The Mound - #40 Dating Apps

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Bumble is very similar to its competitors in that it:

• Presents users with a seemingly infinite queue of profiles (romantic prospects)

• Utilises the swipe-left / swipe-right function birthed by Tinder ~10 years ago

• Employs a freemium model in which users can pay for more swipes, greater reach etc.

Perhaps the app’s sole differentiating feature is that, once a hetero couple is matched, the female user must message first. Around this feature (as well as founder Whitney Wolfe Herd’s championing of women in tech) Bumble has built its brand, positioning itself as a femme-respite in an otherwise indifferent, masc-centric cybersphere.

Last week they went to market with a new brand campaign, toting a new look and speaking proudly of their latest innovations:

Before we get to these “innovations” or the public’s response to this campaign, we should acknowledge the reason for these changes:

Gen Z users have been leaving the platform (all dating apps, really) causing a precipitous drop in the company’s share price and casting doubt over the entire category’s future. Put simply, these brazen moves by Bumble are the throes of an organisation on the brink of irrelevance and, for this reason, I wouldn’t be surprised if the public’s inflamed response to the campaign was their goal from the start.

That’s why I’m not going to talk to you about branding or messaging today. No, today I’d like to talk about the most important P in the four Ps of marketing: Product. 

Following the campaign, I’ve read a lot of takes from CDs and strategists about how Bumble has misread Gen Z, that my peers’ reaction to the campaign is a consequence of our being so different, of COVID or something like that. These aren’t untrue. What few manage to say aloud, though, is that dating apps have failed. Together. At once, the constitutive players are suffering the consequence of not fulfilling their base value proposition: let’s find you a girl / guy! 

It’s either a genius move or yet another example of Bumble’s being totally removed from reality - but those who are tired of Bumble are not tired of dating. They are tired of the process by which such apps fail to facilitate dating. Gen Z are not going celibate - they are being made celibate. 

Here’s how we fix it:

Dating is effectively a marketing exercise - and the dating apps’ failure somewhat mirrors the consequence of tossing marketing’s keys to a salesperson whose sole criteria for success is quantity of leads. 

Rabid to hit their quota, Bumble (like the lead-gen salesperson) will flood your inbox with frankly unqualified leads, paying little mind as to how expensive it is to individually vet each one. It’s a misshapen funnel.

Bumble’s Funnel of Love

What these apps have failed to account for is that when two people fall in love it is invariably a miracle of circumstance: the rom-com trope of soon-to-be-lovers colliding in a bookstore is culture’s recognition of this fact. The most effective dating businesses, then, will not optimise for quantity of leads, but for reach. Understanding the inherent rarity of anyone’s “The One”, they will expose customers to incalculably rich environments, to spaces filled with both relevant and “irrelevant” people. (Sure, you think you like short girls - but you haven’t met Clarissa yet, have you?)

The Healthier Funnel of Love

This is why run-clubs are fast replacing single folks’ usage of dating apps. As tough as waking up a little earlier on a Thursday might be, the pay-off is meeting (i.e. reaching) a large group of people who are similarly-aged, healthy, and demonstrably capable of contributing to and participating within a community when they otherwise could have been in bed. This is sophisticated mass-marketing. It is much harder, nigh impossible to measure - but if any activity warranted the belief in / use of magic, surely it would be finding a life-partner. 

What Bumble - and perhaps your marketing department - must remember is that whilst miracles cannot be planned, they can be encouraged. Perhaps the best way to do this is simply to expose the best parts of yourself to the best parts of this world - and then to let nature take its course.

You’re welcome, Australia. 

PS. The innovations! I forgot the innovations! Alongside the changes to their brand, Bumble announced that now female users won’t have to message their male connections first. Men can now respond to a question pinned on the female user’s profile. 

Yes, Bumble’s innovation is the removal of their differentiating feature. Good luck, Bumble!