NETIMPERATIVE — Mar 7 — US-based relationship service PerfectMatch recently launched in the UK, claiming to offer its users “soul mates, not bad dates.” After launching in the US 20 months ago, PerfectMatch has more than one million members, with a further 5,000 joining every day. It is now the second largest US “relationship” site behind eHarmony. Central to the site’s appeal is the Duet Compatabillity System, developed by relationship expert Dr Pepper Schwartz, a regular on US talk shows such as Oprah and Good Morning America. Interestingly, PerfectMatch attracts more women than men, with average age of members being between 33 and 34.
Category: All UK & Europe
UK Mobile Communities Roundtable
NMK — Feb 24 — Match Mobile users are urban, younger, of a lower socio-economic base, and (in the US) more from the immigrant population, with Match Mobile growing at a rate of 15% per month. The most favoured mobile content applications, according to recent Enpocket research in the UK: Sharing pictures with friends and family7 – 46%, Making / receiving video calls – 36%, Downloading songs -23%, Video clip of sports highlights – 20%, Text flirting / dating – 16%, Watching movie trailers – 12%, Help in managing a diet – 11%, Celeb news / gossip – 9%. There are 52 million handsets and 60 million people in the UK. China has 350 million handsets and 300 million texts a month are sent in Singapore and the Philippines. overall, Japan and Korea are 2-3 years ahead of the UK, who are in turn about 1-2 years ahead of the US.
Online Dating Good For Romance
BBC — Feb 14 — Bath University psychologist, Jeff Gavin, surveyed 229 online daters. He told BBC News that 4% were already married. UK-based internet dating agencies have an estimated six million subscribers. only 9% of chatroom users chose to converse via a webcam, most "shying away" in favour of "text-based relationships." Almost one in five of those interviewed had started a relationship lasting more than a year via a dating website. Male website customers tended to be "more committed" than female ones, as subsequent chatroom conversations gave them a way to express their feelings which did not normally exist. FULL ARTICLE @ BBC NEWS
Europe Falls in Love with E-Dating
BUSINESS WEEK — Feb 8 — Online dating, virtually unknown on the Continent five years ago, is taking off in a big way, even as the phenomenon seems to be slowing on the other side of the Atlantic. Revenues of the leading European dating Web sites will more than double over the next five years, from $200 million to $450 million, predicts Paris-based analyst Olivier Beauvillain, Jupiter Research. Sales in the U.S. are expected to grow only 9% this year, to $515 million. The region's biggest online dating service is Meetic.com, a private company launched three years ago by Web entrepreneur Marc Simoncini. The site is set to hit 10 million members around St. Single's Day and will book around $55 million in sales this year.
The full article was originally published at BusinessWeek, but is no longer available.
Mark Brooks: See you in Prague Both myself and Mark from iDate interviewed with the journalist for this article.
Nielsen/NetRatings Figures Reveal Meetic is Leader of European Online Dating
PR WEB – Jan 8 — According to the latest data compiled by Nielsen NetRatings* (November 2004) for Western Europe, the online dating website Meetic is #1 in Europe. PR WEB
Mark Brooks: I compared Nielsen numbers and Comscore Mediametrix numbers for FriendFinder in September 2003 and was blown away by the difference. Nielsen used a 55,000 USA user sample, Comscore a 110,000 sample set. Hitwise draws it’s numbers from millions of ISP users. Of course, if you don’t want to spend a few grand you can always use Alexa’s rough numbers.
Meetic; European Leader for Online Dating
PR WEB — Dec 17 — Meetic is the European leader for online dating (source Nielsen October 2004 #1 Meetic : 1.5 million visitors in October). The French dating site launched in early 2002 by Marc Simoncini will open up to 4 additional countries in the coming weeks: Poland, Ireland, Greece and Portugal and will now be present in 15 European countries.
Mark Brooks: Meetic has a respectable 3500 Alexa rank as well. In comparison, the top US focused online dating sites see over 5 million uniques a month.
Match.com Europe’s #1 in Online Dating
LONDON — In its first report of pan-European Internet behaviour, independent measurement firm comScore Media Metrix ranked Match.com as the leading online dating site in Europe. According to comScore data, Match.com sites drew nearly four million visitors in October, over 60% more than its closest competitor. #1 Match.com sites 3,960,000 uniques, #2 Ilove.de 2,404,000 uniques, #3 Meetic 2,209,000 uniques, #4 MSN Dating and Personals 1,792,000 uniques, #5 Matchnet 1,310,000 uniques PRNEWSWIRE
Mark Brooks: I just returned from a trip to the UK. The internet, online personals and speed dating seem far more popular since my last visit 2 years ago.
UK Singletons Turn To Web For Dates
YAHOO NEWS UK & IRELAND — Broadband provider PIPEX asked 2,000 men and women what they would be using the Internet for in five years time, and discovered that 9% expected to be looking for love, compared with 6% of women. With 10% of British adults currently living alone, internet dating sites could be hosting almost five million single surfers by 2009. Londoners are the most likely to log on (13%), whereas those in the North will stick to more traditional techniques (just 5% expect to be looking for love online in the next five years).
Mark Brooks: Not virgin territory but still, good territory as the Brits warm up to online dating. The British market is a few steps behind the US market.
Six Million Britons Sign Up for Singles Bars in Cyberspace
THE INDEPENDENT — Nov 15th — There are now 150 online dating agencies in the UK alone, up 20% in just 12 months, according to Hitwise. Online agencies are growing at a rate of 30 a year, with people in London and the South-east making up a third of all UK users. People aged between 25 and 34 make up the largest group of users at 29%. 35-44 year olds represent 26%. One in 10 is aged over 55. Two-thirds to three-quarters of single men and women will be members soon," Professor Scase said. "There are about six million using these services now and by 2005 there will be seven million."
The full article was originally published at Independent UK, but is no longer available.
Hook-Up Sites Blamed for Marriage Breakups
Newsfactor, Wed Sep 1 — Now sociologists have another culprit to blame for huge numbers of failed marriages: The Internet…New figures released by the United Kingdom’s Office of National Statistics show that divorce in England and Wales has risen for the third successive year in 2003, to more than 150,000. Critics have been quick to blame the internet…In another survey in June 2004 only 9% of internet users said they used the internet to meet people.