There are well over a million apps for iOS enabled devices. Android isn’t far behind. Other app stores contain apps numbering in the hundreds of thousands. At the beginning of the app gold rush, developers were incentivized to be first, but not necessarily useful.

That has left us with mobile app stores bursting at the seams with apps, most of which are not worth the money you would pay for them. Today, developers understand that just being in the store with an app is not enough. The app has to stand out in some way and prove its usefulness. Though not quite at the needle in a haystack level, good apps can be hard to find. But more and more each day, they are there to be found on all relevant platforms.

The app market has not only shifted to more useful apps, it has also progressed towards apps from non-tech industry companies. As with podcasts, apps started out as tech demos from tech companies for tech geeks. Today, apps have made a major shift towards the mainstream. They are from mainstream companies, and perform mainstream tasks for mainstream customers.

Here are a few in that category you might find useful:

Legal Services Apps

No one in their right mind would consider a legal app a tech demo for geeks. In fact, it is hard to think of anything more opposite of tech than a legal service. Tech is about the new and shiny. The law is shrouded in ancient tradition. Courtrooms are typified by wooden pews and hardwood floors, much like an Amish church building. They are places one would not even feel comfortable bringing a smartphone. In a courtroom, one is slightly surprised that there are power outlets and electric lights. One might be shocked to discover a thriving marketplace of legal services apps in the App Store.

One of the newer instances of this is the Lexington Law app, which combines the essence of a legal service with the accessibility of an iPhone app. According to the App Store description, this app enables you to:

• • Monitor your case status.
• • View items that have been removed from your credit reports.
• • View ReportWatch credit monitoring alerts.
• • View your credit reports on file.
• • View your current creditor actions.
• • View your credit bureau actions.

Financial Services Apps

It is difficult to say which is older: legal services or financial services. It is also difficult to know which has had a more adversarial history with technology. They are both steeped in tradition, and value the “old ways” just because they are old and tried.

For a long time, banks were as stuffy as courtrooms. It hasn’t been all that long since they added carpeting, comfortable seating, and cash machines that could do more than dispense cash in $20 increments. It is not as if the technology wasn’t there for banks to do more with technology to serve their customers; they were just allergic to the idea. Or so it seemed.

Now, banks are bastions of high-tech goodness. Pretty much everything one was forced to stand in line to do, can now be done from a smartphone. That includes depositing a traditional check. About the only thing you can’t do from a smartphone is withdraw cash. However, there is no longer a barrier to transferring funds from account to account, and person to person.

Check is a particularly exceptional financial app. It is not from a specific bank, but can be connected to just about any type of account. This includes credit cards and loan accounts. Check can be used to pay bills and keep track of where your money goes. It can provide all manner of useful alerts and budgeting tips. What used to take hours, if not days to compile and assess can now be assimilated at a glance from a smartphone app.

Entertainment Services

When we think of entertainment services, we usually think of TV and movies. While they require technology to deliver their goods, they have traditionally utilized the bare minimum technology necessary to get the job done. Furthermore, they have actively blocked consumers from using more advanced technology with their services.

The entertainment industry fought inventions such as the VCR, Laser Disk, DVD recorder, DVR, and any type of on-demand service. Today, with the exception of sports and live events, a person can get all their entertainment needs taken care of through smartphone apps.

We can watch just about any current show on-demand from pay-per-episode or subscription services. If we are willing to wait a few days, we can watch them for free from the network-specific apps. We can watch second-run movies from iTunes and any number of other services. We can buy, rent, and subscribe. Many movies are made available for free through some apps and services.

Best of all, from the perspective of the content providers, we can still see all the ads, in more places, at more times. Proctor & Gamble is not going to suffer because we watch programs from the small screen instead of the bigger one in the living room. Also, we are not going to miss out on that door-buster sale that feeds our shopping addiction. By serving people with technology, all parties benefit.

Mainstream companies are learning that by embracing consumer apps, they can not only serve the customer’s interests better, but theirs as well.