It took two years for Science Inc., a Santa Monica technology company, to reach the top 20 list of the most downloaded apps on Apple Store.
The main activity of Science is to buy, grow and invest in startups. One core premise it relied on was that teenagers are much more entertained through their mobile phones than through standard media (TV or computers).
The company is now focusing on apps that target the adolescent demographic. Horoscopes and dating were topics of former applications, but the Santa Monica hub truly hit gold with their Wishbone app.
On Wednesday, Science announced that the polling app it launched in March has 3.1 million monthly active users, an impressive majority being young girls. The statement also mentioned the app earns money from advertisements.
Michael Jones, CEO of Science, thinks that the increasing attraction that Wishbone has is proof that teens "are hungry" for content on their phones and are growing bored with watching television or spending time on the computer.
Each morning and evening, Wishbone users get a dozen questions called "cards" on their smartphones. The cards have only two possible answers, so the users must choose one answer to continue. They vote for one of the two options and are prompted with the resulting score.
Users see how many people voted, which answer was most popular and by what percent. That concludes the process and allows Wishbone users to move on to the next question.
Wednesday morning's question, "Burgers or tacos?" for example, recorded more than 100,000 votes. According to the feedback, 62 percent of teen girls like burgers more than tacos.
Wishbone has become popular due to several factors, Jones said. Teens have a natural tendency to compare interests and likes with their peers, so polling clicks with them was a no brainer. The CEO notes that offering new content at specific times of the day creates habitual behavior.
Jones observes that the surge in appeal for Wishbone came once the application allowed people to create their own content and submit questions for everyone else to answer. The company has also developed a similar polling app for boys, and it is called Slingshot.
Investors are showing interest in Science's products, but Jones is not looking for partners yet.
"I'm especially proud of the team and eager to see what lies ahead for our next year," Jones said.
