Building An Enterprise App Store – How To Choose Which Apps Your Employees Need

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The big challenge of an enterprise app store is deciding which apps to include
The big challenge of an enterprise app store is deciding which apps to include

The enterprise app store is becoming a reality in many companies. Initially envisioned as a way to make internal apps available to employees, the concept has quickly grown to include public apps available in Apple’s iOS App Store. This allows businesses to offer employees a curated list of apps that relate to specific fields or job functions.

A curated list of public apps is a great idea and it can save employees both time and effort in selecting apps that can help them work more efficiently and effectively. The challenging part, however, is choosing which of the hundreds of thousands of iOS apps to include in your company’s app store.

Developing an enterprise or internal app store isn’t particularly difficult from a technical perspective. Most mobile management suites include an enterprise app store feature that can quickly and easily be setup as an iOS app that’s loaded onto managed devices. That app functions similar to the iOS App Store app. Even if you’re not implementing a mobile management suite with an app store feature, there are standalone app catalog solutions out there, including some free solutions, from companies like App47, ApperianAppCentral, and Nukona (which was recently acquired by Symantec).

The hard part is choosing the apps. Creating a list of approved or suggested apps can induce the same sense of app overload than any of us can experience when browsing or searching the App Store only on a greater scale. Looking at the business and productivity sections of the App Store for iPad apps alone delivers more than 5,000 titles. That doesn’t include looking at other categories related to specific professions like medicine, finance, or education.

So, how do you find apps to offer to employees?

One option is to ask employees, who may already be using apps to get work done. Even if you don’t find employees using specific apps, many will likely be willing to search for and try out apps and report back to you. This not only helps you build a catalog of apps, it also gives employees a feeling of ownership of the app store.

Many enterprise vendors offer iOS companion apps to their other solutions. This is particularly true of companies that produce CRM, ERP, and business intelligence solutions. Similarly many collaborative systems and document or project management solutions have companion apps to consider. Checking with all of your vendors is a great place to start when building an app catalog. In some cases, there may be third-party options in addition to the vendor-provided apps to consider.

Making sure you’re covering basic office needs is another great place to start. That means providing some Office-style solutions like iWork or Quickoffice (Quickoffice is even taking enterprise needs into consideration with its new Quickoffice ProSelect HD app). This basic apps arena can also include mind mapping solutions, task managers, and note taking options.

Looking for iOS equivalents to widely deployed software is another starting point. If you have software that’s running on every computer in your company, there’s a pretty good chance mobile users will want  or need something similar. You’ll probably find variations in terms of types of apps and how close iOS options come to providing the same capabilities.

Asking colleagues from outside your company for advice and suggestions can also help you find useful apps. This can be a great source of ideas if they work for companies that are a little bit further ahead in their mobility journey. You should also leverage your social networks for suggestions as well as online forums related to your company’s industry.

Finally, remember that an enterprise app store doesn’t need to be a static creation. You can and remove apps at any time. You may even want to consider a quarterly or semiannual app store review or accept suggestions from users on an ongoing basis.

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