Online Personals Watch: News on the Dating Industry and Business

Online Video Shakeout

SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE -- July 17 -- While YouTube dominates Web of today, about 240 sites have dreams of success -- or getting gobbled up for big bucks.

You've heard of YouTube. You might have also heard of iFilm, Revver or Grouper. But have you heard of Frozen Hippo? Blennus? Eefoof? By one count, about 240 sites now dabble in online video...setting the stage for a shakeout. On any given day, people watch more than 100 million videos on YouTube.  "People lump us in with YouTube, but we have the technology to be much more than that," said Dmitry Shapiro, CEO of Veoh.  Veoh hopes the computer will become the future set-top box for television. Guba, meanwhile, sells movie and TV downloads from Warner Bros. and Sony. FULL ARTICLE @ SF GATE

Mark Brooks: As users warm up to watching TV on their computer, the online personals industry should warm up more to video dating. And don't forget video dating on your cell phone. That's next.

OPW Interview - Adam Small, CMO of Sexsearch

OPW INTERVIEW -- May 28, 2006 -- Sexsearch is different. It's glossy, sexy and growing gangbusters. The casual dating and, at the other end of the spectrum, serious/relationship dating segments are growing ever stronger. Sexsearch has been barreling along for a couple of years now. Now they are second only to AdultFriendFinder in the casual/adult segment. I interviewed (ex-Yahoo) Adam Small who is CMO of Sexsearch. - Mark Brooks

What’s your story Adam?
After school I moved to New York City and I worked as a financial manager for Prudential. From there I decided I wanted to run my own company and I started a website for college students which was called CollegeU and we ran a discount card program for students and local businesses. I had a friend who was working at Yahoo, and he convinced me to join Yahoo in New York, where I worked for a number of years. I worked with clients such as Microsoft, Johnson & Johnson, American Express. I met Damian, the owner of my current company through some of my Yahoo friends and decided to move to Toronto to start building SexSearch.

What's the Sexsearch story?
Sexsearch took us one and half year s to build...and we launched it in January a little over two years ago. We knew how well dating did, we had worked with Adult Friend Finder and we actually approach them to see if we could do more marketing for them but they weren‘t interested in allowing us to have a private label site at the time. So, we decided to build our own dating site with an adult twist to it. We liked certain aspects of what they had and we added all our own bells and whistles and gave the site a unique design with a more straight-to-the-point focus.   

Who is your target market?
Our target market is anyone over the age of 21 who is interested in sex...which is almost everybody. Other personals sites beat around the bush. We get straight to the point. We know that there‘s lot of people out there who are interested in sex.

How many members do you have now?
We have a little over 6.5 million registered users...and it’s growing fast! 

Are online personal users moving more towards casual dating sites or towards relationship dating sites?
I think online personals users are moving towards lot of different niche dating sites and I think they are definitely moving more towards casual dating sites. We‘ve seen a big increase in the number of members and I know there’s been a decline with some of our main stream competitors. So, I definitely see a trend of users moving more towards casual dating sites like SexSearch. 

What do you have in store for SexSearch?
Towards the end of the summer we will be launching private labels capability, which will allow us to launch more sites for ourselves, such as a mainstream dating site with an edge, of course. We will also launch a gay dating site. Offering private label sites will give us the ability to do deals with other companies who are interested in using our very established database and back-end to offer their own dating site.

Ultimate List of Dating Industry Jobs

May 4 -- I'm rolling the list of internet dating, social networking and business networking industry jobs links into a handy little list.  Please let me know if you have any new links for the list by emailing me at mark@onlinepersonalswatch.com.  Thanks.  - Mark

CommunityConnect
Cupid
Friendfinder
Friendster
Hi5
Lavalife
Match
Mate1
Meetup
MySpace
PerfectMatch
PlanetOut/Gay
Shaadi
Spark Networks
Webdate
Yahoo Personals

Spark Networks Reports Q1 Results

SPARK NETWORKS NEWSROOM -- Apr 27 -- JDate revenue and average paying subscribers increased 8% and 13%. During Q1, Spark redesigned and rebranded its Christian community (ChristianMingle.com) as Relationships.com, already the most-visited Christian community.  Revenue for Q1 2006 was $16.8 million, up 2% on Q1 2005. Spark has reduced spending for AmericanSingles in order to lower customer acquisition costs. Net income was $710,000. EBITDAS profit of $3.4 million, the best to date, up 10%.  Direct subscriber acquisition costs for JDate was $13.20, up 47%, and $35.19 for AmericanSingles, up 37%.  RELEASE @ SPARK NETWORKS

Mark Brooks: One can argue that niche dating sites could be quashed by the big dating sites improving their search capability (e.g. reverse search). However, that argument doesn't take into account the power of a niche dating brand; the attraction of a focused site geared towards a particular demographic, interest, fetish, etc.  E.g. Jdate (Jewish), Webdate (first date on a webcam), ChristianCafe.com (Christians), DateMyPet (Pet Lovers), Sexsearch (Sex Lovers?).  All are powerful brands, worlds apart.  Specific interest dating sites will endure and enjoy especially good word-of-mouth marketing efficiencies, if they do a good job.  Spark (American Singles) has recognised, 'if you can beat 'em, might as well join 'em,' and is shifting it's attention to it's niche dating sites. 

Married Man Sues After Dating Service Won't Match

SAN JOSE KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS -- Mar 27 -- John Claassen is taking eHarmony.com to court, because the popular online matchmaker refused to find him the perfect mate.  Why? Because he is married.  Claassen says he is legally separated. Claassen cites California civil code, section 51 and seeks $12,000 in civil penalties. 

Mark Brooks: Black or white, married or not.  That's the way eHarmony sees it.  That's their position, and when users are paying $50 a month to meet serious singles who are ready for a relationship (i.e. no baggage), why not. Ashley Madison takes a different (appalling) position.  Sexsearch.com doesn't mind separated singles. 

Finding a Partner is a Mouse Click Away

NORTHERN STAR ONLINE -- Mar 7 -- "Where other dating sites focus on the size of their databases and match on a picture and a paragraph, eHarmony is the only site that brings singles together using a scientifically-proven set of compatibility principles based on proven marital success," said Joe Zink, eHarmony spokesman. After the questionnaire is complete, 20 percent of members are left with a screen saying there isn't a match for them.   Other sites: Those of Arab descent have choices such as Arablounge.com and Arabium.com to pick from. For those not necessarily looking for soul mates, adultfriendfinder.com. 

Mark Brooks: Another mention for adult dating.  Seems the press are warming up to the casual dating sector a little.  Adultfriendfinder and Sexsearch were mentioned in a Wall Street Journal Online article last week. 

'Adult' Dating Sites Flourish

WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE -- Mar 1 -- Amid sluggish growth for dating Web sites, a different kind of matchmaking service is thriving online: so-called adult dating sites that dispense with courtship and urge members to head straight for the bedroom. With names like AdultFriendFinder.com, SexSearch.com and IWantU.com, adult dating sites purport to help users find one-night stands, swinger parties and other sexual escapades. "We enable someone to express themselves sexually in a place that doesn't make them feel dirty," said Andrew Conru, FriendFinder founder. He estimated that about half of his site's members are "actively seeking a sexual partner." Others take advantage of features such as chat rooms and blogs. Others are merely interested in being a "voyeur into other people's lifestyles." AdultFriendFinder's traffic rose 67% in January from a year earlier, according to Nielsen. SexSearch.com, the second-most visited adult dating site, tripled its traffic to 3.2 million unique visitors in January while running online advertisements that promise "real people, real sex." Nielsen said traffic to InterActiveCorp.'s Match.com, the most popular of the traditional dating sites it tracks, grew 7% to 4.5 million unique visitors over the same period. Holly Fabian, 40, of Warren, MI, joined AdultFriendFinder "as a joke" to browse the amusing content. She received 150 emails in 24 hours and discovered a man who shared her interests.  They met for dinner, and have been dating for the past two years.  FULL ARTICLE @ WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE

Mark Brooks: It's a rarity that the press write about the casual dating sites, much less Wall Street Journal. 

The Growth of Gay Online Dating

THE INDEPENDENT ONLINE -- Feb 19 -- Gaydar has 3.5 million members globally. The UK is by far its biggest market, with a total of almost one million members. Most are in big towns and cities, especially London, Manchester and Brighton. Most members are between 25 and 34.  There are leather queens in LA, sugar daddies in Shanghai, and, at every point of the compass, married men seeking "discreet meets". When Freud talked about "polymorphous perversity" he foresaw Gaydar. The site caters for any and every preference. Specialised chatrooms include chastity, chubbychasers, Eurovision, hypnosis, kilts and scallies. There is plenty to amuse and arouse, much to disgust, but absolutely nothing illegal. Gaydar membership is £60 a year.  This year, Europeans will spend £157m on online dating. They will spend £291m on "adult content." Go figure. Sex is what's really getting us online in such record numbers.  "Most of the big dating sites claim to be about actual dating aiming at actual relationships," says Nate Elliott of Jupiter Research. "Sites like Match.com and Datingdirect say they want people to meet and fall in love. Users say that friendship is their main goal, not physical intimacy."  The current advertising campaign for Match.com is the UK's biggest online dating promotion. Slogan: "We guarantee you'll find someone special within six months."  Gaydar's homepage features pictures of semi-naked men beckoning you to log on. Slogan: "What you want, when you want it."  "People definitely lie about what they're looking for," says Dr Monica Whitty, social psychologist at Queen's University and co-author of Cyberspace Romance: the Psychology of Online Dating.  "Often women will try to attract more men by claiming they're only after a casual relationship. Men will do the opposite. Both sexes are playing a game."  Gaydar makes ~£1 million a year in the UK alone.  Q Soft Consulting, currently employs a total of 40 people and owns, among other products, Gaydarradio and Gaydartravel. Today Gaydar has more than three million members, while Match.com has just 500,000 gay members.  Gaydargirls.com launches next month. Already 140,000 gay women have signed up.  In December 2005, Gaydar accounted for more than half of all gay website visits.  FULL ARTICLE @ THE INDEPENDENT

Mark Brooks: Fascinating insight on the gay and casual dating market. Sexsearch and Adult Friend Finder are the leading adult dating sites in the USA.  They fly under the wire because the personals rankings don't include them because of their adult content.  I never see them mentioned in the press.  The press don't want to talk about them, the analysts don't include them...but the people are voting for them in droves.  We're in the business of love, which means we're also in the sex business.  Better matches > more love > more sex, and the freedom to express one's sexual preferences are paramount for the success of prosperity of this industry.   

Where Should We Meet in Cyberspace?

BOISE WEEKLY -- Feb 8 -- On Bigchurch.com, a Christian dating site, users can search for bible passages by gospel and verse while looking for love (no same-sex searching allowed). On the other end of the spectrum, AdultFriendFinder.com offers to match up like-minded thrill-seekers of any bent.  For the tasteful hedonist, the site to visit is Nerve.com, a long-established online magazine that calls itself "more forthright and topical than 'erotica,' but less blockheadedly masculine than 'pornography.'" OKCupid is entirely free to use and quizzes users on their opinions about everything from politics to intimacy.  FULL ARTICLE @ BOISE WEEKLY

Mark Brooks: OKCupid and Plentyoffish.com are the big freebie sites these days.  Sexsearch.com is next in line to adultfriendfinder in the casual dating space.

Thousands Seek Sexual Partners Online

THE ROYAL GAZETTE -- Jan 22 -- Adultfindfriends.com, an international website which boasts that it is the "world's largest sex and swingers personals site" has 3,825 listings for Bermuda.  Dr. Adhemar explained that there are two types of socio-sexual orientation: People are either 'unrestricted' or 'restricted'. People surfing these sites are more likely to fall into the first group. Characteristics of the unrestricted group include "a willingness to engage in sexual interactions with partners even in the absence of closeness, commitment or emotional bonding," Dr. Adhemar said. A recent article piqued the interest of 208 men and 27 women who have since joined the site.

Mark Brooks: Here's how the adult/casual dating sites rank against the PG sites, per ranking.websearch.com. Adultfriendfinder 32, Sexsearch 66, Match 120, TRUE 133, eHarmony 333, American Singles 335.

Friends with Benefits. Buddies. Booty calls. Is this what dating has become?

THE SEATTLE TIMES -- Dec 11 -- Today's dating scene is about as easy to pigeonhole as the color of paint. Sure, there are plenty of traditionalists out there, but there are many others who don't date so much as hang out or hook up.  Some rely on what I'll politely call "bed buddies" to get them through the lonely times. Dating has changed dramatically. Fifty years ago, a single woman would sooner hide out in a darkened apartment than let her neighbors know she didn't have a Saturday night steady. These days, she'll post her picture on AdultFriendFinder or Lavalife's "Intimate Encounters" section to find a no-strings sex partner for the night.  "If somebody has no intention of looking for someone special in their life and just wants sex for fun and pleasure, isn't it better that they tell you up front?" says Pepper Schwartz, University of Washington sociology professor and author of "Finding Your Perfect Match." (and PerfectMatch.com spokesperson).  "The honesty may be a little difficult to take, but it might hurt less in the long run."  FULL ARTICLE @ SEATTLE TIMES

Mark Brooks: This is a groundbreaking article.  I rarely see the subject of casual dating sites broached in the press.  Some interesting social trends are empowering the press to start picking this subject area up.  Adultfriendfinder, Sexsearch and Mate1 are the top adult dating sites. 

Alt.com Personal Ads for Wide Range of Sexual Fetishes

WALL STREET NEWS CAST -- Nov 13 -- The alternative sites narrow their focus to create like-minded “communities” devoted to an individual sexual practice or a certain demographics and fetishes.   Nothing seems to be to taboo at ALT.com.  You will find someone wild and ready to play in an adult way here, such as an article on 75 ways to please your lover and more.  Alt.com has 250,000+ members world-wide. 

Mark Brooks: I used to work for FriendFinder.  There are actually some taboo's that their abuse team grooms the site for, but Alt is indeed the most extreme of their communities. Their 'adult' communities(AdultFriendFinder, Alt, OutPersonals) do a good job of helping people match on their not so mainstream sexual preferences.  Sexsearch is a newer entrant that is stealing some of AdultFriendFinder's thunder and is approaching 5 million members.  This important segment demands not to be ignored. However, I've yet to see these sites mentioned/recognised in the mainstream press.  Everyone likes sex, right?  Some people have more specific preferences.  Generally these more explicit, sexually oriented sites are regarded as 'casual,' but many couples have married after meeting their match on these sites.  They are the antithesis of the more altruistic relationship sites.  Except for TRUE which recently launched their 'Sexploration' which is a very nice adaptive 'lite' sexual preferences test. I'm a maverick apparently.  'Are you mild or wild?'  Try the test.

Adult Personals Focus on Casual Encounters and Big Bucks

WALL STREET NEWS CAST -- Nov 7 -- The “naughty niches” has become a major matchmaking market. And like its straight-arrow sibling, it is a very profitable one.  The reason for the success is simple: The sites are more important to them because their tastes are harder to match.  “When we started Friendfinder early in 1996, we found a lot of guys were posting profiles that were more risqué than we wanted on the site,” recalls Andrew Conru, Founder of Friendfinder. “We started out deleting them, but then we recognized the opportunity and started Adultfriendfinder.”  ComScore Media Metrix said the site drew 2,321,000 unique visitors in July 2002. That dwarfs the 788,000 that the generalized Friendfinder attracted that month.

Mark Brooks: According to Alexa, for adult a.k.a. casual dating sites, Adultfriendfinder.com is #1, Alt.com is #2 and Sexsearch.com is #3

PrivateDateFinder.com Lures Marrieds

PRWEB -- Sept 28 -- Newly launched PrivateDateFinder.com is the first and only dating site where you can find romance without anyone else knowing. The site offers a unique way to conceal both how you pay as well as eliminating all the tracks you leave behind. RELEASE @ PR WEB

Mark Brooks: This is a very controversial area.  Adultfriendfinder, Sexsearch and Eroticy are loaded with marrieds.  Ashley Madison actually targets them.  PrivateDateFinder is run on the Relationship Exchange platform which is owned by Vintacom, which was recently bought by CGI Holding, which was just renamed to Think Partnership. I find the practice of encouraging marrieds to cheat of great concern.  Your comments please. 

European Internet Dating Convention in Prague

Last Thursday and Friday I attended the European internet dating convention. Here are the pics. The conference was better attended than last year with 65 attendees and was more heavily attended by European dating companies. Last year half the attendees were American dating companies. Execs from U.S. notables Date.com, Match.com (UK based exec), and adult sites Sexsearch and Iwantu were present. Here’s a smattering of info for you from some of my favorite presentations:

Alex Burmaster is Jupiter Research's new European online dating analyst
- Germans are most likely to be online daters
- British men are most willing to pay for online dating
- Pre-screening to provide matches is the most popular feature to help find love online

Jan Becker, CEO of German leader Friendscout24
- There are 11 million singles in Germany with 1 in 3 single in big cities
- 43% of European users on the web have used online dating (Statistisches Bundesamt 2005)
- Top sites are be2.de and Parship.de for high end 'introductory type' (personality profiling) services

Christian Vollman, CEO of iLove
- iLove had over 2 million uniques in May 2005 according to Nielsen Netratings
- iLove bills mainly via SMS billing
- Their mobile JAVA application has been downloaded 12,000 times so far

Nick Davis, Marketing Director for mobile enabler Mobestar
- Most European providers have recently launched 3G services. Japan is experimenting with 4G
- There are 10 million European 3G users with 18 million expected by 3/06

Eythor Arnaulds is VP at mobile enabler Enpocket
- 'EDEN' is Enpocket's Dating Engine, receives 2 million hits per day, has 22 operators worldwide and powers Match on an exclusive basis in the U.S.
- Airtel in India has 700,000 paying mobile dating members averaging 600 messages per user!

Final Panel Session
- Match is now operating in 32 countries in 19 languages; most significant markets being U.S., Germany and France
- Parship.de is the German leader for personality profiling based services (personality profiling)
- Parship.de charges 179 Euros for 6 months!
- In Europe, the credit card does not rule. One service collects just 30% of it's payments via credit card

Other notable presentations include
- Frederic Bien, Director of Flirt.com
- Richard Exon, Bus Dev Director for Bartle Bogle Hegarty gave an excellent presentation on TV advertising

Marc Lesnick, the internet dating conference organiser, ran a speed-networking session as an experiment on the second day.  We'll see more speed-networking sessions at future events.  Socials in the first evening and a Prague penthouse party on Friday evening completed the event very nicely. 

The next iDate is the big one: See you in Miami Feb 1-2.

Hooking Up Is Out; Finding Your Perfect Match Is In!

PRNewswire -- Aug 23 -- PerfectMatch.com appears prominently in the "Must Love Dogs" movie trailer and throughout the extensive television campaign.  PerfectMatch's remarkable growth in 2005 has been driven by partnerships in entertainment with Sony Pictures' "Hitch," the Dr. Phil Show and Lifetime Television, as well as major online brands MSNBC, iVillage and drugstore.com. PerfectMatch is a premium "relationship" site and continues its impressive growth while the "casual" dating space faces an industry-wide slowdown. A primary reason for the slowed growth within the casual dating space is the emergence of the savvy Internet dater. "Casual sites like Match.com and Yahoo! Personals are terrific to introduce users to online dating," Mr. Dahl, CEO, stated continued. "As singles gain confidence, we can expect them to graduate to a community of like-minded people. At PerfectMatch, singles can do that because we have a community of genuine people looking for real love and sincere 'relationships.'"  PerfectMatch.com(TM), is preparing for another sizeable growth increase in 2006 with the release of a book "Finding Your Perfect Match" authored by PerfectMatch relationship authority Dr. Pepper Schwartz (Penguin), and a partnership with NBC Universal's "The Break-up" starring Vince Vaughn and Jennifer Aniston.  RELEASE @ RED NOVA

Mark Brooks: Match and Yahoo Personals, along with True.com I might add (a relationships site with a slightly broader perspective), allow users the freedom to decide what kind of relationships they are interested in. eHarmony and PerfectMatch are focused on people who are 'very single' and very motivated to hook up for a longer term relationship.  Examples of full-on casual dating sites include Adultfriendfinder/Passion.com (Alexa rank has gone from 100 to 45 over the prior 12 months), Sexsearch (Alexa rank grown from 1500 to 600), Mate1 (15,000 to 2,000).  Eroticy and IwantU are plugging along as well.  Morals aside, full-on casual dating sites are here to stay.  This segment is alive and kicking and not to be ignored.

SexSearch.com Adult Personals Mentioned On Howard Stern Show

PR NEWSWIRE -- July 8 -- Heidi Fleiss, Hollywood's madam and sex boutique owner, mentioned SexSearch.com adult personals three times in the course of the show, joking on how she should post her profile, while Howard Stern dropped the name twice.

Mark Brooks: A separate press release mentions Sexsearch has surpassed 3.5 million registrations. 

Former Friendfinder Executives Face Civil Suit

XBIZ -- May 18 -- Friendfinder (Various Inc) filed suit against affiliate managers, Jack Mardack and Sean Barrett for breach of contract, misappropriation of trade secrets and defamation, among other charges, after they left the company and formed Profit Lab, which does consulting work for competitor Sex Search.  Mardack is accused of poaching the company’s affiliate list and that both execs embezzled and diverted company funds.  The suit further alleges that Mardack shared its affiliate list with competitors, helped set up a competing joint venture while employed at Friendfinder and brokered unauthorized payouts while paying those funds to himself and Barrett, and that Mardack made false statements that the company’s “payment processing was in jeopardy due to Friendfinder’s bad financial condition.” Mardack denies all allegations and says he left FriendFinder because of a "hostile environment.  "I am saddened by the retaliatory sentiment and paranoid tone from Friendfinder. I didn’t take away such an affiliate list.  One who does business in this industry knows that everyone who works in it also has a personal list.” Friendfinder seeks damages and a permanent restraining order against Mardock and Barrett from future use of its affiliate list.  FULL ARTICLE @ XBIZ

Mark Brooks:  Fascinating.  In the sales world salespeople can walk away with their rolodex.  How is the affiliate world different?  I would argue that an affiliate manager should be able to take his 'relationships' from affiliates that he has recruited for the company.  But, not the affiliates already in place.  How to track?  Just what is a 'personal list?'  This case may well lead to some significant affiliate management legal precedents.  Watch this space.

Internet Creates a New Venue for Cheating

WILLIAMSPORT SUN-GAZETTE -- Jan 25 -- Across the country and around the world, people are increasingly caught up in a trend of cheating on the Internet via e-mail, instant messaging or adult Web sites. According to Dr. Dan Egli, a licensed psychologist in Williamsport, “no question about it. Internet cheating is one of the most common forms of unfaithfulness for a married couple today. It’s cheating and no different from meeting someone in a bar.”

Mark Brooks: Many of the adult dating sites have 'discrete relationship' categories. The top adult personals sites are AdultFriendFinder, Sexsearch and Eroticy. New entrant Ashley Madison Agency actually caters to cheaters.