White Label Apps – Starting Your Own App Business

Are you interested in creating and selling apps? It could be a lucrative career. According to a recent report, 67% of SMBs plan to have their own mobile app by the end of the year. Could you give them that solution?

Well, the good news is that you don’t need a team of iOS and Android developers to create an application these days. If your client’s needs are simple enough, you could absolutely use an app maker and claim credit for their platform and development tools. In fact, they actively encourage it through their reseller, or white label app programs.

So what is a white label app?

Let’s say you use Mass Mobile Apps to create an app. You can log into their platform, play around, add features and publish it online. When you do, you will be using the Mass Mobile Apps website and backend. Their logo and branding is everywhere.

But what if you are building a Mobile App for someone else?  You will want to charge a fee for the work you do and if you want to make it look like you own the software that builds the app you will need to either spend hundreds of thousands of dollars and years to devlop your own platform, or you can become a White Label Re Seller.  This means you will license the software of another company and put your branding on it to make it look like your own.  

This is achieved through 3 white label features:

• Hidden branding: whoever is using the app will not know the name of the app maker whose platform they are using
• Customizable branding: you can replace the app maker branding with your own
• Private domain name: your clients will access their app backend through a private domain name associated with your account

In short, you are paying for the right to replace any mention of GoodBarber with your own name or company name, while enjoying all of their features. Of course, any mention of their pricing will also be hidden from view.

Do I need to hide the branding?

Actually you don’t. In fact, some resellers prefer to keep the name of the app maker to leverage the brand as part of their pitch to clients.

As an app maker CEO told us: “It reminds me how it used to be with web agencies. At the beginning they didn’t say they were using WordPress to create the website for their customers. Now, they say they are WordPress gurus.”

Ok I want to start – now what?

Time for research! You should ensure that your app maker is perfect for your new business. Below is a checklist of all the points you should consider:

• Price structure: the app makers world is fairly established, with a wide variety of features and pricing structures. While they are generally paid monthly, you can also pay a lump sum for a certain amount of apps. Some give you a discounted price per app volume. You have to make sure the pricing structure make sense for the kind of reseller business you will run, and that it allows you to scale your business over the years.
• Features: are you going to focus on creating event apps? Or maybe apps for local shops? Different app makers offer different features, so don’t get locked into a contract with one that hasn’t got the features you need, better yet dont get locked into a contract at all.  Any App Building platform worht their salt will not lock you into a contract.
• Custom features: because app makers focus on a one-size-fits-all model, you might need to implement extra features for your clients. Most app makers let you integrate those, so you could invest in a developer for the odd coding job.
• Developer accounts: Once the apps are built, you will need to submit them to an app store. This is done with a developer account and it costs $99 / year for the AppStore and $25 forever for the Play Store. Some app makers let your clients submit through their own developer accounts, but make sure they understand the price and process.
• Reseller dashboard: When you are building or managing several apps at once, things can quickly get confusing. All app makers should give you access to a good dashboard where you can see the status of your apps and  any recent updates (made by you or your clients).

• Team Management: In case you are working as a team. Your app maker reseller program should let multiple users access the reseller dashboard.
• Client CMS: Letting your clients see the app backend is one thing. Giving them the tools to create their own content in the future is another. This is done through a client CMS (content management system) and it could be hugely beneficial if you want them to add regular posts or offers without having to oversee everything.
• Priority support / training: By building multiple apps at once, you will become one of the app makers’ power users. You will also be responsible for any technical problems if something happens to your clients’ apps. So make sure the support is fast, reliable and efficient.
• Marketing tools and resources: As a reseller, your main priority will probably be to find new clients. Some app makers will help you in your search by offering tools and resources to bring in extra business. Here is a post from AppInstitute, for instance.

GoodBarber

Price: $240 / month or $2400 a year for an unlimited amount of apps. There is a plan at $150 / month for unlimited Progressive Web Apps.

Extras costs:

• You need an app developer account for each iOS app you submit ($99 / year).
• There is an extra review fee for submitting to the app store.
• Add-ons: some features need to be purchased on a per app basis (between $40 / $80 per year), but you can also buy unlimited add-ons, starting at $80 / month.
• Geofences: each app comes with 6 free geofences, and you can buy 25 more for $6 / month.
• iBeacons: you get 6 free beacons per app and can buy 25 more for $12 / month.

Main features: A good range of features, from loyalty options to unlimited push notifications. You can read a full review of their offer here.

Reseller tools: good reseller dashboard. Cloning tool to easily duplicate an application. 6 weeks on boarding reseller training that includes a 45 min 1 on 1 call per week to help you get started. Ability to integrate custom code. Online resources (available for everyone).

Unique approach: GoodBarber was one of the first platforms to focus on Progressive Web Apps (PWA). It might be a tough sell for clients, but they could get a simplified website that acts as an app. Their apps also tend to put content at the front, making them ideal for blogs, news publications and magazines.

Become a GoodBarber reseller

Shoutem

Price: The “Agency” pricing, as Shoutem calls it, starts at $279 / month. It doesn’t limit the amount of apps you can build, but instead lets you buy $310 worth of standard Shoutem app subscriptions. While it looks rather confusing, there are two advantages to this method: one is that you can create apps with the lite, basic or advances plans (different prices and different levels of features). Two, you get a discounted rate based on the number of apps you build.

Extra costs:

• Live chat support: $162/ month
• Live chat + 24/7 phone support: $576 / month

Main features: A small but decent list at the moment: coupons, community features, events and places.

Reseller tools: Shoutem offers personal training to help you get started with the platform. You also have a dedicated account manager, and will be able to access white label promotional material to sell your apps to clients.

The new Shoutem extension marketplace. Not quite complete at the time of writing, but a good example of how well-designed their platform is.

Unique approach: Shoutem is taking a leaf from WordPress’s book by opening its code to developers. They aim to create a big marketplace of extensions that you can tweak and integrate with your app. If you know how to code or work with a developer, this could be a huge plus.

Mass Mobile Apps

Price: The “Re-Seller” pricing for Mass Mobile Apps, starts at $125 / month. For this you recieve 5 app credits, this is by far the best opening price point of all the platforms we have tested.  It gives you an easy entry into the market and makes you profitable in short order.  MMA also has the most feature rich and dynamic platform we have seen with a continual barage of new features released monthly.  They also offer customizations so if your client is looking for something very specific for their apps you can get it built with the team at Mass Mobile.

Extra costs:

• Apple IOS submissions $50
• SMS credits $0.05 each - sold in packages

Main features: As mentioned earlier this platform blew us away with the sophistication of its features, no cookie cutter softies here.  The platform is very focused on Loyalty and has 11 different types of Rewards Features.  When speaking to Ali Ispahany who is the founder he emphasied that the heavy investment into Loyalty was by design.  "People download and delete apps every day, we use the hook of loyalty to keep our apps on your customers devices!"  said Ali.

Reseller tools: Mass Mobile offers personal on-boarding when you sign on and offer the best support system we have seen, you litterally can get someone on the phone most times of the day, which is important especially when you are starting out and learning new software. Lots of marketing material and re seller tools like integrated invoicing and email and even an integrated QR Code generator which saves you $ as its bundled with the platform.  

AppyPie

Price: AppyPie has 4 reseller plans: Starter ($100 / month – 10 apps); Pro ($200 month – 25 apps); Business ($300 month – 50 apps); and Enterprise ($400 a month – 100 apps)

Extra costs:

• Certain features use third party solutions. These usually start free but could become expensive if you rely on them a lot.

Main features: In-app store, loyalty features, geo-localization and more.

Reseller tools: Nothing special here.

Unique approach: AppyPie offers lifetime subscriptions (which actually only remain active for 5 years). It’s essentially a discounted rate when you pay a big lump sum in advance.

Final thoughts

In conclusion, it is worth reiterating that, as a reseller, you will become the app makers’ privileged user. You should therefore expect a certain level of support and service to create the apps as easily as possible and focus on selling them instead.

The other good news is that you can easily test the waters by choosing the best app maker for one app and trying to sell it. If you are successful, you can then start thinking more seriously about setting up a stable business. And if you really want to grow it, there is no reason why you couldn’t invest in more than one app maker reseller package!

Did we miss anything? Considering another white label option? Let us know in the comments below as we’ll be exploring reseller programs more in depth in the future with complete comparisons and video reviews.