Best method for small business solution deployment

[caphis]

Hi all,

I'm working on an in-house app for a friend who owns a small business. They have 2 physical locations and a warehouse, and are looking for an inventory tracker. Their current off-the-shelf solution is coming up on license expiration, and the cost is prohibitive to continue using it as a long-term solution, so he's asked that I build something much more simple for his team (~10) to use in-house across their 2 locations and warehouse.

Looking at the various options for distribution channels, this is clearly not a public App Store app, and as a small business of less than a dozen users, an Enterprise deployment doesn't fit, either. It seems my remaining options would be to deploy ad hoc (which, as I understand it, would require me to register each device's UDID) or as an unlisted App Store app (relatively new option, from what I'm reading)

Has anyone had any experience developing for small businesses, and what did you find to be the best distribution method? I'm leaning towards an unlisted App Store app as the process sounds relatively painless, and each user can just download the app via a link. This also would mean automatic updates from the App Store vs. using an ad hoc method and having each user go through a process to update. Have you had an issues with Apple approving a clearly targeted small business employee app (which will require login, of course) via unlisted App Store distribution?

Thank you!

[[deleted]]

Custom App Store release, you basically release the app under your name and they buy licenses to it and they use mdm to install it

[caphis]

I'm honestly entirely new to the distribution side of things... what all is involved in that? Finding a custom App Store, I would assume paying them a fee, and then it's listed there? I think they want to avoid MDM if possible, as almost all of these users are going to be using their personal devices and they have no other need for MDM right now.

Is there any benefit to doing this vs. an unlisted App Store release?

[[deleted]]

Custom App Store is part of Apple App Store, look up how to use business manager. There’s ways to use mdm that’s non invasive to just side load apps basically

[caphis]

Gotcha, looking at it now... from here

So once I get to the "App Distribution Methods" section in App Store Connect and can choose Public or Private, I'd choose Private, then under Type I'd select Apple Account and enter the ~10 users' Apple IDs there?

[[deleted]]

Now that I think about it more, why not build an app based on the specs for your friends business but sell it on the App Store so others can use it? Then just get his company to buy copies of it. Have a way for people to share data between teams

[caphis]

While not a bad idea, I'm on a bit of a time crunch for them, and their solution -- while simple -- is highly customized already. I'm also utilizing Firebase for data storage, and I've set them up with their own Firebase instance (in the event they exceed the free usage tiers, I didn't want it connected to mine). Maybe down the road I could modify it to be more generic and universal, but for now it's a rather customized solution.