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MARKETING VOX -- Aug 23 -- Using its online advertising platform, Microsoft will provide banner ads and sponsored links to Facebook, starting early fall and running through mid-2009. Microsoft launched adCenter in May to compete with Google and Yahoo. Earlier this month, Google struck a $900 million advertising deal MySpace. (Advertising group IPG took a 0.5 percent stake in Facebook earlier this year.)
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GALWAY -- Aug 23 -- With checkmeout.ie, people log onto the website and fill out a questionnaire. They are then sent out cards with a website address along with a pin number. If they see someone out they like, they can simply hand them the card, which allows them to see their details on-line. They can chat on-line and exchange emails.
Mark Brooks: Why hasn't one of the major services (i.e. Match) partnered with Vistaprint to offer this quaint service. You'd think it would be great for word-of-mouth marketing.
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OPW -- Aug 23 -- I'm trying out Meebome. Meebo (funded by Sequoia Capital) is a hosted/online alternative to Trillian, which allows users to consolidate their instant messaging accounts into one IM system. AIM, Yahoo IM, MSN Messenger, all in one place. Meebome allows users to add an instant messaging box to their HTML-enabled profile. - Mark Brooks
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OPW -- Aug 22 -- SingleParents.ie was conceived and developed by web entrepreneurs Kevin Green (a regular at the internet dating convention) and Grainne Barry. Demographic figures in Ireland show an upsurge in the number of single parents. "Separation and divorce are on the upswing in Ireland. 2005 saw a 12.7% increase in divorces over the previous year. While overall divorce rates remain low at 16%, separations are on the increase and there is a fundamental shift towards smaller family sizes and one parent households." comments Greene.
Mark Brooks: By 2008 the majority of family households will be headed by single parents in the USA. This is already true in 15 US states.
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TOP HOSTS NEWS -- Aug 22 -- Michal Frackowiak, a 28-year old Polish Web developer and PhD student launched Wikidot.com, a Wiki-based publishing platform and social network aimed mainly at advanced Internet users, content publishers and broadcasters. "We want to build a social network of users running their own sites. This distinguishes us from most Wiki or blog providers and takes us closer to social services like MySpace.
The full article was originally published at Top Hosts News, but is no longer available.
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MEDIA BUYER PLANNER -- Aug 22 -- YouTube today launched yet another attempt to generate ad revenue, allowing advertisers to promote their brands via customized channels on the site. Warner Brothers created the "Paris Hilton Channel" to promote Hilton's new music album "Paris," and includes a video ad produced by Hilton for her YouTube fans. Advertisers will be able to customize the look and feel of their channels once they meet pre-determined spending quotas. YouTube cofounder and CEO Chad Hurley is quoted as saying he hopes brand channels help build an ad platform that "both the community and advertisers" could embrace.
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THE AGE -- Aug 21 -- Mobile carriers are scurrying to package up live chat and picture sharing services into subscription packages. Australia's slow entry into the 3G mobile market, and the prohibitive cost of mobile data downloads has meant that such services here remain thin on the ground. Hutchison's 3 service was first to enter the 3G market in Australia and offers subscription-based social networking service, Kink Kommunity (owned by Perth company, Loop Wireless which is now owned by Adultshop). New services that blend sophisticated multimedia and location-based services with social networking are beginning to make a mark in the US. Meetro allows people to find and and meet up with people located nearby and combes instant messaging, social networking and location based data. Rabble, combines mobile blogging with location data so subscribers in the area can check out restaurant or music reviews, and user generated photos and video. In Japan, a company called ImaHima has also broken new ground, with technology that can locate where friends are. FULL ARTICLE @ THE AGE
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EAST BAY BUSINESS TIME -- Aug 18 -- Microsoft spinoff Wallop Technologies has taken 8,300 square feet in San Francisco, which will give the social networking startup room to grow once the top-secret site is launched. Wallop is developing a Web site to compete with MySpace. Wallop is using technology developed at Microsoft's research laboratory in Redmond, Wash. FULL ARTICLE @ BUSINESS TIME
Mark Brooks: It was very wise to spin Wallop off from Microsoft. Wallop still has a chance to be a small, secretive, cool, home-spun new social network...which is critical for the seeding stage of growth. A social network started by Microsoft would be too big to be cool. Too loud in the media to be worthy of talking about. Wallop will get a nice balance of plentiful media attention but will still be able to be hip and cool and renegade enough for people to want to talk about it.
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OPW -- Aug 21 -- Clay Elliott, from Gizmoproject just informed me that their instant messaging and telephone service is launching on LiveJournal in the next couple of weeks. They also have a online version available at gizmoweb.com, although it's a little shakey on Firefox, btw. Gizmoproject is an alternative to Skype. - Mark Brooks
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OPW INTERVIEW -- Aug 18, 2006 -- Paul Falzone is co-CEO of Together Dating/The Right One, one of the countries top offline dating agencies. They also run e-love.com.
How were Together Dating and The Right One started?
Together Dating started in 1974 by Chester Chase in upstate New York. As time went on the assets of that service were sold to another gentleman who grew the company. In 1989, I personally got involved in the industry and ran some of the offices. In 1997, it was a very large, built out organization with about 150 locations worldwide…with a less than sterling reputation. It was a huge mistake of the old franchise not to address PR and customer service issues. Anyway, as time went on, I broke away from the chain. I had 14 locations in the Midwest and New England and I founded The Right One on September 4th, 1997, and started to franchise the company. I invented the company from the ground up and put everything on the line.
In November 1997, the CEO of the Together Dating organization, the old franchiser, threw the company into bankruptcy. He had so many complaints, and issues with his franchisees. The creditors eventually (January 1999) awarded the assets of the reorganization to my business partner, Brad Megahan, and his business partner. They got on the phone with me and said, “How would you like to merge with us? We need you.” Any good franchise needs an infrastructure and I didn’t have much of an infrastructure with 14 locations. Brad was a friend and mentor, as one of the most successful franchisees in the chain. He knew how to run a good operation, ethically. Brad and I are now 50/50 partners on Together Dating/The Right One and e-love.com, which is the most recent acquisition that we made.
How many owners are there?
Two owners represent half of all our franchises and there’s a dozen franchisees total. Brad and I know it takes a certain type of person to run a business like this and franchising really isn’t the best way to go. We kept the strongest people in our chain and pruned the rest to make it a stronger organization. We stopped selling franchises and started opening company stores or taking back under-performing franchises. That has proven to be a very smart move because of the strategies we have in place for the future.
How large is The Right One and Together Dating now?
The Right One and Together will do about $45 million gross sales in 2006. We’re at 60 locations. We feel it’s very important and critical to grow slowly with the right management in place. We used to primarily market by direct mail but we’ve switched over, in the last 18 months, to Internet marketing. We have vendors who are doing online marketing for us. We generate leads at $5 to $25 each. Our average direct mail lead cost was around $250 after 9/11. People were afraid to open envelopes because of the anthrax scares.
Just our own corporate stores are generating 15,000 leads a month and we used to get maybe a tenth of that when we were doing direct mail. So we’ve really increased our lead flow. We’ve got three good sized telemarketing facilities in the country now.
How much are memberships?
I can’t dictate what my franchisees charge but everybody is basically in the same ballpark. Smaller towns in the Midwest may not charge as much, but the programs start at around $2,000 to $3,000 and go up to $6,000 to $7,000.
What is e-love?
We recently acquired a company called e-love, which was the old Perfect Match product, out of a bankruptcy. We acquired some great technology. We’re the dinosaurs in the (dating) business, remember. We’ve been around for over 20 years and technology…, no it’s not our strong suit, but I strongly feel that if some of these online dating experts sat with us, and we could take what was in our heads and give it to them, and they took what they were strong in and gave it to us, it would be very dangerous.
I think they need to reach out and touch their clients more than just emailing them. We call potential clients, set an appointment and have them come into our office and spend about 90 minutes with them, going over all the details of what they want in a relationship. We’ll do a criminal background check, verify their identity and, if they’re divorced, check the divorce decree, and then once we feel that they’re going to be great for the membership, we plug them into the system.
The difference with e-love is that the consumer can go home, log in, and type in all the preferences they’re looking for in a person. Up pops nine people per screen and they can click on each person and look at their picture, that we took. It’s not a 20 year old picture. It’s something we just took. They can also click on an icon and check out their video. About 80% of all our members are choosing to do add video. hey can look at all the different aspects of the personality profile that they took with the company and see two bar graphs, one with each persons responses. They can see a visual of how the personalities match up. Users can hear a person, and see what things they have in common with that person. It’s very powerful. So that’s e-love.
What are your plans for 2006 through 2007?
We’ll continue to run a profitable and successful service. We’ll focus on giving great high-touch service, and get even more efficient at converting our online leads into members. You said it well when you gave your keynote speech in February at the Internet Dating Convention, Mark. You said, the offline people have the quality, we have the high-touch service. The online dating companies have the quantity. If only there was a way that offline and online companies could find common ground and grow together.
Our services are all about making people happy. Giving people the relationships they deserve. We have had, over the last 32 years, a profound, a very profound effect on many, many singles across this country and internationally. This company has helped a lot of people over the years and that’s where I really enjoy doing my job. Getting an email from somebody saying, you know, I’ve been divorced for five years and I finally got the guts to join your service. Thank you.
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NEWS.COM -- Aug 15 -- China's not the perfect place to try an Internet company, but Marine Ma's dating business is making slow and steady progress. Marine Ma is not yet 30, but he's already on his third company. Currently, he's the CEO of EFriendsNet, a social-networking company that also functions as a dating service. EFriends claims to be the market leader in China for Internet dating, in both membership numbers and revenue. Recently, I sat down with Marine...
Cliff: The last time I talked with you, you told me about Fanso, the first company you started.
Marine: That was from...1999 to 2001, founded by me and some alumni from Tsinghua University. We focused on providing information such as news, (and) music downloads to the students in universities in China.
Cliff: It was the first company in China that was run by students that was given permission to operate by the Chinese government, right?
Marine: Yeah. In the past if a student wanted to do some business in the university, it was...illegal. At that time the Education Ministry wanted to change something. They (had heard about) Microsoft in America (and how) Bill Gates quit his course while in university to start the company. So, we were lucky enough to get the chance.
Cliff: What kind of music downloads did Fanso support?
Marine: It was all free music--illegal--but at that time no one cared. The Internet industry was not mature, so no one came to us saying, "Hey, your music is illegal." I think the basic reason is we did not charge the users. In 2001, the bubble of the Internet burst, and no more VCs came to China--there was no more money; we'd run out. But I think another reason was more fatal: That is, we had never done business before, so we did not know how to do business.
Cliff: How much money did you raise?
Marine: Six million renminbi (about $750,000). It's not big bucks, but it's big bucks for students.
Cliff: How many partners did you have?
Marine: We had five. We used to have nearly 80 employees within Fanso, but we didn't generate any revenue, and the worst thing is that we didn't think generating revenue was necessary.
The full article was originally published at News.com, but is no longer available.
Mark Brooks: I had the pleasure of meeting Marine at the Asian internet dating convention this year. Where do you think the Asian internet dating convention should be held in Asia next year? Shanghai, Tokyo, elsewhere?
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MARKET WIRE -- Aug 17 -- FriendFinder.com launched a new payment system that permits its members to be billed directly by their cell phone operators. The system uses the Premium Short Message Service (PSMS) protocol. It was recently rolled out in the U.K. for all FriendFinder.com programs. It will be introduced over the next few weeks in Australia, Germany, Austria, France, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Korea, Taiwan and China. In the U.S. it will be available for FriendFinder.com and Passion.com members only, starting in September. Members can handle the entire membership transaction simply by entering their mobile phone number in a box on the billing page. The PSMS payment option is provided by Vidicom.co.uk. A billing confirmation message is sent to the member's mobile phone. When the member replies to the confirmation alert, the cost of the service they requested is charged to their telecommunications provider, providing a convenient alternative for people who do not wish to use a credit card.
Mark Brooks: This will increase FriendFinder conversions, especially on it's casual/adult dating properties. AdultFriendFinder is the top adult personals site, followed by the newer, sexier SexSearch.com.
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WASHINGTON POST -- Aug 17 -- Shortly after AOL announced a dramatically new business plan that included laying off a quarter of its workforce, the company went on a small buying spree, purchasing GameDaily.com, which provides information about video games, and instant messaging firm Userplane. AOL is trying to find ways to keep customers coming back to its Internet community while parent company Time Warner seeks ways to expand its Internet empire. AOL is trying to cut costs as it transitions from an Internet service provider to a Web portal that provides free services and draws revenue from online advertising. It will cut 5,000 positions over the next six months. FULL ARTICLE @ WASHINGTON POST
Mark Brooks: Userplane has a vast reach and has built great good will with myriad internet dating, social networking and online communities. That good will could translate into more deals and distribution opportunities for the new AOL.com.
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