General News

I see that the iDate Awards voting is now open to the public. The iDate Awards is part of the Internet Dating Conference which takes place early next year in Miami. This is the first year of their annual awards and the third year for our DSR Awards (see Story).

The iDate Awards has 11 Categories:

• Best Dating Site
• Best Dating Site Design
• Best Software Provider
• Best Mobile Dating Site
• Best Matchmaker
• Most Innovative Company
• Best New Technology
• Best Payment System
• Best Affiliate Program
• Best Marketing Campaign
• Best Up and Coming Dating Site

Voters get to pick from 6 to 8 preselected nominees, which was decided earlier by vote and the conference organizers. I am a little surprised at some of the nominees, especially in the best dating site category (no mention of POF and eHarmony). What they did do though, which I thought was a great idea, was iDate included a "None of the above" option in the poll. This enables people to skip categories that they either know nothing about or, that they do not agree with the list of available dating services to vote for.

To vote, in the iDate awards visit their website and while you are at it, you should also vote in our Dating Sites Reviews Choice Awards. This year you can vote for your 2 favorite dating sites. You can choose 1 from 10 of the most popular paid dating sites, and for 1 of the top 6 free dating sites.

Every couple of months People Media release the results of a dating survey they have done (see Story). Their latest DatingData Poll is about the recession and if it has impacted people's attitudes towards dating.

Over 27,000 singles responded to the People Media poll across their selection of dating sites (BlackPeopleMeet.com. SeniorPeopleMeet.com, BBPeopleMeet.com, etc..) and 51 percent indicated that the current recession has not impacted their attitude about dating.

24 percent of the American singles who took the poll said that they would not date anyone who was unemployed. When you take gender into consideration for this answer, only 11 percent of men stated this fact while 37 percent of women did.

A further 17 percent of singles said that they are less motivated to date in the suffering economy and 6 percent viewed dating as networking to find a job.

Finally, only 2 percent of American singles are more motivated to date in the current economic conditions.

While not directly related to the poll, the press release also mentions that since the start of the year (2009), and according to ComScore, the number of unique visitors to People Media dating sites has grown by 15%.

To find out more information on some of People Media's dating sites, check out our BlackPeopleMeet review, our SeniorPeopleMeet review and our BBPeopleMeet review.

It looks like the featured fans of eHarmony's Facebook page (see Story) may also be a part of eHarmony's new TV marketing campaign. These new ads are a different format than we have seen before from eHarmony. They will contain web cam interviews of actual couples who got married because they met on eHarmony. We have seen eHarmony couples in ads before, but those ads were very polished. These new ads with the low quality web cam footage make the "commercials convey a high degree of authenticity and immediacy". The lower quality of the web cam videos lends to the credibility that these are real couples with real stories about eHarmony. To see one of the commercials you can visit the eHarmony Facebook page here.

Lucas Donat, CEO of Donat Wald, is the guy who has come up with the concepts for this new marketing campaign. He has been responsible for eHarmony’s television commercials since 2002.

If you have an eHarmony success story and want to be considered for one of their new commercials, visit this page to submit your success story and to send the eHarmony team a short video of you and your partner.

For more information about the new ad campaign, read the eHarmony blog here. To find out about this internet dating service, check out our eHarmony review. To date we have 73 reviews of eHarmony from our readers.

Jet is our third contributor here at DatingSitesReviews.com. She helps people write profiles by day and blogs by night. Luckily we were able to convince her to write for us here. Expect to see Jet put her own spin on the dating world and offer her own opinions, advice and tips.

To find out more about Jet, visit her Bio page. You can use this form to contact Jet and ask her questions or to suggest a topic for her next article.

Welcome, and thanks for contributing Jet.

Tom

Over at geeksdreamgirl.com, I see scores of people whose online dating experience suffers because they're uncomfortable with the writing process. Maybe they don't know how to toot their own horn without sounding arrogant, or maybe writing just isn't their forte. Unfortunately, in a text-based Internet, writing is the skill that can make or break a date and for some people, due to location or other factors, the Internet is their best or only choice.

I saw an old episode of Full House the other day, where the father, using an old dating service, is forced to watch videotapes of prospective dates. It got me weighing the pros and cons of video profiles.

While it's not as good as meeting in person there's no pheromones, or even the overly cloying perfume that might turn you off a video has several advantages over a text-based profile:

• You can see the person in action, so-to-speak, rather than a doctored photo.
• You can hear the natural cadence of their voice, rather than a stilted essay.
• You might get to see them smile. Men often choose their serious picture because they think it's better, when really most people look better with their natural smile.
• The length of the profile could be more natural. After speaking for ten minutes to a camera (and watching it back), they'll finally learn that sharing their life story is excessive.

Of course, there are also major downsides. A dating profile is kind of like a job application you want to make the best impression possible. Many people, including yours truly, lock up at the sight of a video camera and act completely unnatural, which is much more disastrous than a typo.

This is also a case where technology can be your enemy: it's easy enough to make a video today that it's really tempting to make something at 2am and throw it up immediately. It's also tempting to try to do something cool to make yourself stand out, which is almost always a mistake.

There are video dating sites out there, and maybe for those who do better on camera than on paper, that's the best option. But the sites with the largest pools are still primarily text-based, and perhaps, for people like me, that's a blessing. Regardless of the medium, take your time crafting your profile, and make sure you're sending the right message.

In a publicity stunt, the adultery website AshleyMadison.com sent Tiger Woods a contract which offered him $5 million for "advertisement, endorsement, sale and promotion" of their dating site.

At this point in time, Tiger Woods now has a fourth alleged mistress which would make him an ideal front man for the infidelity dating site. I have a feeling, that this $1 billion dollar sports figure wouldn't even consider such an offer. 😉

Seriously though, Ashley Madison didn't let this marketing opportunity that Tiger Woods presented them go to waste. They offered Tiger Woods a contract that they knew, he would refuse. By connected themselves with the hottest news topic of the week, month and maybe even the year, AshleyMadison.com received plenty of free international press.

For more on the story, visit the New York Daily News.

Update: (2009-12-08) - Tiger Woods now has 10 alleged mistresses.