BLK For Black Daters is Rising Star of Match Group Apps

BLK, a dating app specifically for black daters, has become one of the fastest-growing apps in the Match Group suite of dating apps. Match Group currently owns a substantial portion of the dating app market, including Tinder, OkCupid, Plenty of Fish and Hinge among others.

According to The Grio, during the first two weeks when COVID-19 was spreading and people were sheltering at home, BLK saw an 18% increase in daily activity. Now seven months into the pandemic, there is a 38% increase in activity month over month. BLK launched in 2017, and since has grown to over four million users. 

In a recent interview in Paper Magazine, BLK’s Head of Marketing and Brand Jonathan Kirkland pointed out that this year’s growth along with the Black Lives Matter movement has created a real community within the app, where users can discuss their experiences and “have an outlet for big conversations” with people who understand and have experienced similar challenges. In other words, the app is being used to forge connections outside of just dating.

Kirkland also points out that conversations about Black Lives Matter began to take place more inside popular apps like Tinder or OkCupid during the summer, but they were specific to the BLM movement after the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, when the visibility of the struggles black people endure at the hands of police was at its highest. On BLK, users can talk about many facets of the movement and the black experience in a safe space.

As one user pointed out, it became exhausting to explain issues that were important to her with guys from different cultural backgrounds and ethnicities whom she dated on more popular apps – topics like who Sandra Bland was, or what systemic racism is, or that police violence against black people does exist.

Kirkland noted: “…at BLK, we're always Black. That's our focus, that's our lens, that's who we are. And it's not just during a key cultural moment, or Black History Month, or something else in the calendar where it'll make sense."

Another issue that Kirkland pointed out was that black women tend to be ignored on dating apps, with their profiles being rejected more than any other ethnic group, even by black men, or alternately, they are fetishized by other users. Kirkland wanted to create a safer dating space for black women, and the app’s marketing campaigns cater to them. Women make up 45% of the app’s users, according to The Grio.

Kirkland’s plans for the app focus on building community, including the roll out of a series of new lifestyle and entertainment features early next year. His goal is to foster more connections for users both on the app and in the real world.

Kirkland added that the increase in subscribers "speaks to the fact that BLK was something that the community needed and wanted." He went on to say: “this is an app where you’re seen beyond the app.”