FORBES – Sep 10 – An analysis of the security practices of 24 leading online dating sites has concluded that only seven use secure-enough password practices. Password management company Dashlane assessed each site on 19 different criteria, including the minimum length for a password to be acceptable, and whether there was a requirement for a mix of letters and numbers. Only Zoosk and OkCupid score ~50%. Most mainstream Internet services generally get 75 or above; Apple scores 100%. eHarmony scores 38, while Match.com, Gleeden and Adult Friend Finder all get 30%. At the bottom end of the scale, Badoo and POF with 22.
Category: eHarmony
eHarmony’s Elevated Careers Would Contribute 60% Of The Revenue
REUTERS – Aug 31 – With surveys showing 70% of Americans are unhappy with their jobs, Neil Clark Warren thinks that matching personalities can work in the recruitment industry. "Nobody has really matched personalities in terms of the applicant and the supervisor. That's not something that LinkedIn or Monster do," Warren said, explaining eHarmony's plans to get into the employment industry. eHarmony plans to launch its recruitment service – Elevated Careers – in 2016, and expects the business to contribute ~60% of the company's revenue within three years. eHarmony expects revenue to be between $275M and $350M this year.
by Sai Sachin Ravikumar & Lehar Maan
See full article at Reuters
A Lawsuit Claims eHarmony Discriminates The Blind
NEWSWEEK – Aug 6 – A new class-action lawsuit has been filled, claiming eHarmony discriminates against blind people because it’s incompatible with technology that allows them to navigate websites. Blind users of eHarmony require assistance to use it. This violates state and federal law mandating that public entities make goods, services and facilities accessible to people with disabilities “by making reasonable accommodations,” the lawsuit states.
eHarmony Moves Its Headquarters To Los Angeles
BUSINESS WIRE – July 27 - eHarmony has moved from Santa Monica to Los Angeles to accommodate the record growth. Following the return of founder Dr. Neil Clark Warren as CEO, eHarmony has reached ~66M users.
Match Bought POF, And Cements Its Position As Market Leader
MARKETWATCH – July 15 – The Match Group announced that it will buy PlentyofFish for $575M in cash before going public. "In this industry, size really matters," says Mark Brooks, a dating-industry analyst and the editor of Online Personals Watch. "The Match Group gains very sizable key strategic assets and very effectively cements its position as market leader." The US online dating industry is dominated by IAC, with 21.8% market share. While each site has its own secret set of algorithms, the industry is consolidating and becoming more efficient from a business perspective.
"Making ideal matches is a virgin science," Brooks says. "We don't really know when we've been successful, so we don't really know when the algorithm has actually worked." That will soon change with the popularity of location-based apps and mobile technology, he says. "We'll be able to survey singles before and after dates." "Dating algorithms do exactly what they're designed to do, which is to match to sets for data,"” says Amy Webb, author of "Data, a Love Story: How I Gamed Dating to Meet My Match." Some dating sites beg to differ: "eHarmony has only a divorce rate of 3.86%, well below the national average of 40% to 50%."
by Quentin Fottrell
See full article at Marketwatch
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It’s Harder To Turn Profit In The Online Dating Business
WSJ – June 10 – Dating sites in the U.S. are expected to make $1.17B and dating apps $628.8M this year, up from $1.08B and $572M respectively in 2014, according to IBISWorld. “There are too many players and not a lot are generating sufficient revenue,” said Britanny Carter, analyst for IBISWorld. Even major players are under pressure: Zoosk withdrew its plans for an IPO and laid off 15% of its staff. Grindr recently hired investment bank Raine Group to help it find a buyer. But Grindr CEO Joel Simkhai said his service is profitable. Most of the apps that are generating revenue with a combination of ads and freemium features. Users still pay to join some dating sites because it allows them to meet others who have chosen to pay to meet people as well. "It demonstrates a lot of commitment when someone has put a coin on the table," said Mark Brooks, CEO of Courtland Brooks, a company that helps dating companies with business development. eHarmony logged ~$275M in revenue, its highest level in several years.
by Georgia Wells
See full article at WSJ
PlentyofFish Kills eVow.com
OPW – May 13 – POF has pulled the plug on its property eVow. The eVow website was developed as a direct competitor to eHarmony in September 2010. But POF is sticking to its knitting and focusing on growing its core offering, their mobile apps and POF.com. According to WayBackMachine, the last recorded date that eVow was live was March 25th. So eHarmony has one less competitor to think about. I hear eHarmony is in growth mode and doing very well now. Chemistry and PerfectMatch are becoming less of a concern for them as well. I still think we're leaving money on the table. Serious singles want more service, are willing to pay for it, but we're just not delivering. I hope to learn more about how Zhenai and Baihe are outperforming the Western markets in this respect, at iDate Beijing.
Post by Mark Brooks @
CNBC Interview With eHarmony Founder
CNBC – May 10 – After 35 years of counseling married couples, Neil Clark Warren says he’s learned that “if the right person doesn’t marry the right person, you’ve got real problems ahead. When asked what the most important characteristic is in successful relationships, Warren tells CNBC that “Intelligence is really important” when it comes to matching people for marriage. Warren also says that over a 10-year period, the divorce rate of couples who met through eHarmony is 3.86%—far lower than a widely quoted statistic that half of all U.S. marriages end in divorce.
eHarmony Ramps Up Analytics for New Job Matching Business
WSJ – May 8 – The new eHarmony service, called Elevated Careers, is expected to launch late this year. To prepare, eHarmony brought in Hadoop for analyzing massive datasets and a search engine from Elastic, as well as other technology upgrades. Job hunters fill out three questionnaires about their values, personality and experiences with corporate culture. Employers with open jobs, meanwhile, are profiled based on external data and information supplied by current and former employees.
eHarmony Available On SmartWatches
BUSINESS WIRE – Apr 14 - eHarmony has introduced its mobile app with smartwatch support for Android Wear and Samsung Gear S devices. The smartwatches will display enhanced notifications that are synced with the users’ phone.
The full article was originally published at Yahoo Finance, but is no longer available.