FORTUNE – Sep 29 – To combat overzealous swipers, Tinder has turned to a new tool, called Interana, for analyzing data. Some users swipe right too often to maximize their chances of finding a match. Earlier this year, to combat this behavior, Tinder set a daily limit of right swipes. Then it rounded up profiles of the most prolific right-swipers and watched what happened. "We saw those users actually converge in behavior," said Tinder VP of Technology Dan Gould. "They learned the value of the right swipe." Tinder is using data to improve the user experience. It is using software from a startup called Interana, which premiered in 2014 and counts two former Facebook engineers among its founders. With Interana, queries that were taking hours were cut down to less than a second. Now, Interana is everywhere inside Tinder, troubleshooting network connectivity issues and measuring the effectiveness of social media partnerships, among other things.
Category: Outlets – Fortune Magazine
Whim Dating App Skips Messaging And Goes Straight To The Date
FORTUNE – Aug 19 – Whim, a new dating app from OKCupid alum Eve Peters, wants to get users face-to-face faster. Instead of just swiping and chatting, the app sets up actual, face-to-face dates. Users plug in when they’re free, who they like on the app, and when Whim finds two mutually interested daters, it arranges the meet.
CEO Of Three Day Rule: Why I Hid My Pregnancy While Fundraising
FORTUNE – June 22 – After hearing negative comments about pregnant founders, Talia Goldstein, CEO of Three Day Rule, says she felt that the only way to raise money was to hide her pregnancy. During this time, a well-known LA investor wrote a blog post about his struggle over whether or not invest in a company run by a pregnant CEO, which included the chilling line: “A pregnant CEO is going to fail her company.” (Ultimately, he did invest.) In April 2014, Three Day Rule raised a Series A from IAC/Match. Since then, they’ve launched in six cities. "The difficulty I faced while fundraising as a pregnant woman is only one example of the prejudice against mothers that remains pervasive in startup culture. Now, as I begin another round of fundraising while pregnant again, I am determined to take a stand", she said.
Would You Consider Accepting Bitcoin On Your Dating Site?
FORTUNE – Mar 27 - OkCupid already accepts it. You could say that accepting bitcoin was just a marketing gimmick—that OkCupid was just looking to garner some goodwill and buzz among tech types. OkCupid founder and CEO Sam Yagan reasoned at the time: “There’s no question that these digital currencies are going to be the future.” Zoosk's CEO Kelly Steckelberg remains hesitant. “I don’t know that bitcoin is at a place yet that it makes sense for us,” she says, “but certainly if it ever got there, we would consider it, absolutely.
by Daniel Roberts
See full article at Fortune
Kelly Steckelberg – The Woman Tasked With Saving Zoosk
FORTUNE – Mar 26 – Kelly Steckelberg took Zoosk’s top job in Dec 2014. Since then, she’s been clearing a path to profitability. Less than one year ago, Zoosk had filed for an IPO. Things quickly changed. In December, the company called it off and its two co-founders, CEO Shayan Zadeh and president Alex Mehr, stepped down. And in January, it laid off 15% of its staff. Kelly Steckelberg, the new CEO, has been at Zoosk for 4 years and held roles as its CFO and COO. When asked what sets Zoosk apart, Steckelberg was unconvincing. “I think we consider ourselves a serious dating site". Zoosk took in ~$200M in revenue in 2014 but lost money. It had been profitable in 2013 for the full year. What changed? Steckelberg says Zoosk decided to invest heavily in growth, “even at a loss situation.” The company also overstaffed. Zoosk seems to have been operating with the startup mentality that profit doesn’t matter. Zoosk will announce that it was profitable in Q1 2015 and Steckelberg hopes the company’s finances will stay that way.
Tinder Has A New CEO – Chris Payne, Ex-eBay Exec
SEEKING ALPHA – Mar 20 – Chris Payne, until recently the head of eBay's North American marketplaces ops, has been named the CEO of Tinder. Payne replaces co-founder Sean Rad.
by Eric Jhonsa
See full article at Seeking Alpha
Update from Fortune: CEO & Co-founder Sean Rad will reportedly continue to take charge on product and marketing aspects.
Lesbian Dating App Dattch Is Now Her
FORTUNE – Feb 26 – Robyn Exton wanted to help a gay girlfriend who had gone through a break-up get back on the market. She created Her, a free app for women looking to date other women. The idea is to create a community for lesbians looking to make friends, chat, and date. Dating apps specifically for gay women are limited. The most prominent is Brenda, an app similar to Grindr that was created by a man. Exton herself is gay, and says her San Francisco-based team is made up of four queer women and two straight guys. Exton originally named the service Dattch, a blend of the words “date” and “catch.”
Dating Apps Created By Women For Women
FORTUNE – Feb 10 – Women have been subjected to harassing comments on dating apps, like Tinder and OkCupid, which have been created by largely male teams. Several new dating apps have been created by women such as Coffee Meets Bagel that has attracted $2.8M in funding, and Bumble. On Bumble, only women can initiate the conversation. Three Bay-Area sisters, Arum, Dawoon and Soo Kang launched Coffee Meets Bagel. It uses Facebook info to match users with friends of friends. They get one match a day. If both parties decide they want the introduction, the app sends an ice-breaker question to both. Dattch is a dating app aimed at lesbians. Dattch features a pinterest-like layout which is heavy on pictures. The pictures remove the need for self-description and instead drive conversation towards interests and hobbies.
by Shalene Gupta
See full article at Fortune
See all posts on Coffee Meets Bagel
See all posts on Bumble
See all posts on Dattch
Online Dating App “The Grade” Kicks Out Bad Daters
FORTUNE – Dec 11 – The Grade, a new dating app developed by Snap Interactive, gives users a letter grade, and kicks off anyone who earns an “F”– which turned out to be 5% of its early users. The app launched last month. “We want to hold users accountable for their behavior,” says Cliff Lerner, CEO of Snap Interactive. “We believe the next big thing in online dating is accountability.” The grades are determined by an algorithm that looks at everything from grammar to how often users respond to messages. Overall grades are calculated based on the profile quality, responsiveness, and message quality.
The Guy Behind Momo, China’s Tinder
FORTUNE – Nov 3 – Tang Yan started a Chinese social network called Momo that now has 60M monthly active users. He spent eight years at the news site of 163.com, one of China’s top Internet portals, eventually running it, before getting the idea for Momo when location apps like Foursquare were gaining popularity. Momo has become one of the most popular apps in China, and is planning an IPO that values the company at $3B. Momo brings in cash from some paid add-on features, and is exploring new business models, such as running ads from close-by restaurants and small businesses.