Courtland Brooks Press – Page 7 – Online Personals Watch

How Marketers Changed Online Dating

Posted on June 2, 2016

MARKETING NEWS – June 2 – No dating site has found the magic method of creating a love connection. "This is a total virgin science," said Mark Brooks who runs Courtland Brooks, an agency that works with online dating companies. There are 2,5K – 8K online dating platforms worldwide. While it's growing, the industry is "sort of being squished," with the majority of growth seen at large businesses and smaller apps, leaving a large middle section open, Brooks says. According to Brooks, Tinder's explosive popularity changed the face of internet dating. The app grew from college campuses, Brooks says, as the company used a marketing program to entice "campus connectors" to spread the word. "It doesn't take much," he said. "It's such a hotbed on campuses that you can get these things to take off on campus with the right story and the right product. Tinder is a very, very compelling product. It's one of the few dating apps that's truly sharable. For some reason, apps are more sharable in online dating. You wouldn't generally talk about Match, but on Tinder, you'd just show it around and talk about the experience." How do these dating platforms grow? Brooks says the traditional way is via pay-per-click ads and paid acquisition. Companies with more money are able to advertise on TV. Grant Langston, eHarmony's VP of brand marketing refers to TV as eHarmony's "magic formula". Now, TV accounts for ~70% of eHarmony's lead generation. For Zoosk, Facebook mobile app is one of the most successful distribution outlets. The conversion rate for Facebook mobile, from click to install, is ~5% and 10%. Years ago, Brooks says he predicted that "we'd go Star Trek" in online dating, meaning he foresaw the impending mobile boom. In his recent research, he found that 73% of all visitors to dating services are on mobile devices. Brooks believes larger screens, five-to-six inches, will come into prominence in the near future. Users want larger pictures for their online dating needs and Brooks says larger phones and small tablets will serve that need. After that, he believes wearable technology will play a larger role in the industry. People often tell white lies on their dating profiles, but Brooks says sites may be able to take advantage of a customer's FitBit data by matching people who run seven miles per day. Online dating is here to stay with little chance of evanesce. Brooks notes that the availability of people, within the click of a button, has created an addictive element.

by Hal Conick
See full article at Marketing News

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Tinder’s In-House Sociologist Has To Figure Out What People Want

Posted on May 29, 2016

LAMAG – May 25 – Jessica Carbino joined Tinder as an in-house sociologist in Oct 2013. Dating sites & apps use math formulas that use a combination of profile info and online behaviors – to come up with matches. But "Chemistry needs to kick in, and that's the toughest area – how to know someone's going to have a good pheromones effect," says Mark Brooks, president of Courtland Brooks, a consulting firm that has worked with many dating sites. Tinder focused on attraction, at least at the beginning. Now Tinder is pushing for growth and revenue by adding extra features. It started allowing users to include their employment and education to provide a more complete snapshot of themselves. That's where Carbino's work comes in: to find out what users want and what they don't know they want. All of her findings are being used to refine the "product," including its algorithm. It's considerably harder to sell users who are serious on looks alone. "Photos are very important but very limited," says Brooks, the dating industry consultant. "Character is not being communicated there. I think Tinder will prompt us to think differently about how to match-make behind the scenes. And that's important because that's the evolution required for the industry to really reach its potential."

by Fiona Ng
See full article at LA Magazine

See all posts on Tinder

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Quick Review Of Top Dating Sites

Posted on May 6, 2016

REVIEWS.COM – May 4 – Reviews.com have reviewed top dating sites. They excluded niche dating sites, hook up sites, dating apps and sites that don't operate internationally. The top dating site is OkCupid according to their study. Match.com was rated top site for long-term relationship, PlentyOfFish was the most overwhelming and eHarmony the most underwhelming. They looked at how easy it was to create a great profile, how accurate the algorithms were, the amount of bad messages users get and the usability. eHarmony has a reputation for being old-fashioned and marriage-oriented, and it likes it that way. Industry expert Mark Brooks considers it one of his favorites. "They are a high-integrity outfit that are devoted to helping people make long-term matches," he says. "That's the ultimate goal really: great relationships that people feel inclined to stay in. A lot of men bail when they have to answer a lot of questions up front," Brooks says. Reviews.com experience on eHarmony was mostly negative. They found the matching algorithm ineffective.

The full article was originally published at Reviews.com, but is no longer available.

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Radio Interview: Challenges Niche Dating Sites Are Facing

Posted on March 1, 2016

UPTOWN1RADIO – Feb 26 – Mark Brooks, an online dating consultant, says niche dating sites create a romantic community around identity. "Where people have made a call on what they want, they don't really want to meet anyone who's outside the particular thing that they're looking for." But Brooks says the idea is one thing and the business is another. It's really not a big money maker at all. VeggieDate may help vegetarians find love over veggie patties, but it isn't making much money. The site's been alive for several years and membership is steady at 10K users. But according to Brooks, that isn't very many for a niche site.

by Isabella Kulkarni
See full article at Uptown1Radio

See all posts on VeggieDate

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How eHarmony Stays Relevant In The Age Of Tinder And Match

Posted on February 16, 2016

IBTIMES – Feb 14 – "We know how to do this one thing. If the world is not interested in this one thing. We will go out of business," Grant Langston, eHarmony's VP of brand marketing, said. That "one thing" was match people for serious relationships. When the founders pitched the idea back in 2000s, people would laugh. At that time, online dating was primarily for sex. But 16 years later, eHarmony is one of the leaders with ~11.9% of the $2.4B online dating industry (IBISWorld). "eHarmony is a relationships company. Match is a relationship company, but I think eHarmony picks up where Match leaves off,” said Mark Brooks, an online dating app consultant. With its over decade of experience, eHarmony is not a young player. And at 80 years old, its CEO Neil Clark Warren is far much older than other leaders in the field like Tinder's 29-year-old CEO, Sean Rad. But eHarmony is seen as still able to innovate. At this year's iDate, eHarmony was awarded the title of most innovative company. Next month, eHarmony launches Elevated Careers, a shot at matchmaking for the job market.

by Kerry Flynn
See full article at IBTimes

See all posts on eHarmony

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College Students Are Tindering For ‘Friends’

Posted on February 13, 2016

CNN MONEY – Feb 12 – College students say they're using dating apps for friendship. 58% of students said that they've never gone on a date using the app, in a survey by college jobs startup WayUp. 53% say they're using dating apps to find friends, 27% are looking for a significant other, and 20% were looking for a hookup. According to Jason Helfstein, Internet analyst at Oppenheimer & Co., it doesn't really matter why students are using the app, there's still "value" in it for Tinder. Dating industry analyst Mark Brooks agrees. "It helps people connect with the concept of Internet dating," he said, that as people start to look for more serious relationships "they'll generally drift toward other services".

by Allison Croghan
See full article at Fox13

See all posts on Tinder

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This Is The Busiest Time Of Year For Online Dating

Posted on January 6, 2016

MARKETWATCH – Jan 5 – Dating app Zoosk expects a 20% jump in users in the first two weeks of the year and eHarmony had a 21% increase in mobile registrations since the holidays. Grindr usually experiences a 30% to 50% increase in users. Match.com expects a 60% surge in new members between Christmas Day and Valentine's Day. Sign-ups on OkCupid, were up 30% this past Sunday. Many singles sit around the family dinner table during the holidays and think, "Maybe it would be better to have a partner," says Mark Brooks, a dating-industry analyst and the editor of Online Personals Watch. "That's when they start hitting dating sites in droves and go on dates before the indigestion sets in." It may also be more polite to arrange dates in the New Year rather than during the holidays, especially with family around. "They're going to be around for you long after your relationships," he says. "The trick with holiday dating is to make sure no one feels neglected."

by Quentin Fottrell
See full article at Marketwatch

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Three Day Rule Matchmaker Reveals How She Tracks Down True Love For Her Clients

Posted on September 29, 2015

DAILYMAIL.CO.UK – Sep 28 – Anna Leifeste is a full-time matchmaker at Three Day Rule, a personal matchmaking company based in Los Angeles. The dating service charges $3,5k for its three-month package, and $5k for six months that includes date coaching, styling and professional photography, according to Online Personal Watch. Anna, who has a master's degree in counseling psychology from Northwestern University, describes her day as a matchmaker.

by Erica Tempesta
See full article at DailyMail.co.uk

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Ashley Madison’s Female Users Are Non-existent

Posted on August 28, 2015

FINANCIAL POST – Aug 28 – In April, Ashley Madison's head of international relations Christoph Kraemer estimated the company's value at $1B, pegging the ratio of men to women in the 30-45 age range at ~50-50. But a data analysis by the Gawker affiliate Gizmodo revealed there were only 5.5M female profiles and only ~12K of them displayed evidence of being connected to actual women who used the site. 10K accounts were registered to ashleymadison.com email addresses, while ~81K appear to have been created on an Ashley Madison computer, based on their IP addresses. If those allegations are true that's likely the last nail in the coffin for the site, said dating company consultant Mark Brooks. "I think people would have forgiven (the security breach). I think they would have gotten over that, as long as they put safeguards in place so it doesn’t happen again," Brooks said. "This, they don't move on from. This means this brand is not trustworthy. That’s a big deal."

by Claire Brownell
See full article at Financial Post

Mark Brooks: Alexa tells us that the female population is greatly under-represented and their confidence on this stat is 'high.'
Similarweb shows us that the top referring sites to AM are porn sites.
Looks like Ashley Madison falls into a category that I like to call 'High Emotion Entertainment.' Users get entertained. They may well get emotional support. But the chances of much more are slim. Still, there are plenty of users willing to pay for hope. AM proves that point magnificently.

See all posts on AshleyMadison

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Match Must Use Size To Overcome Challenges Facing Public Dating Services

Posted on August 26, 2015

DEAL REPORTER – Aug 24 – OPW – Aug 24 – As The Match Group moves toward an IPO, it must use its size advantage to overcome the difficulties that have plagued other dating companies that have gone public. FriendFinder traded on NASDAQ and was delisted in 2013 for failing to trade above the USD 1 level. Zoosk filed for an IPO in 2014, intending to raise more than USD 100m, but withdrew the application citing unfavorable market conditions. In the past 2 years, shares of Snap Interactive have not been above the USD 1 mark with stock plunging 85%, and Spark Networks has seen its stock decline 60%, to USD 3.11. Chinese dating firm Jiayuan International has seen its US-listed stock rise 22% in the last year, however, their success is partly a by-product of China's booming economy. "Match's size will be an advantage over other publicly traded dating entities," said Mark Brooks, an industry consultant with Courtland Brooks. Its scale and brand awareness means it probably pays much less to acquire new users. “This is very clearly a game of size,” Brooks asserted, adding that Match.com does not have to pay search giant Google for every new member because it has built a brand through time, helped by TV and radio advertising.

by David B. Wilkerson & Marina Temkin & Louise Bleakley
Read the full article

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