To what extent has having a social message in dating helped Bumble?
Having a business with a social message can have a great impact on society. As brands influence customer psychology, to have customers associate with your social cause is a massive win not just for the business but for the world. Companies like Lokai, We Wood and Skyline Socks to name a few are built around giving back to the society. But while these companies give back, to what extent are they effective in growing in terms of scalability?
Bumble was launched in 2014 by business mogul Whitney Wolfe Herd following her sexual harassment lawsuit against Justin Mateen, former co-founder of Tinder, whom she had dated on and off.
As it turns out, the then 24-year-old female entrepreneur was not just fired from Tinder for being too young and “female” but also harassed through comments, emails and text messages post-breakup.
This was a bold move for Whitney, who decided to create Bumble, a dating app that allows women to make the first move with male users.
This addresses the problem of creepy texting and downright dangerous harassment, which are the major reasons why a lot of people have always been sceptical about online dating.
The launch of this app was a powerful social statement globally, where it sent off a strong message about women empowerment, encouraging women to make bolder choices in not just dating, but in business and life!
This also led to a lot of celebrities to come out in support of the app, including popular Kardashian – Jenner mom Kris Jenner, actor, producer and filmmaker Priyanka Chopra; and supermodel and entrepreneur Karlie Kloss, to name a few.
Everything seemed perfect for the brand, but then why did Tinder still manage to retain itself as the crowd favourite?
More convenient
If you are one of the millions who have downloaded Tinder, you will notice that it is much easier and quicker to sign up on the platform and get going.
All it asks for is a short bio and your music preferences which are generally synced from your Spotify playlist.
In comparison, Bumble asks you to answer a series of questions and build a more detailed profile, which can sometimes feel like a matrimonial page. For example, it asks you questions about liking dogs, smoking, drinking etc.
This can be because Bumble widely markets itself as an app for relationships, while Tinder is sometimes seen as an app for hookups (although, it is used for relationships as well).
Sexist
While I am all in for a dating app with an empowering concept, the sexist nature of the app, which only allows women to pick who they want to speak with can potentially carve down the entire niche of the market, making it more attractive to women. Male users can sometimes feel alienated by this system.
Although is a great social message, it may not be very good in terms of acquiring users.
Tinder, on the other hand, has no such barriers and freely allows male and female users to swipe and make the first move regardless of gender.
Logo
Tinder’s logo is that of a red and white flame which represents passion. While the red flame is perfect for a dating app since it signifies the fieriness of new relationships. This is also more attractive to millennials and college students.
Bumble’s logo is yellow in colour with the image of a beehive signifying a queen bee and the busy nature of people.
In a statement, Wolfe also said “But then we thought about it. Wait a second — Bumble—like the bee society. There’s a queen bee, the woman is in charge, and it’s a really respectful community. It’s all about the queen bee and everyone working together. It was very serendipitous.”
The yellow colour is more often associated with positivity and joy, which somehow cannot be related to the idea of dating strangers — realistically speaking.
While there are people who have experienced happy endings on dating apps, most of them are usually looking for casual relationships.
In terms of logo and aesthetics, Tinder comes out as the clear winner.
More features
Given the open nature of Tinder, the app has been successful in branching out to many fun and innovative features revolving around dating. For example, Tinder allows you to swipe on people from other countries while Bumble doesn’t.
However, Bumble has managed to create a reputation of safety and trust around it so much that it recently launched the Bumble Bizz platform which allows people to network professionally through the app.
Only the feature is not in terms of dating.
Power is only there where there are users.
For an app like Bumble to give power to women users where there are lesser users compared to Tinder sounds odd.
One of the best examples to shed more light on this point is Bumble’s recent launch in India. India is one of the world’s most highly populated countries. But it is also a country which is considered unsafe for women.
Bringing in Bumble’s feature would be more than perfect, but just when that happens, Tinder decides to introduce a new feature in India, called “My Move”, which is similar to Bumble’s feature where it lets women make the first move.
On top of that Tinder has confirmed that it would begin to test a new feature that will allow women to choose when to start a conversation, rather than have it as a default setting like Bumble.
Being the current more popular app in India, Tinder has clearly kept up with trends and keeping an eagle eye on competition has proven to be beneficial for the company.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the point is that while Bumble sends off a great message, users care more about the convenience, easiness of the process — and this leads to increased usage and signups as there are more people to swipe on.
This can be an important lesson for businesses that, it is not just important to have a socially responsible message but also a scalable, user-friendly business model.
And even though Bumble sends out an important message of feminism and women empowerment, Tinder sends off an even greater message – Equality.
The post Why Tinder beats Bumble and the world is still not ready for a feminist dating app appeared first on e27.