Hello, and welcome to Online Personals 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 messmo Media.
Real Simple Magazine recently ranked four of the most popular internet dating websites in what could be considered a battle of the titans! Here are a few of the stats:
- Plenty of Fish came in at number 1 with free membership, 3 million users per month and a 12 minute registration time.
- Match.com is a close second with a membership fee of $30 a month, 3 million users per month, and a registration time of 15 minutes.
- True.com came in third with a membership fee of $50 a month, 2.5 million users per month, and a registration time of 10 minutes.
- eHarmony came in fourth with a membership fee of $60 a month, 2 million users per month, and a registration time of 25 minutes.
Moving on, the parent company of extramarital websites AshleyMadison.com, CougarLife.com, and EstablishedMen.com is pushing for IPO! Avid life Media has raised $60m and is pursuing a listing on the Toronto stock exchange. Avid Life Media posted $30 million in sales and $8 million in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization in 2009.
Match.com recently launched a new relationship website. While Match.com focuses more on dating and allowing members to look around for suitable partners, their new brand MatchAffinity takes a more scientific approach to match making. Each user takes a simple psychometric style test and will then be matched with other members on the site based on a percentage compatibility ratio.
iovation is very successfully fighting internet crime. The website stops over 30,000 fraudulent activities per day to be exact. The provider of reputation services for preventing online fraud and abuse has announced monthly recurring revenues are up 50% since the beginning of 2009. iovation has performed 2.7 billion reputation checks on behalf of customers, processing nearly doubled in 2009 over 2008.
Now for our hookups and breakups.
Lovestruck.com partnered with Fetch Media to manage their mobile media strategy and advertising campaigns. Lovestruck.com matches daters whose offices are located close to each other in order to meet for coffee, lunch or after-work rendezvous. Boonex, meanwhile, has teamed up with Messmo for their mobile offerings. Thanks to messmo, sites can now easily extend the reach of their existing member-to-member communications through the use of mobile messaging.
Just in case you missed the announcement, WhiteLabelDating.com is now offering profile matching technology to all of its partners and brands looking to build online dating sites after signing a deal with IntroAnalytics. The technology matches member profiles based on implicit behavior as they move around the site, rather than relying on the user’s preferences or questionnaires.
Finally, here are the winners for the first ever 2010 iDate awards:
- Zoosk took home 2 awards for the best up and coming dating site and best mobile dating site
- Match.com also took home 2 awards for best dating site design and best dating site
- eHarmony won best marketing campaign
- FriendFinder was announced best affiliate program
- PayPal was named the best payment system
- iovation was acknowledged for best new technology
- OKCupid won an award for most innovative company
- Cupid's Coach Julie Ferman was awarded best matchmaker
- and White Label Dating snagged the award for best dating software provider
Congratulations to our winners!
This edition of Online Personal Watch’s Weekly News Roundup has been sponsored by messmo Media. Make real money with mobile dating. Talk to Brendan O’Kane of messmo Media.
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.