Robert Wuttke, Be2 CEO And Founder Interview

OPW INTERVIEW -- Dec 20 -- You’ll be hearing more about be2. They are a rising star in Europe and are launching in the USA. The company is founded and run by Robert Wuttke, PhD. He’s a regular attendee at the internet dating conferences in the USA and Europe. - Mark Brooks

What is your background and the founding story of be2?
I have a PhD in sociology and history. I did my studies in Germany and Italy and then spent a year at MIT in Boston. I focused on sociology and have my first business experience in the media industry with Bertelsmann AG and Lycos Europe. At that time I became aware of the first internet dating products, which fascinated me because online dating can bring together people who would otherwise have had no chance to meet each other offline.

Congratulations on the round of funding you just received. What will you do with the 15 million Euro?
We are going to focus on improving our service, which has always been our priority. Then we’ll further expand our product into other countries. But in particular we want to start penetrating the markets we’re in now, serve those markets better and increasing our respective market share.

Why do you think personality profiling works well for dating sites?
There are different people with different needs on dating sites. One of the needs is to find somebody for a long term relationship. Typically people 25+ have put this focus much more up front. So for somebody, who is looking for a long term relationship, it makes more sense to find the compatible matches immediately instead of browsing through a database and finding out later whether the person is a match or not.

In general, how do you think personality profiling on dating sites can be improved?
They will get better not just by becoming more reliable in terms of psychology but also through other things like the expression of attitudes, preferences and interests with sophisticated algorithms, rather than just simple questionnaires. There are a lot of things that will be done over the next couple of years and I think we’re just seeing the beginning of what is going to happen. What makes the be2 test very strong is that the number of questions is very elegantly reduced. We don’t ask irrelevant questions and I think this is something that users appreciate. We are going to improve the test even more now.

I understand be2 has very aggressively opened up in a number of countries, over 30 countries at this stage. What are your lead countries at this stage?
We like the Spanish speaking countries, but also are intrigued in what’s going on in Europe overall and central Europe where we are less present at the moment. But this is something that will also change over the next year or so because we’re now going to use the funding to start penetrating markets better. Right now you can say be2 does not have a single location it would depend on in terms of revenues.

Are there any particular people that you would like to reach out to people in the next year or so?
I’m looking forward to continuing our dialogue with academics.

See all posts on be2

Comments

[Fernando Ardenghi]

I suspect Be2 simply translated its personality test into several languages as if it were only an ipsative instrument for entertainment purposes.

Who independently validated/certified Be2 test???

As Parship, Ulteem and others, there is not any Scientific Paper peer_reviewed that substantiate "be2 is the professional, scientifically based personal introduction service for creating lasting relationships."
http://www.be2.com/tourpage/page1

How a prospective client could differentiate Be2 from Ulteem and Be2 from Parship? They all three have a whole precision of their matchmaking algorithms less than any person could had achieved searching by his/her own!!!

It is really funny that Dr. Wuttke said "We like the Spanish speaking countries" and Be2 is full of fake lovestories.

The Spanish speaking countries are terrible because if you do not exactly customize the site to taste/sound/look really local, you are not going to get traction.
Even Match.com had failed to do that!
Spanish for Argentina is quite different from Spanish for Spain, Spanish for Venezuela&Colombia and from Spanish for Chile.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voseo

-----------

new fake love stories at Be2

- Brazilian site 480
- French site 484

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

- Brazilian site 477
- French site 485

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

- Argentinean site 475
- French site 481

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and others are still fake

United Kingdom 152
Ireland 158
South Africa 381
---------------
Canada 221
New Zealand 224
Australia 223
United Kingdom 220
South Africa 372
---------------

- Argentinean site 90
- Brazilian site 57

---------------
Spain 215
Colombia 442
Venezuela 443
---------------
Spain 205
Colombia 445
Venezuela 444
---------------
Spain 415
Venezuela 441

Even Match (Argentinean site) has fake lovestories like this http://ar.match.com/success/successStories.aspx
because Barcelona is in Spain and not in Argentina.

Regards,

Fernando Ardenghi.
Buenos Aires.
Argentina.
[email protected]

[max]

Fernando,
reading your comments it is clear for me that you are expert in the area.
Two points :
1. When we see your dating site life ? It seems your site will be much better then any others. It will be also perfect and do not have any of problems which you think other sites has... How long we shall wait :-) ? Come one , show us !

2. Respect to be2.com and eharmony. We doing business there and guys make there "money machines" working good for them and for clients.

Regards,
Max

[Fernando Ardenghi]

Hi "Max"

1) Not known. I hope sooner.

2) eHarmony could be a "money machine", but I seriously doubt on Be2.
FYI, Be2 service under fraud investigation in Mexico and Spain, seems they have some denounces in consumer associations. [You can use Google/Yahoo and search: Be2 + fraude]
See example: http://elfraudebe2.blogspot.com/

Regards,

Fernando Ardenghi.
Buenos Aires.
Argentina.
[email protected]

[max]

Hello "Fernando",
Answer for both points above : invest 1-2m USD, get business to produce first 10m USD revenue a year and then please back with suggestions.

Until this moment I not really understand your position in be2/eharmony area. It seems you just not love them because they are successful.

Regards,
Max

[Peters]

Here in Belgium, the dating site like Be2, Parship and Meeticaffinity have to respect the laws on matrimonial agencies.

They can not fake profiles or stories. They may not reconduct the contract tacitly. They have to give the opportunity to pay a 3 months in 3 times.

Parship faced problem with justice yet.
They announced 80.000 customers... they were obliged to write the real number which is 5012 ( this figure has not change for weeks)

http://www.b-gsm.com/parship_pg_FR.pdf
http://fr.parship.be/docs/public/conditions/

The company which injected 15 millions euro also injected 5 millions in Netlog, the company which does not respect laws on privacy and is doing viral marketing
( like nice-people.be )

In FRance Meetic is also illegal, they reconduct the subscription tacitly. This is forbiden with matrimonial laws and I think with the Chatelet law.

[Henning Wiechers]

Hey, do you have any idea what "5000 premium members in Belgium" means?

Everyone pays about 40 US$ per month which means about 2.5 Million US$ annual turnover. And Belgium is real small...

[Victim1]

Be2 is very well known to be a worldwide scam, and NEEDS to be shut down. First they charge your 5$, then 180$ after, there's no way to cancel it or what so ever, the customer service are just computers, that won't do anything. If you block the payment from your bank, they will put the blocked payment into a debt collector.

[Thomas Brooking]

Hi,

My name is Thomas Brooking and I work at be2 in our customer service team.

From your post it seems you have been unhappy with our service. If you feel that your case has been mishandled in any way please write to me and I will investigate it personally.

As we have a clear price communication (on-site and by email confirmation), various straight-forward options to cancel the membership as well as a team available for customer service, it would be very helpful to understand your specific case better.

Many thanks in advance!

All the best
Thomas Brooking
[email protected]

[David philp]

Having signed up for six months why is it l cannot view pictures(still fuzzy). Or read any of the comments

[laura]

i GOT REFUNDED , I AM SO GLAD ,  YOU HAVE TO CONTACT BE2 INTERNATIONAL TO GET REFUNDED AND YOUR ACCOUNT WILL BE DEACTIVATED IF YOU ARE NO LONGER INTERESTED IN THEM.

EMAIL THEM NOW :   [email protected]