Marketing

U.S. Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg is making history as the first candidate to have met his spouse on a dating app. The young millennial mayor of South Bend, Indiana and rising star in the sea of Democratic hopefuls disclosed that he and his husband met on Hinge.

In a profile in The New York Times in 2018, Buttegieg’s husband Chasten Glezman said he downloaded Hinge because he “wanted a platform where you’re not necessarily inundated with hookup culture and sex.” Hinge has marketed itself as a dating app for more serious daters since its inception, and has recently doubled down on this effort with a redesign aimed at helping users find relationships so they can delete the app.

Match Group announced some changes in key leadership and company structure in light of its new focus on the Asian market.

As U.S. and European markets make up the bulk of revenue for Match Group, the company sees great untapped potential in Asian markets, where young single populations are booming. According to Tech Crunch, there are more than 400 million singles in Southeast Asia and two-thirds have not tried a dating app.

Match Group is focusing on Japan, Taiwan, India, South Korea and Southeast Asia with three new general managers hired to oversee expansion in these areas. One manager is Junya Ishibashi, who will become general manager of Match Group for Japan and Taiwan. Taru Kapoor will be general manager of Match Group India, and Lyla Seo is now GM of Match Group for South Korea and Southeast Asia.

Hinge has taken a bold new step in differentiating itself in a crowded dating app market. Its new branding campaign was just unveiled with the slogan “designed to be deleted,” assuring users of its intention: to help them find serious relationships and get off the app for good.

According to The Verge, Hinge has also debuted a new redesign to put this message front and center for users. The new profile creation process utilizes animation and prompts for users to add information about themselves, adding the tag at the end of each suggestion: “so you can delete us.”

Image: Bumble

Dating app Bumble has set its sights on partnering with prominent female leaders, including tennis champion Serena Williams. The company just announced that she will be an investor and active member of the new Bumble Fund, as well as a global ambassador for the brand.

The Bumble Fund is an investment fund started by Bumble founder and CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd to help female entrepreneurs get support for their projects and businesses. It’s also a great way to market the company’s networking app Bumble Bizz. The Bumble Fund focuses on getting businesses started with initial funding, ranging anywhere from $5,000 to $250,000, primarily for businesses led by women of color and underrepresented groups.

Image: Adweek

Dating app Bumble repurposed a coffee shop to act as a gathering space for attendees of the famous SXSW festival in Austin, Texas. The company wanted to create a more intimate and inviting space to allow its customers to better connect, as well as to show off the capabilities of its platform.

Bumble’s headquarters are also located in Austin, and while there is traditional booth space available for companies looking to market themselves to SXSW attendees, Bumble chose a more engaging way to reach out to potential customers, according to AdWeek. They rebranded a local coffee shop in their signature yellow, providing comfy couches and tables along with a tagged wall saying: “Make the First Move.”

The 2018 Winter Olympics brought a flurry of Tinder activity to South Korea. Competitors in the Olympic Villages received free Tinder Gold upgrades, while premium users around the world used the Passport feature to change their location to PyeongChang in hopes of matching with an athlete. Tinder reported a 1,850 percent increase in “passporting” swipers and a 348 percent increase in overall Tinder usage in the Olympic Villages.

Outside of the Olympic Games, it’s a different story for Tinder. The dating platform has struggled to outdo local services in South Korea, where meeting a romantic partner via a mobile app is not yet as socially acceptable as it has become in many western nations. Despite these difficulties, Tinder CEO Elie Seidman believes South Korea is a crucial testing ground for the service, and in a press conference in Seoul, Seidman indicated the company would take a different tack as it looks to expand in Asia.