General News

2012 is upon us, and so is an annual rush to join online dating sites in the new year.

It's known as the Holiday Effect - the 15 to 20 percent increase in online daters from December to February. Every year online dating sites experience a surge in membership over the holiday season, as singles who didn't have someone to kiss under the mistletoe or at midnight on New Year's Eve turn to the Internet for a fresh start in the new year.

There are a number of reasons that January has become such a busy month for online dating. New Years resolutions are on everyone's mind, focusing many people's attention on improving their current relationships or finding a partner if they're single. The idea of making a fresh start for the new year is also a strong motivator that draws traffic to online dating sites, as is the pressure from family and friends to settle down that singles often experience during the holidays.

"There is also the anticipated Valentines Day event which many single people dread more than any other day of the year," says Penny Russell, a spokesperson for a single parent dating site, "and this often spurs them into action and a determination to seek out a new partner before that day arrives."

Doree Lewak, author of The Panic Years: A Guide to Surviving Smug Married Friends, Bad Taffeta and Life on the Wrong Side of 25 Without a Ring, believes that the pressure to be attached during this time of year is especially strong on women. "Women still feel huge pressure around the holidays," she told USA Today, "and certainly exacerbated by New Year's - to have a date. I don't think that moment has passed."

Dating sites all across the Web experience the Holiday Effect from both men and women, from Match.com who say that their busiest season is December 26 to February 14, to PlentyOfFish.com who report a 15% spike in sign ups and a 20% increase in activity from current users during that period.

And it's not just the dating sites themselves that benefit from the Holiday Effect. As more and more members join the sites, the pool of potential dates increases dramatically, improving everyone's chance of finding love in the new year. Many dating sites respond to this trend by offering special rates around the holiday season, so if you're in the market for a membership take advantage of their holiday gift and start the new year off right.

If you are interested in finding a service to join this year, you should take a look at our list of reviewed dating sites or try our dating site search tool.

Are you looking for PerfectMatch.com promotions? Here are the ones we found that give you a range of ways to try this dating site, from a trial offer to free months when purchasing a membership.

Trial Offer

• 3-Day Free Trial

Save Money

• Save 55% on a 3 Month Membership

Free Months

• Buy 1 Month and get 1 Month Free
• Buy 2 Months and get 2 Months Free

For more information on this dating site, you can read our PerfectMatch.com review.

This is the busy season for online dating sites. Chemistry has decided that this would be a great opportunity to have a free weekend promotion. So starting Friday, January 13, all day Saturday, and until the end of day on Sunday, January 15 all members of Chemistry.com will be able to flirt, communicate and connect for free.

The year 2012 will be an exciting year for Chemistry and its members as the dating service has updated the look of their website along with adding a number of new features for making connections easier.

November 2011 was when the last time Chemistry had a free communication weekend. To find out more about this matchmaking service you can read our Chemistry.com review.

For years, algorithms have ruled the world of online dating - and the more complicated and inscrutable, the better. eHarmony lured in users with it's 258-question personality test, and sites like PerfectMatch.com and Chemistry.com boasted about the experts - a sociologist and an anthropologist, respectively - who designed their matching algorithms.

Increasingly, finding love online feels a little bit awkward and a lot less personal. It's practically a formula: log on, review a stranger's profile, click through their pictures, send a message that refers to something interesting you found on their profile, ask an intriguing question or two, then hit "send" and hope that your message was witty, unique, and mysterious enough to warrant a response.

But all that is about to change, if Nerve.com has anything to say about it. Introducing Nerve Dating, a new service for singles that calls itself "The first dating site for humans." Nerve Dating isn't the site's first time at the rodeo - Nerve Personals (a home for "literate smut") was popular at the turn of the century, but it slowly faded into obscurity as sites like Match.com and OkCupid gained in popularity.

"The story of online dating has become about algorithms and not about having fun with people online," said Sean Mills, the chief executive of Nerve, in a blurb about Nerve Dating on NYTimes.com. "We're moving away from the algorithm era into the social era. This is a dating site that reflects how the Web has changed."

Nerve's newest dating service takes its inspiration from social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. Instead of basing interactions on static profiles and complex matchmaking algorithms, Nerve Dating is based around status updates and minireports about details like concerts attended and favorite meals eaten. Users can click on the "What did you do last night?" page, for example, and see if someone's activities catch their eye, or discover other users' deepest thoughts on culture, sex, and dating in the "Opinions" section.

"We're giving people a reason to get to know each other rather than setting them up on an awkward blind date," Mr. Mills said. Nerve Dating hopes that the unusual tidbits of information the site provides will act as natural icebreakers for members, and that the social networking style of the service will feel familiar to Web-savvy users who are used to the format.

Given that Nerve is already a popular site that receives two million visitors each month, Mills is confident that Nerve Dating has a shot at becoming a major player in the online dating industry in 2012.

Between Christmas and the New Year last month Mamboo.com users on average viewed 40 percent more pages. New subscriptions are also up by 38 percent and members are also sending 30 percent more online gifts. The most important statistic is probably that the number of messages members sent, doubled during this time period. This all points to a very active dating service.

Mamboo also sees a busy January this year. They forecast a 60 percent increase in traffic in the first two weeks alone this month. Between Christmas and Valentine’s Day is the peak season for dating services so most sites will see an increase in traffic.

For more information about this story you can read the press release.

As 2011 comes to an end, it's time for a retrospective. We've laughed, we've cried, we've dated, and now it's time to look back on all that we've learned about life and love over the course of the last 12 months.

Thankfully, Match.com has done a lot of the hard work for us already, creating a Retrospective In Love Infographic that lays out all the most important facts and figures of 2011 in bright colors and eye-catching graphics. Check out the full version here, and the highlights below:

Match.com:

• 1 in 3 online dates in 2011 originated on Match.com, as did 1 out of every 8 dates of any kind in the United States.

• All in all, singles had more than 23 million conversations on Match.

Location, Location, Location:

• 94% of New Yorkers are willing to date outside of their borough.

• Scottsdale, AZ is the #1 place to find dates with foodie dads.

• Yonkers, NY is the top place for dating single moms.

• 30% of New York women consider firemen to be the sexiest profession for men.

• The top 5 most fit cities on Match are: Boulder (CO), San Diego (CA), Denver (CO), Bridgeport (CT), Los Angeles (CA).

• The top 5 cities for finding your perfect nerdy companion are: Sunnyvale (CA), Cambridge (MA), Somerville (MA), Berkeley (CA), Santa Clara (CA).

The Dirt on Dating:

• 65% of women spend more than $50 preparing for a date.

• 46% of women are ok with their dates using coupons to pay.

• 80% of singles don't believe that their dates should end between the sheets.

• Texting may be popular, but 80% of daters still prefer to hold conversations on the phone.

• Forget the rules about white after Labor Day - 81% of men like women who wear white pants on a date.

• More than half of men think that making out is appropriate on first date, compared to only 1 out of 4 women.

The Low-Down on Love:

• 76% of singles believe that, if they marry, they will be married forever.

• 85% of women believe that it's possible to have both love and a successful career.

• 54% of men say they have experienced love at first sight.

• But only 44% of women say they have experienced the same thing.

• 35% of singles have had a one-night stand that turned into a long-term relationship.

• 35% of men and women have fallen in love with someone they were not initially attracted to.

For more information on the dating site that created the infograph you can read our review of Match.com.