Why the Girls app in the Apprentice might actually have been better

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If like me, you were surprised – no – outraged, that the boys’ app bombed on The Apprentice last night, then you may have chalked up the failure of Slang-A-Tang to that guy on Wired getting upset by regional mockery, and tipping the PR balance in favour of the girls’ offering – Ampi-App.

Or as Lord Sugar pointed out in his boardroom – maybe the the product just wasn’t as good.

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First things first, neither ideas or apps were good: both were gimmicky and annoying and much closer to the fart apps that fill the App Store than gems like WordLens or Pulse or Flipboard or Camera+. Slangatang was a collection of phrases in regional accents, Ampi-App was a bunch of annoying noises that you can use to annoy your friends…

But I think the girls’ one was just slightly better. They only had one idea, but they did do some market research. And I think it paid off – just.

The boys thought of a funny thing, did it better and sold it better

But the girls thought of the situation in which people would use the app: err, when you want to annoy your friends – you know – and that, I think is what makes an app slightly better.

At what point in your day would you decide to pull out your phone and listen to a series of regional phrases? Er, none that I can think of. And okay, while you might not always want to annoy your friends, it fits your phone into a social context.

With apps always you have to think of the USER and the USER SITUATION. Then you also have to factor in that idiots buy crap.

Still! A lesson learned..

Anna Leach

2 comments

  • The girls won because the app was more sort after, getting the product to meet customers needs is essential. There is no point in being succesful if it isn’t the product people want.

  • I think we were all scratching our heads when Lord Sugar had said the girls team had won. But as you point out in your post, the first thing that the girls did was market research, which the boys did not do. Another thing that girls got right and most likely contributed to them winning was the description of the app of itself on the various app stores. The boys’ description of their app was not very good and ultimately cost their downfall even though their app was better than the girls.

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