Category: All Interviews

OPW Exclusive Interview #3 – Click2Asia’s CEO

Posted on May 27, 2005

Click2asia_ceoOPW CEO Interview — May 27, 2005 — Click2Asia is focused solely on the Asian dating market and competes with AsiaFriendFinder and AsianAvenue.  Pierre Wuu co-founded Click2Asia in 1999 and talks about his company and the Hong Kong internet dating convention (photos). – Mark Brooks

Pierre Wuu – During the internet heyday Click2Asia was an Asian online portal.  In late 2002 we adjusted our business model and focused on Asian online dating.  Now we have two major divisions; nationwide events and online dating.  We get quite a lot of Yahoo and Match defectors because we're so focused.  They offer 'Asian.'  We offer 23 breakouts so there are a lot more Asian subcategories for people to search on.

How is Click2Asia different from Asiafriendfinder and Asian Avenue?
Many of the Asia FriendFinder women are overseas Asian and many of the men tend to be non-Asian.  Our site focuses more on the core U.S. Asian community.  We don't have many overseas women.  Asian Avenue tends to be a much younger demographic. Their average age is early twenties whereas our demographic is more late 20's. 

Where are most of your members?
L.A. and San Francisco followed by NY and pockets of Seattle, Houston, Chicago, Atlanta and Vancouver.  All in line with US census.  Asians represent 4% of the U.S. population which is roughly 12 million.

How did the Asian internet dating convention go?
It went well, Marc did a great job.  We got to network and learn a lot about the Asian market.  It opened my eyes in terms of what they are doing in China.  Especially the mobile and seeing how much further advanced beyond the USA they are.  It's a huge market with a lot of upside but it has it's share of challenges; namely pricepoint and payment procurement.  You can have tens of thousands of subscribers but may only get $4-$7 a month.  Also, payment can be up to 3-6 months delayed.  For example, with China telecom, we could be waiting 3-6 months for payment.  Online dating in Asia is huge but it shouldn't be treated as homogeneous market.  Korea, Phillipines, China, Singapore, Vietnam, all need to be treated very differently.  Finally, the advancement of the mobile technology is way ahead of North America; texting, paging, use of mobile devices and how they pay with mobile. 

How much are they willing to pay?
In China people are willing to pay 20-25% of the U.S. online personals memberships; $4-$7 a month.  However, for events, we should be able to get 50% of the U.S. market rate.  There's definitely a group of people who will pay a higher price point at events, there's a finite number of tickets, but it's better to be less expensive with online dating to maintain critical mass. 

How about the presentation on the Indian market?
The presentation on the Indian market opened my eyes.  They don't typically date.  They are more interested in marriage.  It's a totally different approach. 

What does the future hold for Click2Asia?
We're looking at Asia and expanding our network within North America.  When you look at the Jewish market, Jews in North America represent half of the Asian market.  So you can see the ethnic online dating market has huge potential.  We want to make inroads on the kinds of numbers Jdate are doing.  Jdate is a good comparison for our future potential. 

OPW Exclusive Interview #2 – Tribe.net’s New CEO

Posted on May 1, 2005

Jan_gullett_tribe_ceoOPW CEO Interview — May 1, 2005 — I've been intrigued with Tribe.net for a while now; 'Craigslist meets Friendster.'  Marc Pincus started it not long after Jonathan Abrams started Friendster (purportedly friends).  But Marc is handing the CEO's baton to former Pepsi and Proctor and Gamble exec Jan Gullett.  I interviewed Jan to find out a little more about Tribe and where he plans to take it.  – Mark Brooks

Is Tribe.net a dating site? – Dating is a fairly specific activity and we're a general social community.  Building relationships is at our core, but dating is only one kind of relationship.  We’re much broader in scope and certainly not a dating specialist.  We have a local focus and we help get people together.  Knowing who people are is really critical to knowing if you want to do business with them.  We think people are hungering for relationships with people they can trust and ‘community’ relies on people knowing one another.

You mentioned recently you'd be taking a more proactive approach to marketing, but given that Tribe.net is a social network, why the need, it grows itself? – We’re not as big as other social networks but we have good organic growth, so additional marketing will accelerate our growth.  We have attractive fundamental metrics that we want to take advantage of.  We’ve had a nice compound annual growth rate for the last year now.  It just remains to be seen how fast we can step on the accelerator. 

What do you think of Craigslist? – Craigslist is a great service to the community.  Tribe.net is quite different in approach, and people are better off for having both of us.

Why did you decide to join Tribe? – Tribe.net is a real benefit to the community, it’s fun, and I believe there’s a great opportunity for growth.  We had an individual who had cancer and raised $100k from local people through the site. This just wouldn't have happened if he went out and stood on a street corner.  Helping people pull together to help one another is of great interest to me. 

Is there any similarity between Tribe and Starbucks? – Besides being equally addictive?  The reality is we have incredibly intense usage by our members.  The involvement, time and relationship with the site is really very strong.  People hunger for relationships and friendships and being a part of a larger social group.  There’s a hunger to be in groups of people with similar interests.  As we live in more crowded areas, with less public space and fewer places to hangout…it seems like most of hangouts have gone by the wayside and are being replaced by commercial real estate.  Starbucks and Borders have become the new local hangouts.  In a way, we’re the online version of that.

What's the caffeine? – Personal satisfaction from high-touch human relationships.

What do you think of the background checks legislation? – In the early days people communicated anonymously online.  Now there’s the concept of wanting to be known as a real person online, no longer wanting to do stuff surreptitiously.  I believe in honesty, and being comfortable being a real person in the online world is important.  For young people, the online world is their world.  It’s not artificial for them, not a separate playground.  It’s where they live and they want to be associated with others as real people.  That’s why we’re investing a lot of time and effort in building out the ability of our users to represent themselves on the web.

And what of Yub.com’s ‘affiliate program for everyone’ site model? – Amway made a lot of people successful.  I would say there's business promise.  But there’s the sanctity of social friendships based on merit and fundamental essence of goodwill.  We don’t want to pollute Tribe.net with an external economic motivation.  We’re an online hangout…for very good and valid reasons.  Gratifying reasons.  Rather than capitalize all out, we’d rather benefit everyone from the Tribe.net goodwill.

What have you learned from Tribe.net users? – We measured response rates of listings from people with profiles and those without and the difference is phenomenal.  We have actual proof of the value and leverage of having real people, known in the Tribe.net community, list items…they get an order of magnitude greater response rate to their listings.  This is at the core of who we are: providing a rich environment where local people can connect with each other  ‘Thin’ services run the risk of burnout. 

How will Tribe.net make money? – We’ve put a lot of thought into this.  We’re a media business…sponsored tribes, listings and display advertising. These are just different types of marketing messages which we intend to monetize.

OPW Exclusive Interview #1 – R-Kevin Ambler

Posted on April 20, 2005

Kevin_amblerOPW INTERVIEW — Apr 20, 2005 — R-Kevin Ambler – House sponsor of the Florida background checks legislation

Why the need for legislation? – “I have a 15 year old daughter and a 17 year old son who live on the internet.  It’s their tool for communicating.  Background checks sounded like a good idea for protecting their interests in the future, especially after I heard about a national poll in which 20% of the one thousand online dating respondents thought background checks were already required. (Independent national survey of online daters, Infosurv).  Many online daters have a false sense of security.  Clear disclosure is required in this case, along with the meaning of 'background checks' and limitations.  It’s not a perfect system.  Some states don't release conviction records publicly.  I have written this legislation so if a site does a check a pop-up that has to be electronically acknowledged is displayed.  Do you know there are over 200 million conviction records publicly available!  I want my daughter to know, and have the ability to identify felons in the future.  As a parent it's incumbent of me to protect my kids future.  They are the most internet savvy generation yet…and the most likely to drop their guard.  The government looks after public safety and welfare.  Disclosures are a part of that.  The government requires labeling and warning on cigarettes and other known perils.  I should note, this legislation does not require anyone to adopt background checks.” 

What is the legislations likelihood of success? – “The first committees have processed it after an excellent vetting of the issues.  It was debated twice for over an hour in the house.  We are becoming alarmed about the number of predators and felons so anything we can do to improve the odds and safety is a good thing, a step forward, so I have a very positive outlook on this legislation.  The Florida legislation is different from the rest of the country.  I spent 20 years as an attorney, am a former federal prosecutor with the US attorney’s office, and have a deep understanding of constitutional issues. I drafted the legislation to balance business, commerce and government issues in the interests of protecting safety.  It was very carefully tailored to be minimally intrusive to the business model but offers a fair level of protection.  The legislation goes one step further; if the site does background checks and finds convictions, it can choose to disclose to the member that this person has been identified as having a felony or sex related conviction.  It’s up to the site if they choose to ban communication or simply disclose.” 

How about married people? – “We’re not legislating on marriage disclosure.  We’d be getting into morality issues.” 

What are the next steps for the legislation? – “There’s one more committee in the house and senate; the justice council and judiciary committee.  It then goes to full votes in the senate and house and has to pass in both chambers, and then the governor has to sign it.  If it were to fail then it could not come back up till next March in the next legislative session.”

What are the implications for other online services? – “ISP's are excluded from liability…background checks have nothing to do with the carriers of online dating sites.  The employment area is also ripe for discussion  i.e. monster.com should indicate if applicant background checks have been done.  I don't see anything beyond services effecting individuals safety as possibilities for future legislation.  Sites that are involved in financial deals could also choose to do background checks.  I could foresee them being offered in environments such as eBay.  But, this area does not serve the same compelling safety interests for legislation.  I don't have to meet people from eBay…but a background check would have some bearing on whether I trust them.” 

Mark Brooks: Some useful links to proposed legislation; MICHIGAN SB 286, FLORIDA HB 1035, FLORIDA SB 1768, TEXAS HB 1307, CALIFORNIA AB 1681