What a year for Lycos. Bought by Daum, then Matchmaker was put on the block for $2 Million, which no one seems willing to pay, and now they have decided to become a “personal communications hub.” Next up for Lycos, a dating search engine. Lycos Dating Search enables users can search through multiple dating systems at once to try finding a more appropriate person.
From ClickZ:
The service will use a paid inclusion revenue model, charging the dating firms on a click or acquisition basis. Lycos hinted this might be just the first of a series of niche meta-search applications it is readying. Currently, Lycos has signed up True.com, Tickle.com, its own Matchmaker.com and smaller sites like iMatchup.com and LoveAccess. Users of the Lycos Dating Service can see member profiles without themselves first registering with the service.
Lycos Dating Search users can search and view profiles and photos for free on sites like iMatchup.com, LoveAccess, Tickle.com, True.com, and Lycos-owned Matchmaker.com. Users can view unlimited profiles on these sites without registering for sites. Only active or recent profiles, and profiles with photos, are displayed.
Lycos is again focusing on search applications after its former parent company Terra Lycos last year tried to remake the firm in the model of a then-trendy social network, but its new Korean buyer, Daum Communications, this summer reset the corporate strategy to refocus on search. It even plans to bring back Lycos’s early mascot, a retrieving dog, and the tagline “Go get it.”
The idea of driving traffic to dating sites has merit. This is not a new idea. GooDate has been trying out the concept of meta-search for at least a year and several other sites have already come and gone. I even own a few urls related to the concept.
Lycos has deals with sites who are struggling, representing only a few hundred thousand active members. Millions of stale profiles don’t mean anything unless you know how to convert them, which the industry hasn’t figured out how to do, yet. They are competing for keyword prices against their own partners, which doesn’t make sense. Talk about a risky strategy.
