This is a guest post from Jared Johnson of Ultera Digital. Learn more about him and his agency at the end of the post.

Mobile apps continue to be an essential part of the digital marketing ecosystem in 2015, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy to create them successfully. Thankfully, we are long past the days of marketers everywhere clamoring, “I need an app!” without understanding how or why. Remember that, circa 2008?

We have learned a lot about mobile behaviors since then. For instance, U.S. smartphone owners use an average of 24 non-native apps per month but spend 84% of their time on just five apps – Facebook, Gmail, Instagram, Weather and YouTube. It’s easy to see why. Those apps are powerful, useful and convenient. They help us make connections. They serve a specific purpose. Above all, they make life easier.

So what about the millions of other apps out there? Why are so few considered successful?