General News

POF launched eVow back in September of 2010. Within a few months the dating site went paid. Members needed to buy a subscription to correspond with their matches and to use the advanced search features. eVow did well for a while especially when a link to the service was displayed on the Plenty of Fish website. Since then the site has seen traffic drop by about half according to Alexa. To counteract this it looks like eVow has developed a strategy which is their new dating app.

The eVow online dating app was released in October of 2012 on both Google Android and Apple iOS. The app currently has a 3.9 rating on Google Play with most of the reviews being positive and only a few minor tweaks/annoyances being mentioned. What is interesting is that the eVow app is completely free to use. You do not need a paid subscription. The eVow app doesn’t have all of the features of the website but it does have most of them. This includes sending and receiving messages, viewing your matches, and searching.

So those of you interested in using eVow I would recommend creating a membership on the dating site and then downloaded the app to message your matches. This way you can use the site for free and not pay the regular subscription fee that runs from $19.99 to $39.99 per month depending on the length of the subscription term. I am not sure how long they plan to keep the communication part of the app free so I would try it out as soon as possible.

The holidays: that time of year when couples look cuter than ever and everyone else suddenly starts whining about how miserable it is to be single.

Yawn. Can we move on to a new holiday narrative, please? I'm getting bored of the old one, and so is Match.com by the looks of it.

"Tis the season to be single!" proclaims the Match blog. And to celebrate that take on this time of year, Match has posted some new "holidating" data. Here's what 1,000 Match singles had to say about dating during the holidays:

• Some Christmases are blue. 76% of singles say they've ended a relationship during the holiday season.
• Sometimes, the family is at fault. 30% of singles say that family was the cause of a holiday breakup, because they were turned off by spending time with their partner's family during the season.
• The new year is the perfect time to start fresh. Finding love is a popular new year's resolution. 64% of singles say their resolution will be related to their love lives.
• Most singles think they won't be getting coal in their stockings this year. 82% say they belong on the nice list, while 17% say they'll definitely be listed on the naughty one.
• Holiday loneliness gets the better of some. Some singles report dating someone during the holidays just to avoid spending the season alone. Of those, more are men: 14% of men vs. 10% of women.
• On the other hand, it's fun to spend holiday parties solo. 80% of singles say they've been their own dates at holiday parties and had a great time flying solo.
• It's not just the thought that counts after all. Nearly 75% of women admit they've been disappointed with a present from a significant other at least once. On the other hand, just 47% of men say the same thing.
• There's one gift men and women want more than any other. Ambition is the top quality singles look for in a partner. Career-oriented dates are the most popular, topping hipsters, foodies, and party people.
• Gift giving is the best part of the holiday season. Gift giving is the holiday activity that singles look forward to most (45%), followed by attending holiday parties (31%).
• Love is all around. 82% of singles say they feel more romantic during the holiday season than any other time of the year.

Check back with the Match.com blog for more upcoming holidating info from relationship experts or you can read our review of Match.com for more information on the dating site.

Couple profiles have been getting a lot of play lately in the media. Facebook has added couple pages and the dating sites How About We along with Zoosk has introduced couple profiles.

Well, since April Zoosk has seen signups for their Couple Profiles explode. In the 6 months since launch 3.3 million couple profiles have been created. This works out to 15 percent of all new Zoosk signups. From these 2 statistics we can then figure out have many signups Zoosk receives on average in a month (international). Since they receive 550,000 couple profiles a month (3.3 million divided by 6) this would mean the total number of new users every month on Zoosk is around 3.7 million.

Zoosk couple profiles are made up of 3 different groups. 50% are married, 40% are in a committed relationship and 10% are engaged. These couple profiles have posted 1.5 million romantic moments with 2 thirds of them including pictures.

To find out more on this story you can read the press release here. To see why this dating site is so popular with singles and couples you can check out our Zoosk review.

Well according to a Canadian newspaper about 1,200,000 Canadians have used online dating to try and meet their match. This works out to about 4% of the current population of Canada. Surprisingly 18% of these Canadians were either common law or married (cheaters!). 80% of the Canadians were single and I am not sure what the other 2% was (it wasn’t talked about). They also mention that as far as age is concerned, singles between 23 and 29 are the largest demographic. I was taken aback by this statistics since I had thought singles aged 50 plus was the largest growing age group in online dating.

Anyways, to find out more about this story you should read The Vancouver Courier here or if you are interested in other statistics you can read our online dating facts page.

Rumors on the internet speculated that IAC may have been interested in buying the United Kingdom based Cupid since over the past few years their sales have grown considerably. IAC also has been in a bit of a buying spree lately as in the past few years they have picked up the dating sites Date Hookup and OkCupid.

IAC (InterActiveCorp) who owns Match.com let it be known in a short statement that they are not interested in acquiring Cupid plc. I am not surprised by this since IAC’s dating division has never been interested in adult oriented dating sites. A number of Cupid’s most popular dating services like Flirt and Be Naughty are adult oriented.

It was just in March when we found out that POF removed who has viewed your profile for free members. Well I found out they have done it again and removed another feature from free members. I received an email about the reasons to upgrade my account and it listed features and abilities you can unlock. Members who have paid for the upgrade are the only ones who now can see when someone was last online. This is an important attribute that members use when deciding to contact someone. Who would contact a person who hasn't been on Plenty of Fish in the last 6 months? I know I wouldn’t since most likely the person will not respond back since they have either found someone or has moved on to another dating site.

While I don’t think Plenty of Fish will ever remove sending messages for free on their dating site, I am finding it much harder to call this dating site a free service. The features they have removed lately are really important cues online daters use to figure out if it is worth sending that message or not. It is almost a requirement now to pay for POF to make it useful. I don't begrudge Plenty of Fish for wanting to make a buck since dating sites are a business and businesses need to make money. I think the reason we are slowly seeing POF moving to a paid upgrade business model has to do with Apps. With the rise of smartphones it is harder for online services to make money by displaying ads (there is no room on the screen). Now when you combine this with the increase usage of users using dating apps over the last year to access their favorite dating site, profits for free dating sites are falling. Maybe this is just a sign of the times for all free online services and not just dating.

To find out more about this popular dating site you can read our POF.com review.