Apple needs an App Store for the enterprise (section)
Apple is in the enterprise. It has been for some time. So I don’t understand why the needs of enterprise users aren’t better met in the App Store on Mac and iPhone.
Work doesn’t cut it
Apple does a good job supporting its App Stores with editorial content designed to direct attention to new and useful apps. On the Mac, you’ll easily find a section Apple calls “Work” which you’d imagine would highlight apps for working, which it tries to do – but work is such a generic articulation that the section kind of misses out on the enterprise apps.
You can also find a Business category inside Categories, but once again the content of this collection simply doesn’t seem terribly business like.
Sure, you can explore what’s inside these sections and you’ll find collections around Workflow, task management and what-not, but it’s hard to get deep and there’s a terrible Year Zero approach to the information there.
What happens to old apps collections and why are they so hard to discover?
Apps for real work, and real stories
The thing is, this is a small oversight (and I know Apple, just like everyone else at the moment, is kind of busy), as it means millions of workers suddenly forced to try to work remotely during the ongoing pandemic just didn’t have the curatorial guidance they needed to find apps that might have met their ongoing enterprise productivity needs.
That’s not to say those collections weren’t made, or that they don’t exist, but it seems to me that Apple needs to take another look at the Work category and think a little differently about it.
Work isn’t all about calculator apps and Mac maintenance (which is what I see on the Work Mac section), nor is it about list apps. There are dozens, perhaps hundreds of mission-critical enterprise-focused apps that deserve a little more attention.
Yes – these apps may not be the kind of consumer-friendly sales proposals that keep the App Store afloat, but they do illustrate the direction of travel for the mobile enterprise in a time of great change – and making it possible to explore these apps – and their stories – on both Mac and iDevices might make for some pretty interesting site content.
It would also help enterprise IT departments and their workers find apps that are sufficiently robust for enterprise use, while consumers might gain a little insight into some of the fascinating enterprise-focused app development stories around in the world.
I think Apple should think about creating a small team focused entirely on the kind of enterprise-focused apps that really are changing the game at the moment, and use the App Store to highlight them more effectively. Even Tudder.
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