iOS Reels In More Paying Customers than Android, Developer Finds

Tango, a free video calling service with tens of millions of customers, recently introduced two new offerings allowing users to do voice mail and calls with animations overlaid on top. The first animation is free, and if you want unlimited use of a set, it will cost you $1.98.

You can use it to make calls to any other person who has Tango installed on their device, whether it’s a PC, phone or tablet, and you can initiate a Tango call with your voice.

When you have something cool to share, you can then easily move into a video call. Also cool is that it automatically finds the friends that already have Tango.

Eric Setton, a founder and the chief technical officer of Tango, said his customers came from both iOS and Android camps in relatively equal numbers, but that the conversion rate from free users to paying customers was four times higher on iOS than on Google’s Android platform.

And it’s not because people who buy iPhones are richer. The reason, according to Setton, is iTunes.

“Apples to apples, no pun intended, Apple just does a much better job on conversion,” said Mr. Setton. “It comes from years of collecting credit card numbers on iTunes. People can use their stored credit card numbers and purchase things easily. Punching in a credit card number on Android is more work.”

According to the New York Times’ Bits blog, each service had picked up two million subscribers since their introduction in mid-December, Mr. Setton said.

Mr. Setton specifically notes that Ice Cream Sandwich, the latest version Android, is a promising step towards attracting more paying customers from the Google camp, as it offers to load credit card information into the handset.