FOX BUSINESS – Feb 15 – IAC CEO Joey Levin provides insight into why people should invest in online dating apps and explains how his company has climbed the economic ranks. Video.
Month: February 2020
Muzmatch Is the World’s Largest ‘Halal’ Muslim Dating App
ALBAWABA – Feb 14 – Muzmatch brands itself as a platform for Muslims to date and get to know each other for the purpose of marriage. When muzmatch was first released, it took them four years to get to one million users. After that, they glided into two million users within just six months. Currently, almost half of matches on muzmatch are intercultural and interracial. Muzmatch is not the only Muslim-focused dating app. Minder, for example has a Tinder-like interface but is made for Muslims who want to "halal-date", and Muzproposal is similar to Bumble in that the woman alone can initiate the conversation after matching.
Loko – Video Chat Dating App
PEOPLE – Feb 14 – Norm MacDonald, the comedian and his friend, Vivek Jain, have developed a dating app called Loko, which aims to separate itself from similar services by asking users to rely on video chats to get to know their matches. Loko is free to sign up, but users will have to pay $1.49 to use the app for a week, or $3.49 for a month. Having a small paywall helps to ensure users are the real deal, as opposed to being a bot. So far, tens of thousands of users in cities such as LA and New York City have downloaded the app.
Tinder co-Founder Funded App for Couples to Have Sex
2OCEANSVIBE – Feb 13 – Lover is a recently launched app that helps couples to get that spark back, by tackling particular issues like low libido, boredom, or dissatisfaction in the bedroom. The app has apparently received notable funding from "the founder of Tinder" (according to Mashable), but we're unsure which founder it is. The app boasts hours of activities covering everything from low desire to difficulty reaching orgasm.
Selective Search – Executive Matchmaking Business
INC – Feb 14 – Executives and entrepreneurs pay upward of $250,000 for Barbie Adler's exhaustively curated matchmaking service. Adler, a former executive recruiter, founded Chicago-based Selective Search in 2000. The company, which employs 40 people, has annual revenues north of $10M. It claims an 87% success rate, which works out to ~4K happy couples–1,800 of them married–to date. Roughly a third met "the one" on their first introduction. The process begins with a tell-us-everything intake interview: 15 pages of questions. Potential matches undergo the same in-depth personal interviews as clients. ~30% of Selective Search's clients are women, who also make up the company's fastest-growing category.
Harvard Grad’s New Dating App Is ‘Something More’
BOSTON GLOBE – Feb 14 – Harvard grad Adam Cohen-Aslatei, who'd been in the dating business for almost 12 years (he was the managing director of Bumble's gay dating app, Chappy, and had also worked for The Meet Group), went on to develop S'More, short for "Something More," an app that technically gives users less until they earn it. Users can't see people's faces as they swipe; everyone looks blurry to start. Cohen-Aslatei's launched the app in Boston at the end of December, giving a first look to students at Harvard. Now S'More is in three cities (also Washington D.C. and New York) with a pool of thousands in each location.
How Two Matchmakers Won a Nobel Prize
by Nicole Freeling & Jess Wheelock
See full article at University of California
Dating.com Accused of Scamming Users
BBC – Feb 14 – Sacha Cowlam is talking about her month-long trial with Dating.com. In the space of just over two weeks Dating.com took 17 payments of £15.99. Each time she read an email it cost her 10 credits. Twenty credits cost £15.99 and Dating.com set up auto-payment as the default option when she gave her bank details to pay £3 for a month-long trial. Dating.com says its terms and conditions are as clear and transparent as they can be. But at 12 full pages of A4 paper long, they may not be enforceable, says legal expert Gary Rycroft. "Any T&Cs which a company seeks to rely on must be prominent and explained to the consumer in order for it to be enforceable in law. The fact the auto-payment box was ticked as the default option could be another potential breach of the Consumer Rights Act 2015 because it has a requirement for transparency "which has, on the face of it, been breached".
Sam Yagan, Co-founder of OKCupid: 3 Questions That Can Predict Compatibility
BUSINESS INSIDER – Feb 14 – Sam Yagan founded OKCupid in 2003 with some friends whom he met while attending Harvard University, where he had started SparkNotes, a study-guide company. Yagan and his business partners designed OKCupid with a question-and-answer-based system to help people determine whom to date. "You can disagree on religion, you can disagree on pets, you can disagree on lots of things," Yagan said, explaining that three specific questions were the best predictors of long-term compatibility in a relationship.
Here's what they are:
- Do you enjoy horror movies?
- Have you traveled alone in a foreign country for fun?
- Have you ever wanted to chuck it all and live on a sailboat?
Behavioral Economist Valentines Cards
OPW – Feb 15 – Here's some cute ideas for how Behavioral Economists would do Valentines cards.
Along with OPW.news, we also run BehavioralEconomist.com which is a Facebook group with 12k members.
I believe past behavior is a key indicator of future behavior, and character traits. That's very relevant to dating. I think we need more behavioral economists looking at the dating industry and giving us their wisdom. So, I bought BehavioralEconomist.com, while studying BE at London School of Economics in 2017. Now the community is taking off nicely. Join the fray at BehavioralEconomist.com.