eHarmony

eHarmony was on the brink of disaster in 2012, ready to be sold to the highest bidder on the auction block, at least according to a recent article on Online Dating Insider. But the company was determined to turn things around.

According to eHarmony executives, “We took our hard won stash of capital and used $153.2M to buy out all the “Class B” shares, and we began the pursuit of our own company.  We asked five of our former and highly-esteemed board members to step aside and give us a chance to do more of what we needed to do to bring this company back.  We made tough decisions…let some people go, terminated vendor contracts. Moreover, we have cleaned up “our house” by appointing an all-new executive management team that is a more aligned team than we have ever had before.”

For those of us who did not know eHarmony was on the brink of financial ruin, this letter came as a surprise. In the time they were desperately struggling to tread water, Neil Clarke Warren, the company’s founder, came back on board as CEO and reminded the company of the reason they were successful in the first place – their focus on matching for long-term relationships.

While most dating sites and apps have gone in the opposite direction – focusing on quantity instead of quality of matches, and casual meetings instead of long-term relationship potential, eHamorny’s serious focus has paid off.

“Instead of losing 100,000 end of period subscribers each year, suffering...losses of 50% every single year, our EBITDA for 2014 will literally be dramatic and the cash in the bank increasing substantially each month. EBITDA is currently running $9.4M ahead of plan as we work with our forecasts. Our end of period paying subscriber count has hit its all-time high...”

eHarmony was not afraid to get rid of what wasn’t working. Trimming staff by over 30%, they went from about 300 employees to only 190 in all of the U.S., U.K. and Australia. They have also dropped vendors who weren’t contributing to the primary focus of the site – relationships. (That is, focusing on the long-term potential.)

eHarmony’s success rate speaks for itself. It claims to have made more than 600,000 marriages, and has only a 3.86% divorce rate (compared to the over 50% divorce rate of Americans in general).

The company plans to take its technology in other directions besides love. They are planning the launch of Elevated Careers by eHarmony, where they hope to make successful coupling between potential employees and employers by using the same psychologically-based matching system to help people find their dream jobs.

While the company didn’t offer exact figures, they did claim to have hundreds of thousands of users as well as 1.2 million matches. It looks like they have turned things around, though most of us didn’t even realize how much they were struggling.

To find out more about this dating service, you can read our eHarmony review.

Starting tomorrow and ending this Sunday eHarmony is offering a coupon code for members to receive 50% off on a 6 month membership. You can use the coupon code on the eHarmony website or dating app but it must be used from September 25th to (and including) September 28th, 2014.

The coupon code is: GET50OFF

Once you create a free profile and fill out the personality questionnaire you will be prompted if you want to purchase a subscription or continue on as a free account. A free account allows you to try out most of eHarmony's features but it does not include profile pictures and sending email. If you choose to purchase a subscription you will then be asked to enter the coupon code.

This code is for the United States only and reduces the 6 month eHarmony subscription by 50% which means it will only cost you $29.95 a month. To find out more about this dating service and why it is so popular you can read our review of eHarmony.

The end of August marked a very special milestone for eHarmony: the website’s 14^th birthday.

All those years ago online dating was still a young industry, and founder Dr. Neil Clark Warren (yep, the guy from the commercials) revolutionized it with his research-based approach to matching people for marriage. eHarmony famously created algorithms based on 29 Dimensions of Compatibility scientifically proven to predict successful long-term relationships. Fourteen years later, those algorithms are still going strong.

Since its inception, eHarmony has racked up more than 45 million subscribers – meaning approximately 1 out of every 7 people in America has subscribed to eHarmony at one point or another. The site is responsible for more than 600,000 marriages in its lifetime. On average, 438 people marry every day in the U.S. after being matched by eHarmony (that’s nearly 4% of all new marriages in the country!).

eHarmony has seen many major changes in the last 2 years, when Warren returned as CEO after previously leaving the company. Amongst the milestones are:

• The launch of eH+, a premium matchmaking service
• A cross-platform redesign of the website
• Record numbers of subscribers and mobile users
• New levels of profitability

“We are so proud of what we have achieved at eHarmony,” said Dr. Warren. “Our success in online dating underscores an opportunity to impact areas beyond online dating. We are launching new verticals in the coming months and years that broaden our reach--verticals that will build eHarmony into a relationship site. Soon, eHarmony will influence the way we look at finding a job, finding friends and solving loneliness.”

As it enters the next phase of its teens, eHarmony has big things in the works. Chief among them is Elevated Careers, a service to match employers with prospective employees and help people find their ideal jobs.  After 3 years of research, eHarmony hopes Elevated Careers will help users find fulfilling, meaningful jobs that last longer than the national average of 4.6 years.

When asked how eHarmony plans to make it work, Warren told Business Insider “The first thing we do when getting involved with a company is we want a short inventory filled out by every person in the company. Just asking how they perceive the culture of the company. We want that culture to be matched up with the culture of the person who’s the applicant.”

“The second thing we do,” he continued, “is we want the org chart of the company, so that if an individual wants to work in a particular part of the company, we want to know what skills are required of the applicant.”

And finally, he added, “we want to know whether the personality match of the applicant and the person they’re going to report to is a good fit for the company and individual. If we can get the culture, skillset, and personality right, we’re convinced that the typical 4.6 year average duration at a company in America, we’ll be able to take that way up.”

For more on this dating site and to find out why it has been such a popular online dating service you can read our review of eHarmony.

It’s no secret that eHarmony and Match.com are old rivals in the online dating space. Match.com has been building its empire through its parent company IAC, which has bought several successful dating sites and apps, including Tinder. eHarmony has remained focused on its technology and matching success, and has expanded to include matchmaking services for VIP clients who are willing to pay. In December, eHarmony plans to launch a new career-matching site as well.

Now it seems despite the different directions the companies are going, they still remain fierce competitors, especially when it comes to marketing and attracting new users. eHarmony recently ran a “#1” campaign, citing its success in making more long-term matches than any other online dating website. The problem is, without concrete numbers from all sites, it’s a little tough to prove. At least, according to the National Advertising Division (NAD), an investigative unit of the advertising industry’s system of self-regulation. The unit is administered by the Council of Better Business Bureaus.

This week, the National Advertising Division (NAD) recommended that eHarmony discontinue using certain “#1” advertising claims for the company’s dating website, including “#1 Most Marriages,” “#1 Most Enduring Marriages,” and “#1 Most Satisfying Marriages.” It seems that Match.com was the first to ask the regulators to look into the matter.

NAD reviewed claims made by eHarmony in broadcast, print and Internet advertising, following a challenge by Match.com, LLC. Match claims that this is advertising is misleading, as the numbers of marriages produced by both sites is extremely close. Also, eHarmony didn’t take into consideration Match’s entire network of sites co-branded under different names. This makes Match.com’s numbers much larger, and perhaps greater than eHarmony’s.

NAD concluded that, although the number of marriages that should have been attributed to Match could not be pinpointed, the actual difference between the number of individuals within the sample who met their spouse on eHarmony versus Match.com was even smaller than reported by eHarmony’s survey, or possibly favored Match.

In addition, eHarmony claimed its study was independent, although its co-authors included a former director of eHarmony Laboratories and a scientific advisor to eHarmony. When NAD informed the company of their findings, eHarmony agreed it would no longer describe the study as “independent.”

eHarmony, in its advertiser’s statement, said the company “respectfully disagrees with much of NAD’s analysis of our specific advertising claims.  However, because eHarmony values the NAD process and appreciates the NAD’s efforts, we will take NAD’s recommendations into consideration in our future advertising.”

In a recent interview with Business Insider, eHarmony CEO Neil Clark Warren lamented the growing popularity of dating apps like Tinder, where users can swipe left and right after judging someone based on a few photos and short description. Many people prefer the ease and accessibility of dating apps to filling out long questionnaires or writing detailed profiles.

As a psychologist, Warren has touted the benefits of matching based on compatibility - eHarmony's mission and the basis of its marketing – as opposed to the pitfalls of just leaving things to chance. He believes that the game-like dating experience apps like Tinder offer could lead to superficial relationships that don't last for the long-term. 

"I’m sad about it, to tell you the truth, because it doesn't work," he told Business Insider. "It won’t work over time. These new apps tend to be so superficial. They will allure a lot of people into thinking that they belong together when they perhaps don’t belong together at all. They’re depending on superficial almost accidental compatibility. Compatibility is a serious matter, and it’s very deep and very important to figure out."

Tinder has taken the dating world by storm, almost rendering traditional online dating sites with algorithms and matching technology passé. Instead, Tinder has managed to present dating as more like a game - something that engages people and is easy to use, if not very focused on the end result.

But one has to ask: why should any dating app or online dating company be invested in people coupling up? It takes away their business in an industry that relies on sheer numbers in order to sell their product or attract investment dollars.

Dr. Warren however, maintains that he is focused on the end goal: matching people for the long-term, and doing it scientifically. He tells Business Insider that while "it isn't horrible to date people who aren't perfect for you," he thinks that these relationships will accidentally extend into something long-term, like marriage, where the partners eventually split. 

"These companies that are bringing out these apps, they haven't done any careful research about what works," Warren said. "They're just trying to throw something out there that makes money for the company."

He added: "As a psychologist, I've presided over the funerals of an awful lot of marriages, and I've seen people suffer a tremendous amount of pain who went through horrible divorces."

While this might be a little misleading - after all, to some extent, love happens by chance - be it through a dating app or an online dating site, or even while standing in line for your morning coffee. Connection happens, and sometimes it just has to be pursued, regardless of how compatible you are. But for those looking for more serious relationships, would you place your heart in the hands of Tinder or eHarmony?

eHarmony has started today a 4 day Free Communication Weekend which runs from 12:01AM Friday, August 15th to 11:59PM Monday, August 18th (Pacific Standard Time).

This will most likely be the last free communication weekend (FCW) of the summer. So if you are interested in trying out this dating service, now is the chance to do it for no cost and with no credit card required.

All new and existing free members participate in FCW so once you have created your membership account and taken the personality questionnaire all you need to do is review your new matches. Once you have selected one or more members you would like to converse with you then start the guided communication process. This is a series of 3 or 4 questions that you ask your match. He or she will then answer the questions along with asking their own. This process is a great way to break the ice and helps get the conversation going. Once it is complete you can then start mailing the person directly. This FCW does not include eHarmony's secure call, profile photos or skip straight to email. To enable these features you will would have to purchase a subscription.

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