This is the news for October 18th through October 23rd, 2009. Here are some of the topics we covered for this week:
TECH CRUNCH – Oct 20 - Zoosk, a social dating site, sees an ~12M unique users a month, and has a member base totaling over 40M. Based on last month’s performance, the company says it has a $30M run rate, and expects to close out this year with $18-$20M in revenue. Zoosk launched back in 2007, and has been showing some strong growth recently, particularly on social networks. The site has a strong presence across Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Hi5, and Friendster. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH
PR NEWSWIRE – Sep 15 - Zoosk, a social dating community surveyed 1,005 of its users in the U.S. to better understand their thoughts about their single status. ~70% of women cite the freedom to "do my own thing" and the ability to "flirt with anyone, anytime" as the best aspects of being single. Nearly half of men, however, responded that none of the benefits of being single outweigh their wish to find someone special. The number of Zooskers has climbed from 15M in January 2009 to 40M in August 2009.
The full article was originally published at Reuters, but is no longer available.
This is actually the news for May. We’re playing catch up. I had some critiques of the video and fixed them. You said you weren’t happy with the sound quality. We fixed it with a pro microphone. You wanted hi-res. You got it. You weren’t happy with the video quality, so I nixed my mug from the video and added hi quality images.
June, July and August are in process.
– Meetic‘s strategy after buying Match UK
– Dating site abuses Obama
– Zoosk adds Netflix and Last.fm to date cards
– CNN features virtual currencies
– Craigslist sues South Carolina attorney general
– DNA dating safety and ethics concerns
– Matchmaking does ok despite the downturn
– Illinois state nixes tax hikes that include taxing dating sites
– Sex toys for the horny Japanese
We’re working on June, July and August videos. Please let me know if there’s any other ways we can do better with them, and make them more useful.
PRESS RELEASE — Aug 11 — Zoosk, the social dating community, has launched Zoosk Desktop and Zoosk Mobile. Zoosk Desktop is a downloadable app, built using Adobe AIR technology, that runs on users' computer outside of their web browsers. Members can see a real-time stream of activity by other singles in their local area as well as instant notifications when they receive winks, emails, or virtual gifts.
The full article was originally published at PR Newswire, but is no longer available.
ZOOSK — July 24 – Zoosk conducted a survey among one thousand Zooskers to learn more about their thoughts on virtual gifts.
The full article was originally published at Zoosk blog, but is no longer available.
OPW INTERVIEW — June 18 — Zoosk is doing very well and are running primarily on Facebook, MySpace and Bebo. They just raised $6 million in a 3rd round. Here’s our interview with the founders, Shayan Zadeh and Alex Mehr. – Mark Brooks
What is your founding story?
Alex: Shayan and I were brainstorming different online dating ideas four or five years ago. At that point, we didn’t see the entry point. When Facebook opened their platform we started a few applications on Facebook. The one that became really successful was our online dating application. We build on that and developed Zoosk over time. Zoosk was launched in December 2007.
How does Zoosk work?
Shayan: To use Zoosk you can simply find it on Facebook and get started within minutes versus hours of filling up questionnaires and signing up on 3rd party independent sites. From there on it’s very similar to the experience people are familiar with. We are just trying to make it a little more fun and a lot less pressure.
How much information do you pluck from Facebook to fill into the profile?
Shayan: Users fill out their profiles themselves directly. We help them in the process by pre-filling some sections and they can choose to keep some of them or change them entirely. A lot of users want to have different personas. They don’t want their personas they set up for their friends to be exactly the same as they set up for online dating.
Do you allow videos?
Alex: Not at this point.
Talking of videos, congratulations on your recent round of funding. I see you’re a rather reserved bunch from the video you put up on Facebook.
Alex: Very much so.
That was like a hell of a party. Is your ‘awesomeness undeniable’ at this stage?
Alex: I think our numbers and our growth curve speak for themselves. Facebook users have shown time and time again that awesome stuff works on Facebook. Things that are not awesome don’t survive.
You’re also on MySpace and Bebo. How much would you say your traffic come from Facebook versus the likes of MySpace and Bebo?
Alex: Facebook is the largest component of it but Bebo, Hi5, MySpace, Friendster and Hyves are not negligible, they’re just smaller than Facebook.
What else would you say that you do is different from the rest of the industry?
Alex: We want to be as simple as iPhone or iPod’s interface, just a few buttons, very straightforward. The user can be matched within seconds after adding the Zoosk application.
Shayan: Another big differentiator is the users that actually make up the site and that’s what a dating community is all about. We have been fortunate enough to reach an audience that previously has been harder for online dating to cater too. 65% of our users are below 30 and 90% of our users are younger than 40 years old. It’s just a different thing that they’re looking for. Success is not defined as I want get married in 6 months. It’s defined as I want to meet great people that I can share stories and life with.
How would you say social dating and pure internet dating are distinct from each other?
Alex: On traditional online dating it’s just like walking into a bar alone. Social dating is like going to a bar with your friends and having fun. The circle of friends that are accessible to you through Facebook and other social networks, enriches the dating experience, it makes it more fun and more interactive.
What your users are saying?
Shayan: We get fascinating stories from our users from all walks of life. We have gone from zero users in December 2007 to over 30 million right now. That unprecedented growth is a testament to how people are responding to this and spreading the word for us through social networks.
How much do you charge?
Alex: $25 a month in US and then we have 3 and 6 month discounted plans.
Shayan: We are one of the few freemium dating sites. Unlike a lot of dating sites where you have members who can’t respond because they’re not paying, Zoosk’s users can respond even if they’re not paying members. There are certain privileges that require the premium membership. For example: initiating conversations, knowing who has contacted you or who has looked at your profile.
As you were looking at the industry and learning about other dating sites, were there any particular sites that inspired you?
Shayan: We have taken bits and pieces from all over the industry and not just from online dating sites but social networks as well. Zoosk is a marriage between a social network and a traditional online dating site. We have taken ideas and inspiration from the likes of Facebook, and we have also looked at market leaders like Match and Meetic.
How do you think the industry is going to shake out in the next 2 or 3 years?
Alex: Pretty soon, over the next few years, you will see that there won’t be any successful or growing online dating site that is a standalone. Everything is going to be dissolved into the new social operating system such as Facebook.
What would your advice be to the CEO of Spark Networks or Match.com?
Alex: My advice is to continue doing what they’re doing because we don’t want any competition.
Congratulations again on the recent $6 million raise. What are you going to spend it on?
Shayan: The main purpose of the funding is to further accelerate the growth for Zoosk and grab even more market share in the countries we are actively growing right now.
How are you getting on with the Brits?
Shayan: They love us. 1 out of 20 single people in the UK have been on Zoosk already.
How are the revenues looking at this stage? Are you able to disclose any revenue?
Shayan: We are not talking about exact numbers yet but what we can tell you that we’ve already surpassed revenues of multiple publicly traded online dating companies in the US.
OPW — June 15 — The Zoosk team are pretty happy about raising their 3rd round. How do I know? The party boat video on Facebook tells it like it is. "Our awesomeness is undeniable," apparently. I'm interviewing Alex for OPW today and we should have it live for Thursday for you. WATCH THE VIDEO HERE
REUTERS — June 12 – Online dating network Zoosk has raised $6m in a third round. The company raised $4m in a second round last June.
The full article was originally published at Reuters, but is no longer available.
PR NEWSWIRE — May 19 – Zooskers can easily link their Last.fm and Netflix accounts to their Zoosk Date Card by providing their Last.fm username or a link to their Netflix queue's RSS feed. Once a user links their accounts to their profile on Zoosk, music picks made on Last.fm and movie titles selected on Netflix will automatically appear on the user's Zoosk Date Card.
The full article was originally published at PR Newswire, but is no longer available.