How many times have I complained about crappy dating site newsletters? They stink, with few exceptions.
My friend Kara sent me the most recent Evan Marc Katz newsletter. She pointed out that Evan is taking the newsletter subscribers first name and embedding in deep inside the newsletter.
Evan’s newsletter has you reading along… love, blah blah, feelings, blah blah then BAM, using our first names. Totally wakes you up and makes you pay attention.
This is email newsletter 101 stuff, but yet so few companies take adantage of what they know about members to improve the communication.
Evan could use some help with the newsletter signup process though, it’s awkward.
More video next week. Figuring out how to embed links into the video itself, but then again, maybe leaving them in the post is better for Google?
Check out 12seconds.tv (via ReadWriteWeb), the Twitter of videoblogging. Reminds me of video speed-dating, when three minutes is two minutes and 48 seconds too long.
All of these micro-services make me think of all the cool companies could pop up to create additional services for dating sites, like we see happening with Twitter. Search stinks on dating sites, because the profiles lack anything close to useful information, because the software isn’t evolved enough to support anything except basic profile questions and because there are not enough personality testing systems out there, and so on.
I know a few very large dating sites are opening up their database to certain companies, but what about an API with strict Terms of Service? Think of the iPhone applications submissions process. They don’t come to your office and drink your coffee, but they give you a general once-over to make sure you’re not obviously dangerous.
We, dear readers, collectively are much smarter than dating sites will ever be. Go get out a clean sheet of paper and design a modular dating site where members can choose from a number of feature providers, the marketing is fantastic, the site is cheap or free and the people are not felons. Report back in the comments.
Heading off to Vermont for a few days, several family celebrations happening and and I need some time in the woods.
