January sure is turning out to be busy, working with clients to get ready for the only online online dating conference in the US, the Internet Dating Conference.
At iDate, you can:
- Get up to speed on search marketing
- Learn about potential service partners (background checks, voice and video)
- Buy a domain name
- Discover which dating software is best for you
- Find out why your site doesn’t convert as well as you expected
- Meet people willing to sell/trade traffic
- Find out what’s coming in 2008
I can’t wait to see the panel on dating software, that alone will be worth the price of admission. Over the years I’ve received hundreds of emails from people asking if they should use a white label service or go with SkaDate or Dolphin. Will the industry go straight to white label, hosted solutions? There are strong pro’s and con’s to this issue. Expect this to be a highlight of the show.
It’s interesting to see the difference between the dating and social networking presenters. Lots of new names on the presenters list.
I am surprised that Mate1 is presenting and SinglesNet is not. SinglesNet #1 these days, at least in terms of traffic.
Mary.com is talking about scientific matching. Scientific matching drives many of the comments on this blog, this is going to be a hot topic. Hopefully Fernando Ardenghi and Dr. James Houran will be in attendance. Maybe Dr. Mark from WeAttract, if he can pull himself away from the legal battle with Match long enough.
Note to the iDate organizers. Stop the pop-up windows on the conference site, makes it difficult to easily view the presenters and exhibitors list.
And now, a word about “working the room” at iDate.
Prioritize your targets – It’s almost impossible to meet everyone you want to at a conference. If you find yourself in an elevator with the business development person from a major dating site, what are you going to say?
Your elevator pitch is not limited to elevators, but cabs, bars and hallway meetings. Be brief, succinct and to the point. Why are you different/novel/valuable? Tell them in a sentence or three. I can’t tell you how many companies contact me, expecting me to bow down at their knees, when their pitch sounds exactly like their competitors, if they even acknowledge competition, which is rare. According to dating sites, “nobody is doing what we’re doing” is the golden rule. Let’s work on breaking that rule and bringing things back down to reality.
Think about how your product or service will appear interesting to different tiers of the online dating industry in order to succeed. One size does not necessarily fit all.
Doing a deal with a top-tier site can take up to a year. If you are answering to a board of directors, this is a tough reality to swallow. What can you do to get your service out in front of it’s intended audience in the shortest amount of time?
If you’re a startup working nights, or have begged/borrowed what you think is enough money to bring your product to market, guess what, you need to be funded through and beyond the partner adoption process. Nobody wants you to run out of cash before you launch on a partner site.
Over the past year or so I’ve noticed that more and more of my interest and focus lies in working with companies looking to partner up with dating sites. There is a whole new vanguard of startups out there building what dating sites are unable to, or won’t develop in-house. Video-dating, reputation management and safety and security measures come to mind. These services have been lingering at the edge of the dating industry for years, expect 2008 to be a major breakout year for all things video and safety-oriented.
Several companies have approached me wanting to know the best way to approach iDate as a vendor looking to partner with dating sites. I’m available if you would like the inside track to having a successful conference.
