Online Dating

Countless singles have professed their love for pizza on their dating profiles. But would they trust a purveyor of pizza to find their perfect romantic match? That may soon be an option for singles in the Netherlands, where Domino’s Pizza has revealed plans to launch a branded dating app.

Domino’s chief executive Don Meij announced the upcoming app, which will match customers according to their favorite toppings, at the company's general meeting in Brisbane in early November 2018.

“Simply swipe your favourite pizza and the Domino's dating app will connect you to other pizza lovers, find a match, and go on a date,” he said. “Domino's provides the meal, and even the conversation starters. What better to bond over than your shared love of pineapple on pizzas?”

Bumble has made experiential marketing a core part of its strategy to expand its user base. Last year, the company launched a series of roving pop-up spaces that debuted in New York City and has since made stops in London, Los Angeles, and Vancouver. Earlier this year, Bumble teamed up with HBO on a "Stay Home To The Movies" activation set in a New York City brownstone that aimed to recreate the experience of a romantic night in.

Bumble’s latest move to bring the dating experience offline is a partnership with Marriott International's Moxy Hotels. Certain Moxy locations will host "BumbleSpot #attheMoxy” events where Bumble users can bring their connections from the digital sphere to real life. BumbleSpots are places that have been verified by Bumble as inclusive environments in which to meet connections from Bumble’s dating, friendship and professional networking services.

“At Bumble, we’re more than just a dating app – we’re a mission-driven platform that connects people across the most important relationships in their lives in love, friendship and business. We’ve worked so hard to cultivate a safe and empowering community online and we’re always looking for opportunities to help our users bring those connections to life,” said Andee Olson, director of partnerships at Bumble. “The idea for BumbleSpot is to create a network of physical locations across the US and Canada that support our mission to end misogyny and empower women in their relationships across all aspects of life.”

Online dating company eHarmony will be introducing a new feature to try and prevent its members from ghosting each other on the site.

According to an exclusive in Yahoo! Finance, the anti-ghosting feature is a chat bot which uses A.I. technology to assess activity between members, as well as pulling information from profiles to help encourage conversation. If the feature notes that you and a match were messaging for several days or weeks and then stopped, it will prompt each of you with a message like “hey, this person stopped talking to you. Say something.”

The chat bot also provides specific questions based on the information it can gather from each of your profiles. For instance, if the chat bot notices your match likes certain TV shows, or old school jazz music, the chat bot will prompt you to ask her about her interests. For example, it might say “ask her about Game of Thrones,” encouraging you to not only message your match but provide you with a conversation starter.

Brian Norgard, who has reigned as Tinder’s chief of product the past two years, announced his resignation.

According to website Tech Crunch, Norgard says he is exiting on a positive note and plans to get back to his entrepreneurial roots. Before he joined Tinder, he founded startup messaging app Tappy, which was acquired in 2014, along with Facebook messaging app Chill, another successful startup with 30 million users. When Norgard first joined Tinder, he was head of revenue and moved on to his chief of product role.

Norgard cites Keith Rabois of PayPal as his inspiration for leaving to pursue something new.

“It’s been a great ride but my strength has always been in the early-stage game,” Norgard told TechCrunch. “What I’m trying to do now is take all the learnings from that wonderful experience and bring them into my investing.”

Chappy, a dating app for gay and bisexual men, has announced a new partnership with GLAAD. As of November 2018, every chat initiated by Chappy users will raise money for GLAAD’S work to accelerate acceptance for the LGBTQ community through an initiative called “Chats For Charity.”

“Chats For Charity” is designed to unite and mobilize the LGBTQ community around a common interest, to support global LGBTQ voices, and to influence the community to be tolerant, respectful, inclusive and non-discriminatory.

“Every time Chappy users chat and connect with each other, they will be supporting GLAAD’s culture-changing LGBTQ work,” said Zeke Stokes, vice president of programs at GLAAD. “Chappy is making a powerful commitment to LGBTQ acceptance and we are proud to partner with them on this initiative as well as their broader work to build community.”

Bumble disclosed in an exclusive to website Bustle that they will soon be launching a new feature called BumbleSpots to help its members meet face-to-face.

BumbleSpots offers Bumble-verified locations where its members can meet so they feel safe grabbing a drink with a match for the first time IRL. It’s a new way for the female-friendly dating app to appeal to its prime market: single women.

Getting people to meet in person instead of messaging each other over a dating app is no small feat. Tinder and Hinge have been trying different approaches to get users to meet face to face, but it’s still a difficult proposition. This is especially tough for female daters, who feel unsafe meeting strangers at locations or neighborhoods that are unfamiliar. Bumble wants to remove as many barriers as possible for women to feel more empowered in the online dating process - not only to reach out via a dating app, but also initiate meeting in person.