Statistics

In a poll that appears to be from eHarmony (though it is reported on a UK website) found that 19% of married couples surveyed met online. The poll was conducted in 2006 and 2007 and surveyed 10,000 married couples. 17% of these couples met at work with the same percentage meeting through friends. In a similar poll conducted in 2004 and 2005, of the 5000 married couples surveyed, 14% met online, with 20% meeting at work and 17 percent through friends.

In the 2006-2007 poll if you looked at the age group 45-54 for couples, the result showed 31% met online. In the 20 to 44 age range this is much lower at only 18% of couples met online.

I was surprised by the poll results and I would have expected the numbers regarding married couples meeting online to be slightly lower than it was. I wonder what this percentage would be for couples who are not married yet? If this was an online poll (it is not mentioned if it is or not) then I would also expect the numbers of married couples who met online to be higher since the couples who are polled are people who are tech savvy and have been online.

These poll numbers are also backed up by some eHarmony statistics we reviewed a little while ago (see story). If you look at the comments section you will note it is calculated that eHarmony has a 32% to 40% success rate. A success is measured by if a couple who met on eHarmony actually got married.

Go to Mirror.co.uk News for the full story or check out our review of eHarmony for more information on this dating service.

Update - August 16, 2008

I found another news item regarding this survey which gave me a few more facts. It was an online survey and it was done by Harris Interactive.

Lavalife Prime was launched in June 2007 and had an advertising budget of less than $1 million. It started as a free service where singles of the age 45 and older could come to meet other singles online. Agneta Owen, a marketing consultant for Lavalife Corp. expected it to attract 25,000 members by June 2008. They almost doubled their goal. This means Lavalife had planned to spend $40 per member ($1,000,000 / 25,000 expected members) and ended up spending only $20 per member in advertising dollars. Recently Lavalife Prime started to charge it's members (see Story) so it will be interesting to see where membership levels drop too. On average paid dating sites can expect 10 to 20 percent of its free members convert to the paid service.

The over 50 crowd is a valuable market. This age group are usually at the height of their income level and make up roughly a third of the population in North America. Does Lavalife Prime offer what older singles are looking for? We will have to wait and see. This segment of the market already has a number of successful dedicated sites. Lavalife Prime would have to compete with these as well as the established dating services like Match.com and eHarmony. Prime hopes with their spin on the dating service experience and their sprinkling of social networking features, that they will come out on top. The relative unique feature of Lavalife Prime seems to be the section "My Life Experiences" in the profile. It contains the members pictures and videos of different memories or experiences they may of had through out their life. This is then presented in a picture time line.

We expect to do a full review soon of Lavalife Prime.

Update: Check out the new Lavalife Prime Review.

According to this article, a recent worldwide survey of adults by Harris Interactive shows that 23 percent of people go online for dating, while 50 percent use social networking sites and 72 percent use the internet for gaming.

Only two of these activities generate any real income for investors besides online advertising. The next big website will be one that can combine all 3 of these online activities successfully.

India's matrimony market is estimated to be worth almost $230 million annually (£118 million). This includes online dating and matrimony services which brings in about $13.5 million (£7 million). An Indian matchmaking service called Shaadi.com has become quite popular among singles in the 20 to 40 age range and is now one of India's five most popular sites according to the Britain’s Telegraph newspaper. The dating and marriage service reports it has over 10 million members and is responsible for a million marriages worldwide since its inception in 1997. 6000 profiles are created every day on the site with 60% of them being male. Shaadi.com is not just a website, there are more than 150 Shaadi Centres in 87 Indian cities. This allows parents and children to sit down with a relationship adviser and review the dating services huge database of potential matches.

One of the reasons Shaadi.com succeeds according to the Telegraph is because:

The unofficial eHarmony Blog got the scoop on eHarmony's traffic statistics being accessible to the public at Quantcast. eHarmony has been a Quantified Publisher since February 2008. This means the traffic information is very accurate because a script or tracking image is inserted into every page at eHarmony which allows detailed tracking of all visitors.

The first thing to realize is (if you don't know too much about this type of thing), don't worry about being tracked. It happens on most web sites. Online businesses(and blog owners) want to know about their traffic, since obviously visitors are the bread and butter. If you do worry about it, visit the sites Privacy Policy where they should tell you what is done with this information. The main things most companies want to know about visitors are:

• How many there are?
• How many come back?
• Where are they coming from?
• What do they visit on the site?

USA Today had an article about singles finding love and marriage through online dating after the age 45. The article focuses mostly on older singles who have not married before. In 1990 only 0.4% of woman and 0.6% of men married for the first time between the age of 45 to 49. According to the U.S. Census, In 2006 on average men married for the first time at 27.5 years of age and woman at 25.5.

Recently dating sites have started to track this demographic of later life first marriages. Match.com reports an increase of 10% of new members since 2005 who are over the age of 45 and never have married. Currently this demographic makes up 14% of their members. Yahoo! Personals also has seen a increase of 33% in this demographic for 2006 and 2007.

Online dating has made it easier for these singles to meet. According to Craig Wax of Match.com:

As people get older, they tend to find themselves in fairly established patterns, so the ability to meet new people goes down over time. They've got to do something new if they want to meet different people.

By doing a new activity, it allows these singles to easily reach out beyond their circle of friends, family and co-workers and meet someone new. If you want to find love, online dating is your obvious choice since these services offer an environment that is geared towards matching compatible singles.

For more information about the dating services mention here, visit our Match Review (match.com) and our Yahoo! Personals Review (Personals.Yahoo.com).