Month: October 2020
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Mark Brooks Joins Anna Faris on Her Podcast “Unqualified”
OPW – Oct 3 – Unqualified is created and hosted by actress Anna Faris. The podcast consists of interviews with celebrities, followed by phone-calls to listeners asking for relationships and other advice. In this episode, Anna interviews actor Adam DeVine (Workaholicsm, Modern Family) to talk about the dangers of filming his new show Bad Ideas. Later, Anna is joined by online dating expert Mark Brooks to answer questions about online dating.
Anna: How do you truly get to know somebody online?
Mark: Dating apps are a great way to get the tough questions out of the way right up front. Dating takes practise, you gotta know what some of the rules are.
Anna: How can you find safety in the online dating world?
Mark: There is some reality of Internet dating which is very important to understand – people fib, usually about age, height and weight. Some of the dating platforms offer background checks and authentication. That's where the industry is going next. Online daters should also use video to get a better sense of people.
Anna: What is this fear of meeting in real life?
Mark: The best antidote is to go out on 20 dates (video dates these days… ) you will get a sense of yourself and the other person, and build up the skills of dating.
Anna: What dating apps would you recommend?
Mark: There is a way to help people warm up to video dating. I recommend checking out MeetMe. You don't even need to do a video date. You can watch other people video-date. It's fun to watch and you can give them advice and then vote if you think the couple should take it further.
Plenty of Fish to Partner With Self-care App Shine
PR NEWSWIRE – Oct 2 – According to a recent study from Plenty of Fish, one-third of U.S. singles have experienced increased levels of anxiety over the past six months. To help daters find some relief and prioritize mental health, Plenty of Fish is partnering with Shine, a self-care app created by women of color, to provide free Shine Premium memberships to 5K Plenty of Fish members.
Bumble Partners With the National Domestic Violence Hotline
PR NEWSWIRE – Oct 1 – Today, Bumble is announcing a multi-year partnership with The National Domestic Violence Hotline in response to the increase in unhealthy and abusive relationships. The Hotline saw a 101% increase in reported digital abuse from 2019 to 2020. Bumble will be supporting the nonprofit's "love is respect" initiative that engages, educates, and empowers young people to prevent and end abusive relationships.
Account Takeover Fraud up 282%
TECH REPUBLIC – Oct 2 – Account takeover (ATO) fraud attempts to steal from consumers and e-commerce merchants was up 282% between Q2 2019 to Q2 2020, according to the new data from digital trust and safety provider Sift finds. ATO attacks create significant and lasting brand damage. In surveying 1,000 US adult consumers, Sift said it found that more than one-quarter (28%) of respondents would completely stop using a site or service if their accounts on that site were hacked. Of consumers who confirmed being victims of ATO attacks, ~61% said their e-commerce accounts were hacked. Other online destinations on which consumers reported experiencing ATO include: Social media sites: 36%, financial services sites: 35%, online dating sites: 22% and travel sites: 19%.
Loosid Is a New Sober Social Network
FORBES – Oct 1 – Online dating platform Loosid is a free, "sober" social media networking app. While Loosid users can seek alcohol free relationships, the app also encourages friendships and online groups highlighting different interests and causes.
IDEA Webinar – Panel Update
OPW – Oct 1 – We've finalized the panel for the Productivity and Collaboration Advisory session on Friday, and added Eric Eichmann, CEO of Spark Networks. Here's the line up.
PANEL
Geoff Cook – CEO/Co-Founder, The Meet Group
Murugavel Janakiraman – CEO/Founder, Matrimony.com
Jens Kammerer – CEO/Co-Founder, Jaumo
Eric Eichmann – CEO, Spark Networks
HOST/PRESENTER
Mark Brooks – President, IDEA & CEO, Courtland Brooks
Join us Friday 8am PST / 11am EST / 4pm GMT for this fast paced IDEA webinar covering tools & techniques to improve productivity & collaboration for your work-from-home teams.
Sponsored by RealMe & vPaaS by The Meet Group.
100 spots only. Reserve your spot here.
Q&A With S’More’s Founder About Shaking up the Online Dating Industry
MEDIUM – Oct 1 – Adam Cohen-Aslatei is the Founder and CEO of S'More, the new relationships app that's about getting to know a person before seeing a profile picture. He is the former Managing Director of Chappy, Bumble's gay dating app. He spent 5 years at The Meet Group (MeetMe, Skout, Tagged, Hi5, Lovoo, and Growlr), and has consulted for companies including Spark Networks (Zoosk, JDate, Christian Mingle).
Q: What led you to this particular career path?
A: I've always been drawn to the idea of connecting people, and actually created my very first dating program, Harvard Speed Dating, back in grad school. Every big dating app that I know focuses on images first. That's why S'More was born. S'More focuses on the whole person and elevates the standard of online dating. The app is designed to prioritize getting to know a person before deciding if you like them and before you even see them. The more you engage and chat with a person, the more their profile photos unblur and the more their private content unlocks.
Q: We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors?
A: People like Dimitri Volkov from dating.com who is S'More's early investor, Geoff Cook from The Meet Group and Whitney Wolfe from Bumble…disruptors who had vision and built companies from the ground up. My greatest mentors are also my industry peers, such as Daniel Gendelman founder of Raya, Dan Kurani founder of Friended, and Amanda Bradford founder of The League.
Q: Can you share the best advice you've gotten along your journey?
A: Whatever happens, "never, never stop", surround yourself with the brightest people and celebrate the small wins.
Q: Being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good?
A: I would say that good or bad, disruption is rarely easy. Our industry has not seen a major disruptive force for over 8 years.
Q: How are you going to shake things up next?
A: Our hope is that some of the largest players adopt some of our industry-first features and approaches to make dating just a little less superficial and more effective. These include removing race filtering, 100% of profiles verified on dating apps to prevent catfishing. S'More is not just for dates. We are a relationship app. We are continually adding more community features into the app so there are more indirect ways to meet someone special whether via a newsfeed, chatroom, or mini trivia game.
Bumble Launches Podcast in India
BIZ ASIA – Oct 1 – The new podcast called 'Is Romance Dead?' is aimed at facilitating dynamic, insightful and engaging conversations around dating, relationships and love. In addition to the podcast, Bumble has partnered with India Film Project to present a series of virtual workshops, exclusively for the Bumble community, led by incredible women creators from the Indian film industry and performance arts.