Android App Development Frameworks for App Development

Over the past couple of years, the trend of mobile app development has accelerated rapidly. Moreover, this happened as the people, especially businesses and entrepreneurs have discerned that mobile applications are an excellent idea to connect with a large customer base worldwide in the real-time. A mobile application enables you to acquire many things. Some of them are listed here:

Strengthen your brand

Stay connected to your existing and potential customers

Generates a loyal customer base efficiently

Offer more reliable customer support when it comes to availability and readiness of performance

The most outspoken form for android app development is by downloading Android Studio, which is an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) having the necessary packages to assist you in android application development. Also, Android Studio is only an environment that supports mobile app development, and you must have the programming know-how for writing the required codes for developing the app.

The standard Android application language is Java, which is backed by Google. Java is employed to build the backend, whereas XML is applied for outlining the layouts of Android app. So ideally, android app developers should be well-versed with Java and XML if they are looking forward to android app development using Android Studio. You can use various SDKs, for example, the Android Native Development Kit in incorporation with Android Studio, if you are competent with C#, C++, C, or BASIC.

Written below are the most recommended Android app development frameworks:

Xamarin

Xamarin is a blessing for C# app developers for the development of android apps without diving into Java. Since it is one of the best Android app development frameworks, it is practiced by 1.5+ million users as of now. It presents a comprehensive set of C# codebase for native app development not only for Android but also for other mobile operating systems. Applying .NET codebase, Xamarin as Visual Studio is practiced by Android mobile app developers widely for native application development.

React Native

The open-source version of Facebook’s JavaScript framework to develop native mobile apps has been used by numerous Fortune 500 companies such as Instagram, Tesla, and Walmart, for mobile application development. Users cannot differentiate amid apps built on Java & React Native, and this is because React Native’s fundamental building blocks are the same as native apps. By attaching codes in other languages such as Java, Swift, or Objective C, you can optimize your React native app manually.

Ionic

Ionic is licensed under the MIT License, which is a free and open-source app development framework and will remain open always. Using Ionic framework, you can build progressive web and native mobile apps. The framework is cross-platform; enabling quick development of mobile apps for Android, and then you can convert it to other platforms as and when required. But one problem with Ionic is its poor documentation. Ionic demonstrates to be an exception here by conceiving documentation with real-life examples.

Cordova

Mobile applications are the native extension to web applications. Considering this as the base, people behind Apache developed a free and open-source development framework using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Cordova as a mobile app development framework lets developers build multi-platform mobile apps applying a single code base. The app can access native device APIs, which makes it tough to locate if the app has been developed using native languages or not. Despite the fact, it was initially invented for developing online apps; Apache Cordova presents assistance for offline situations also, addressing it an excellent platform for desktop app development too.

PhoneGap

After Apache Cordova, the same team built another mobile app development platform, Adobe PhoneGap. Using Adobe PhoneGap framework, web app developers can speedily transfer their skills to mobile app development. PhoneGap is nothing but Cordova distribution with various tools and plugins launched. With PhoneGap, you can build cross-platform apps with a single base code as it provides an intuitive desktop app. The popularity and ease of usage ensure its ever-growing maintenance community and vice versa.

Titanium

Titanium, an open-source mobile app development framework has a mobile-first approach at its essence. It enables developers to create clean and visually attractive apps that have not only native looks but also has native-like functioning. Titanium incorporates API Builder with Hyperloop, all available for the Titanium developers.

Unity

It’s a Microsoft game engine used by programmers widely for developing 2D and 3D games. Other than this, it can be employed in cross-platform app development. It is ideal to start with mobile app development when incorporated with C# as it has an IDE just like Android Studio.

The App Builder

It is an online application development framework that possesses stimulating clients in building brilliant looking apps without any knowledge of the design. So, if you cannot distinguish or determine where elements of the app should lie for better designing, this framework is for you. The applications built on app builder are very interactive and synced instantly with all the devices the user is logged on. In-depth analytics open to the app developers empowers them in making strategic decisions like retaining features that are embraced by the users while discarding the features which slow down the app.

Conclusion

There are many android app development frameworks available today, and the big decision is to pick the best amongst them for your application development project. Whatever framework you adopt, you have to first create a layout of your app with details such as sections, features, and design elements. These details in turn will decrease the development time whatever the scale is. All the Android app development frameworks explained above are free and have burgeoning community support to assist the users when they stuck. You can also grab the opportunity of android app development by hiring an android application development company which can do wonders for your business.

UI Design Errors that Might Ruin your Conversion Rate

When talking about designing your website or the mobile application, User Interface (UI) is the king. Usually, users see the UI design of any app or website first and then interact with it. In addition to it, Website visitors give great importance to the UI, and the same level goes for the apps as well. A regular user makes an impression of your site instantly. For the growth of a website, it should provide a better user experience as a site which doesn’t give a better UX cannot develop much. Visitors generally leave websites or apps, if they find layout dull/ unimpressive or content useless/inappropriate.

If a site’s pages loading time is more than 2 seconds, its performance suffers too. Furthermore, when a website’s design is not interactive, or navigation is disordered, it profoundly affects the growth of the site. So, undoubtedly, UI is the key to the success of any website. We may encounter several UI design errors, which cause deterioration in the conversion rates of a website. Moving forward, let us come to the point and analyze what some common UI design mistakes committed by website designers, UI developers, and business owners are. So, if you have made the exact errors then take preventive actions depending on your understanding and analysis.

Messy layout

Websites with messy layout irritate the end-users and disgrace user experience. In case the design is cluttered and disorganized, it affects the site’s conversion rates because clients cannot get the CTA status. The use of unnecessary content, colors, pictures, and insufficiency in focusing on creativity can cause layout cluttered, which is not right for your site.

Wrong position of CTA

A site’s CTA must always follow the users’ state of mind. Their opinions and purchasing attitude would become active when you choose the specified features of your CTA like color, design, size, shape, location, language, and length. So you must determine the well-defined combination of features and check your CTA several times before making it live. Also, you must accurately describe the users that it can be clicked and they must hit on it. When you see the ideal balance, you will experience loads of conversions.

Unresponsive design

This is the significant UI design flaw which most of the UI developers make which restrains a website’s growth and causes failure. An unresponsive design depicts the site useless being responsive across platforms and devices as users cannot access the features using the devices of their choice. Moreover, responsiveness is liable for the ranking of the website, and sites that overlook this significant feature encounter a lot of issues. Even, an unresponsive design stops sites from giving a better UX.

Use of stock images

Stock images are undervalued as they are fake, and users immediately notice that. The visuals heavily influence website branding and marketing as it adds your site’s mood and tone, which cannot be done by stock photos. Also, users look for particular products or service, and when visitors visit your site, they believe in your products or service. However, you must not use stock photos as they portray falsehood, and if they find a false image on your site, it may ruin their psychology badly. You must recognize the reality that website imageries must be such that it boosts users’ confidence and engagement, which is only attainable by using authentic images.

Improper navigation

If your website’s navigation is not organized correctly and inappropriate, the users leave your site earlier than predicted. A site’s objective is to let users navigate efficiently from one place to another or through the website to have data easily. If there are accurate visual signs and images for everybody to move from one place to another, the navigation is spontaneous. If in case, the navigation is unclear and menus are not appropriately placed, it may irritate users and make them leave your site.

Inadequacy of social proof

In case the robust UI design is concerned, the user-produced contents, testimonials, or client feedback won’t be deliberated as the fundamental elements. An appropriate web page must comprise of all social proofs of your quality as these proofs are profoundly crucial for your website or app’s branding and conversion. If there is no credibility, visitors won’t visit your site, and they won’t trust you without social proofs. Furnish authentic messages to your promising clients to take a sigh of satisfaction, and this can offer you more increased conversion rates than the CTA or product details can afford. We cannot deny the fact that genuine client reviews are believed more than the sales pitch.

The slow speed of web page loading

Another user-interface error is the slow speed of web page loading could impact page views, make clients dissatisfied, and as a result, ruin the conversion rate. Besides, when the loading time is increased, the users move on to the next one, leaving your website, somewhat of your competitor which clients never expects.

Indulging yourself into the UI design

Involving yourself in the UI design is one of the deadly errors you can ever make. A UI/UX designer should follow & maintain all rules set for sufficient user experience. You can be creative but ensure that you maintain and follow all the terms fixed for obtaining adequate UX. You should work skillfully with your team of sales and marketing to discover the most suitable ways of UI designing. Outline the most challenging UI aspects that provide excellent exposure.

Content congestion

Having loads of content on the pages can confuse users rather than keeping them focused on your site. Users don’t prefer reading excessive content to get information. Instead, you must focus on telling more in more restricted content and having a copy which makes emotional effect, not repetition. You can create dynamic website development and retain impactful content on site pages as this will overcome UI design errors.

Final words

It’s evident that UI comes with a lot of obstacles, but you can overcome them by applying the suggestions given above while designing the user interface of your app or website. And fixing the above-discussed issues will make your design perfect. While hiring a mobile app development company or a web app development company, ensure that they also follow the above suggestions. An efficient application would inevitably increase your site’s conversion rate, and you will undergo an improvement in client satisfaction.

Impact of AI & its Implementation in Mobile App Development

In the epoch of cutting edge technologies, several devices and technological tools are available in the market. Smartphones namely, Google’s Android and Apple’s iPhone are the most widely used smartphones and are profoundly popular nowadays. With a combined mobile app development market share close to 99%, both Google and Apple work to bring more innovations and new features into their smartphones as billions of people all over the globe are utilizing them daily.

In the limelight comes the significance and role of Artificial Intelligence in mobile application development, which gives more fuel to Google & Apple to bring advanced changes to their respective platforms. AI is beneficial for developers and even for the general users. With implementing AI features into application development, then the smartphones can perform various advanced technology functions like face recognition, text recognition, voice recognition, image labelling, and barcode scanning etc. Being an entrepreneur or a business owner, you must understand how AI will cause an immersive user experience and how it simplifies the work for smartphone users?

Benefits of AI in mobile apps

AI plays a pivotal role in mobile app development, as it has several advantages. Also, Smartphones with AI features in it are playing a significant role in mobile phone experiences for the end-users. For instance, Apple’s iPhones, Google’s Pixel phones, Samsung’s Galaxy phones, and Huawei’s Mate range phones have specialized hardware designed specially to perform AI-based tasks efficiently. A couple of years back, this capability was possible only in 3% phones, and by 2020 it is supposed to rise to 35% of all smartphones.

AI features and capabilities needed in smartphones

All mobile application development companies aspire to present the best user experiences to their users. Accelerometer, Gyroscope, GPS, Barometer, Camera, and more things which are inbuilt within your phone closely observe the usage behavior. By implementing AI (Artificial Intelligence) and MI (Machine Learning) in smartphones leads to the learning of the users’ behavior and producing fantastic results.

According to a recent report, annual global AI software revenue is projected to rise from $9.5 billion in 2018 to $118.6 billion by 2025. With introducing the advanced features, AI is at the center of the customers’ demand for a swift and real-time response for their queries. AI has helped in taking mobile application development to the next level. The role of AI in mobile application development can’t be underestimated as of now, and AI is bringing so many innovative mobile applications to us.

Let us now examine how innovation in AI is causing remarkable results in mobile applications and the Smartphone world.

Applying AI ideas in mobile apps

There are multiple ways by which a mobile application development company can implement AI in its mobile application development solutions. As per the responsibility, mobile app developers learn to incorporate AI within their app development project so that it becomes more innovative and productive.

AI in face recognition

Both Apple and Google have been using AI for years and working in this significant technology, and they have become successful now. Both the companies mentioned above state that their new system for recognizing faces is the best one that recognizes faces with high accuracy. Not only this face recognition technology can detect and recognize an individual’s face, but it also serves the digital image/video into various frames.

Mobile app development companies employ AI for unlocking the phone and securing folders and applications comprising confidential and sensitive data through a phone’s camera. AI algorithm also assists in several additional simplistic features like smile shutter, creating depth in an image, adjusting the camera’s lenses in different light conditions, and more to deliver the best user experience.

AI in voice and image recognition

Undoubtedly, AI is changing the mobile app industry for better. With AI, apps are now integrated with image recognition and voice recognition features where users can search by text or by using images and voice. Siri on Apple iPhones is an example of AI which works like a Virtual Assistant using voice recognition. For Androids, Google voice assistant is an example of AI technology. This is possibly due to AI and ML technologies that these assistants are also more efficient than humans. AI Algorithm is powerful, and also works in noisy backgrounds with up to 98% of accuracy for voice recognition.

AI backed automatic intelligent digital assistant or chatbots

Now, people dislike writing long letters or making calls to access customer support services as most of the process is done online. Hence, customers do not expect opening hours, unlike the traditional one as customer service should be available round the clock. This is why numerous mobile app development companies started to adopt AI integration and built an intelligent digital assistant like Chatbot to provide customers with 24×7 support services to answer their queries. Chatbots need no recognition anymore as they have already become famous for their exceptional conversational experience. It is expected that the world business will be using Chatbots for grievance handling by 2020 as Chatbots can handle multiple queries at the same time and provide quality responses.

AI for video or audio recognition/ optimize the searching process

AI can also be used to recognize the videos or audios which the smartphone users watch or listen. Also, AI-based algorithms and techniques help in optimizing the search process for the users who are using it on either the Android or iOS platform. When it comes to entertainment purposes, AI is doing incredible work for mobile app users. When talking about Siri, it can do such a job if programmed to do so like for using the implemented AI technology. You can tell the singer of the music audio/video, the name of the movie/ album it belongs to, and or the actors playing roles if you are searching for an audio or video. Also, to search for something you can instruct Siri and you will get the desired results.

AI technology can analyze a large amount of users’ data

AI requires a large amount of data to operate effectively and accurately. Its efficiency depends on its capacity to efficiently analyze data like the upcoming trends, past trends, market changes, the effectiveness of an app, behavioral patterns, financial ratios, comparisons, historical data, likes and dislikes data, and much more. Therefore, AI is essential for many business verticals which are operating over mobile apps.

AI helps in securing your mobile app

These days, there is a sudden jump number of cybercrimes and safeguarding highly sensitive data, and personal information is a big challenge. Therefore, mobile app development companies are looking forward to using AI for building highly secure mobile applications for keeping sensitive data and personal information secure and safe. AI can be adequately used with other technologies to provide a speedy and highly-secure authentication process to provide an extra bit of security to the users’ data.

AI can help in mining big data

Big Data domain is notably accessible these days. Many apps are created to mine the big data; however, if AI is used to develop these apps, they become more efficient and produce astounding results and patterns. Also, AI helps in refining the method of acquiring precise information by analyzing different kinds of data.