Online Personals Watch: News on the Dating Industry and Business

Looking for a Sugar Daddy or Sugar Mommy?

CTV.CA -- July 30 -- Seekingarrangement (100,000 users) offers to facilitate relationships between an older and wealthy individual who gives a young person expensive gifts or financial assistance in return for friendship, intimacy or sex. "Sugar daddies" pay $35 a month to access profiles of "sugar babies" on the site. The sugar babies can join for free if they complete a profile and submit a photo. Diamond members pay $1,000 to have their wealth verified. FULL ARTICLE @ CTV

Mark Brooks: Sounds like a form of prostitution really. WealthyMen.com is the category leader.

aWOWtrip Dating Site Connects Travelers and Locals

EMEDIAWIRE -- July 31 -- aWOWtrip launched today for travelers to connect and add some "WOW" to their trips. Members choose the activities and type of interactions they want. aWOWtrip currently offers messaging service, chat rooms, events scheduling, and profile rating. FULL ARTICLE @ EMEDIAWIRE

Mark Brooks: Nice angle, but what do you think of the name of this site? Your comments please.

Spark Networks Loses Two Directors

PR NEWSWIRE -- July 30 -- Spark Networks announced today that it has lost two of its directors to 'other business commitments' Laura Lauder and Scott Sassa resigned from the company's board of directors, which now consists of seven members. CEO, Adam Berger, said the firm will enjoy reduced governance costs. FULL ARTICLE @ SOCALTECH

A Thaw in Investment Products for Adult?

NEW YORK TIMES -- July 27 -- FriendFinder Inc. gets 140k new registrants a day, and $200 million in annual revenue. But AdultFriendFinder helps people meet for sex. The explicit photographs and language has put off mainstream investors. Now several former Wall Street investors specialize in marrying mainstream money with explicit material. Sex entertainment companies can be purchased at a discount because of less competition driving up prices. Some companies have been repackaged in a more conventional way to make them more attractive to investors. FULL ARTICLE @ NEW YORK TIMES

Mark Brooks: I would not be surprised if a deal was on the table for FriendFinder. Will Dr Conru sell his baby? It's got to be worth North of $1billion at this stage.

This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.

A Virtual Arab Neighborhood

ARAB NEWS -- July 3 -- Nuzizo.com is a social network which is divided into "neighborhoods" in a virtual city. Each neighborhood has a separate cultural theme and "citizens" take up residence in a neighborhood, generally ethnic. One of the fastest growing of the 23 neighborhoods is Al-Arabia, with 1,780 residents. According to the website, Al-Arabia is influenced from all parts of the Arab world. FULL ARTICLE @ ARAB NEWS

Mark Brooks: Nuzizo was created by the founders of World Singles.

This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.

Match.com Expands Mobile Online Dating Service

REUTERS -- July 30 -- Online dating service Match.com is launching a new application for cell phones. MatchMobile will first be made available in the United States, UK and Canadian markets, with plans to extend the service to nine more countries by the end of the year. For an extra fee of about $5 per month, MatchMobile subscribers can receive and answer e-mails from suitors on their mobile phones.

Kingdom Of The Online Cupids

FINANCIAL POST -- July 28 -- Dating sites rake in $700-million annually in North America. Canadian companies -- from Lavalife to plentyoffish.com -- could argue Canada is the capital of the online dating business. Lavalife, sold in March 2004 to U.S.-based Vertrue Inc. for about $150-million, was the start of it all in the late 1980s. The Canadian dating site making the biggest splash is Plentyoffish.com. The site pulls in more than US$5-million a year from text ads that appear beside user profiles. FULL ARTICLE @ NATIONAL POST

iLoveTexting Mobile Dating Service Launches In The US

PRESS RELEASE -- July 27 -- iLoveTexting.com allows its members to register their profiles and receive matches on their cell phones, where they can start communicating. iLoveTexting is a subscription service reserved for most major carriers such as Cingular, Sprint, Nextel, At&T, Dobson & Cellular One, Alltel and T-Mobile(r) users. FULL ARTICLE @ PR.COM

Mark Brooks: SMS revenues are increasing in the USA but are declining in Europe. Many users are opting for all you can eat SMS plans.

Modern-day Matchmakers

THE WASHINGTON TIMES -- July 27 -- Leandra Ollie hopes to help black singles in the D.C. area find a match. With more than 1,200 professional matchmakers, fees from $5,000 to $25,000, the industry earned $236 million in 2005, according to Forbes.com. Some matchmakers receive up $100,000+ for matches. Ollie started Talented Tenth Connection to specialize in black singles after getting certified at the Matchmaking Institute in New York. FULL ARTICLE @ THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Match Mobile is Live Today!

OPW -- July 30 -- The new Match Mobile is live. This version is powered by Trilibis, the same makers of the Webdate Mobile app and the popular social networking app Peepsnation. The most significant change is that users can now (at last) browse the entire Match.com database. The prior, Enpocket powered service, only allowed searching of ~300k contacts that had specifically signed up for Match Mobile.

I've not heard much in the way of positivity about mobile dating in the last couple of years. In a sea of disappointing mobile apps, patchy connections and poorly thought out mobile devices, Match Mobile is a standout. Very satisfactory. Match is moving in the right direction with their mobile strategy. Now I wonder... what are they rolling out for the Japanese market? Next years Asian Internet Dating Conference will most likely be in Tokyo, or possibly in South Korea around May 2008. I'll review some Asian mobile apps then. See the SF Chronicle article.

In this 45 second video you'll see the search, search results and profile viewing on Match Mobile.

Photos Of Social Networking Conference

OPW -- July 30 -- The photos from the Social Networking Conference are live. Link To Photos. I think this was Marc's best event yet. The next event is focused on social networking and internet dating in Europe, and will be in Barcelona on October 1st and October 2nd. There will be a strand of presenters for internet dating and a strand for social networking. - Mark Brooks

Reminder - Silicon Valley Affiliate Dinner

OPW -- July 26 -- I'm hosting a dinner at Tarragon, in Sunnyvale at 140 South Murphy Ave (Map), on Tuesday 31st July for affiliates. Show up 7pm for drinks, ~8pm for dinner. Please RSVP to mark@onlinepersonalswatch.com. See AffiliateDinner.com for other listings. - Mark Brooks

Snooty Dating Site Targets Colleges

BOSTON HERALD -- July 26 -- The RightStuffDating.com bills itself as "the Ivy League of dating," where students, alumni and faculty make romantic connections. New members have to provide proof they attended one of 50 approved schools. The site claims 5,000 active members and two marriages per month. FULL ARTICLE @ BOSTON HERALD

China Consumer Survey

MARKET WIRE -- July 25 -- The Chinese economy is hot. Their stock market is up over 43% since March. There are over 380 million consumers in China between the ages of 18 and 34. These consumers prefer Chinese goods over American or Japanese goods. They are also more likely to research products via the internet and to surf, email, blog or IM according to a BIGresearch survey. FULL ARTICLE @ MARKET WIRE

Mark Brooks: I just spent two months in China. Once people start using and trusting credit cards, and the online ad market matures, the Chinese internet dating market will dwarf the USA market.  However, for now the Chinese don't trust the internet, don't use credit cards (they use debit cards which don't allow monthly recurring charges), and ad buys aren't tracked on a CPM/CPC/CPA basis.

Call For Advertisers

OPW -- July 26 -- Do you have, or know of simply the best way to monetize top tier dating and SNS sites? Surveys, lead gen, co-reg, CPM, CPA... Email me with an overview of what you have to offer. I have a number of mainstream and niche (PG/adult/gay) clients looking for ways to monetize their sites. Sites range from 100,00 uniques a month to 10's of millions. Please email mark@courtlandbrooks.com asap. - Mark Brooks

Userplane Money

ONLINE DATING INSIDER -- July 24 -- Userplane Money launched, a new rev-share platform. When your visitors use Webmessenger and Webchat, you can now earn revenue from the ad views they generate. The more ads displayed, the more money you make. It's that simple. There are no fees to participate, and monthly payments are issued via PayPal. FULL ARTICLE @ ONLINE DATING INSIDER

This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch and FrequentFlirters.

Peepsnation Launches On Virgin, Verizon, Sprint and Boost

INTO MOBILE -- July 24 -- Peepsnation, the new mobile social-network-turned-peer-ranking-dating-service will launch on Virgin Mobile, Verizon, Sprint, and Boost Mobile. Users of Peepsnation 4.0 will see an improved user interface to upload pictures; manage profiles; rate, rank and tag items; search profiles; and even filter by gender, location and age. FULL ARTICLE @ INTO MOBILE

Mark Brooks: Trilibis made the Peepsnation app. They also made Webdate's mobile app. Enpocket and Plutolife are other mobile enablers. Match has a new app in store. Watch this space.

Transpera Launches, Twango Acquired, IceBreaker Raises $7m

SEATTLE PI -- July 24 -- The launch of Transpera comes on the heels of Nokia's buyout of Redmond mobile photo and video startup Twango. Transpera is backed by IDG Ventures, Intel Capital and First Round Capital. IceBreaker, the Bellevue developer of the mobile dating service "Crush or Flush", has named David Laub as its chief financial officer. IceBreaker raised $7.2 million in venture funding last month. FULL ARTICLE @ SEATTLE PI

This post also appears on SocialNetworkingWatch.

MeetForLunch.com - Lunch With No Strings Attached

PRESS RELEASE -- July 24 -- A new free online dating service, Meet For Lunch was designed as an alternative to expensive dating services. It allows singles to meet other qualified singles for a no strings attached lunch date. The site matches people based on: political, arts, music, literature, technology, sports -- as well as age range and gender choice. FULL ARTICLE @ PR NEWSWIRE

Frances DreamNex Sexyavenue.com Launches IM

PRESS RELEASE -- July 24 -- DreamNex announced the launch of new instant messaging software for online dating, Dial-Messenger. In beta test since March, the software launched on SexyAvenue.com website with the addition of a "Dating" section. The SexyAvenue.com website attracts over 20 million visits each month. In the first month, DreamNex was ranked No. 4 in the online dating sector in France in terms of audience  and generated revenues of €34 million and operating income of €5 million in 2006 (source: Médiamétrie, March 2007). FULL ARTICLE @ LA TRIBUNE