About the Statement of Work (SOW)

Questions to answer

  • What needs to be done?
  • How should it be done?
  • How long should should it take?

Sections

  • Confidentiality
  • Milestones
  • Reports
  • Deliverables
  • End products
  • Timelines

Overview

  • What project is about (1-3 sentences)
    • Mission
    • Vision
    • Objectives
      • Problems solved
      • Value to customers
  • How it works
    • Broad overview using a real-life situation
    • User flow
  • Target Audience
    • Who & Why
    • How demographic relates to the look & feel of app
  • Business model brief
    • Price
    • When customer pays
    • How customer pays

Confidentiality Agreement

  • Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDAs)
    • Drafted by Attorney

User Personas

Business Model

Advertisment

App Pricing

In-App Purchases

Competition

User Experience & Design

  • How users benefit from features
  • Intuitiveness, engagagement
  • User journeys
  • Wireframes
    • Device-specific variations
  • Style guide
    • Color scheme
    • Fonts
    • Brand
  • Mockups
  • Prototypes (Figma)
    • Simulates user experience & workflows
  • Animations, video, audio

Features

  • Features
    • Must-haves (non-negotiable)
    • Should-haves (important, not vital)
    • Could-haves (nice, but could be left out)
    • Will-not-haves (features which are not a priority)
    • Pages/Screens
      • Actions user is able perform

Information Architecture

  • Data models
  • Data displayed to users
  • Data collected from users

User Flows

Technical

Technical Overview

  • Details of solution
  • Visuals & graphics
    • Examples:
      • Charts
        • Stacked Bar Chart
        • Tree Maps
      • Graphics
      • Video
      • Examples
        • Links to existing solutions similar to app

Platforms & Tech Stack

  • User Platforms supported
    • Versions
  • Technology Stack
    • Back-end / Services
    • API
    • Front-end / Mobile APp
  • Technical Solutions Required
    • e.g mobile app, website admin, reports
  • New solution or updating existing solution?

Components

  • Vendors
  • Libraries

Process flow

  • Processes outside the app/site
  • Other systems
  • Flow Chart Diagram

Users, Roles, & Access

Reports

  • Details
  • Frequency

Support & Maintenence

  • Months of support
  • Support model
    • Dedicated resource
    • Fixed committment of time

Timelines

  • Length of time estimate per feature (hours)
  • Outcome Roadmap

Team

  • Skills required
  • Roles
    • Project Management
    • Designer
    • Developer
    • Testing

Costing

  • Total cost
    • Development cost (hourly)
    • Professional services (e.g. project management, graphic design)
    • Maintenance costs
      • Additional development requests
      • Maintenence contract

Intellectual Property

  • App name uniqueness
    • App stores
    • Domain names

Development Methodology

  • Agile - frequent software releases with completed functionality
  • Sprints - 2 weeks

Project Management

  • Tools
  • Meetings
    • Iteration Planning (Weekly)
      • Task prioritization
      • Task estimation
    • Standup (every other day)
      • What’s been done?
      • What should be done next?
      • What are the blockers
    • Demontration (Weekly)
      • Show working software
      • Gather feedback
    • Retros (Bi-weekly)
      • “Do more” / “Do differently” / “Do less” / Issues / Feelings / Actions

Testing

Test Cases

User Experience (UX) Testing

Functional Testing

  • Ensure users can use app’s features without issues
  • Test conditions
  • Feature comparison between platform versions of app

Performance Testing

  • App Responsiveness
  • Speeds of screens loading
  • Battery & Memory utilization
  • Network efficiency
  • File sizes of App & data

Security Testing

Device & Platform Testing

  • App Simulators
  • Test on muliple devices
  • TestFlight

Deployment

App Store Submission

  • App Store Release requires:

    • App title
    • Description
    • Category
    • Keywords
    • Launch Icon
    • App Store screenshots

  • If app requires login, provide Apple with Test User Account

App Store Review

  • Time: Days to weeks

Monitoring & Analytics

Performance

- App
- Dependent systems

Mobile Analytics Platforms

Crash reports

User-reported issues

Feature utilization by users

Training

Support

  • How end-users are supported

User Feedback

Feedback & Submission process

  • In-App Feedback
  • User Surveys

Advice

  • Describe reports early, so they can be integrated into the system at the best cost
  • Establishing a style guide early on as part of your mobile app development process improves the productivity of your mobile app developers. Following a style guide will help keep your app’s look and feel consistent
  • Make sure that your app employs consistent fonts, style treatments, color scheme, padding between data, icon design, and navigation
  • Security
    • Hire outside agencies to perform thorough security testing on their applications

Resources

Process

  • Break down the requirements into a feature list and initial architecture design
  • Dev team estimates against each feature
    • Convert each feature to technical tasks and estimate the hours.
  • Discuss the QA efforts, Project handling time
  • Prepare the quote

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