Internet Dating Video News Summaries

Internet Dating Video News Summary #21

OPW Weekly News Roundup - December 10th, 2009 from Mark Brooks on Vimeo.

Hello, and welcome to Online Personal Watch’s Weekly News Roundup. I’m Mark Brooks, and here are the latest headlines from around the industry.

This edition of the weekly news roundup is kindly sponsored by iovation.

Blackbox Republic is officially open for business with the launch of a private network for people of all orientations and lifestyles. The website aims to blend the best features of social networking with the personal perks of online dating. In the words of CEO, Sam Lawrence, “if Facebook and Match.com had a love child it would be Blackbox Republic”. (Blackbox Republix is a new Courtland Brooks client, I should note)

Just in case you missed the announcement before, Zoosk has raised a whopping $30 million in series D funding. The round was led by new investor Bessemer Venture Partners with the cooperation of existing partners Canaan and ATA ventures. If you think 30 million is a great number, then 40 million is even better. That is the total number of singles who are currently using the Zoosk application.

Russian dating website Mamba is also peeking 8 digits with just over 11 million members. They’re also seeing over 100,000 concurrent users now. Now for Hookups and Breakups! CommunityMatrimony.com recently “tied the Knot” with Twitter. Members of Community Matrimony now have the bonus feature of adding their Twitter updates to their Matrimony profile!

The adultery site, AshleyMadison.com, is attempting to secure a promotional contract with Tiger Woods. Ashley Madison offered Tiger Woods $5 million to promote for AshelyMadison. Wood’s marriage troubles, of course, were recently made public knowledge. CEO,Noel Biderman said he has preserved more marriages than he has destroyed.

Meanwhile, online dating website IllicitEncounters.com has reported a huge increase in the number of financial workers signing up to have an affair. Out of the 380,000 members across Britain, 20,000 work in financial services.

Match.com is gung-ho about mobile dating and is at it again with the release of a new mobile app for Sprint Network’s Palm Pixi phone. Users will be able to view singles in their area, edit their profile, and connect with other singles while away from their computers.

Finally, iDate awards voting is now open to the public alongside industry professionals! As a reminder you have until January 7th to get your voting in for the 1st ever Internet Dating Industry Awards. Let your voice be heard. Submit your picks for the best dating site, best matchmaker, best dating software provider, most innovative company and more. Awards will be handed out in a special ceremony on Jan. 28 during the 7th Annual Internet Dating Conference in Miami.

This edition of Online Personal Watch’s Weekly News Roundup has been sponsored by iovation. iovation, helping companies expose cybercriminals and fight fraud with device reputation.

That’s all for this week’s news roundup. Tune in again next week as we bring you the latest and greatest from the world of online dating. No ads, no fluff, just raw news and CEO interviews. I’m Mark Brooks. Thank you.

Internet Dating Video News Summary #16

OPW Weekly News Summary - Nov 5th, 2009 from Mark Brooks on Vimeo.

Hello, and welcome to Online Personal Watch’s Weekly News Roundup. I’m Mark Brooks, and here are the latest headlines from around the industry.

Despite the poor economy, online dating has continued to thrive. This includes related white label businesses. Ross Williams, founder of White Label Dating, even told Britain’s Real Business magazine that the recession “doubled my business.”

Williams in the interview said White Label Dating’s turnover doubled to 25 million pounds in 2009 and that he is expecting an additional 100 percent growth this year.

In the past five months, White Label Dating has unveiled 186 new dating sites, including ones for Borders, Cosmo and Men's Health. With these new launches, White Label Dating now runs more than 2,571 sites worldwide -- 1,138 of which are in the U.K.

Dating Factory, a new option for white label dating solutions, has also seen success. In a statement exclusively to Online Personals Watch, Dating Factory CEO Tanya Fathers, formerly of World Dating Partners, said:

“The DatingFactory.com project was launched during the recession mainly because we identified the online dating market as the one of the most recession-proof areas on the Internet. Our revenue in October has grown. One of the recipes for success for DatingFactory.com  is to focus on high profit non-English countries as well as traditional U.K., USA, and Far East  markets. This gives our partners opportunities to diversify their efforts to create an even more stableRe income during this time of recession.”

Who else is on the upswing during the recession? The mobile dating market is doing ok. Worldwide, it has grown from $330 million in 2007 to $550 million in 2008. Juniper Research predicts revenue will double to $1.3 billion by 2013.

A new mobile plug-in for Apple products is now available from Mamba, Russia’s largest dating service. Mamba.App gives users access to all the basic Mamba services, including search, IM and profile updating. Mamba has over 11 million members, with 80,000 online at any one time.

Moving on, let's have a look at an interesting magazine study of women and online dating. According to new polls from Self Magazine, online dating is currently most popular with middle-aged women.

68% of women over 51 use dating sites, as compared to just 29% of 18-25 year old women. And around 50% of women ages 26-50 use dating sites.

When it comes to looking for sex buddies online, middle-aged women are again leading the pack. 27% of women over 51 are using the Web to initiate intimate encounters, as compared to 12% of 18-25 year olds. 18% of women 26-35, and 21% of females 36 to 50.

Also of note, more than 30% of women aged 26 to 50 have flirted with a stranger online while in a relationship, according to the survey. OnlineBootyCall, Fling and other hookup websites tend to outperform many mainstream online dating sites in terms of the amount of traffic they receive. Last May, Match.com had 5 million unique visitors, while AdultFriendFinder had nearly 24 million and Fling 18 million.

Speaking of intimate encounters, Ashley Madison, a site that helps facilitate extramarital affairs, is beginning to attract more gay and bi-curious members. Of Ashley Madison’s 4.7 million members, more than 143,000 are looking for same-sex encounters. Two-thirds are women seeking women. The remainder are men looking for men.

Finally, there’s still time to submit your nominations for the first annual iDate awards. Categories include best dating site, best software provider, best matchmaker and best affiliate program. The awards will be held on January 28 during the Internet Dating Conference in Miami. To submit your nominations, please visit www.idate2010.com. The nominations and voting, I should note, are heavily weighted towards Internet Dating Executive Alliance members. So, if you're an executive at an internet dating company, please, we're counting on you taking a minute to nominate companies, and vote.

This edition of Online Personal Watch’s Weekly News Roundup has been sponsored by Viximo. Viximo, helping the internet dating industry to get their virtual gifting and virtual currency offerings right first time, profitably.

That’s all for this week’s news roundup. Tune in again next week as we bring you the latest and greatest from the world of online dating. No ads, no fluff, just raw news and CEO interviews. I’m Mark Brooks.  Thank you.

Internet Dating Video News Summary #14

OPW Weekly News Summary - October 23rd, 2009 from Mark Brooks on Vimeo.

Hello, and welcome to Online Personal Watch’s Weekly News Roundup. I’m Mark Brooks, and here are the latest headlines from around the industry.

Niche online dating network People Media has received recognition for its remarkable revenue growth from Deloitte LLP. Deloitte ranked People Media #359 on its annual Technology Fast 500 list. This list measures the fastest-growing technology companies in North America. 

Rankings are based on the percentage of annual fiscal revenue growth over the past five years. During this period, People Media grew 342 percent. Interest in targeted dating sites has exploded over the last several years. People Media’s 27 dating sites each cater to a particular community, from seniors to single parents and numerous religious affiliations.

Congratulations to social dating site, Zoosk, for reaching the big four-oh… that is, 40 million users on its service. Here are some quick stats about Zoosk. The site launched in 2007 and now draws around 12 million unique visitors per month. The revenue run rate at Zoosk is 30 million dollars, and the company expects revenue for 2009 to be between 18 and 20 million dollars.

Zoosk has been able to dominate the dating sector on networks like Facebook, MySpace and Bebo against a backdrop of competitors which include Hotornot, Speeddate.com, and Are You Interested.

Congratulations also go out to the newly-launched eLove.com. The service offers both online dating AND traditional matchmaking. eLove is actually running on the LoveAccess platform. The site has been revamped and soft launched and offers video profiles and both text and audio chat among other things. Those desiring more personalized attention can get help from one of eLove’s matchmakers. Users decide which mode of service they want to use: online dating, or the higher end matchmaking services.

Time now for our hook-ups and break-ups segment. Here’s a rundown of the new partnerships that were announced this week:

- Sugar daddy dating site SugarDaddyForMe now offer voice and SMS features. These services will be powered by the anonymous mobile calling platform, IcallU, by Swissmatch.

- Match renewed its distribution contract with Australia’s nine-msn network. The agreement was started in 2008 and has been renewed for 3 years, no less

- MSN Russia, meanwhile, will be partnering with Mamba, the country’s largest Internet dating company. Mamba also owns a white label system that brings together more than 20,000 partners.

- AARP, the largest organization for Americans 50 and over, has hired Dr. Pepper Schwartz to be their new Love & Relationships expert. Dr. Schwartz is also a consultant for the personality profiling site, Perfectmatch.

This hook-up really caught my attention because I think it’s about time AARP teamed up with a personality profiling dating site and ran their own co-branded site. I wonder if we will soon see an AARP and PerfectMatch co-brand?

As for this week’s break-ups, Australian dating network Cupid Media is breaking up with… it’s members? Cupid Media has been rejecting 3,000 profiles a day. The service believes these accounts have been created by fraudsters trying to dupe singles. Actually, all dating sites have a problem with this sort of thing. So the dating industry reviews profiles, uses tools like iovation and often blocks countries, wholesale.

That’s all for this week’s news roundup. Tune in again next week as we bring you the latest and greatest from the world of online dating. No ads, no fluff, just raw news and CEO interviews. I’m Mark Brooks.  Thank you.