Cost

Just how crazy are single consumers for Tinder? And how much will they be willing to pay for the service?

The company is betting that certain features will be very valuable to Tinder users who have been requesting them since the service launched. So valuable that the company will be beta testing different price points in the UK, Germany and Brazil, with prices ranging from $.99 US to $4.99 to as high as $20.00 US for the premium version of the app, Tinder Plus.

Tinder Plus will roll out in these three markets first to determine how to proceed in other markets.

Online dating sites like OkCupid and Plenty of Fish have had a free model for a long time, which has managed to expand their membership databases and make them tough contenders with paid sites such as Match.com and eHarmony. But now that free dating apps like Tinder have entered the picture and taken the dating world by storm, the paid dating sites have seen not only a decline in membership, but also in revenues.

Is online dating on its way out?

According to a recent article in The Economist, paid online dating sites have reason to worry. In the article, The Economist points out Cupid, who runs subscription-based dating websites such as Cupid.com, UniformDating.com, and LoveBeginsAt.com, announced a $4.9 million loss in the first 6 months of 2014, up 20% from last year. The number of members has dropped, too. At the end of 2012, Cupid’s sites had 113,000 paying members, but by June 2014, they had just 48,000.

While this is a disturbing trend for online dating sites like Cupid – which haven’t really taken off like other paid sites Match.com and eHarmony – it could weed out many contenders in the online dating market over the next couple of years. However in contrast to Cupid's earnings, eHarmony recently reported incredible subscriber growth and better earnings than they have seen in years, due to focusing on long-term relationships and technology that they market as extremely valuable for finding the “right” match.

But what about popular free dating apps and websites like Tinder and old-timer OkCupid? They have attracted users because of their easy set-up and accessibility. They have made online dating less intimidating, (although a little more sketchy according to some users). Are they responsible for the decline in companies like Cupid? 

Not necessarily. Even free apps and websites aren’t so free anymore.

There has been a shift for the free dating apps and online sites to offer “freemium” services – that is, additional features to the basic service but for a price. In the current online dating market, revenue growth needs to happen for investors to remain interested, and that means charging for services once the user base is built. Tinder recently announced that it will launch a premium paid service in early November, while the basic features of the app will still be free. OkCupid started with a freemium model a while ago, charging users who want to filter profiles according to user preferences, or to be able to review and see reviews of other members.

Still others like eHarmony are adding more personalized matchmaking services at a very high price – thousands per year – for those who want a relationship but would like someone else to do the heavy lifting. eHarmony has not reported numbers to see the success of this particular service.

So what does the future look like for online dating? One thing is for sure: free models likely won’t last forever.

eHarmony recently launched a new service called eH+, which provides professional matchmaking for those willing to pay a fee for more personalized service. Now, the company is introducing Ashley, the matchmaker behind the new service.

Before you start envisioning sessions with Patti Stanger and some TV-worthy drama, Ashley is much more focused on understanding her client’s perspectives. She finds out where they seem to be running into roadblocks in their love lives, and what might be holding them back. She works with them through one-on-one conversation, feedback, and a focus on finding a mutually beneficial relationship.

According to eHarmony, Ashley’s focus is to create a great connection with her clients so that she’s better able to help you find a long-term, lasting relationship. She’s earned Master’s degrees in Marital and Family Therapy and a Doctorate in Psychology, so she’s trained to work with people to help cultivate healthy relationships.

So what does all of this personal service cost? It’s not cheap at $5,000 per year. But if you really are focused on finding the right relationship and you don’t want to spend hours in front of your computer pouring over profiles and sorting through all of eHarmony’s guided communication, this might be for you.

In fact, with eH+ you don’t even need a computer. You can talk to Ashley via phone or Skype (or however you prefer). She also calls you when she finds a match for you. It’s a good option for busy professionals who are looking for a little more personalized service, like hand-picked matches and follow-ups after dates.

eH+ sounds similar to traditional matchmaking services that provide one-on-one support to their clients, but instead of relying on a smaller pool of people, eHarmony can pull from its vast database to find you quality matches. In essence, eHarmony’s matching system is still doing the technical work of sifting through thousands of profiles to find the right matches for you, and the professional matchmaker is providing an extra level of service to help you improve your dating skills and connect with the person who is the best match.

According to eHarmony founder Neil Clark Warren, eHarmony has now 762,000 paying members, up 50% from last year. They won’t disclose how many people have signed up for the eH+ service, but Warren claims there has been great response.

eHarmony has its sights set to the future, though – and they are moving beyond the dating world. The company’s next focus is matching people with the right job. “Sixty-five to seventy-five percent of people in US are not happy with their job,” according to Warren. “They can be if they match on both the cultural basis with the company they work for and on individual personality basis with the person to whom they report," he said.

A new kind of LinkedIn based on eHarmony matching? I’d be curious to check it out.

To find out more about this dating site you can read our review of eHarmony.

A lot of people love online dating because of its convenience. It's hard to beat being able to scan through potential matches from the comfort of your own home, entirely at your leisure. Traditional dating can be found, but it can also be a huge time suck. Sometimes all you want is an efficient way to weed out the frogs from the princes (and princesses).

Online daters already know that dating websites are a great way to save time, but it turns out they're also a great way to save money. Couples who meet online tend to marry after a shorter period of time than couples who meet in real life, meaning that a courtship that begins via the Internet ends up being thousands of dollars cheaper than meeting and wooing someone offline.

According to market strategists at New York City-based ConvergEx Group, the average dating period prior to marriage for a couple who met in real life is approximately 42 months. Let's do some math: if that couple goes on one date per week, and that date costs around $130 (for food, drinks, entertainment tickets, etc.), then the total cost of that couple's courtship would be around $23,660.

The average time between meeting and marriage for couples who meet online, on the other hand, runs around 18.5 months. The average dating site customer spends $239 a year for online memberships, according to ConvergEx Group, and if we assume that the amount spent on dates is the same, an online dater saves $12,803 in comparison to an offline dater.

And what if the dates go Dutch? In that case, each online dater saves just over $6400. Not too shabby at all!

But, just because it's more acceptable, easier, and less expensive for people to meet online doesn't mean more US citizens are using dating sites to meet marriage partners. According to the Pew Research Center, only 51% of Americans were married in 2011 – a significant drop from the 72% who were married in 1960 – and the numbers are continuing to decline.

ConvergEx suggests that the trend could be in reaction to the high divorce rates seen throughout the 1970s and 80s. “Seeing their parents and/or friends’ parents go through a divorce has made today’s young people more cautious when it comes to finding a mate,” they say.

Many more of today's young people are putting their careers had of relationships, making them less reliant on a spouse for support and possibly also contributing to the decline in marriage. Marriage rates are reportedly also dropping faster among people with less education. "Declining marriage rates among those with lower levels of educational attainment is a warning sign that is worth watching," says ConvergEx, "especially if the trend continues."

Heads up, OkCupid users: the game is about to change on everybody's favorite free dating site.

The most observant OkCupid users may have already noticed a new feature has quietly appeared on their profiles. Click on your username and a drop-down menu appears with a new option: Promote Me. For an extra $2 fee, users who want a little extra attention on the site can promote themselves to fellow OkCupidites.

The feature is so new that OkCupid hasn't even released a formal press release, but word on the street is the site plans to formalize and publicize the new addition in the next few weeks. The question is: How will the introduction of a paid promotion feature alter the otherwise very democratic experience on OkCupid?

OkCupid co-founder and president Christian Rudder promises that little will change. "The idea is that we're showing you to the same people we would over time, but in a very condensed way," he told BuzzFeed. "We still only show you to good matches (high match percentage, nearby) - not just randoms." In other words, promoted profiles will always be people you would have been matched with eventually, they're just coming sooner than they might have without the paid promotion.

So how does paid promotion work? What the $2 fee actually gets you is 10 minutes of enhanced visibility. For those 10 minutes, your promoted profile is pushed to the front of the crowd in all areas of the site, like QuickMatch and "People You Might Like." Promoted profiles are not marked in any way, making them indistinguishable from other profiles. In tests of the new feature, BuzzFeed says, OkCupid found that those 10 minutes of promoted time gave users 30 times more exposure than they would have otherwise received in the same amount of time.

The jury is out on whether OkCupid's new strategy will work. Some fear that paid promotions will clutter the site's pages with less attractive users whose profiles aren't getting any attention. Others say that the exact opposite will happen. Since attractive users find it easier to get dates, supporters say, they stand to gain the most from increased exposure and will find the feature most useful.

Whichever direction the new feature goes, Promote Me is pretty much guaranteed to be a popular addition to the site. Rudder told BuzzFeed that over 2,500 people paid to promote themselves in the first 24 hours after launch, and that was before most OkCupid members were even aware Promote Me existed.

OkCupid has always been known for its cutting-edge approach to online dating. That edge became even more cutting earlier this month when The Coinbase Blog made an exciting announcement:

We're proud to announce you can now find true love with Bitcoin by using OKCupid! This is one more step forward for bringing Bitcoin to the masses - one date at a time.

That's right, OkCupid has just become the latest company to accept the controversial digital currency. The site's 4 million active members can now use Bitcoin to pay for "A-List" extra features, making OkCupid one of the largest sites to accept Bitcoin in the world. The real price will continue to be displayed officially in dollars on the site, and will be adjusted for Bitcoin users in real time to reflect the present exchange rate from Coinbase.

Coinbase is a Y Combinator startup that calls itself "the simplest way to buy, use, and accept Bitcoin." The platform to buy and sell the digital currency will keep a 1% transaction fee from all dealings with OkCupid.

OKCupid CEO Sam Yagan spoke to Ars Technica about the company's big news. "Our plan is to liquidate our holdings daily and turn them into US dollars," he said. "There's an open question as to how much liquidity there is. I think there's going to be a tremendous amount of volatility. One of the reasons why we want to be early in the mix is so we can learn."

OkCupid users had shown little interest in incorporating Bitcoins into their online dating experience - the number of requests for Bitcoin integration barely reached double digits - but Yagan is determined to keep OkCupid ahead of the pack.

"There's no question that these digital currencies are going to be the future," he said in a quote on Forbes.com. "Whether it's actually the form of Bitcoins or evolves into something else, we want to be out in front. We want to be the ones who have the experience. There's a lot to learn."

It is, without a doubt, a move in an interesting direction. There's certainly a degree of irony in an online dating site - where trust is a big factor and users are often concerned about scams - adopting an anonymous currency as a payment option. But it's a massive win for Bitcoin, which has already been enjoying a boost in mainstream attention and legitimacy.

OkCupid users: How do you feel about using a digital currency to pay for A-List subscriptions?