BUSINESS INSIDER – Feb 10 - Happn is the latest addition to the app-based dating scene. It secured $8M, and now boasts ~2M downloads and 700K active monthly users. Around a third of those are in London. Happn uses GPS to connect users who cross paths within a 250 metre radius. There’s no swiping. If users want to grab someone’s attention they can send a “charm.” A small fee is involved for men who want to send out charms. Happn is already in Paris, London, New York, Sydney, and parts of South America, and the team wants to see it expand internationally in the next year or so.
Category: Outlets – Business Insider
Bumble Has Better Initial Traction Than Tinder, Witney Wolfe Says
BUSINESS INSIDER – Jan 28 – In August, Whitney Wolfe was in the middle of a very-public sexual harassment lawsuit with Tinder, which is now valued at ~ $750M. She says she came up with the name and initially promoted it on college campuses. She was given a cofounder title. One person who reached out to Wolfe after the lawsuit was Andrey Andreev, the co-founder of Badoo. Now he’s partnered with her on a new dating app that resembles Tinder, Bumble. They recruited another Tinder co-founder who departed, Chris Gulzcynski, and Tinder’s former VP of Design, Sarah Mick. Bumble, like Tinder, uses profile swiping to match single people in the same town. But on Bumble, women are forced to make the first move. Wolfe says the initial traction is even better than Tinder’s was, with ~100K downloads in a little over one month and high user engagement.
by Alyson Shontell
See full article at Business Insider
See all posts on Bumble
See all posts on Tinder
See all posts on Badoo
Tinder’s Success Has Boosted eHarmony
BUSINESS INSIDER – Nov 26 – Grant Langston, VP, brand marketing at eHarmony says competition from apps like Tinder has helped his business. “Since Tinder launched in Australia we’ve seen a surge in subscriptions. The press they are receiving is bringing lots of people to the online dating world” he said. Tinder’s spike in popularity in Australia this year has saw user numbers on eHarmony’s website increase by 20%. In the US, the largest area of growth has been in the 23-33 age group; Australia has experienced a similar trend,” he said.
Cuddlr: The App That’s About Cuddling
BUSINESS INSIDER – Nov 20 - Cuddlr app has been questioned a lot since it launched worldwide in Sep. Some criticise it for being male-dominated, while others have complained of meeting up for a cuddle, only to be stood up. According to Cuddlr's co-founder, Charlie Williams, the app has been downloaded 214K times and saw ~9K "cuddles" in the first week of launch. Cuddlr works like Tinder. People connect the app to their Facebook profile, and the app shares the first name and pictures of cuddle candidates within walking distance. Users tap the picture to request a cuddle.
Facebook: Social Media Doesn’t Stifle People’s Opinions
BUSINESS INSIDER – Aug 28 – A new report from the Pew Research Center claimed that people are less likely to post anything controversial if they're not sure their audience agrees. Winter Mason, a Facebook researcher, broke down the study and explained why it may not be so true. First of all, Mason explains, the phenomenon of people not wanting to express themselves to unlikeminded audiences is a universal reality, one that is not unique to the Internet.
by Rebecca Borison
See full article at Business Insider
Mark Brooks: As more people express themselves the online norm of being critical becomes more acceptable. The Internet dating industry has a problem with helping people gage reputation in the context of romantic relationships. They're scared to offend. On another note…Facebook is proving to be a major source of traffic for Internet dating sites, but is also very challenging. A Facebook representative will be speaking at the upcoming Internet Dating Conference in Cologne to help clarify on where Facebook stands on Internet dating advertising now, and give some guidance on how best to scale and monetize it.
Summarized by
CEO Of eHarmony: Tinder Is Superficial And Will Never Work
BUSINESS INSIDER – Aug 7 – Neil Clark Warren, the CEO of eHarmony, is not too fond of apps like Tinder. "It doesn't work," he said. "They're depending on superficial almost accidental compatibility. Compatibility is a serious matter, and it's very deep and very important to figure out. The companies are just trying to throw something out there that makes money for them."
How The Endless Quest For Love Is Sparking Massive Growth In Dating Apps
BUSINESS INSIDER – July 24 – We've got new apps popping up every day: Coffee Meets Bagel, Hook, Pinch, Instamour, Wyldfire, Whim, Floret… Online dating can often be frustrating, which in turn leads to more willingness to try new apps. A lot of people see a need to come up with new ideas. Mark Brooks, the iDating consultant behind Courtland Brooks, thinks that dating apps more closely translate the real-life experience of meeting someone. "The mobile platform is simply a superior platform for internet dating. Mobile daters will go on many times during the day but just for a few minutes, they’re chatting and then they go back to work, and then jump back on. Internet dating has never really meshed with true user behavior," he said. "The true user behavior is when someone starts chatting someone else up, they’ll be in a continuous conversation and reel them in for a date. The problem with online dating is the incentive structures are quite broken. Mobile gets us closer." These dating apps all need to figure out the revenue model. Brooks thinks in-app spending is the way to go. And then there's always ads. Larger corporations acquiring the smaller startups when they run out of money. We saw this happen with IAC. Brooks sees Match Group holding out as the powerhouse. Match Group is currently under IAC, but Brooks anticipates a future separation that would leave Match Group as the ultimate online dating umbrella. "Starting a dating app is rather like starting a restaurant," Brooks said. "It looks very easy to do. It's a very sexy business. But it's a lot more difficult because of the critical mass problem. "What I typically find happens is that entrepreneurs spend 90% of their money building the app. But it does require cold hard cash to grow. Although there may be many startups, there will be few survivors. Very few have that unique way of driving eyeballs. Tinder did well."
Tinder’s Pitch Deck When It Was A Tiny Startup
BUSINESS INSIDER – July 11 – Here's what the $500M app was like when it was first starting out and how it planned to monetize. It used to be called Match Box. The company changed the name because it was too similar to Match.com.
IAC To Acquire HowAboutWe
BUSINESS INSIDER – June 27 – The deal has not yet been finalized. It's expected to close on Monday, at which point, a number of HowAboutWe employees may lose their jobs. HowAboutWe and IAC have been in serious deal talks for the past week. It's unclear how much IAC will be paying for HowAboutWe, or if the brand will continue to standalone among the other dating brands in IAC's portfolio.
by Alyson Shontell & Hunter Walter
See full article at Business Insider
This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.
HotOrNot Relaunch: It Shows Users Attractive People Near Them
BUSINESS INSIDER – June 1 – HotOrNot, the dating site that was sold to Badoo for $20M, uses location-based data to show users the most attractive people around them. Badoo has hired Justine Sacco, the former communications director for IAC. Sacco was fired last year after posting a controversial tweet before a trip to Africa. Sacco is reportedly helping with HotOrNot's promotion and relaunch.