From Envisioning To Execution – Our Expedition On Developing Discounter

As businesses sketch new ways to fulfill existing market demand optimally or create new demand with innovation, Discounter came with a niche and inherently unique idea. An idea of becoming a go-to application that offers the best deals and value offers to users across restaurants, cafes, amusement parks, cinemas, utility stores, etc across UAE. Moreover, merchants can also promote their offerings on the application with great discounts on food, beverages, meals, entertainment, recreation, and daily essentials.

Identifying Problems and Finding Solutions

Technology Stack:

• Java & Kotlin for Android
• Swift for iOS

Tools Used:

• Xcode
• Android Studio

This project was initiated with the idea to build an application that gives people maximum offers like a discount, vouchers, cashbacks, etc. for their dynamic interests from food to shopping to recreation. Hence it included the user and their inclination toward restaurants, cafes, amusement parks, cinemas, utility stores, etc across UAE. In addition to that, the application should enable merchants to practice active promotion and incentivize offers to drive their business and attract customers.

Objective:

When Discounter approached us, they wanted to build an application that is extremely user-friendly and unique in terms of its accessibility, appeal, aesthetics, and function just like the idea of Discounter in the first place.

The application should be able to serve all its stakeholders i.e both the user as well as the merchant with optimal ease. The majority of the contemporary applications pose the problem of taking time to offer redemption and losing the market. Therefore, we planned to build an application that met the criteria of working “instant to the t” and saving time on the process of redeeming the offer on the purchase. In addition to that to make it a useful app on the go, it will also notify the user of the offers of the nearby vendors as per their location.

Challenges:

• Showing the best offers to users nearby their locations.
• Integrating the push notifications with the deep link.
• Showing the trending offers based on users’ preferences.
• Provide special gifts to selected customers or devices.

We used Xcode (version 12.0) and Android Studio (version 4.2) to develop the application.

Xcode is Apple’s integrated development environment used for developing software for macOS, iOS, iPadOS, watch OS, and tvOS. Meanwhile, Android Studio is the integrated development environment for Google’s Android Operating system designed specifically for Android development.

Approach:

We were keen on offering our clients an application that is intuitive enough in understanding the interest of the user and fetching offers that suit those interests best wherever they go. In addition to that, it also becomes a platform for merchants to showcase their services by effective campaigning with offers like discounts or vouchers.

• We added login functionality that allows the user to log in with their email ID or phone number and a password. And also included the option for a password reset.

• We added a feature in the app for saving the user preferences and for collecting some user information like gender, DOB and location, and based on that we filtered the trending offers.

• Also, we have added a feature for the admin to choose any 5 offers as per admin preferences to show trending offers.

• We created an engaging homepage with a navigation menu, slider banners, and category display.

• We have used the cloud messaging service of Google firebase to integrate push notifications with deep links.

• The next focus was the product listing page with categories, subcategories, and “Favourites”, “Redemption” and “Gifts” functionality.

• An offers detail page was added with images, offers as per location, and descriptions of all products.

• We also incorporated a simplified user dashboard where customers can edit their personal details, view order history, manage transactions, and log out. A search bar was added with vendors’ search dropdown functionality.

• We also built a feature where there could be a competition between customers, based on points earned by redeeming the offers.

• We also developed a well-managed control panel for the merchants, where they could start showcasing their offer easily post signing up and verification from the admin.

• Implemented functionality to send push notifications to customers if there is an offer on their nearby stores.

• We have integrated a Telr payment gateway for making the payment from vendors

With the necessary updates and UX design done on Discounter, it was all set to take the market!

Partnering with Pro Web was just the beginning for Discounter to become a successful application with its unique concept and niche offering to the users.