Match Group

An article at the Globe & Mail looks at the increased popularity of online dating since the downturn in the economy which started in the fall. They include a couple of reasons for this. The main point mentioned is, people rather use online dating first to filter out the duds (their word) before spending good money on an expensive dinner.

It's a pretty good deal at $25 a month to go out and meet people online, versus going out and spending 50 to 100 bucks per night and possibly not meeting anyone.

The other reason they suggest is bad times makes people re-prioritize what is important in life. I agree with both of these points, plus I think online dating is also a good distraction from bad times. Nothing legal gives you a better high than when you find someone that gives you that butterfly feeling in your stomach.

The article also gave us a few more statistics of some of our reviewed dating sites. Lavalife member registrations are up 11 percent from November with Toronto leading the charge with a 20 percent increase (Lavalife is based in Toronto). Messaging among members on Lavalife is also at a 6 month high. At the same time Plenty of Fish has had a banner year with a 77 percent increase from December 2007 until December 2008. Apparently about 900,000 people log in every day. A poll at Date.com also discovered that almost 50 percent of members are now spending more time on their dating site making sure they have found Mr or Miss Right before they go out on a date.

Since last Fridays story called Chemistry.com's Chief Scientific Advisor is on ABC's 20/20 Tonight we have learned that Dr. Helen Fisher and Chemistry.com will be featured on other popular network TV shows like USA Today, ABC’s The View, CNN and GMA Weekend. if you missed the 20/20 special then you can check it out online at ABC News. Dr. Fisher was on Good Morning America as well last Monday, discussing her book which examines true love.

As Valentine's Day approaches you will see Dr. Fisher and Chemistry.com more and more in both print and video. This include Feb. 11 in USA Today, Feb. 12 on The View and on her busiest day, Friday February the 13th, where she has 30 interviews scheduled on morning shows across the country.

I am in the midst of setting up a new category for free dating sites and it will initially include reviews for the following 3 free dating services.

• DownToEarth.com
• OkCupid.com
• PlentyOfFish.com

These dating reviews will be setup the same way as our other reviews and users will have the ability to submit their own reviews of these dating services as well. I hope to get everything together by the end of February.

I just notice that Chemistry is going to offer a 48 hour Chemistry Flirt-a-thon. Starting Wednesday, January 28 to Thursday, January 29 all members will be able to flirt, communicate and connect for FREE. This means tomorrow, as a free member, you will have almost all the features a paid member has. I can't think of a better time to try out see if this popular matchmaking service would be a good fit for you.

This is the first time, as far as we know that Chemistry has run this type of promotion for all of North America. Chemistry's main competitor, eHarmony, has run similar free promotions but there's usually fall on the weekends or holidays. The one difference between the two promotions is Chemistry's is open to all users and not just new members like with eHarmony.

Read our Chemistry.com review for more information on this popular dating site.

Dr. Helen Fisher was at the iDate conference which was recently held in Miami. Dr. Helen Fisher is Chemistry's chief scientific advisor for their match system. David Evans of The Online Dating Insider shared with us some information he learned from her keynote speech:

• Dr. Helen Fisher studied 178k people on Chemistry.com.
• The Chemistry questionnaire has been taken by 7 million in 39 countries.

Chemistry currently has 4 million paid and registered users (info from their about us page on IAC) so it looks like just under half never signed up after the profile questionnaire.

For more information on this personality matching dating site, read our [staticpage: Chemistry review].

There is a promising future for mobile dating as predicted by Juniper Research. They claim the value of the chatroom market and mobile dating will grow to almost $1.4 billion by 2013. For the most part revenue will be generated by subscriptions but event-based charging (like paying a fee to contact someone or virtual gifts) and advertising will continue to become a larger part of the revenue stream.

... many companies which have migrated to this approach are seeing conversion rates amongst customers buying premium rate goods and services which generate revenues significantly in excess of those achieved under flat rate subscriptions.

By 2011 it is predicted less than 30 percent of mobile dating customers will be on a flat rate subscription model. China and Japan currently have the largest number of mobile dating customers.

There is no mention what the 2008 revenue is for this market. Currently from our reviewed online dating services, Match.com (called matchMobile), Date.com, Lavalife, DatingDirect and Shaadi.com all offer a mobile phone service along with their dating website. Other sites like MeetMoi also offer location based mobile dating based on the GPS in your phone (with lots of privacy options of course). With the rise of 3G and the large bandwidth it provides I expect to see the rise of video mobile dating as well.

For reviews on dating services that offer a mobile/cell phone dating service check out our new Mobile Dating Category.