Hinge

NBCUniversal’s Peacock has struck a deal with dating app company Match Group to offer a three-month free subscription of its streaming service to users of the company’s popular dating apps.

The theme of the new campaign is “find someone to get streamy with,” according to the joint announcement.

The companies kicked off the campaign on June 22nd according to The Hollywood Reporter, and the offer will be extended to users of all of Match Group’s apps, including Tinder, Hinge, OkCupid, BLK and Plenty of Fish.

According to the announcement, the campaign will include “editorial content” and “experiential events” that are tied to Peacock programming, such as the upcoming Women’s World Cup and Big Ten football games. Match Group app members who participate will be eligible for additional offers and promotions from Peacock for the duration of the campaign, but the 3-month subscription is available now.

A new user survey from Hinge found that memes were fast becoming the best way to show affection for a match, as well as to display your personal sense of humor.

Almost three-quarters of the 2,000 users Hinge surveyed said they used memes to find out if they share a sense of humor with a match, and 60 percent said they want to get a sense of someone’s “meme humor” before going on a date, according to Mashable.

A vast majority – 93 percent – say that memes reveal a potential partner’s sense of humor, and almost as many consider a shared sense of humor an important factor in a relationship. And if you are worried about what meme to send or what someone’s sense of humor is like, don’t stress: 36 percent of daters said they feel more interested after receiving a meme from someone, even if they don’t think it’s funny.

Shares of Match Group stock rose following the company’s second quarter forecasts, despite the decline in earnings for Q1.

Match Group reported EPS (earnings per share) of 42 cents, beating the consensus of 41 cents, per Reuters. It’s also a 5 percent increase from the same period last year. Revenue however was $787.12 million for the quarter, below the expected $793.87 million, and a 2 percent decline from the same time last year according to Yahoo! Finance.

Paying app users decreased by 1.1 percent to 15.87 million, according to Yahoo!, but revenue per payer actually increased to $16.26, up from $16 in the last quarter, a hopeful sign.

One of Germany’s most prominent banks, DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale, has reduced its shares of Match Group by 4.7 percent.

According to BestStocks.com, DekaBank now owns 178,837 shares which amounts to about $7.2 million, compared to the previous quarter in 2022 where it held 187,697 shares worth $11 million.

Match Group’s stock price fell 10.45 percent between March and April according to Investing.com, and has fallen 54.78 percent overall in the last year. In addition, a Goldman Sachs analyst has now adjusted its price target for Match Group stock, lowering it to $58, down from $65 earlier in the year. It still suggests the company’s stock is a buy, according to Market Screener.

Match Group is listed as a “moderate buy” among analysts according to Bloomberg.com, but several shareholders have now filed class-action lawsuits against the company for not being forthcoming about the problems with Tinder’s product rollouts. Tinder brings in the lion’s share of revenue for the company, and for the first time, the app saw a decline in Q4 2022.

A new strategy that’s gaining steam among organizers is using dating apps to reach out to potential voters ahead of crucial U.S. elections.

According to The Guardian, encouraging young voters on dating apps to go to the polls on April 4th was an important strategy in the race in Wisconsin for a State Supreme Court seat, where youth votes ensured a victory for a Democrat-backed justice in the face of increasing rollbacks of rights regarding abortion and education.

In a report from Vanderbilt University in 2020, researchers found that 31 percent of millennial respondents were using online dating services even more than before the pandemic, and an even larger percentage of Gen Z singles were turning to dating apps to meet people. At the same time, they are increasingly resistant to phone calls and texts from organizers and campaign staff, especially as they get bombarded around election time. Dating apps are a way to casually engage their commitment.

India is now among the fastest-growing dating app markets worldwide, thanks to a growing young population of singles and their changing attitudes towards dating.

In terms of year-over-year growth, India emerged as the fifth largest market in dating app spending in 2022, according to a new study by data.ai Intelligence. Researchers found that Indian users spent $31 million more in 2022 than they did in 2021 despite economic factors like inflation that affect consumer spending.

Match Group, Bumble, and other major dating app companies have made a big investment in India, hoping to capitalize on this attractive market which now brings in millions of dollars in revenue each year to dating app companies.