Industry

Match Group signed a partnership deal with OpenAI’s ChatGPT-4, which includes over 1,000 ChatGPT Enterprise licenses for company employees to help with their work-related tasks. Match Group noted that the press release announcing the move was written by ChatGPT.

While Match Group has been heavily focused on using AI to develop new features for its platform, this move incorporates it into the company’s internal workflow. Employees will use ChatGPT-4 to aid with coding, design, analysis, to build templates, and other tasks.

It will also help with marketing communications, although the press release is a bit over the top. As Tech Crunch notes, even though releases are designed to create buzz and excitement, Match’s latest announcement is heavy with love analogies and puns, which makes for a groan-inducing read.

New research has shown that the dating app market, once booming after the pandemic, has started to show signs of slowing down.

According to Tech Crunch, research firm data.ai found that global downloads of dating apps saw very tepid growth year-over-year in January 2024. The slight increase of 1.9 percent (128 million installs) from January 2023 was down drastically from the 29 percent increase seen the year before.

In the U.S., data.ai found only a 2.38 percent year-over-year growth from January 2023 to January 2024, with 12.7 million installs, down from a 16 percent growth seen during the same time period last year.

The U.S. market is one of the largest and most lucrative for dating apps, but Pew reported last year that only three in ten U.S. adults had ever used a dating app or online dating site, the same percentage that was reported in 2019. This was surprising considering how dating apps took off during the pandemic and the years immediately following.

Some dating app users are becoming creative in their frustration with matches they are served and have started using hacks to trip up the algorithms behind the matching.

According to a recent feature in The New York Times, these hacks are aimed at besting the algorithm so that users can try and access different results. The tricky part is, the dating apps are putting more and more features behind a paywall, so it’s getting more convoluted to try and get around the algorithm.

But some dating app hackers are finding success and posting their methods on TikTok and Reddit. For example, some users recommend deactivating and then reactivating your account to get a fresh set of matches, according to The New York Times. Some have also suggested rejecting a bunch of attractive profiles to throw off the matching process, or to switch your location to a different city, which is like pressing “refresh” on your matches.

Match Group released its first quarter revenue forecast, falling below Wall Street analyst expectations as users continue to cut back on their dating app spending.

According to Reuters, the company also authorized a $1 billion share buyback plan.

The company, which owns Tinder, Hinge, OkCupid and Match among other dating apps, said paying users declined 5 percent in the fourth quarter of 2023 compared to the previous year, to 15.2 million. It expects revenue between $850 and $860 million for the first quarter, down from analysts’ forecasts of $867 million on average, according to Reuters.

OkCupid just celebrated its 20th anniversary and released some interesting dating trends as we start 2024, driven mostly by its younger users. The irreverent dating app has attracted a wide array of singles over the years, thanks to its unique question and answer format for people to get to know each other.

The dating app surveyed close to one million of its users and found that almost 80 percent consider themselves independent daters, and those who declare themselves as independent are receiving 5 percent more likes compared to people who say they aren’t.

In fact, according to the company's blog post, in 2023 there was a 181 percent increase in mentions of “independent” on OkCupid profiles, which points to healthier dating trends in 2024. Other dating apps have also found their users (especially younger Gen Z daters) want to focus on their mental health and well-being before getting involved in a new relationship, so it seems to be a trend.

Image: eHarmony

eharmony unveiled a new ad for its dating app in time for dating’s busiest season, but the LGBTQ+-led campaign did not go over well with Christian groups.

The ad features a lesbian couple snuggled up on the couch waiting for their laundry to finish. When the buzzer goes off, one partner gets up to retrieve the laundry while the other lies on the bed, waiting and smiling. Then her partner unloads all the clean laundry on her, and she is elated and taking in the warmth of the clothes fresh out of the dryer. The tagline for the ad is: “Get who gets you.”

According to The Pink News, despite the cute and feel-good premise, right wing Christian activist group One Million Moms has launched a petition to remove the ad from the air, and so far have received over 12,000 signatures. The organization claimed that the ad was airing during “prime time” when children were likely to be watching television and was “crossing a line that eharmony should have never crossed,” according to the petition.