OPW -- May 21 -- Earlier this week I spoke with Marc Simoncini, the Founder and CEO of Meetic. Meetic is focusing on expanding Meetic Affinity all over Europe. Its in all countries except for the Nordics at this stage. This is a higher end dating product for serious daters (which is akin to eHarmony in the USA). They will be rolling out a product for a younger audience called Peexme. Its a mobile application and web application that will be launched in June. Watch this space for more info. Peexme will be more of a flirting than a dating service. Meetic is their dating service and their matchmaking product is Meetic Affinity. As far as their acquision of Match Europe goes, they will continue to run all the brands but will only promote the top brands. Meetic will run Match in the Nordics, and Meetic all over the rest of Europe. They will actively market and promote one brand per market. So that means they will stop promoting Match and DatingDirect in the UK. Additionally, they will merge the Match Europe and Meetic databases.
The deal with IAC is an eight year agreement. There are three main elements to the agreement.
1. Match has no right to manage the daily business in Europe. It will be managed by Meetic
2. There's a reciprocal right of first refusal for acquisition
3. And there will be two members on the board of Meetic, from IAC
See all posts on Meetic
See all posts on Match.com
See all posts on DatingDirect
NEW MEDIA AGE -- Apr 30 -- The UK dating services industry is worth an estimated £600 million a year and, according to Hitwise, there are more than 1,300 dating sites in operation. Meanwhile, Jupiter Research predicts the number of paying members of dating sites will reach 6 million in the next three years, rising from 2.6 million in 2006. In the midst of such vast anticipated growth, two of the biggest players — Meetic, which owns Dating Direct, and IAC, owner of Match.com — have agreed to a deal.
Industry reaction to the owners of Match.com and Dating Direct getting into bed together seems to be one of general puzzlement. IAC plans to sell its European operations of Match.com to Meetic in return for €5 million (£4.5 million) and a 27% interest in Meetic. So why would the world's largest dating site suddenly decide to sell its profitable European operation? Ross Williams, co-founder of WhiteLabelDating, which powers dating sites for publishers, sees the strategy behind the decision. "There was a clause in the announcement that didn't make many of the headlines, but I think will tell you the direction IAC is going in: Match has the option to buy Meetic in its entirety in about three years. So this is kind of phase one of setting the limits of both businesses."
There's a general feeling in the industry that the Meetic/IAC deal will be just the first of a number of unions in a sector that has hundreds of competitors. Markus Frind, founder and CEO of free dating site Plenty of Fish, believes we'll see more forced marriages in the UK market. "A lot of dating sites have been losing traffic over the last two years and some aren't even profitable; that can't go on forever," he says. But it seems the economic squeeze isn't impacting the bigger players in this sector. eHarmony launched in the UK last October saw an almost 2% increase in the number of pages people viewed on days when the Dow Jones was down 100 points or more. Match.com has also seen a 35% increase in sign-ups since the beginning of the year.
With so many players in the market, differentiating each dating service arguably comes down to how effectively sites match individuals. While approaches differ slightly, no one player seems to be doing anything radically different. Online dating service Parship claims to have been the first in Europe to offer a scientific approach to matchmaking, with its psychometric compatibility test, taken by more than 9 million people to date. eHarmony uses an in-depth 250-question questionnaire based on 35 years of clinical psychology research. Tapping into this trend, Match.com launched its work-in-progress personality test in December 2008.
Another growth opportunity for the buoyant dating market is the 'second' generation of single people, who are gradually putting their trust online. WhiteLabelDating, which runs Fun at Fifty, has seen a "massive increase" in the popularity of its over-50s dating site. Launched in October 2008, user numbers have risen each month, with March 2009 showing visits up by 47% on the previous month.
See all posts on Meetic See all posts on PlentyofFish
See all posts on Dating Direct See all posts on eHarmony
See all posts on Match.com See all posts on Parship
See all posts on WhiteLabelDating
PR NEWSWIRE -- Jan 5 -- Meetic will focus on
profitability in 2009. Meetic allocated ~15m Euros exceptional ad
expenditure in 2008, mainly for offline branding to increase the
profile DatingDirect, Neu.de and the matchmaking service
MeeticAffinity. The Group is confident that it will gain a significant
share of the European matchmaking market in 2009 and generate EBITDA
margin of 20% to 25%. In '08 the Group disposed of its Chinese
operations (eFriendsNet, Yeeyoo). Investments in Latin America, which
are currently marginal, will be maintained. FULL ARTICLE @ MSN MONEY
THE INDEPENDENT -- Dec 14 -- Membership is booming at internet dating sites as the credit crunch and impending recession bring a rush to find a partner to share the pain. Companies such as Match.com and EasyDate, which owns the SpeedDater, DatetheUK and BeNaughty brands, say they have seen some of their best days trading ever. Match says it has experienced its 10 biggest days in terms of visitors in the past year, and three of those have been in the past few months. EasyDate says its sites have seen growth 10% above average since the beginning of September. DatingDirect hit 5m registered users five weeks ago. Nielsen Online indicate an 18% rise in unique users visiting internet dating sites between September and October, although that follows a 14% decline in the previous month. According to Jupiter Research, the industry will grow from 2.8m paid users in Europe in 2006 to about 6m by 2011. Over that period, revenues from British dating sites, will increase from €85m last year to €147.3m. Industry expert Mark Brooks says only four or five internet dating sites worldwide make serious money and that the growth in online dating is likely to slow in the UK next year as the market begins to reach maturity. FULL ARTICLE @ THE INDEPENDENT
See all posts on EasyDate See all posts on BeNaughty
See all posts on SpeedDater See all posts on Match.com
See all posts on DatetheUK See all posts on DatingDirect
OPW -- Nov 3 -- Allegran runs Loopylove and GirlsDateForFree. Apparently 17 were laid
off today. Everyone but management and a few in marketing. Reasons
mentioned were the high cost of marketing, losses of of £1m this year,
Plentyoffish taking market share in th U.K. and Match and Dating
Direct's considerable ad spending. Allegran got squeezed in the
middle. (Full Disclosure: Plentyoffish.com is a client of Courtland
Brooks)
See all posts on LoopyLove See all posts on Match.com
See all posts on GirlsDatingForFree See all posts on DatingDirect
See all posts on PlentyofFish
PRESS RELEASE -- Oct 15 -- Dating Direct, the online dating service, is launching
DatingDirectAffinity.com, a site which uses online psychometric testing
and a professional coaching team to help single people find a serious
long-term relationship. The
service also offers members professional relationship advice and
guidance through online coaching videos and advice columns from a team
of psychologists and dating experts. FULL ARTICLE @ BRAND REPUBLIC
GLOBAL EDGE -- Sep 25 -- Darren Richards grew Dating Direct from nothing
into the UK's largest dating site with over 4m monthly users. He
sold out to Meetic for £30m in 2007. He
talks to Globaledge about his plans to repeat his success in the
property portal market with PropertyIndex.com.
Q: How running a dating site
compares to operating a property portal?
A: The
challenges are actually very similar. Both businesses are about using
the internet to bring people together, either on a date or introducing
buyers to sellers in the case of property.
Q: You had first-mover advantage back in the nineties with Dating
Direct. It must be very different working in such a saturated market?
A:
We always put the user at the heart of
the online experience and stayed two steps ahead of the competition.
Q: How do you plan to do this with PropertyIndex?
A: We have over 150,000
properties from over 1,000 agents. We offer agents very competitive pricing but we realise that
we need to be more innovative, both in terms of our offering to
consumers and agents.
Q: For example?
A: On the consumer side, we have a number
of Web 2.0 innovations in the pipeline and we plan to go further than
anyone else in this respect. I'm a big fan of sites like TripAdvisor.
Q: Is there anything you can tell me about your plans to improve your proposition to agents and developers?
A: Our lead numbers are growing rapidly at the moment which is
ultimately what agents judge us on. Leads were up 70% between July and
August and so far for September, we are 25% ahead of where we were last
month. In terms of improving the proposition, we recently introduced
featured positions and branding on a cost-per-click basis which is
something most other portals don't do. Pay-per-performance is generally
what agents want and we'll continue to innovate with this in mind.
READ FULL INTERVIEW @ GLOBAL EDGE
BIRMINGHAM POST -- Sep 8 -- Teaching children how to manage relationships at school should help tackle Britain's high divorce rate, it has been claimed. They need to be educated in matters such as how far they should go on a first date, what it means to be in a relationship, how best to conduct themselves and know the difference between a friendship and something more serious. The call comes from DatingDirect.com, the UK dating agencies, which claims it is dealing with a growing number of divorced clients who do not know how to form lasting relationships. FULL ARTICLE @ BIRMINGHAM POST
BLOOMBERG -- May 14 -- Meetic, Europe's biggest Internet dating
service, plans to double earnings in four years by charging more of its
Web-site users and expanding in Germany and the U.K. Meetic, which
bought DatingDirect in the U.K. and Neu.de in Germany in the past two
years, may make "smaller, targeted'' purchases in Nordic countries
such as Sweden or Denmark. Meetic's earnings jumped 52% to 26.5m euros
($41m) in 2007. Meetic is adding two new Web sites, one catering to
women, one to young people. FULL ARTICLE @ BLOOMBERG
NMA -- Mar 17 -- The UK and Germany are Europe's largest online dating
markets, worth 66m Eur las year, according to Jupiter. PlentyofFish,
Gaydar, DatingDirect and Match dominate the UK's online dating market,
according to Hitwise. Offline matchmaking service Dateline, which has
been operating in the UK for more than 40 years, has launched an online
dating site Dateline.co.uk. WhiteLabelDating.com has been appointed to provide the platform for the site. FULL ARTICLE @ NMA
BRAND REPUBLIC -- Mar 11 -- DatingDirect.com has signed a deal with Five to sponsor
the third series of 'Grey's Anatomy', which starts next Thursday. It
is the first TV sponsorship the dating service has taken. The sponsorship trails will show 99 conventional dating rules being
given a DatingDirect.com twist, and will fill a 15-second opening
credit and six five-second break bumpers. FULL ARTICLE @ BRAND REPUBLIC
NETIMPERATIVE -- Feb 11 -- DatingDirect.com partners with Orange UK
to provide a converged web and mobile online dating service for the
mobile network's customers. The mobile
platform
provides a number of features including message and alert retrieval,
instant chat and allows for searching for members live online by
geographical area. Orange mobile users can also register and subscribe to the mobile dating service direct from their handset. FULL ARTICLE @ NETIMPERATIVE
OPW -- Jan 18 -- We've just updated Hitwise UK Online dating rankings. SexInTheUK is # 1, moving PlentyofFish, Gaydar.co.uk and DatingDirect down to #2, #3 and #4.
Pocado.com
entered the chart at #6. BeNaughty, GirlsDateForFree and
TelegraphDating dropped to #7, #8, #10 from #4, #6 and #8. LoopyLove
slides off the top 10.
BRAND REPUBLIC -- Dec 17 -- DatingDirect.com launched a TV campaign
directed by
'Desperate Housewives' and 'Sex in the City' producer Pam Thomas. The
ad was created by V/DDB France and will run for two months from January
1 on ITV1, Channel 4, Five and Sky channels.
See video.
TRADING MARKETS -- Nov 21 -- MIG, a multimedia mobile interactive services provider, delivered the first on-portal mobile payment service for Dating Direct, called Payforit. The key features currently include: trusted user functionality, flexible subscription engines, consumer identification. FULL ARTICLE @ TRADING MARKETS
Mark Brooks: Email me at mark@onlinepersonalswatch.com if you'd like a free copy of my 20 point analysis of 15 payment processors.
OPW INTERVIEW -- Oct 16, 2007 -- Dating Direct is the UK's top straight internet dating site (Gaydar is #1 according to Hitwise, and PlentyofFish is #3) and was bought by Meetic back at the beginning of 2008. Here's the quick interview I did with Marc Simoncini, the day I heard they were to buy DatingDirect.com. And here's my recent interview with the CEO of Dating Direct, Alistair Shrimpton... - Mark Brooks
What is the founding story of DatingDirect.com?
DatingDirect.com was founded in 1999 and was, I believe, the first UK online dating service. It was created by an entrepreneur, Darren Richards, who went into this market because he was frustrated with the poor online dating choices available at the time. He thought he could better and did just that.
DatingDirect.com was the historical first mover in the UK and, in many metrics, has been the brand leader ever since. The company was running successfully when Meetic bought it earlier this year.
Could you tell me more about DatingDirect.com’s new platform?
When Meetic took over, we had to migrate the 5 million plus registered users on DatingDirect.com onto the standardized global Meetic platform. It was quite a challenge because millions of people who are used to the look and feel of one particular service are now presented with something completely new. But the product, especially in terms of features and usability, is an enormous improvement and consumer reaction has been phenomenal. Our growth since migration has been impressive. I can’t put figures on it, but I think all of our UK internal targets are higher than our best forecasts.
In terms of these new features, the word that I would use for the new DatingDirect.com on the Meetic platform is “live.” Dating is impulsive. Nobody knows why people suddenly get the urge to talk to somebody. But when members do, they can see right away who is online, who is available. Members can enter their post code, see who’s online in their area, and chat to them with an instant messenger that is built into the Meetic browser system.
I know a lot of sites offer this, but this is a really important feature for us and one our users really appreciate. When we did the research for the new platform, 82% of our users said that, of all the proposed changes, instant messenging is the killer application. And that has proven so in our post research results. Instant messenger is what’s really moving the needle for our business.
Are people in Europe making money from mobile?
In 2006, just under 7% of Meetic Group’s total global revenue was mobile revenue. The mobile solution provided by Meetic across its platform is probably the best execution that I’ve ever seen of a web proposition delivered to a mobile phone. It works really well and almost perfectly replicates the website functionality. Users can see new members, get messages, search for people who are local and online, and then chat with them in an instant via mobile. It’s really exciting and I believe the mobile-phobic UK is actually going to produce significant revenues for us in the years to come.
Across Europe, I believe we’re working with 21 operators. Within the Meetic Group, we’re already working with Vodafone, Orange, O2, and most of the other major operators. Within three weeks of launching our new platform, we signed a linking agreement with Vodafone and my commercial sense tells me that we’ll probably close out the other major operators in the UK by the end of 2007.
What are your thoughts on future online dating in the UK?
When I first looked at the UK market, I was amazed at the number of online dating companies. If I look at comScore numbers, there are hundreds of UK-focused online dating services. A lot of these companies are very focused, niche players and I think the niche players here have a great opportunity to make a very good business out of continuing to focus on those niches.
If we compare markets in Europe, we see that the UK is probably the one that has the lowest credibility for individuals who want to date online. People are still a little embarrassed to admit that they’re doing it, but there’s been a huge escalation in acceptability, particularly in the last six months. My belief is that this will continue and, as online dating becomes more of a mainstream industry here, there will be two or three major brands that will push through and be able to deliver scale operations. And it’s honestly pretty obvious at the moment who two of those companies would be.
What are your goals for DatingDirect.com for 2007 through the end of 2008?
I think that we have completed phase one, which is the successful migration of the current DatingDirect.com users onto the new platform. For the rest of the year, I think we’ll probably work on two key objectives. The first one is to continue to educate and help the DatingDirect.com users who joined from the older platform. We want to help them understand how the new site works and make them as loyal to the new DatingDirect.com platform as they were to the old. It is very important to us to reassure these millions of users and this will be our number one priority for the remainder of 2007.
Almost equal to that is our ambition to win more market share. I think a prime target market of 30-35 year olds is beginning to move more towards online dating in the UK and we want to grab the lion’s share of this new market. In 2007, we’ll have activities that are actually focused on us beginning to win that piece of the market.
In 2008, we are planning a pretty big offline media campaign in the first quarter that will involve a substantial investment above the line, i.e. TV media.
NETIMPERATIVE -- Sep 22 -- DatingDirect is celebrating National Dating Day (September 24) with a dramatic cube installation located under the clock at Waterloo Station. Passers-by can later go to a specially-created microsite at DatingDirect to compete to win a date with any of the celebrities, single models, and DatingDirect members they saw inside the installation.
Recent Comments