Category: FriendFinder

A Date With Faith

Posted on February 20, 2005

HOUSTON CHRONICLE — Feb 18 — Thanks to everything from faith-based Internet dating sites to 1,000-member singles groups within congregations, spiritually minded solos across the country are looking to religion for love.  "It's not always so easy when you're single, so it gives them some common ground," said Diana Howard who estimates she has about 2,200 people on her Jewish Community Center singles mailing list. Faith is also an important factor for online daters at Soulmatch. Since launching in mid-2004, the site has picked up 100,000 users president Sujay Jhaveri.

Mark Brooks: Faith based sites represent one of the strongest online personals verticals.  Bigchurch, JDate, ChristianMingle and ChristianCafe.com are the market leaders.

Online Personals Sites Customer Experience Ranking

Posted on February 18, 2005

BUSINESS WIRE — Feb 14 — Yahoo! Personals, Match.com and True.com provided the best search functionality and dating information, earning the highest customer experience rankings. Yahoo! Personals, AmericanSingles and eHarmony ranked highest among prospective customers.  The Keynote Customer Experience Rankings are based on research with 2,000 customers and 2,000 prospective customers using American Singles, Black Planet, eHarmony, Friend Finder, Friendster, Lavalife, Match.com, PerfectMatch, Tickle, True and Yahoo! Personals.  "Consumer satisfaction with online dating sites is considerably lower than satisfaction levels seen with other online services. However, these diminished satisfaction levels are driven primarily by the personal expectations of the customer and their interaction with other members," said Dr. Bonny Brown. The best sites were well organized and easy to use.  Poorer sites were cluttered with ads or heavy text.  83% of start at a search engine. A clear advantage for Yahoo! Personals; 40% started at Yahoo.  eHarmony was the most common destination for Google searchers.  50% of customers expressed interest in personality tests, 50% in physical attraction testing. 45% interested in background checks.  30% of online dating service customers in the study were married or living with a significant other/partner!  Tickle is considered the "fun" site; 73% described the site that way. Yahoo! Personals is considered the "friendly" site (76%), and True is the "safe" site (69%).

Mark Brooks: How did Keynote end up with a sample set containing 30% non-singles?

FriendFinder Instant Messaging Center

Posted on February 9, 2005

BUSINESSWIRE — Feb 9 — The FriendFinder IMC enables daters to instantly and anonymously strike up a conversation or video conference with other members across all of the FriendFinder sites. There are over 100 million worldwide using instant messaging according to the 2004 Pew Internet and American Life Project. Messages to and from people within an individual's Friend Network are automatically accepted. Once logged into the FriendFinder IMC, the user doesn't need to re-enter their login information or password to visit any of the sites. Over 89 million users have participated in the FriendFinder network since its inception in 1996, underscoring its unmatched leadership in the marketplace with 75,000 daily sign-ups.

Mark Brooks: Comscore Mediametrix numbers last year showed the FriendFinder network of online personals sites to have more unique visitors than Match or Yahoo Personals.

Internet Dating Advice

Posted on January 30, 2005

THIRD AGE — Jan 27 — In 1727, Helen Morrison, a lonely spinster in Manchester, England, placed the first lonely hearts personal, advertising for a husband in the local weekly newspaper. In response, the town mayor committed her to a lunatic asylum for a month.  Internet dating is here to stay, and it's only going to grow.  Just like bars or clubs, different sites tend to attract different types of people, but that isn't often obvious until you've read a number of profiles. Make sure your profile serves you well.  Be honest when creating your own profile, and keep your radar up when reading others'. 

The full article was originally published at Third Age, but is no longer available.

Mark Brooks: Dr Andrew Conru created one of the earliest online personals ads in 1994 when he added his post to webpersonals.com, which he later sold to a company that was eventually rolled in to what is now Lavalife.  He then went on to create the FriendFinder sites in 1996.   

Battle for Supremacy Among Leading Online Relationship Sites Heats Up

Posted on January 30, 2005

BUSINESS WIRE — Jan 27 — Online relationship sites devoted to serious relationships are  attracting millions of new members. This burgeoning market segment will continue to attract interest, investments, and members in 2005, and the two companies poised to capitalize on this trend are PerfectMatch.com and eHarmony.com. "eHarmony has done a very good job at educating the market about the differences between a dating site and a relationship site," said Duane Dahl, founder and CEO, PerfectMatch.com. "They've spent a tremendous amount of money, but money doesn't necessarily mean success for eHarmony's members. We are gaining ground quickly." 

Mark Brooks: The holy grail of online dating = finding a truly compatible match (whatever your preferences might be).  The three big psychological profiling based online dating players are eHarmony, True and PerfectMatch.  I'll be profiling the PhD's behind these sites shortly.  Yahoo, Match and FriendFinder offer optional profiling as well, but a minority of their users have taken the profiling tests. 

Internet Creates a New Venue for Cheating

Posted on January 29, 2005

WILLIAMSPORT SUN-GAZETTE — Jan 25 — Across the country and around the world, people are increasingly caught up in a trend of cheating on the Internet via e-mail, instant messaging or adult Web sites. According to Dr. Dan Egli, a licensed psychologist in Williamsport, “no question about it. Internet cheating is one of the most common forms of unfaithfulness for a married couple today. It’s cheating and no different from meeting someone in a bar.”

Mark Brooks: Many of the adult dating sites have 'discrete relationship' categories. The top adult personals sites are AdultFriendFinder, Sexsearch and Eroticy. New entrant Ashley Madison Agency actually caters to cheaters.

iDate 2005 Photos

Posted on January 24, 2005

OPW — Jan 24 — The online personals industry signature conference was a grand success again this year.  Industry execs from eHarmony, Cupid, Date, True, FriendFinder, Community Connect and local Miami mover and shaker WebDate rubbed shoulders with mid sized players such as MingleMatch and ChristianCafe.com and smaller players such as PlentyofFish, DateMyPet and MyeMatch.  Periphary services companies such as LookBetterOnline and SafeDate, and advertisers such as MetricsDirect joined the tour de force.  The convention enjoyed double the attendance of 2004 in it's plush new quarters at the Wyndham Resort Miami.  Please post comments if you attended.  Here are the photos from iDate 2005

eHarmony and ThirdAge Partner

Posted on January 10, 2005

PRNewswire — Jan 10 — eHarmony and ThirdAge, the only online content, marketing and research company focused exclusively on Baby Boomers, today announced a partnership to provide branded access to eHarmony's patented Compatibility Matching System(TM) to millions of Baby Boomers via ThirdAge.com. More than one-third of the 97 million Americans over 45 are unattached and are turning to the Internet for love.

Mark Brooks: The seniors niche is booming as the 45+ set warm up to online dating. Seniorfriendfinder is the niche leader. Seniorscircle is a small player.

Nielsen/NetRatings Figures Reveal Meetic is Leader of European Online Dating

Posted on January 9, 2005

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.

FriendFinder Launches LesbianPersonals.com

Posted on December 16, 2004

BUSINESS WIRE — Dec 14 — FriendFinder Inc., the world's largest online dating network, today announced the launch of LesbianPersonals.com, an online dating destination focused on enabling women to pursue their romantic and sexual interests online. With over two million active members, LesbianPersonals is already the world's largest online personals and swingers community for alternative-minded women.

Mark Brooks: Dr Conru has been creating targeted online personals communities since 1996. He's up to 19 dating sites now. ItalianFriendFinder was the last community. FriendFinder Inc OWNS the adult online dating space with Alt, AdultFriendFinder and Outpersonals. Comscore, Nielsen, Hitwise; let's see the stats for these sites in your online personals roll-ups please.