Online Personals Watch: News on the Dating Industry and Business

Lavalife.com Unveils "Ride The First Car"

PR NEWSWIRE - Feb 7 - On February 9, ahead of Valentine's Day, singles throughout Toronto should boldly ride the first car of the subway train during their daily commute. To celebrate, a street team will be in place at the bustling Yonge and Eglinton stop to distribute free Lavalife.com buttons, which singles can discreetly wear to help identify each other.

See full article at PR Newswire

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Lavalife.com Asks Singles "What's Your Number?"

PR NEWSWIRE - Sep 27 - In the upcoming movie, "What's Your Number?" Ally, played by Anna Faris, is told by a group of girlfriends that women who have had more than 20 sexual partners will not find a husband. The movie begs the question, "What is an acceptable number of partners?" 79% of single men and 94% of single women agree there is still a gender bias of "stud" versus "tramp." When asked if they were comfortable dating someone who has had more sexual partners than themselves, 7% of men and 77% of women answered "yes."

See full article at MarketWatch

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Tigits Dials Up Online Dating Opportunity

THE GLOBE AND MAIL - Apr 15 - When Sean Miller got into the online dating world, he saw opportunity in providing people with second telephone numbers that could be used just for dating, and would be less expensive and easier to get than through a major telephone company. It took him 18 months to develop Tigits. Mr. Miller was also able to bring on Bruce Croxon, co-founder and former CEO of Lavalife as an adviser and investor. The service, which includes voice mail and will soon offer text messaging, costs $9.99 a month after a 30-day free trial. Tigits’ customers get a second telephone number that works just like their regular number. They can block callers, switch number and stop their service at any time.

by Mark Evans
See full article at Globe and Mail

Mark Brooks: Vumber came three years earlier with the same solution. It's good for end users, but not good for dating sites. The service is too disconnected from dating sites.  Match and FriendFinder integrated Jangl (which was later sold to Jajah). Jangl/Jajah is a better solution for dating sites because it keeps users connected to the dating site. Users simply hit a 'call this person' button on Match. (Full Disclosure: Vumber and Jangl are prior clients of Courtland Brooks)

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This February, Lavalife Introduces 'Free Love'

PR NEWSWIRE - Feb 1 - This February, Lavalife.com, is offering a 30-day free trial to all new members. During the 30-day free trial, new members can send unlimited mail and instant messages and even see who has checked them out.  Members will also get to experience the all-new Virtual Dating feature on Lavalife – bound to be a hit with Valentine's Day fast approaching. Members can get to know other singles and go on a Virtual Date by creating a personalized avatar and selecting a fun destination. FULL ARTICLE @ PR NEWSWIRE

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Lavalife Sold To First Media Group

OPW - Dec 3 - [Breaking news, you heard it first on OPW]. Lavalife was sold on November 30th to First Media Group. The group also operates Quest Chat lines and QuestPersonals.com, a competitor to Lavalife's telemedia and online business. Ron Duke, the CEO & CFO has left, and Peter Housley, the President and COO of First Media Group has resumed his role as CEO of Lavalife. He was CEO in 2003 and was the original brand architect. No numbers have been released. 

Lavalife Reveals The Fate Of The Turkey Baster

PR NEWSWIRE - Aug 24 - The new movie, "The Switch" starring Jennifer Aniston and Jason Bateman tells the tale of a 40-year-old woman who wants to find the "right" sperm donor and have a baby on her own. Lavalife asked singles: "Would you donate your sperm or eggs for a friend who wanted to have a baby?" 63% of men and 48% of women surveyed said yes. A recent article by Lisa Daily in Lavalife's online magazine, "Click," discusses how smart women are choosing to have children by themselves in record numbers. According to the 2000 Bureau of the Census, non-marital cohabitation, separation, and divorce have become more common, as has remarriage. Half of all children in the US lived or will live with only one parent before reaching adulthood. Most one-parent families (86%) are headed by mothers. FULL ARTICLE @ PR NEWSWIRE

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Former CEO Of Lavalife Becomes CMO At Kobobooks

OPW - Aug 3 - Why would anyone buy a book these days. Save the paper, and enjoy your reading more by using an e-reader. Marina Glogovac worked with Lavalife from 2004, and was CEO from 2006 through 2009. She is now the CMO of Kobobooks which offers an impressive little reader for $149, along with an ipad app, and reader apps for numerous devices. They have top notch books at sub $10 pricing and look set to give Amazon's book department a run for their money. You can see our CEO interview with Marina here. Congratulations Marina.

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Lavalife Works Out Kinks In Site Redesign

OPW - May 31 - Lavalife sent out an email to members letting them know they've worked out the kinks in their site redesign. A new IM system is mounted to the bottom of the screen. Photos are now larger. Nav has been improved. See for yourself with this Lavalife site tour.

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Internet Dating Industry Weekly News March 2nd, 2010

This is the news for February 23rd through March 2nd, 2010. Please follow this link to enjoy the high-resolution version. Here is the news we covered:

• PlentyofFish continues to grow rapidly
• Match.com to acquire Singlesnet
• German online dating market booming
• Smartdate.com raises 2.2 million Euros
• Australians suffer heavy losses to online fraud
• Weopia.com launches new virtual dating service
• HerWay.com partners with HonestyOnline
• Maryland Bill proposes tight restrictions
• Harvard Professor Michael Norton to speak at iDate L.A.

Lavalife Is Being Shopped

THEDEAL.COM - Feb 12 - Lavalife is being shopped by its owner, online marketer Vertrue. Vertrue paid C$152.5M ($113.9M) to acquire Lavalife in 2004. Vertrue was itself bought out by management, private equity firms One Equity Partners and Brencourt Investors and venture capital firm Rho Ventures for $855M in 2007. Lavalife's Web properties have been on the block for about four months. Lavalife Voice, a phone-based dating service, is not being shopped. Some say the auction has been going on for longer than that. "They've wanted to sell for a while," Noel Biederman, CEO of Avid Life Media, said of Lavalife. "Lavalife is not of great strategic value, and its business is in decline," said Mark Brooks, an industry consultant with Courtland Brooks. The company has not disclosed revenues since it was taken private in 2007. That year it brought in ~$90M. Although online dating giants Avid Life and FriendFinder Networks canceled initial public offerings this month, the space is still ripe for M&A deals, according to Brooks.

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Twitter's Now A Dating Tool

STRAIGHT - Feb 4 - Meeting a romantic partner on-line isn’t a new phenomenon, as dating sites like Lavalife and eHarmony have been around for years. However, social-media services like Twitter and Facebook are opening up new avenues through which people can make on-line connections. While profiles on dating sites may offer only select details, social media can enable people to gain more insight into other people’s personalities. The rise of social-media services doesn’t worry Kate Bilenki, the operations manager for PlentyOfFish. Bilenki told the Straight her company is confident that its service remains the best way for people to make a romantic connection on-line. Bilenki asserted that, for the purpose of looking for love, Twitter is inefficient, as it connects users with a vast number of people, of which only a small percentage are possible romantic partners. “A lot of people on social-networking sites are married, they’re in relationships, and they’re not looking to date,” Bilenki said. “On our site, they’re looking for a relationship.” FULL ARTICLE @ STRAIGHT.COM

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Older Singles Click Online

FREE PRESS - Nov 9 - eHarmony.com, Match.com and lavalife.com have seen significant growth in the number of users age 50+ in recent years. Joe Tracy, publisher of Online Dating Magazine, says that "the 50-plus segment in the online dating world is the fastest growing." eHarmony saw a 20% growth in users ages 60+ during Q1 2009, compared with the same period in 2008. FULL ARITCLE @ FREE PRESS

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Lavalife.com Tests Online Speed Dating

OPW -- June 22 -- Speeddate and Woome are leading the industry when it comes to online speed dating. Match launched online speed dating in 2004 and gave it a shot and later pulled it. Lavalife is giving online speed dating a shot in Toronto. It's on one of the main tabs as soon as you log into Lavalife. It's temporarily free but will eventually cost money/tokens. The online speed dating events run 8pm each night.

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Lavalife Moves To Skype

THE GLOBE AND MAIL -- Apr 5 -- Lavalife has introduced Lavalife World Chat available through Skype. The service will allow singles to connect with other singles by creating profiles from personal voice recordings, listen to other profiles, exchange voice messages and join the Lavalife World Chat room. After downloading Skype, users can dial +9907LAVALIFE to find and talk to other singles around the globe. FULL ARTICLE @ GLOBE AND MAIL

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Canadians In The Business Of Love

IVEY INTOUCH MAGAZINE -- Apr 3 -- “Tele-personals,” known today as Lavalife, is one of the world’s oldest online dating services.  The founding partners started out dabbling in the business of celebrity voice tapes for answering  machines. They developed  “Tele-classifieds" and soon found that personal advertisements had the most potential.  Today, Lavalife offers its voice, Web and mobile services in more than 60 markets across the U.S., Canada and Australia. Sam Moorcroft discovered online dating services when he found himself single and unemployed in Toronto in the late 90s. He created ChristianCafe.com. The key to the success of ChristianCafe.com was filling a niche in the market. ChristianCafe.com has grown into a multi-million dollar operation, and is now celebrating its tenth anniversary online. FULL ARTICLE @ IVEY INTOUCH MAGAZINE

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Marina Glogovac Steps Down As Lavalife CEO

OPW -- Apr 1 -- Marina Glogovac has worked with Lavalife since 2004, first as the Chief Revenue Officer and and then as CEO since 2006. She has stepped down as CEO of Lavalife. Ron Duke, whos was the CFO, is taking over as the CEO. 

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It's Raining Romantic Men Online

SMH -- Feb 14 -- Figures obtained from internet dating services show that in some age groups there are far more men than women searching for a partner online. RSVP reports that women are outnumbered by men 1.5 to 1 in their late 20s to mid 30s. On Lavalife, women remain in high demand even after they turn 50, when almost three times more men in that age group are logging on. FULL ARTICLE @ SMH

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The Morning Show With Mike And Juliet

FOX NEWS -- Feb 3 -- There a plenty of fish in the sea, and nearly as many online dating sites. M&J investigate which services will help you find that perfect catch. M&J spoke to Dr. Gian Gonzaga from eHarmony, CEO of Lavalife Marina Glogovac and Mark Brooks from PlentyofFish.com. 

Juliet: Dr Gian what are the components to making a successfully compatible relationship?
Dr. Gian Gonzaga: One thing relationship science has shown for the last 40 years is that people who are similar to each other on some important core personality traits, attitudes, values and interests are going to get along better.

Juliet: We’re going to move from E-Harmony to Lavalife.
Mike: Marina, I’ve heard this site called sort of the Sex and the City website.
Marina Glogovac: Yeah, we have 3 distinct communities- a dating community, a relationship community and an intimate community and that’s for people who are more open minded about exploring intimacy. The point is if you’re single you can quickly be surrounded by likeminded people who share your relationship goals.

Juliet: Next we’re going to look at PlentyofFish.com. What set’s PlentyofFish apart from all the other sites?
Mark Brooks: Well we heard a lot of talk about Plenty of Fish being free, free, free, but the real difference these days is it’s big, big, big. We have 900,000 people logging in every day. And we know now that 800,000 people a year are meeting and are in successful relationships because of PlentyofFish.com.
Juliet: Is there a science behind why you hook up so many people together?
Mark Brooks: The fellow who started the site is actually a math wizard and he’s observed the real world and he’s bottled the best of matchmaking. We have a chemistry test but there is a lot going on behind the scenes to match compatible people.

Stephanie: I’m a huge fan of PlentyofFish. Because it’s free and with the economy being down like it is, why not try a free site for 3, 4, and 5 months and then if it doesn’t work you can always pay later. And then take your saved money and go on a date.

Watch the show @ Mandjshow.com
PART 1
PART 2

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www.cheapdate.com

GLOBE & MAIL -- Jan 29 -- Lavalife, PlentyofFish, Match and PerfectMatch have seen their memberships soar after the stock-market plunge. Lavalife registrations are up 11% from last month, PlentyofFish enjoyed 77% growth in visits from Dec '07 through Dec '08. "Unlike the real world, dating sites offer the lovelorn a "completely refined, focused community", says Mark Brooks. Dating sites take care of the formalities. "If somebody wants to wander around and meet somebody, that's not a good idea on two counts: No. 1, it'll take them a long while and No. 2, they've got to get all the difficult questions out of the way." A survey by Florida-based Avalanche LLC - which operates international sites date.com, matchmaker.com and amor.com - found that 48 per cent of respondents were spending more time online or on the phone with a potential date before spending cash on a face-to-face meeting. Joe Tracy, publisher of Online Dating Magazine, agrees that bad economic times force people to "reprioritize their goals in life." Paul A. Falzone, CEO of LoveAccess.com agrees. "People, when they're confronted with any type of dilemma in their lives, tend to want to migrate back to what's comfortable to them. They go back to eating their comfort foods, they crank up the heat by the fire instead of going out all night, and they want someone to be able to share things with." FULL ARTICLE @ GLOBE & MAIL

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Jobless, Lovelorn Rush To Network

CRAIN'S NEW YORK BUSINESS -- Jan 18 -- For the last four months of 2008, LinkedIn, which has 1.4 million members in New York state, reported an 11% increase in the number of connections made between users, a 10% boost in invites sent among members and a 9% uptick in page views. Facebook reached 150m+ active users earlier this month. Interactive One, which operates BlackPlanet.com, AsianAvenue.com and MiGente.com, has seen a 12% jump in uniques. Sign-ups from New York state residents on Lavalife.com were down 13% until the stock market meltdown, according to Marina Glogovac, CEO of Lavalife. New York membership increased 7% each month from the beginning of the 3rd quarter through the end of 2008. Although OKCupid met its goal of reaching $2m in revenue last year, Mr. Yagan admits that his site is vulnerable to a declining ad market. FULL ARTICLE @ CRAIN NEW YORK BUSINESS

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