Comments on: Huge Opportunities Exist in The Online Dating Space

By: Mason

Mason — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 00:24:21 +0000

Ive never had a problem in finding good marketing. Ive been using this company called http://www.adwido.com. They have been able to get my message out and heard. Good luck to you all in your marketing adventure.

By: Kyle O'Connor

Kyle O'Connor — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 16:28:12 +0000

Ah, interesting. That could certainly play a role too. Mate1 does not seem to have a very aggressive presence in the affiliate market — certainly nowhere near Singlesnet’s.

I do know that POF does talk quite a bit about how the free model will eventually take the paid model down. Not sure how valid that is, though.

By: David Evans

David Evans — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 19:52:25 +0000

I would not attribute the drop in Mate1 traffic to free dating sites, there are other forces at work such as ad spend, employee performance, adwords management, affiliate marketing effectiveness and more.

By: Kyle O'Connor

Kyle O'Connor — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 03:10:36 +0000

The industry does have sites like plentyoffish and mingle2 eating away that their userbase. In the past year, mate1 and true have seen their numbers drop off while POF’s have grown.

At this point, all three are roughly on par, but with the paid sites trending down while the free sites are trending up.

They’ve still got some time, but it’s not especially hard to program a dating site, and the paid sites are going to need to hustle to protect their business model.

By: Adam

Adam — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 22:00:16 +0000

Awesome article. Your totally right in date sites focusing their promotion efforts on promising singles that they will be off their site quicker rather than offering year long subscriptions. I think free dating sites like plenty of fish are stealing lots of market share from big players like date.com and match.com. Unless these large corporate sites revise their strategy, they will soon go by the wayside in terms of relevance.

By: Andrey Malygin

Andrey Malygin — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 22:22:44 +0000

Good post, thank you Dave. Another part of the issue I find that many CPA and rev/share advertisers have notoriously low-performing ads. Because CPA is a virtually risk-free model – they have less incentive for creating strong ads, comparing to the CPM advertisers – who better know how to make their banners work. Those with stronger ads ultimately have a competitive advantage, – which especially comes handy during the unstable period.

By: Pemo Theodore

Pemo Theodore — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 03:34:00 +0000

I agree Dave, current business disasters in the banking arena should prove the theory of the simple business model – deliver what is promised & reap success, dont & fail! Online dating is the only business where successful matching of a couple means loss of two members. However the wom that is generated will more than bring return traffic. Customers want authentic results because their happiness depends on it & that is why they visit online dating sites. The message to these sites is really deliver or die – any other business model will not work now that the pressure is on economically. Thanks for the post Dave

By: Evan Marc Katz

Evan Marc Katz — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 03:25:27 +0000

My concept of retention for dating sites: you’re not trying to convince people to stay for years. You’re empowering people to use your site more effectively, which will cause them to WANT to continue to use your site in perpetuity.

It all hinges on the average user seeing results. This gives him hope and incentivizes him to continue paying $30/month as long as he’s having success.

If dating sites did a better job, you’d have more members like me: people who date for three months at a time, find someone, try a relationship, break up a few months later and come back again. Why? Because it WORKED last time and it beats the hell out of trolling for strangers at bars.

Dating sites should create a culture of lifetime online daters by helping members use their sites – information and coaching on usernames, photos, profile, emails, etiquette. Until they do, you’re left with the current state of the industry: a low-rent shopping mall where most singles fail and quit.

Remember, a 5% increase in retention can boost your revenue by over 25%.

What could be more important than that?

Evan Marc Katz