Online Personals Watch

OmniDate Helps Daters Find Real Love In A Virtual World

CHICAGO TRIBUNE -- May 11 -- Paula Weisz's favorite place to take her dates is the Millennium bar. For her dates, she doesn't get dressed up, doesn't put on makeup, and doesn't even need to leave the comfort of her living room sofa. Weisz is among the growing number of people who are exploring virtual dating. "The gap can be filled by this simulated world that's safe, virtual and fun," said Ravit Abelman, who, with her husband Igor Kotlyar, founded both the OmniDate.com beta (showcase) site and the OmniDate program. "People can move from the online world into the real world and not be strangers." Through OmniDate, users choose avatars, that will represent them on their dates. Virtual dates can include touring a museum gallery, going to a bar, listening to the user's choice of music or even going to the beach. In 2006, researchers at the MIT Media Lab found that people who interacted with each other in the virtual world through avatars had better chemistry in face-to-face meetings than people who had only viewed profiles. Many sites, such as Woome.com and Speeddate.com, are using video chatting to make the online dating experience more realistic. But for some daters, being on video may be intimidating. FULL ARTICLE @ CHICAGO TRIBUNE. Also in COLUMBIA NEWS, THE TORONTO STAR and INDIANA GAZETTE . 

 Mark Brooks: Igor and Ravit have done a great job building a dating app that really gets daters more emotionally involved and connected. It's a lot more interesting than flat IM. OmniDate is a client of Courtland Brooks and sponsor OPW, btw. Let me know if you'd like a demo, or email Ravit directly.

Date.com Partners With Enlaso

MARKET WIRE -- May 9 --  Date.com and ENLASO, a provider of enterprise language solutions, partners to localize Date.com's network of dating sites into numerous languages. Date.com, Matchmaker.com and Amor.com will be translated into Spanish, Portuguese, and German. Before the end of 2009, Date.com plans to have its dating sites available in 18 languages to better accommodate its growing subscriber base from outside the US and to assist it in marketing itself internationally. FULL ARTICLE @ MARKET WIRE

Customer Care Reputation Studied Online Before Making Purchases

RESEARCH BRIEF -- May 5 -- Among a new study "Exploring the Link Between Customer Care and Brand Reputation in the Age of Social Media," by the Society for New Communications Research, there is a growing group of consumers using social media to research companies.

59% of respondents use social media to "vent" about a customer care experience
72% of respondents research companies' customer care online prior to purchasing at least sometimes
84% of respondents consider the quality of customer care at least sometimes in their decision to do business with a company
74% choose companies/brands based on others' customer care experiences shared online
81% believe that blogs, online rating systems and discussion forums can give consumers a greater voice regarding customer careless than 33% believe that businesses take customers' opinions seriously
FULL ARTICLE @ CENTER FOR MEDIA RESEARCH

Mark Brooks: Internet dating site users will often ask other users what sites work for them. So, the best way to increase your margins over the long term is to tune your dating site to it gets real results as fast as possible.   That means culling your database regularly of dead profiles, and doing more with email marketing, and improving your compatibility profiling. Internet daters want dating sites to do the work. They want dates asap. 

Marco Koeder On Mixi Internet Dating In Japan

OPW -- May 9 -- Marco Koeder, Executive Manager of Cybermedia, talks about what the Japanese do for internet dating in Japan at the Asian Social Networking and Internet Dating Conference. 

Marco Koeder On The Use Of Avatars In Japan

OPW -- May 9 -- Whilst at the Asian Social Networking Conference in Tokyo today, I asked Marco Koeder, Executive Manager of Cybermedia, about the use of avatars on Asian SNS. 

Parship Doubles In Size

PR NEWSWIRE -- May 8 -- Parship, the online matchmaking service, announced a turnover for 2007 of 46m Euros, which represents an increase of 100% over the previous year. Parship now operates in 14 countries, including the UK and Ireland, employing a total of 150 people. According to Jupiter Research there will be an average growth for the whole dating sector in Europe of 20% in the current year. FULL ARTICLE @ IT NEWS

Like Jangl, TalkPlus Losing Its Voice As Well

GIGAOM -- May 7 -- Michael Cerda, former CEO of Jangl along with the cofounder, Ben Dean and three other Jangl employees is joining Jajah. "The company was finding its groove in the marketplace, but our investors though it wasn't enough for us to keep going, and decided not to fund us", Cerda said. Jangl had raised about $9m in VC funding from Storm Ventures, Labrador Ventures and Cardinal Ventures. Cerda explains the rise and fall of Jangl on his blog. Jangl is not the only VoIP company to nosedive. We have heard from reliable sources that TalkPlus, is going nowhere fast. Michael Toepel, who was the CEO recently left, after the company failed to get new investment to keep going. FULL ARTICLE @ GIGA OM

This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.

White Labeling Rant

OPW -- May 8 -- Affiliates built FriendFinder to a $300 million a year revenue company. But affiliates don't want to build someone elses brand. They would rather build their own brand, and brand equity. I worked with FriendFinder as an affiliate manager in 2003 and have been surprised that they have not pushed their white labeling products more, since then. FriendFinder would far rather promote their own brand, as would most dating companies, but a number of white labeling companies are on the rise now. You can find a list here. (White Label Dating, a client of Courtland Brooks and sponsor of Online Personals Watch, is one of them, and our recommended provider.) 

White labeling is the last big opportunity in internet dating because it allows mega-affiliates, and entrepreneurs, and online media of all types, to build their own brands and utilize the economies of scale of working in a network. The little guys get economies of scale. The guys who have lots of traffic, but don't have the time or inclination to build their own dating site can use white labeling to get up and running quickly.

This post also appears on FrequentFlirters.

2 Million And Counting

PR NEWSWIRE -- May 7 -- AshleyMadison.com, the world's largest infidelity dating service, announced today that their membership base has doubled in just one year to 2m members. With 85% of all new members hailing from the US, Ashley Madison boasts members in every state, including Alaska and Hawaii. California tops the list of fastest growing states with an incredible 205% increase in membership since last year. FULL ARTICLE @ THE EARTH TIMES

Flirting Online A Major Struggle

STREET INSIDER -- May 7 -- According to WooMe survey, nearly 3 out of 4 single online adults (72%) find flirting online more difficult than in person, citing the inability to observe body language, gauge chemistry and assess physical appearance as major contributing factors. 61% of single adults say looks are most likely to attract them to someone within the first minute of an introduction. Only 17% thought sense of humor was most important and an even lower 9% said they value intelligence most. "With WooMe, people meet face-to-face via webcam in fast and fun live introductions where they can decide if they are 'wooed' in one minute and move on if they are not", said Stephen Stokols, CEO and co-founder of WooMe. FULL ARTICLE @ STREET INSIDER