If you are to run some kind of profitable or non-profitable project you have to raise money for it. In commerce it is called investment. There have always been many ways to receive financial support for your business. However, modernity has brought new instruments into this.
WHAT IS AN INVESTMENT PLATFORM?
Modern investment platforms are online financial markets. They are comparatively new, yet essential part of the modern business. With an investment platform you can buy bonds, shares, funds and other kinds of valuable papers. Investment platforms not only simplify investing but also may provide beneficial discounts.
If you are not an investment neophyte and require no advice on investing you may be interested in cutting out intermediaries, who take advantage of all your transactions, thus reducing your income. On the other hand, it also works for the industry’s newcomers. It is especially interesting for those, who want to get started with minimum investments made. Getting rid of middlemen and providing stock operations essentials to the customers looks appealing for both ‘big sharks’ and smaller fish. Investment platforms let you gather all your assets in one place. At the same time they reduce tax losses. Basically that’s the principle of any investment platform’s work. Simplicity and speed made them extremely popular within the last decade in fintech development.
There are two main types of investment platforms: fund supermarkets and fund wraps.
Fund wraps
Fund wraps are online finance administrating services that provide shareholders access to customised advice and huge pools of mutual funds. Fund wraps are often offered by full-service brokerage companies. Usually, the investor looks through a list of mutual funds, which are often suggested with reduced sales loads and chooses one of them. Dealing with fund wraps, investors yearly pay a special overall fee, well known as the wrap fee.
Fund supermarkets
Fund supermarkets are single online investment platforms that are used as stalls for all the mutual funds from different families. This kind of IPs looks pretty appealing, especially to investors. They are able to buy, sell and exchange different types of assets within one fund supermarket. Fund supermarkets are a preferable option for investors working with highly valuable networks and fund families.
Wraps vs Supermarkets
While fund supermarkets deal with mostly, you know, funds, wraps usually tend to offer other investment assets and other services. FWs and FSs are competing for customers all the time. They offer wider choices of assets, better services and more reasonable fees. Thus, fund supermarkets are taking more and more of wraps’ territory . Wraps on the other hand try to compete providing less complicated and cheaper services.
Every single web-based investment platform has to possess several archi-important features to be attractive for its potential clients:
User admin area and software development flow
The very first thing your potential customer will face is the interface. Make sure you eased the signup process as much as you could. Also design the user’s cabinet as a convenient virtual investor’s office, where users will be able to search for and analyse all the vital data.
Tools for money management
Investors are looking for the platforms, providing them full sets of tools inside of a convenient interface. That’s why money management tools are essential for a web-based investment platform. If your clients get a convenient dashboard with plenty of tools, giving them clear and fast access to all of their finance and assets, rest assured: they will never leave your platform.
Safety and security
Of course, when it comes to financial operations one can barely find anything more important than their money’s safety! Consider generous security measures for your investment platform, believe, they will pay off. High security standards will provide you not only healthy sleep, but also a reputation of a reliable service provider and partner.
Client support
Online Investment platforms are greatly customer- and business-oriented. That’s why, providing a decent customer support service is an important part of any investment platform. Consider outsourcing your customer support service to a specialized firm, which has enough experience in this field.
Up-to-date information
Stockholders use investment platforms for both financial operations and data analysis. Hence, informing them about important stock changes and new assets in time is one of IP’s key responsibilities.Information is power and for investors it is also money. If you want your platform to be successful you need to provide relevant information faster than your competitors.
If you want to create an investment platform there’s something you should consider:
Choosing tech stack
In order to choose the tech stack for your web development of investment platform, you have to know your target audience first. If you know your customer and their desires, you may figure out which tools and services they will demand. Ergo, your tech stack depends on the functionality of your future project. Do you have a full vision? Well, if you don’t have it there are some options to consider.
Consider a MVP
MVP or a minimum viable product is a minimalistic version of a project, which only has a handful of essentials, providing minimum services. MVPs are used either due to the lack of budget or if the final product’s appearance is questionable. MVP will let you maneuver in the first instance and provide you with a better understanding of what your platform should look like, giving you additional time to embody all the best ideas within the basic template.
Architecture
Want to build an investment platform? We’ve already mentioned that you can use a MVP. If it is your strategy you will be building your platform’s architecture slowly, step by step, adding new tools and features.
Bank integration
An advanced investment platform desperately needs arrangements with banks. Thus, your customers will get investment suggestions based on their financial reliability, credit score and financial capabilities. The number of banks you will connect to will also affect your platform’s architecture.
Country and Time Zone
It is really important to make sure you use banks of a reliable country with clear laws and business policy. Time Zones might also play an important role. Diversifying might be a great idea!
Code logging
Mistakes are inevitable and you better be aware of them. Be careful, because they may be caused beyond your direct responsibility zone. While dealing with an investment platform you surely involve third parties. Track all of the system’s malfunctions in time, it is your vulnerable point.
Sandbox environment
Sandbox is a backup mechanism of your platform, use it to prevent mistakes and try new functions and solutions without risking to lose potential customers. It is also a very important tool for testing new antimalware technologies.
Matching your UX
An average investment platform is a virtual medium with lots of information that users try to cope with and properly analyse. Abundance of tools, assets and data makes IPs’ UX development a challenging task! The most important thing is to keep this balance between providing enough data to your customers and not overloading them with dozens and hundreds of irrelevant notifications.
How much does it cost to create an investment platform
Sure, creating an investment platform seems a profitable project to make. Yet, you should be aware of the precise cost. It’s only half of the work to develop an investment platform, you should also maintain and promote it. Here is a full list of your possible expenses:
- Web-based investment platform design – 10,000$ to 200,000$
- Average yearly maintenance – 2,000$ to 60,000$
- Marketing – 20,000$ and more
How much does it cost to create a mobile app for an investment company
To create an investment web-site is expensive, however to create an investment app is also quite budget consuming. Depending on the added features investment app’s development may require 10, 20, 50 or even 100 thousand dollars. We’ve already mentioned the MVP approach: use it and spend the resource generated by your project itself for its development.
SapientPro is experienced in all kinds of web development; working on investment platforms we have enriched ourselves with some specific experience and here are some tips of ours:
- Make your code from a scratch: projects like those are unique and require personalised attitude and customised approach
- Be generous, while testing your platform: it is mostly related to interface issues, bug-tracking and security measures, being tested
- Find out about the topic: in order to create an investment platform, you should know how to invest; don’t be afraid to take a professional advice
- Hire experienced devs: creating an investment platform will require skilled developers, familiar with the area
Our company offers all types of possible solutions for those, who are interested in creating their own investment platforms. We have vast experience working with data-bases and maintaining web-platforms for trading and e-commerce. Don’t hesitate to contact us and we will help you with any type of online fund platforms, manage your project, define the strategy and find the best partnership solutions!
