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eamore nyc dating industry event june28 2011

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Talked to a number of dating site startup in recent weeks. Here’s what I came away with along with a few of my favorite best practices. Of course not everything is right for all sites but these are key issues to address.

  • Raise several million at least. Anything less and you run out of money before you get serious traction
  • Do the exact opposite of what everyone else is doing and grab some of those 60 million singles not doing online dating
  • Strongly consider launching on a white label platform to test and refine concepts
  • Free with Freemium features: See OkCupid’s awesome A-List
  • Dynamic Profiles: Pull from social services and actually do something with the information
  • Make profiles easy to update via email/twitter/phone
  • Add in location-based alerts: Dave’s at Ironsides Bar (with solid privacy controls)
  • Trust and reputation: ID verification, perhaps background checks on back-end hidden from users if possible
  • Game mechanics: Inspiration at emailga.me
  • Loaded phrase but matchmaking prowess and Great Date leaderboards are fun and functional
  • Make the site as social as possible
  • Make it even more social
  • Video profiles: crowdsource-reviewed
  • Instant-messaging with strong filters
  • Inbox filters
  • Drag-and-drop photo upload
  • Automatic time-outs for overzealous/creepers/psychos
  • Partner with a reputable traffic driver. Too many co’s out there pushing crap into the system. Money is money but I like to sleep well at night
  • Behavioral targeting, because people don’t know what they want
  • Write press releases that don’t suck
  • Buy traffic from other dating sites (keep it in the family like POF)
  • Advertise targeted offers, not University of Phoenix junk
  • Run beta.mydatingsite.com to test out new stuff publicly
  • Buy a few small or medium sites and roll them up to get early traction
  • Test and iterate: feedbackroulette.comusertesting.com

Things I wouldn’t do

  • Build out on credit cards: running out of money before critical mass is achieved = doom
  • Try to be another Match/Meetic/Plentyoffish
  • Do yet another casual/adult dating site
  • Build a site based on generic features
  • Try to compete in a saturated niche market: Jewish, Christian and Seniors – no way
  • Base services on a standalone mobile app: Unless the concept was close to perfect
  • Buy a lot of cheap crappy traffic to launch site
  • Believe that viral marketing is going to keep my acquisition costs low
  • Use a lot of busty co-eds in my advertising
  • Forget that 99% of dating site launches go nowhere

The version I use with clients is 25 pages long. Consider this the absolute minimum list as you plan your site.