How We Developed The Daily Muslim App - Strategies and Features

Why is an Islamic app like the Daily Muslim app needed in the first place?

There was a time when people spent a significant part of their day doing prayers, following their religious practices. It was easier in the past because, well, work schedules weren’t too hectic. There were fewer distractions in life after work.

But now? People have 10-hour workdays, side gigs, cafes to go to after work, movies to watch, and what not! Naturally, it has become harder to accommodate all of that plus religious practices into a 24 hour day.

The challenge is harder, particularly for Muslims. Waking up at dawn to do the fajr, offering namaz five times a day, reading the Quran, offering duas throughout the day are just a few things the followers of Islam practice. Plus, the fact that many of these practices have to be done at particular times makes it all the more difficult for professionals leading a busy life.

But the solution to this serious problem isn’t complicated, thankfully!

One of the best Islamic apps, the Daily Muslim app, is here to help Muslims across the globe stay on track with their prayers and other daily religious practices. It’s the ultimate productivity app for people who wish to manage their day in a way that they can practice Islam with discipline amidst a hundred distractions.

Here’s a brief case study of how Third Rock Techkno realized the app idea with user-centric strategies.

Table of Content

• Daily Muslim App - Ideation
• Daily Muslim App - Initiation
• Daily Muslim App - Development
• Daily Muslim App - Monetization Strategy
• Daily Muslim App - Launch and Results

Daily Muslim App - Ideation

We were approached by the client after she had done considerable market research on her app idea. Being a Muslim working mother herself, the client had thought of the app as a means to organize her own life. She also realized that there are so many others like her who can benefit immensely from the Daily Muslim App.

To validate her idea, she conducted thorough market research along with a deep competitor analysis.

As the first step, she evaluated the existing Muslim apps and studied the strengths and weaknesses. The most in-demand feature was the Islamic reminder app feature. On the other hand, a common limitation of all those Islamic apps was the UX. The apps aren’t very intuitive and do not cater to all the categories of users.

Moreover, the technical glitches in the Islamic Android apps ended up turning off the users and had low retention rates.

After this, she knew for sure that there was a scope for Daily Muslim App. The userbase of these apps confirmed the market demand of the app. On the other hand, all the negative reviews of those apps indicated that the users would be very receptive to a similar app if it didn’t have UX and technical issues.

See More: 10 Muslim App Ideas to Build a Strong Community

Daily Muslim App - Initiation

During the first meeting, we had a detailed discussion with the client regarding the Islamic app development goals she had in her mind. We also talked about the kinds of users she wanted the app to cater to.

Interestingly, the client had come to us with very specific buyer personas. The Daily Muslim App intends to solve the problems of four kinds of Muslims:

The Traditional

In the age group of 40+ years, this group is able to operate the smartphone but has limited familiarity with modern technologies. They want the app to help them with prayer reminders and other practices but in a minimalistic format.

The Ambitious

This group is of working-class or otherwise busy Muslims aged between mid-twenties and late thirties. They are pretty comfortable navigating modern tech and would love a comprehensive Muslim productivity app.

The Skeptical

Typically consisting of students and professionals in their early twenties, this group hasn’t been practising consistently lately. They aren’t very religious, so the app has to ensure it doesn’t keep nudging them with reminders all the time. However, if presented the right way, they will be open to trying the app’s suggestions of Islamic practices.

The Newbie

These are the people who have recently converted to Islam and are having a hard time learning all the religious practices. An app that helps them build daily habits would be very well received by this group.

Based on such a wide range of target users, we knew we had to think of a UX that wouldn’t be too complicated for a traditional user, or too boring for a skeptical user. The features had to be the right mix of reminders, records, and other things.

Daily Muslim App - Development

The main challenge for us was to make the app easily accessible to all the different types of users. So our UX UI team got on to creating a design that would fulfill all their needs while also minimizing the limitations.

For example, the Typography had to look appealing to the Skeptical and the Ambitious groups on one hand. On the other hand, it had to be easily legible for the Traditional users.

After a couple of brainstorming sessions, we came up with a list of just the right set of features that the Islamic daily app should have.

Prayer Times

We decided that the features relating to Prayer Times should enable the users to remember when they are supposed to pray and plan for it in advance. If a user forgets about it while they are busy, the app should send them a reminder.

As for the Skeptical and the Newbie group, the app should be able to help them with how to do the prayers, the rakahs, and other related practices.

Quran Reader

Quran Reader is a feature that all categories of the target users would love in the app. However, since the age group is quite varied, we decided to add an important feature here: a slider on the screen to adjust the font size.

Moreover, the Quran is available with Sahih International translation. for the Skeptical and the Newbie users.

Qibla compass

A Qibla compass was a must-have feature since the beginning because of its pervasiveness. Sometimes, it can be difficult for Muslims to find the right direction (Kaaba) for their namaz. This Qibla compass helps them find the Kaaba within a couple of minutes.

Vast in-built collection of Duas

The app features a large number of Duas and presents them in different categories. To make practising Duas easy, the app also provides the translation of these Duas and bookmark the favorites.

There are also many smaller features that make using the Daily Muslim App an absolute delight. Some of them are:

• Fajr alarm every morning
• Zakah calculator
• Adding and tracking daily goals
• Customized Homescreen

Daily Muslim App - Monetization Strategy

One of the most common app monetization techniques is to generate revenues via ads. However, because the app is about practising religion, playing ads was out of the question. A person who is preparing to read the Quran would find it utterly inappropriate if the app showed them an ad.

And anyway, the founder wasn’t looking to launch the app just to generate revenue. So they took a subtle approach and launched the app as a Freemium product.

That means, most basic features in the Daily Muslim App are free. If a user wants to access advanced features like tracking personal goals or save favorites in the app, they need to buy the premium version of the app.

Daily Muslim App - Launch and Results

With the help of the cross-platform framework Flutter, we were able to build the app with maximum possible efficiency. After thorough testing of the app and a couple of re-touches, the app was launched on both Play Store and App Store in a lot of countries. Within a couple of months, the app has bagged 5000+ downloads!