Online Dating

Would you consider bribing someone to go out with you, say with a nice dinner or skydiving trip? According to Brandon Wade, an MIT graduate and founder of a new matchmaking app called Carrot Dating, most men would.

The idea behind the app (and its name) is that users can "dangle a carrot" in exchange for getting women to go out with them. (In fairness, the site claims that both men and women can accept or offer gifts in exchange for a date.)

Users can accept gifts or activities for a first date, from something as expensive as plastic surgery or as minimal as a tank of gas.

Most of the reviews for the new service have been skeptical, if not downright hostile regarding the purpose of the app.

Business Insider's Christina Sterbenz wrote in a scathing review, "through Carrot Dating, users (but really men)... can buy credits to send "gifts" to other users ... so they'll agree to a first date. That sounds quite like an activity illegal in most of the continental US - prostitution." She goes on to say that, "in fact, this problematic app is teaching men that women are greedy idiots who can't see through blatant and pathetic misogyny."

Wade has a different opinion however, especially when it comes to online dating. He maintains that women constantly get messaged while men struggle to get even one response. This is a way to level the playing field, to ensure that men get what they desire, too, instead of just messaging and hoping.

"Online dating is a superficial game," the Carrot Dating site claims. "With Carrot Dating, you won't get rejected before you even get a chance. Convince singles that spending time with you is worth it by making an offer that they simply cannot refuse."

But does this approach work in the real world, especially if you're looking for a real relationship and not just a pretty date?

Not likely. Some experts have chimed in too, noting that when you're buying presents in order to secure a first date, then she probably won't continue to date you unless you keep buying her gifts. There is no motivation to really get to know each other as you would on a traditional date without such bribes.

This app plays into the insecurities of men, especially when it comes to online dating. Unfortunately, it's not an app that can ultimately help them obtain a relationship. That takes work, not gifts. And it probably takes a few more messages and a more open mind.

When Aaron Schildkrout cofounded HowAboutWe.com, he had a vision for online dating, one that didn't rely on complex mathematical calculations to determine whether two people are compatible. He pictured a site where real-life dates were the focus, so users got straight to what really matters: meeting face-to-face.

"We branded ourselves as the offline dating site, as explicitly an alternative to these profile-heavy matching algorithm dating sites," he told The Washington Post. "It's about getting offline, going to the real world and getting chemistry."

It appears to be a smart approach at first glance, but since its founding in 2009, HowAboutWe has evolved to depend more on formulas, not less. As more and more users joined the site, the challenge was no longer to show them as many potential dates as possible, but to show them the right dates. In order to create an experience worth coming back for, HowAboutWe needed to get smarter.

HowAboutWe's two-person data science team created an algorithm that combines a user's profile information (like date ideas and demographics) with data gathered from that person's behavior on the site (e.g. what kind of profiles they looked at and how often).

In contrast to HowAboutWe's focus on casual dating, eHarmony believes its users are looking for long term relationships and its algorithm reflects that. eHarmony members are required to fill out a personality questionnaire with hundreds of parts developed from research of around 50,000 happily married couples. To determine compatibility, historical data is paired with analysis of users' behavior on the site and the constraints, like target age range, people place on their matches.

As expected, predicting love is no easy feat. Match.com president Amarnath Thombre says that what users claim they're looking for is often not the kind of profiles they actually view. How did Match cope with the mixed signals? "We said, 'We're going to base these things way more on actions you take. . . . If you start breaking your rules, we're going to start ignoring your rules,' " Thombre explained.

On AshleyMadison.com, the popular matchmaking site for affair-seekers, matching is driven almost entirely by an algorithm. "At least when it comes to the topic of infidelity, traditional research avenues have been kind of absent," said founder Noel Biderman. "There aren't a lot of universities out there that can give you wholesale data on how unfaithful this population or society is or what triggers this."

Can a mathematical formula ever fully replace the magic of serendipity? It seems unlikely, but if the two can work together, we stand a better chance of finding love than ever before.

For more about Aaron Schildkrout dating site you can read our review on How About We.

When you first decide to sign up for an online dating website, it can be downright intoxicating. The possibilities are endless. You have butterflies. You feel that the very act of creating the profile will instantly flood your inbox with messages from your potential true love.

Sure, all of that is true, in a sense - those possibilities do exist, though reality tends to be a little slower, with more rejection and a lot of first-contact emails. What many don’t realize is that all of that same potential exists in your everyday life, as well.

After all, it’s possible you could meet someone in line at the bank, or at work. “But you’re talking about something that’s highly unlikely!” you protest. “I want to meet someone faster. I want to meet someone now.” Online dating is certainly a more efficient way to meet higher numbers of people, to be sure. But, just like in real life, there’s no 30-minutes-or-less guarantee.

For some, the key is to take their inflated online dating expectations and temper them with their real-world expectations. Think of it this way: you’re probably not walking around the mall or the grocery store or the mall actively hunting for a potential date. You don’t wrap up your errands saddened that no one has approached you and asked for your number. You know love could pop up at any moment, but you’re not tapping your foot waiting for it to arrive, either.

Similarly, take your time with online dating, and try not to get too wrapped up in it. Obsession is a sure road to burnout, and you’re left feeling discouraged and bitter - never a good place to be. The goal is not to find a life partner by Saturday; the goal is to meet someone who truly is compatible and with whom you truly share a spark. Someone who fits the bill might be sitting online, waiting to meet you - or maybe they won’t even sign up for another month.

In the meantime, don’t make checking your dating email your primary hobby. Romance is a happy bonus, but it’s not the only important thing in life. When you do meet someone compatible, you’ll want to be confident and secure, not impatient and anxious. Just because the internet moves ever faster doesn’t mean our expectations always need to follow the same pace.

Some people causally use terms of endearment. Everyone is a “sweetie,” a “hon,” a “dear.” These rare people manage to use such terms with people they’ve just met - and, even more surprisingly, they never come off as condescending. There’s just something in the tone, in the expression: not a hint of malice.

However, if those very same people were to write a profile or a first-contact email, and they didn’t make any modifications, they’d quite possibly come off as annoying, patronizing or even offensive.

The issue is similar to that of using humor in a profile: you lose so much when you erase the tone of voice, timing, or facial expression that it’s easy to get the wrong idea. It’s true that some people can get away with using affectionate titles at first meet - but that’s because they’re using the entire package, not just the words themselves.

Furthermore, a first meeting in person is just not the same as a first-contact email. Even in person, simply standing in the same room is not a free pass to get familiar. Using an affectionate nickname at the end of a night of conversation is one thing; putting your arm around someone and calling them “sweetie” before you’ve even been introduced is quite another.

That’s essentially what you’re doing when you start a first-contact email in a way that’s overly familiar; you’re jumping over natural steps, forcing a connection when there isn’t one yet. No matter how compellingly a profile is written, you can’t really know someone until you’ve met in person for at least some amount of time. And, equally importantly, they can’t really know you. Not yet.

In person you may well feel an instant connection, like you’ve known each other for years. You may move more cautiously, taking things slow, revealing more of yourself when you’re ready. You may find that you’re on a date with a pleasant person and nothing more. The key is, you won’t really know if calling someone “hon” is appropriate until you’ve met. And honestly, even then, not everyone really is a “hon.” Some names fit better than others, and your date doesn’t want to be a one-size-fits-all.

So as you write your first-contact emails, remember that you’re dealing with a stranger, no matter how inviting their profile was. You can be warm and friendly, yet still polite and appropriate. There’s plenty of time to get familiar later; enjoy this stage as well.

Good news, eHarmony users! eHarmony.com has just announced the launch of a new service designed to enhance the experience for those who want a higher level of service from their online dating site. The new service, called eH+, offers the best of eHarmony alongside a very special upgrade: a personal counselor.

The counselors are credentialed therapists working with eHarmony founder, himself a psychologist, Dr. Neil Warren. "Finding the love of your life is the single most underestimated challenge in the human experience," said Dr. Warren in a press release. "In the course of the dating process, we know that some people want or need a higher level of service in finding their marriage partner and since this decision impacts your life more than any other single decision, we want to provide help every step of the way."

So what exactly does it do?

"eH+ melds the power of eHarmony's online capabilities with the guidance and care of the matchmaking industry," said Grant Langston, Vice President of Customer Experience for eHarmony. "eH+ is exactly suited to take our proven compatibility algorithms and bring personal, one-on-one attention to the difficult process of finding the right person to share your life. We know that we have more marriages, with more satisfaction and fewer breakups than any other service and we are confident that eH+ will add another layer of strength to our already powerful process."

And that's not all. eH+ also promises:

• Matches chosen for you by your credentialed professional counselor
• Freedom from your computer - no updating profiles, managing matches, or juggling communication
• Matches who have been vetted for interest in you, so you no longer have to wonder whether your interest is reciprocated
• A deeper and more varied set of matches than what you likely would have encountered without an eH+ counselor
• Increased privacy, because your profile isn't automatically exposed to hundreds of people you've never met

If you think all that personalization comes without a price, think again. The bespoke eH+ service will cost $5,000 for a one year subscription. It certainly isn't cheap, but according to eHarmony 66% of its members were surveyed and indicated they would be interested in subscribing (though who knows what "would be interested" actually means?). Unfortunately the service is too new to hear reviews from users.

eH+ launched in beta on November 1, and its official launch is set for December 1. For more information on this dating site and its features you can read our full eHarmony Review.

What do you do when you love data, but can't seem to crack the online dating code? Rewrite the code, of course.

That's exactly what Amy Webb, author of Data, A Love Story: How I Gamed Online Dating to Meet My Match, did. After a bad breakup, and a series of bad dates through online dating sites, Webb decided to turn her passion for numbers and algorithms into a strategy for hacking the online dating system. "Rather than waiting for an algorithm to set me up," she told a rapt TED conference audience, "I'm going to try reverse-engineering this entire system."

She began by writing down every possible trait she was looking for in a mate. By the end she had amassed 72 different data points that covered everything from religion, to occupation, to hobbies, to children and parenting styles, to travel plans, to body type. She then prioritized the list, breaking it into a top tier and a second-tier of points and ranking them from 100 down to 91. Finally, she devised a scoring system to mathematically calculate whether or not she thought the date would be a good match for her.

At first glance, her points system appeared to be a success. She returned to online dating and found a good-looking, well spoken, and well-traveled man she thought could be the man of her dreams. There was just one problem: he didn't like her back. That's when Webb realized there was one variable, the competition, she hadn't considered. What about all the other women on online dating sites?

Webb's next step was market research. She created 10 fake male profiles in order to gather data about the women who were attracted to the kind of man she really wanted to marry. She looked at both qualitative data (the humor, the tone, the voice, the communication style) and quantitative data (average length of their profiles, how much time passed between messages). Her findings are fascinating.

"Content matters a lot," she explains. "Smart people tends to write a lot, 3000... 4000... 5000 words, about themselves." Successful online daters also tend to use nonspecific language and optimistic language, which makes their profiles feel more approachable. Timing is also very important, Webb found. "The popular women on these online sites spend an average of 23 hours in between each communication," she says. "And that's what we would normally do in the usual process of courtship."

Armed with new insight, Webb could optimize her online dating approach and create a super profile. And it worked. She is now married and has a daughter, and wrote a book to share her insider knowledge of the online dating system with the world. The question is...what does all this mean for you?

"There is an algorithm for love, it's just not the ones that we are presented with online," Webb says. "In fact, it's something that you write yourself...all you have to really do is figure out your own framework and play by your own rules."

Related Article: Amy Webb Tells TED How She Hacked Online Dating