Marketing

Oops, eHarmony.co.uk got into a little trouble with the UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) for a TV campaign which aired in 2008. The TV commercial in question shows 8 couples who me on eHarmony. A voice over states during the commercial:

It’s no surprise that over 4 million Americans get married each year. But what might surprise you is that 2% of those newlyweds said they met on eHarmony. And now we’re in the UK.

A total of 5 viewers challenged the 2% of marriages eHarmony claimed to be responsible for, and a further 3 complained about the "significant conditions" needed to receive free matches.

The ASA ruled that the eHarmony ad was misleading because it had made an absolute claim on the statistics in the ad and the dating site also failed to make it clear that 20% of all visitors who attempt to sign up to the service are disqualified. To fix this problem eHarmony plans to indicate that the statistics mentioned in the advertisement are the results of a study done by Harris Interactive in 2007. eHarmony will also further explain that to receive free matches new members must fill out a in-depth questionnaire and fall within the required age range and marital status.

For more on the story, read Marketing Week. To find out more about eHarmony, you can read our review.

It looks like Plenty of Fish has a new advertising and marketing plan aimed at young adults and it involves celebrities. The first hint of this new tactic was when PlentyOfFish.com appeared in a Flo Rida video for the song Available (see Story). At first I thought it was a strictly a promotional partnership between the dating site and Flo (POF is in the video, so the dating site will then promote Flo Rida) but now I am not so sure. I have a feeling POF basically paid to be included in the video for the publicity.

Plenty Of Fish now has a new promotion featuring Lady Gaga. At each concert stop on The Monster Ball tour, two singles can win a "date of a lifetime". The date includes tickets to the concert and backstage passes. To enter the contest you can visit the Lady Gaga page on POF.

It definitely looks like POF is trying to attract young adults to their dating site by being associated with popular music artists. I wonder if they will be doing other advertising, besides using the internet, to promote this new contest?

For a bit more on the story, read the press release. To find out what singles are saying about POF, read our Plentyoffish.com review.

Match.com spent around £6m on advertising in the United Kingdom according to Nielsen. Hanft Raboy and Partners previously held the Ad account for Match.com in the UK but this year the new marketing director, Karl Gregory decided on using Mother instead.

The only details we have on the new marketing campaign so far is, it starts in the new year, and it will attempt to engage people at an emotional level.

For the full story visit Marketing Magazine and to find out more about this UK dating site, read our Match.com UK review.

The Yahoo marketing department must of reviewed Yahoo Personals lately. There are no real graphic changes but the wording has been updated on the homepage. The first thing I notice was the new page title. A few months ago it was:

Find Singles with the Top Online Dating Site -- Yahoo! Personals

Short and sweet, with the dating site name at the end. This wouldn't have been my first choice but let's see if the new one is any better:

The dating sites BlackSingles.com and HurryDate (both part of Spark Networks) have partnered with Eizzil Entertainment in a marketing campaign for the movie "SPEED-DATING". The movie is slated for a 2010 release and is a feature length romantic comedy starring Mekita Faiye and co-starring Clint Howard and Chris Elliott (among others). As part of a combined U.S. national promotion tour, Spark Networks and Eizzil Entertainment will present BlackSingles.com and HurryDate events in 12 major cities across the country.

For the full press release, visit SOA World Magazine and for more information on the movie, visit the SPEED-DATING website (including a full cast list). To find further details about the dating service for African-Americans mentioned in this post, read our review of BlackSingles.com.

The latest video for the track Available by Flo Rida is featured only at Plenty of Fish. This song is off his new album R.O.O.T.S. and contains Flo Rida surfing the Plenty of Fish dating site on a laptop looking through profiles and singing about being a single man. Flo must be serious about dating since he was only viewing members who had upgraded their membership. 😀

I am not sure how this partnership between Flo Rida and Plenty of Fish came about? Did Plenty of Fish pay to be in the video? Both parties benefit from the partnership and increased media exposure. The video is on a site that gets millions of hits a month, which is good for Flo Rida anda younger audience than usual will be visiting Plenty of Fish to check out the new video and possibly create a dating profile as well.

For more information on this dating site, read our review of Plenty of Fish.