OPW – Dec 3 – [Breaking news, you heard it first on OPW]. Lavalife was sold on November 30th to First Media Group. The group also operates Quest Chat lines and QuestPersonals.com, a competitor to Lavalife's telemedia and online business. Ron Duke, the CEO & CFO has left, and Peter Housley, the President and COO of First Media Group has resumed his role as CEO of Lavalife. He was CEO in 2003 and was the original brand architect. No numbers have been released.
Category: Lavalife
Lavalife Reveals The Fate Of The Turkey Baster
PR NEWSWIRE – Aug 24 – The new movie, "The Switch" starring Jennifer Aniston and Jason Bateman tells the tale of a 40-year-old woman who wants to find the "right" sperm donor and have a baby on her own. Lavalife asked singles: "Would you donate your sperm or eggs for a friend who wanted to have a baby?" 63% of men and 48% of women surveyed said yes. A recent article by Lisa Daily in Lavalife's online magazine, "Click," discusses how smart women are choosing to have children by themselves in record numbers. According to the 2000 Bureau of the Census, non-marital cohabitation, separation, and divorce have become more common, as has remarriage. Half of all children in the US lived or will live with only one parent before reaching adulthood. Most one-parent families (86%) are headed by mothers. FULL ARTICLE @ PR NEWSWIRE
Former CEO Of Lavalife Becomes CMO At Kobobooks
OPW – Aug 3 – Why would anyone buy a book these days. Save the paper, and enjoy your reading more by using an e-reader. Marina Glogovac worked with Lavalife from 2004, and was CEO from 2006 through 2009. She is now the CMO of Kobobooks which offers an impressive little reader for $149, along with an ipad app, and reader apps for numerous devices. They have top notch books at sub $10 pricing and look set to give Amazon's book department a run for their money. You can see our CEO interview with Marina here. Congratulations Marina.
Lavalife Works Out Kinks In Site Redesign
OPW – May 31 - Lavalife sent out an email to members letting them know they've worked out the kinks in their site redesign. A new IM system is mounted to the bottom of the screen. Photos are now larger. Nav has been improved.
Internet Dating Industry Weekly News March 2nd, 2010
This is the news for February 23rd through March 2nd, 2010. Here is the news we covered:
- PlentyofFish continues to grow rapidly
- Match.com to acquire Singlesnet
- German online dating market booming
- Smartdate.com raises 2.2 million Euros
- Australians suffer heavy losses to online fraud
- Weopia.com launches new virtual dating service
- HerWay.com partners with HonestyOnline
- Maryland Bill proposes tight restrictions
- Harvard Professor Michael Norton to speak at iDate L.A.
Lavalife Is Being Shopped
THEDEAL.COM – Feb 12 - Lavalife is being shopped by its owner, online marketer Vertrue. Vertrue paid C$152.5M ($113.9M) to acquire Lavalife in 2004. Vertrue was itself bought out by management, private equity firms One Equity Partners and Brencourt Investors and venture capital firm Rho Ventures for $855M in 2007. Lavalife's Web properties have been on the block for about four months. Lavalife Voice, a phone-based dating service, is not being shopped. Some say the auction has been going on for longer than that. "They've wanted to sell for a while," Noel Biederman, CEO of Avid Life Media, said of Lavalife. "Lavalife is not of great strategic value, and its business is in decline," said Mark Brooks, an industry consultant with Courtland Brooks. The company has not disclosed revenues since it was taken private in 2007. That year it brought in ~$90M. Although online dating giants Avid Life and FriendFinder Networks canceled initial public offerings this month, the space is still ripe for M&A deals, according to Brooks.
Finding Love On All The Right Websites
THE HAMILTON SPECTATOR – Feb 13 – Weirdos, misfits, perverts and losers. That's who was out there in the early years of Internet dating, or so it was commonly believed. But in the 15 years since Match.com came out with the first major dating site, the stigma has slowly disappeared. It's a $3-billion US industry, says Mark Brooks of Courtland Brooks, a U.S. consulting firm for Internet dating and social networking companies. In August 2009 alone, there were 113M hits on Internet dating sites worldwide. Meetic.com, Europe's largest online dating company, saw its revenues increase by 23% last year and membership grow to ~1M. Plentyoffish.com claims its members will go on more than 18M dates this year. Lavalife welcomes 15,000 new members every week. FULL ARTICLE @ THE HAMILTON SPECTATOR
See all posts on Match.com See all posts on PlentyofFish
See all posts on Meetic See all posts on Lavalife
Twitter’s Now A Dating Tool
STRAIGHT – Feb 4 - Meeting a romantic partner on-line isn’t a new phenomenon, as dating sites like Lavalife and eHarmony have been around for years. However, social-media services like Twitter and Facebook are opening up new avenues through which people can make on-line connections. While profiles on dating sites may offer only select details, social media can enable people to gain more insight into other people’s personalities. The rise of social-media services doesn’t worry Kate Bilenki, the operations manager for PlentyOfFish. Bilenki told the Straight her company is confident that its service remains the best way for people to make a romantic connection on-line. Bilenki asserted that, for the purpose of looking for love, Twitter is inefficient, as it connects users with a vast number of people, of which only a small percentage are possible romantic partners. “A lot of people on social-networking sites are married, they’re in relationships, and they’re not looking to date,” Bilenki said. “On our site, they’re looking for a relationship.” FULL ARTICLE @ STRAIGHT.COM
See all posts on eHarmony
See all posts on Lavalife
See all posts on PlentyofFish
Older Singles Click Online
FREE PRESS – Nov 9 - eHarmony.com, Match.com and Lavalife.com have seen significant growth in the number of users age 50+ in recent years. Joe Tracy, publisher of Online Dating Magazine, says that "the 50-plus segment in the online dating world is the fastest growing." eHarmony saw a 20% growth in users ages 60+ during Q1 2009, compared with the same period in 2008.
The full article was originally published at Free Press, but is no longer available.
See all posts on eHarmony
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Lavalife.com Tests Online Speed Dating
OPW — June 22 — Speeddate and Woome are leading the industry when it comes to online speed dating. Match launched online speed dating in 2004 and gave it a shot and later pulled it. Lavalife is giving online speed dating a shot in Toronto. It's on one of the main tabs as soon as you log into Lavalife. It's temporarily free but will eventually cost money/tokens. The online speed dating events run 8pm each night.
