App development · Gold Coast team, Brisbane and Australia wide
Your crew reports jobs through a group chat. Customers ring the office to ask where things are up to. Someone types it all into a spreadsheet at 9pm. Our app development work replaces that with one app your staff and customers actually open: fast on a phone, connected to your systems and planned with the people who'll use it. We're app developers on the Gold Coast, working with businesses in Brisbane and across Australia.
Signs
Most businesses don't set out to build an app. They get there after years of stitching together tools that were never meant to run a business.
01 · Group chat
Updates, photos and questions scroll away within an hour, and nobody can find last Tuesday's sign-off.
02 · Paper forms
Checklists and timesheets live in the ute until Friday, then someone retypes them.
03 · Camera roll
The proof of work exists. It's just on your apprentice's phone, next to his holiday snaps.
04 · Spreadsheet
It works until two people edit it at once, or the one person who understands it goes on leave.
05 · Inbox
Every "where are we up to?" call is time your office could spend on work that pays.
06 · Calendar
Three calendars, two people booking and one very unhappy customer standing at a locked door.
Six workarounds. One app your team opens instead.
Which kind of app
The first question isn't which developer. It's which kind of app. Picking the wrong one is the most expensive mistake in app development, so here's how we explain it to clients.
Best for: Office teams, portals and dashboards
Runs in the browser on any device. Nothing to install, one codebase, and every update goes live for everyone at once. This is classic web application development.
Best for: Field staff and repeat customers
A web app that installs on the home screen from a link, opens full screen and can work offline. Most of the business apps we recommend sit here. It's cross platform app development without two separate builds.
Best for: Public apps needing deep phone features
Built for iPhone and Android and listed in the App Store and Google Play. Worth it when you need heavy device features or a public store listing. It costs more and every update goes through store review.
Our honest default: start with an installable web app, prove people use it, then go native only if the numbers say so.
Sketch to pocket
Keep scrolling to watch one app take shape the way ours do.
We draw the screens on paper with your team. It's quick, cheap and easy to change.
The sketch becomes a clickable prototype you can tap through on your own phone.
Real data, real sign-in and connections to the systems you already use.
Your team installs it, and the group chat finally goes quiet.
Illustrative app for a building business, not a client's live product.
What we build
Drag through a few of the apps we're asked for most. Each one starts with a real job someone does every day.
If the app is one part of a bigger system, see our custom software development service.
What makes it stick
An app nobody opens is just an expensive icon. The ones that stick are faster than the workaround they replace, so we design around the busiest moment of someone's day.
We design for a quick load on a mid-range phone, because a slow app loses to a text message.
Big tap targets and short forms that work with one hand, or with work gloves on.
Entries save on the phone and sync once the reception comes back.
Alerts for the few things people need to act on, not a stream of noise.
Details flow into your CRM, accounting or booking tools, so nobody types them twice.
Crews, managers and customers each see only what they need.
How we work
No big reveal at the end. You see the app early and often, and nothing gets built that your team hasn't tried first.
Step 1 · Discovery
We ride along, sit with the office and map the job the app has to do. You get a written scope, screen sketches and a costed plan.
Step 2 · Prototype
A clickable prototype goes to the real users. We watch where they hesitate and fix the design before any code.
Step 3 · Build
Short build cycles with a working app to test at the end of each one. Your feedback steers the next cycle.
Step 4 · Launch
We load your data, train your staff and stay close for the first few weeks while habits change.
Step 5 · Support
An agreed support arrangement covers hosting, updates, fixes and the next round of features.
App costs
Every app is scoped before it's priced, but you deserve a starting point. These are the entry prices for each kind of project. All prices are plus GST, and bigger builds cost more.
Small technical sprint
From $2,500
Test an app idea with a clickable prototype or a tight proof of concept before you commit.
Custom automation or integration
From $5,000
Link an app to your CRM, accounting or booking system, or add automated workflows.
Custom software application
From $10,000
A field service app, customer portal, booking app or staff app, built around your workflow.
Complex system
Quoted after discovery
Multiple user types, heavy integrations or native store apps. Priced from a written specification.
We don't sell cheap template apps or monthly app subscriptions. Every app is a scoped project with a plan you can read before you pay for the build.
Request a project reviewTrack record
These results come from websites and growth programs we've built and run. The same team plans and builds our apps, with the same focus on what brings in work.
Page 1 rankings and +340% leads.
Chartered Accountants
Qualified enquiries up +280% in 6 months.
Premium Builders
Phone calls and bookings up +420%.
Garage Door Services
Why WDC
We've been building for Australian businesses since 2014, from our studio on the Gold Coast. Plenty of our clients are an hour up the M1 in Brisbane, and others are in Sydney, Melbourne and regional towns. Workshops run in person when it helps and over video when it doesn't.
You work with the people building your app, not a sales layer. We'll tell you when an app is the wrong answer, and when a better website or a simple automation would do the job for a fraction of the cost.
Questions
Tap a question to see our reply. Want to ask about your own app? Request a project review.
Web Design Collective
App development team
It comes down to scope. A prototype sprint to test an idea starts from $2,500 plus GST. Connecting an app to your existing systems starts from $5,000, and a business app such as a field job app or customer portal starts from $10,000. Bigger platforms start with paid discovery, so your quote comes from a written plan rather than a guess.
A clickable prototype usually takes a couple of weeks. A focused first version of a business app usually takes a few months, and we release it in stages so your team can use the core screens sooner. You get a timeline for your own app at the end of discovery, before you commit to the build.
For most business apps we suggest an installable web app first. It works on iPhone, Android and desktop from one codebase, installs from a link and updates without store reviews. A native store app makes sense when you need deep phone features or a public listing, and we'll tell you in discovery if that's you.
When a store app is genuinely the right call, we scope it as its own project, including store review, testing on real devices and ongoing updates. Most of the business apps we're asked about don't need it, and an installable web app gets your team using it sooner for less.
Not a finished idea. Bring the problem, the people who deal with it every day and whatever you use now, even if it's a messy spreadsheet or a pile of paper forms. Discovery turns that into screens, a scope and a price.
Yes, it can be built to. An installable web app can save entries, photos and sign-offs on the phone and sync them once the signal comes back. We decide what needs to work offline during discovery, because it affects the design and the cost.
Usually, yes. If your CRM, accounting package or booking system has an API, the app can read from it and write back to it, so nobody types the same details twice. We check each connection in discovery before we price the build.
We train your team, watch how the app gets used and fix anything that trips people up. Then we agree an ongoing support arrangement for hosting, updates and new features, so the app keeps up with the business instead of going stale.
Bring the group chat, the paper form or the spreadsheet everyone dreads. We'll review it with you and tell you honestly whether an app is the right fix, and what it would take.