There are almost 5 billion internet users in the world. That’s a striking two-thirds of our global population! People browse the internet for different reasons and if you come up with unique solutions that can increase the internet user’s productivity, reduce distractions, and just make their overall browsing experience better then wouldn’t that be awesome? Chrome extensions can do that and more!
Developing a chrome extension is a great idea (especially if you follow the 5 hot tips for efficient chrome extension development) because these small add-ons can help users customize the google chrome browser and enhance their user experience by expanding the browser’s capabilities and adding additional functionalities. Businesses that use special chrome extensions make their work more efficient by streamlining their tasks and increasing overall productivity.
So let’s go ahead and check out what are chrome extensions and find out the right way to go about your chrome extension development journey:
What Is Chrome Extension?
Ideally, chrome extensions are mini-programs installed on the chrome browser to serve one primary purpose. The main purpose of chrome extension development commonly revolves around the objective to improve or enhance the users’ web experience, broadly in three ways:
- 1. By pulling up productivity
- 2. By helping to aggregate information
- 3. By making a flat web experience fun
Benefits Of Using Chrome Extensions
Enabling increased functionality, freedom, and innovative solutions, chrome extensions can help users enhance their internet browsing experience in different ways. You can also customize your chrome browser adding new features based on your unique personal preferences and requirements. This is why there are more than 137,345 extensions available for Chrome.
Here are the top benefits that the most efficient chrome extensions commonly impart:
Increase Productivity And Efficiency
You can customize your chrome browser according to your requirements and incorporate useful features and functionalities that can improve your workflow and productivity. Various extensions can help businesses save time and boost productivity by automating tasks, monitoring employees, and controlling overall business processes.
Provide Multi-Device Support
During the current times when working remotely is gaining popularity, people are gaining more freedom to get their work done from different locations! This means people are not confined to working from a single device like a company desktop and they can choose to work from different devices like their laptops and tablets. A chrome extension provides its user the flexibility to sync their extensions to any device they log on to. This is extremely convenient for the users and the businesses as well.
Privacy And Security
We are living in a digital era where sneaky websites are constantly trying to steal the user’s data and monitor their activities, not to mention the threats from hackers, malicious viruses, and spyware! The solution? Custom online security and VPN extensions that can protect your data and give you the privacy and peace of mind that you deserve. An increasing number of businesses are becoming aware of these benefits and getting bespoke extensions developed for their in-house operations.
Efficient Project Management
Collaboration, communication, and on-time delivery are the three pillars of efficient project management. Chrome extensions can help in monitoring tasks, tracking progress, and sharing resources with team members easily. Bespoke features like setting due dates, reminders, customizing tasks, and group chats can really help in managing projects successfully from the start to finish.
Support Digital Marketing
Digital Marketing is becoming an extremely competitive field where it's crucial to stand out from the competition but in order to do that marketers need access to multiple tools and websites to effectively analyze data and performance. Switching between multiple websites can be extremely time-consuming and confusing for anybody. Hence, special extensions that can provide key metrics of any domain in one place can be the holy grail for any digital marketer.
Smart Online Shopping
Who doesn’t like shopping online? Who doesn’t love to save some time and money while at it? As a result, simple browser extensions that can address these ever-growing needs of modern consumers have the potential of gaining huge popularity. Popular features supported by these extensions can include - notifying the user when there’s a price drop on their favorite product or when their wishlisted product is back in stock and comparing prices of a product from several platforms.
Earn profits
Browser extensions can be a great source of income if it addresses the right pain points of consumers and has robust functionality. There are several ways to make money from chrome extensions like charging a subscription fee, adding advertisements, or affiliate marketing. The best part is, the ways to monetize chrome extensions are many, too!
How To Develop Chrome Extension - The Step-By-Step Guide
Google chrome is the most popular and reliable internet browser in the world making chrome the primary browser of more than 3.2 billion internet users! And that’s exactly the hotspot the businesses are making the most of, via custom chrome extension development. However, you have to be careful while planning the project and the following guide will help you make your development process much more efficient:
Decide The Main purpose & Functionality Of The Extension
Figure out what will be the extension’s main purpose and what features would support it. Follow best practices to ensure user satisfaction without compromising on their safety and privacy.
Find A Competent Development Team
Work with an experienced team of chrome extension developers who possess expertise in developing custom extensions. Using the right technology and high-quality codes will give your extension an edge over the others.
Design The User Interface
Collaborate with the development team to design a functional user interface. The UI of your chrome plugin should be simple and easy to use without any unnecessary clutter.
Development
After communicating requirements to the chrome extension developers and establishing the scope of the project let the experts handle all the technicalities of developing your chrome extension.
Test Out Your Extension
Test the extension carefully after the development team is done from their side to provide any important feedback and fix the bugs that might come up.
Launch & Support
Once everything looks good and your extension functions properly it’s time to launch your extension! And always remember to address the user feedback, whether you’re publishing it on the chrome web store or using it for your business.
Challenges In Chrome Extension Development & How To Overcome Them
Developing a chrome extension can be extremely rewarding but you might face some challenges in the process, so here’s a list of probable red flags you can face on the way and some useful tips on how to overcome them and keep your chrome extension development process running smoothly.
Chrome Extension Development Pain Points and Solutions:
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Development Can Be Tricky
Development Can Be Tricky
It’s a no-brainer that chrome extensions development can be extremely challenging if you don’t have any prior knowledge in developing custom extensions. Working with an experienced team of chrome web developers who have worked on similar projects in the past can solve this problem. But you should conduct a thorough background check on your vendors - look into their past track records, client feedback, employee background, and understand their workflow before hiring them.
- Not Widely Supported
Not Widely Supported
Browser extensions are usually not supported on mobile devices hence most of the users may only come from desktops and laptops. So it would be a good idea to develop a separate mobile application to satisfy the requirements of your mobile users.
- Code Easily Decrypted
Code Easily Decrypted
Simple browser extensions can be easily decrypted and used by your competitors. Hence, it's important to use technologies like API to secure your proprietary information from outsiders.
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Reliance On The Web-Store
Reliance On The Web-Store
If a person has published their extensions on the chrome web store for monetizing it then they are at the web store’s mercy as they can remove or suspend the listing from their store anytime. To prevent such scenarios respect the chrome web store’s guidelines and never allow any malicious bugs in your plugin.
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Huge Competition
Huge Competition
Again, if a business wants to monetize their chrome extension then they will be facing huge competition from similar extensions on the web-store. Only 1.79% of extensions have more than 100,000 users. To beat the competition offer robust functionalities and unique solutions to address your user’s pain points.
Chrome Extension Development Services We Offer
BinaryFolks offers the best in class custom chrome extension development services. What sets us apart is our proven experience of working with the latest technologies to offer completely customizable state-of-the-art chrome extensions. Our company has an immaculate track record of working on a range of scaleable browser extension projects. We specialize in implementing JavaScript APIs for secure third-party API integrations for your extension. Our skilled team of chrome web developers are dedicated to providing robust and full-featured browser extensions for every purpose and will never compromise on the code quality and performance of a project. Here are some prominent chrome extension development services we offer:
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Screenshot Extension
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Gmail Extension
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Project Management Extension
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Time Management Extension
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Online Security Extension
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Adblocker Extension
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VPN Chrome Extension
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Password Chrome Extension
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Shopify Extension
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eBay Chrome Extension
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Amazon Extension
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Etsy Extension
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LinkedIn Extension
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Facebook Extension
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Instagram Extension
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Twitter Extension
Few Selected Chrome Extensions We Developed Recently
Our diversified experience from working with several cutting-edge startups and fortune 50 companies from around the world makes us a reliable choice for your next chrome extension development project. We collaborate with companies from various industries to produce some of the finest extensions for our clients. Check out a few of the latest chrome extensions we have developed recently:
Web Scraping Extensions
Enterprise Productivity Extension
Security & Privacy Extensions
Adblock Extensions
Ecommerce Extensions
Social Media Extensions
Password Management Extension
Chrome Extension Maintenance & Support
FAQs
- 1. Charging the customers for the extension.
- 2. Including in-app payments with the extension.
- 3. Search advertisements and affiliate marketing.
- 4. And you can also choose to sell the extension.
- 5. Read more about monetizing your extension here!
Check out why Chrome Extension Development can be the best investment for your business here!