Statistics

What is love in the time of Tinder and marriage in the age of Ashley Madison? You've heard the critiques. Detractors say Tinder encourages shallow hookups at the expense of meaningful relationships. And Ashley Madison... well, we all know how well things are going for them lately.

But it's not all bad news. Despite being one of the earliest players in the online dating game, eHarmony remains one of its strongest. Founder Neil Clark Warren sat down with Bloomberg to discuss how the site remains relevant despite the increasingly competitive landscape.

Warren shared some impressive stats about eHarmony. The site boasts over 66 million users and is responsible for around 2 million marriages. It's divorce rate is only 3.86%. Its fastest growing demographic is 25-35 years old. Sixty-two percent of users now come through mobile platforms. eHarmony even saw 80,000 new users sign up in a single weekend. Clearly, growth is not an issue for the company.

As to competitors, Warren feels eHarmony has nothing to fear from services like Tinder and Ashley Madison, because they're designed for difference audiences. Tinder users tend to be young and Ashley Madison users are typically not looking for long-term relationships. eHarmony, on the other hand, primarily serves older users who looking for serious partnerships.

That's not to say eHarmony is lazy in its approach to business. The company works hard to keep up with the rapidly changing online dating market – lately, for instance, by bumping up its security measures. “We've never been so serious about security,” says Warren. “We're spending several million dollars a year to make sure our security is as solid as it can be.”

eHarmony also keeps things fresh by introducing new features. Most recently, the company has announced plans to enter the professional world with a careers platform called Elevated Careers, expected to launch by December. The aim is to apply what eHarmony has learned about playing cupid to the workplace, using algorithms and other assessment tools to match applicants with their dream jobs.

Warren notes the far reaching implications of the career matchmaking service. Today only 30% of Americans say they like their jobs. If eHarmony can successfully help users find better employment opportunities, Warren promises a revolution in America – one in which people are happier in their professional lives and, in turn, happier in their personal lives.

All in all, Warren is feeling confident about the company's future. “eHarmony has never been in better shape,” he says.

Ever wonder what dating is like in another part of the world? I'm going to assume the answer is yes, because I don't know a single person who doesn't have a weakness for a sexy foreign accent.

The problem is, dating could be a totally different experience in the land that sexy foreign accent comes from. You might think you're being cool while they think you look crazy – and unless crazy is their type, that isn't going to get you very far.

Coffee Meets Bagel has published the results of a new study on dating trends around the world, so you'll be a little less clueless during your next international love affair. CMB asked 7,441 users from around the globe about everything from their eligibility to how much they’re willing to pay on the first date. Here's what they found.

The easiest city in the world to date, if you're a man, is Hong Kong. Sydney comes in second place, followed by New York, London, Toronto, and San Francisco. If you're a woman, Sydney takes the top spot. The remainder of the top five, in order, is London, San Francisco, Toronto, New York, and Hong Kong.

It's no surprise to see New York high on the list for men. Single women outnumber men by 230,000 in NYC, according to CityLab.

Men are more likely than women to have sex on a first date, especially if they live in NYC. New York was crowed “the most adventurous city” for guys, with 66% of NYC-based male respondants saying they're up for first-date fun. At 36%, London ladies are the most likely to say yes to sex on a first date.

When it comes to eligibility, most daters don't consider themselves “extremely eligible.” San Francisco and Sydney scoreas the top spots on that front, but the numbers are low. Only 28% of SF women and 29% of Sydney men believe they're “extremely eligible.” Come on, people – where's the self-esteem?

Men in London are the most willing to drop big bucks on a first date. The gents of England's capital said they’d spend £20 to £40 on a first date. In USD, that's about $30 to $62 – not the fanciest meal of your life, but certainly not the worst. Not that any of us are immune to the charms of a Chipotle date, either.

Across the board, most daters are looking for relationships. Only 12% said they're in the market for casual hookups, while 70% said they want a relationship and 11% said they're searching for their future spouse.

And finally, no matter how much we try to deny it, looks do matter. Both men and women listed “physical attraction” as the #1 trait they look for in a match.

You can kiss SexyGirl88 goodbye. Usernames will no longer be part of the dating profile, at least on Match.com. The dating website giant has announced that it will no longer require its members to sign up with usernames, which have long been the cornerstone of the dating profile.

Since Match was created 20 years ago people have used catchy, cute, and frankly sometimes crazy usernames as a way to express themselves. But given the ubiquity of online dating coupled with the popularity of social media, the stigma of “being seen” online no longer exists. Despite the creativity usernames require and how they have playfully enhanced profiles seen by potential matches, Match feels there’s no longer a need for people to hide behind an alias.

Match decided to pay homage to the art of the username by providing some final statistics about them, gathered from its own user database. They created a list of the top 10 “most memorable” user names (making it understandable why many people won’t be sad to see them go):

• TwisDemNipples
• Hardworkingmilf
• IWantAllDaSecks
• DilettosJunkie
• SkittleFartz
• TonyPonyNY
• GlitterIsAColor21
• SPF70Always
• BigGulps32oz
• Assless_Chaps

Match also conducted a survey of its members on some of the best and worst usernames employed over the years. (Although we should note that daters could have used this kind of information when usernames were still a part of the equation.) Perhaps this information can help you with your profiles on other dating sites.

Match discovered that your given name matters. Guys named Mike (61%), Dave (60%) and Steve (59%) are the most likely to get messaged by a woman on Match, while men are more likely to contact Sarah (62%), Michelle (60%), and Lisa (59%).

Country music has always been a money-making business, and it seems that daters on Match likewise preferred to emphasize their own country roots. “Countryboy” and “Countrygirl” have been two of the most popularly utilized names on the site, but 78% of women and 36% of men would NOT reach out to someone with that moniker. The least popular usernames - “Babygirl” ( 14%) “Angel” ( 29%) and “Cowboy” (16% ) did not fare too well, either.

Match also found that men and women differed on what they felt made usernames “bad.” According to the survey, 62% of men felt that immature names were a turn-off, while 81% of women felt offensive names were a turn off.

Now that Match no longer requires usernames, perhaps other dating sites will follow suit. Thanks to dating apps, profiles are being streamlined down to their basic elements: photos and a few tags. It makes sense that usernames would become sidelined, too.

For ore on this dating service you can read our review of Match.

Younger daters are really into dating apps – they helped bring Tinder into the mainstream, and now there are a slew of new dating apps hitting the market, allowing you to do everything from set your Instagram feed to music (Raya) and obtain the dating profile of that girl at the coffee shop you just couldn’t bring yourself to talk to (Happn). While younger daters are active on these apps, as it turns out, the fastest-growing group of online daters is 60 and older.

But do younger and older online daters date differently? University of Texas researchers Eden Davis and Karen Fingerman suspected that their were contrasts between their motivations for online dating, but wanted to determine this through the content of their profiles, so they conducted a study published this month about the differences in profile language and motivation each age group has when it comes to dating.

While we know people using dating websites and apps are typically motivated to find a partner and to date, we know little about the differences of what motivates them to use dating sites, what exactly they are looking for, or how they present themselves to different partners. Gathering 4000 online dating profiles from men and women across the United States, the researchers sampled profiles evenly by gender and from four age groups (18 to 29; 30 to 49; 50 to 64; and 65 or over). The final sample ranged in age from 18 to 95.

First, the researchers studied the most common words used in profiles by all age groups, which included: like, love, music, good, enjoy and fun. But they also discovered different age groups used different words in common when crafting their online dating profiles. For younger daters, these most frequently included the words: go, get, work, school, laugh, movies, much, find, think, try and anything.

Older daters seemed to be more focused on building connection. Their profiles most frequently included words like: man, woman, share, relationship, humor, travel, years, honest, important, well, sense, and family.

Eden said in her report: “Notably, older adults used more positive emotion words such as “sweet,” “kind,” and “nice,” more first person plural pronouns such as “we,” “us,” and “our,” and more words in the ‘friends’ category. These findings suggest that when they present themselves to potential partners, older adults focus on positivity and connectedness to others. Not surprisingly, older adults were also more likely to use health-related words such as “ache,” “doctor,” and “exercise.”

Younger adults tended to enhance their profiles, using mostly first-person singular pronouns like “I” and “me.” They also tended to focus on work and achievement.

The researchers concluded that adults of all ages were looking for love and a partner to enjoy life with, but that younger adults focus more on themselves and their own attributes, while older daters focused on positivity and connection to others.

Next time you think “I would never be stupid enough to fall for an online dating scam,” think again. According to an FBI report, Americans lost over $85 million through online dating and romance frauds last year.

It seems like common sense not to give money to a stranger you met online, but that $85 million tells a different story. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) had a busy year in 2014 and o ne budding crime trend stood out: the increased use of social media to perpetrate frauds.

“Over the last decade, the growth and popularity of social media has increased,” says the FBI report. “Social media has revolutionized the way people interact with others and has become an integral part of life for people of all ages. Criminals have exploited social media by phishing for unwary users to fall victim to their scams.”

IC3 complaint data shows 12% of the complaints submitted in 2014 contained a social media aspect, including online dating scams. Women over 40 were the worst-hit demographic, with total losses of $68,529,135. Men over 40 followed, with losses of $13,766,588, then men and women 39 and under, at $4,417,280.

The amount lost to romance scams averaged out to a whopping $14,000 per complaint.

In one particularly common scheme, scammers assume the identities of military personnel and pretending to seek relationships online. Once they've made a digital connection with someone who falsely believes them to be trustworthy, the criminals present convincing scenarios involving family tragedies, severe life circumstances, and other hardships in attempt to solicit money.

In most cases, scammers exploit their victims' personal information using compromised accounts or social engineering. The FBI offers the following advice to online daters:

• Be wary of individuals who claim the romance was destiny or fate, and you are meant to be together.
• Be cautious if an individual says they are in love with you and cannot live without you, but need you to send money so they can visit you. If you do not send money or otherwise try to help, they will claim you do not love them.
• Fraudsters typically claim to be from the United States (or your local region), but are currently overseas, or going overseas, for business or family matters.

If you see any of these signs, especially if you see more than one happening concurrently, beware. You could soon be contributing to that $85 million dollars.

A recent article in Marie Claire surveyed single men across the U.S. to ask them about the online dating profiles they come across, and what they felt women lied about most when writing their online dating profiles.

The number one thing guys think women lie about is their looks – whether it’s their weight, “athleticism,” height, or even whether or not they've posted an old picture from five years ago. Enough women have used tricks to make themselves look more “attractive” – from using old photos to Photoshopping their features to avoiding posting full-body pictures – so that men are automatically suspicious of how they portray themselves physically, and what they might be hiding. So ladies, no more cover-ups. Include recent photos, and a body shot as well as headshots. Since there are also studies on the wide range of taste men have, you should show off your “flaws” - likely, it means more dates.

Men also believe women lie about their age. Let’s face it – I think this happens for both genders, especially for men who want to date much younger women. There is an age bias in online dating, which contributes to this phenomenon, but perhaps we should all do a reality check. Do you really want to admit you lied about something so fundamental when you meet in person, especially if you really like the guy? It pays to come clean from the start, so trust won’t be an issue.

Men are also weary of women who post that they love their independence – and include lots of photos with their girlfriends as proof. If you describe yourself as "not clingy," the first thing a man will wonder is – how clingy will she be? Instead of saying this in your profile, talk about the trips you’ve taken or the things you like to do. There’s no need to prove your independence if you have it.

Perhaps thanks to the movie/ book “Gone Girl,” men also get suspicious of any woman who describes herself as “laid-back.” They immediately wonder if she’s very sensitive or highly reactive. Same thing with women who describe themselves as successful – if they have to say it, are they really? (Plus, men tend to lie about their own success.) Again, it’s best to avoid defending yourself to someone who has never met you.

The last and most important thing to note is that men don’t believe it when women say they want a “casual” relationship. When they take this statement at face value, often times, the women end up wanting more, so they avoid women who write this altogether. The important thing to remember is – be honest. If you want a relationship, you shouldn’t be afraid to admit it. In fact, it will help you weed out the ones who don’t – because you won’t succeed in changing them.