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Agenda Finalized For The Internet Dating Conference
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BlackPeopleMeet.com Launches Free Online Magazine
BUSINESS WIRE - Jan 12 - BlackPeopleMeet.com, the online dating site
devoted to African-American singles, has launched BlackPeopleMeet.com
Magazine, which is free and requires no
membership. It is filled with insightful advice and perspectives to help
single African-Americans navigate through the world of dating, love and relationships. FULL ARTICLE @ EARTH TIMES
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Oxigen Partners With WDP To Launch MyCupid In India
NEWSWIRE TODAY - Jan 12 - MyCupid, a new matrimony site, launched in India by Oxigen, an IT-enabled multi- services platform, and World Dating Partners. A user can create a profile, update information, upload pictures and videos, chat and selectively allow others to browse their profiles. The payment for these services can be made through Oxicash, hence you don’t need a Bank account or a credit Card to use the "paid for" services. FULL ARTICLE @ NEWSWIRE TODAY
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Iris Robinson’s Infidelity Scandal Is Not So Scandalous
PRESS RELEASE - Jan 12 - Iris
Robinson, wife of First Minister Peter Robinson, admitted that she engaged in an extramarital affair with a 19-year old
lover. Noel Biderman, CEO of AshleyMadison.com, says this is just another example of the
evolution of traditional marriage in our society. AshleyMadison.com was
created to provide those seeking extramarital affairs a place to meet people
who share their situations and desires. Additionally, Noel Biderman has written
a book entitled “Cheaters Prosper: How Infidelity Will Save the Modern
Marriage”.
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Massive January Snowstorm Boosts Adultery Website
PR NEWSWIRE - Jan 11 - It's been reported that on a typical day,
anywhere from eight to ten thousand people sign up to
AshleyMadison.com, infidelity dating site. Last Thursday,
over 25,000 new members signed up. That's someone new joining the
infidelity service every 3 seconds, making it AshleyMadison.com's most
profitable day ever. FULL ARTICLE @ IT NEWS ONLINE
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Founders Of FastLife In A New Reality Show
NATIONAL POST - Jan 11 - Justin and Annabelle Parfitt are the stars of Love Incorporated, a new reality TV series airing on the Slice network. Justin and Annabelle own FastLife, a speed dating company that operates in Canada, Australia, US, UK and China. The couple lives a semi-nomadic existence, bouncing between desks in existing offices and meetings in developing markets. The 13-episode series focuses on the couple's relationship and their business, zeroing in on some of FastLife's 150-200 monthly events.
The full article was originally published at National Post, but is no longer available.
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DNA Matching
MAIL ONLINE - Jan 11 - DNA matching offers the chance to pick a partner with the widest possible variety of genes and therefore the best immune system for any potential children,’ explains Eric Holzle, a former engineer-turned-matchmaker who runs ScientificMatch. DNA testing can ascertain whether or not you will have ‘a more satisfying sex life with less chance of cheating’. Both ScientificMatch and Swiss company, GenePartner.com, which provides a DNA matching service for a variety of dating sites in Europe and the U.S., cite the infamous 1995 ‘sweaty T-shirt’ experiment in which women were asked to sniff the T-shirts of similarly aged men and rate their body odours as proof that DNA matching works. ScientificMatch offers life membership site for ~£1,200. Meanwhile, GenePartner’s tests start at ~£60. FULL ARTICLE @ DAILYMAIL.CO.UK
See all posts on GenePartner
See all posts on ScientificMatch
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FriendFinder Sets IPO Terms
REUTERS - Jan 10 - FriendFinder set the terms of its initial public offering on Friday, cutting its size by more than half. FriendFinder's properties range from AdultFriendFinder.com to BigChurch.com and SeniorFriendFinder.com. It also publishes pictures and video, and the magazine Penthouse. FriendFinder plans to sell 20M shares for $10 to $12, each. At the midpoint that would raise $220M. The company filed for an IPO in December 2008 of up to $460M, but did not disclose details. FULL ARTICLE @ REUTERS
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Online Dating Industry Will Grow By Almost A Third
Mark Brooks: People Media was recently sold for $80 million to IAC. Cupid Media is doing well. I wonder how long it will be before they are acquired? First Beat Media, World Singles, FriendFinder's network of sites, Avid Life Media are other examples of networks of niche sites that have exceled and enjoyed the benefits of the 'network effect.' Given the choice, users will often join multiple sites within a network, which means improved ARPU. (Full Disclosure: First Beat Media and Avid Life Media are current clients of Courtland Brooks. World Singles is a former client, and I worked for FriendFinder in 2003-2004).
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Lovestruck Raises £285,000
PR WEB - Jan 10 - London dating site Lovestruck.com has raised £285,000
in Series A funding. Lovestruck.com matches single professionals to
others who work close by for coffee, lunch or after-work drinks. FULL ARTICLE @ PR WEB
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Markus Frind: Selling Your Site’s Data Will Reduce Your Site’s CPMs
Q: Have things changed? Hire anyone?
A: We've hired a few people for customer service and to build out our advertising efforts.
Q: What are your thoughts about display advertising these days? Does it work?
A: Everyone is using the wrong metrics these days. I think a far better
metric that we use is monetization per pixel. The future of online
advertising is not with bigger ad formats, or even existing ones.Q: A month ago, you launched a new self serve ad platform on Plentyoffish. Why?
A: We
have over 100 variables on each user such as age, gender, income,
profession, etc.but no platform could make use of this data. Our new
system lets advertisers target their audience down to a zip code level.
Q: How much creative flexibility is there for the advertiser?
A: The image as well as text can be customized. On our site the creative flexibility lies in being able to hyper target certain demographics and change your creative accordingly.
Q: Do you ever buy advertising? Any recommendations you would make to online marketers given your extensive experience on the sell-side?
A: I buy a lot of ads and I sell a lot of ads. Clicks mean absolutely nothing, if you are doing a major buy in 2 weeks take one week to get a baseline for your traffic, the moment you turn on those ads measure what delta from the baseline you have and measure what happens after you stop advertising. Yes view throughs are useful but measuring viralness of an ad spend is far more powerful.
Q: What do you think of data exchanges?
A: If you give
out data, others will use that data to target ads. The end result is
CPM's on your site go down because the users have previously been
exposed to these highly targeted ads on other sites.
Q: If you had to pick one or two key trends you see coming in the next 12-24 months in online advertising, what would they be?
A: Accountability and real measurement.
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Looking For A Job?
OPW - Jan 10 - We've updated the iDating industry job listings again. Here are some sample job listings that we thought were interesting:
Be2
Legal Counsel - Focus Internet Law
Group General Counsel - Focus Corporate Law
Director, Executive Office / USA - CA, Pasadena
Project Manager / USA - CA, Pasadena
International Product Manager / USA - CA, Pasadena
Director, Digital Marketing / USA - CA, Pasadena
Director, Marketing Intelligence & Insights / USA - CA, Pasadena
Director, Business Intelligence / USA - CA, Pasadena
PR Associate / UK - London
Sr. Director, Finance / USA - CA, Pasadena
Product Manager (Mobile) / Canada - Toronto
Match.com, Chemistry.com, People Media
Sr. Marketing Director / USA - TX, Dallas
VP Marketing & Acquisition / USA - TX, Dallas
Public Relations Coordinator / USA - TX, Dallas
Chief Technology Officer / USA - CA, Aliso Viejo
Legal Counsel - Focus Internet Law
Group General Counsel - Focus Corporate Law
Dating Direct (descriptions in French)
Account Executive - Search Enginge Marketing - Marché UK / France, Boulogne - Billancourt
Director, Executive Office / USA - CA, Pasadena
Project Manager / USA - CA, Pasadena
International Product Manager / USA - CA, Pasadena
Director, Digital Marketing / USA - CA, Pasadena
Director, Marketing Intelligence & Insights / USA - CA, Pasadena
Director, Business Intelligence / USA - CA, Pasadena
PR Associate / UK - London
Sr. Director, Finance / USA - CA, Pasadena
FriendScout24 (description in German)
Marketing Performance Manager / Germany - Munchen
Product Manager Online / Germany - Munchen
Product Manager (Mobile) / Canada - Toronto
Match.com, Chemistry.com, People Media
Sr. Marketing Director / USA - TX, Dallas
VP Marketing & Acquisition / USA - TX, Dallas
Public Relations Coordinator / USA - TX, Dallas
Online-Buddies
Director of VP, Program Management
PerfectMatch
Full Time Member Service Representatives / USA - WA, Bothell
PlentyofFish
Senior Web Developer / CA - Vancouver
Shaadi
Product Manager / India - Mumbai
Spark Networks
Affiliate Marketing Manager / USA - CA, Beverly Hills
Chief Technology Officer / USA - CA, Aliso Viejo
Yahoo! Personals
Product Manager
Project Manager (Yahoo! Personals Japan)
Director, Business Development and Strategy
Zoosk
Director of Engineering - Mobile / USA - CA, San Francisco
For the full listing, go here.
Do you have an idating job offer which is not included? Please, send the details (company, job title, location, link to details) to petra@courtlandbrooks.com and we will add your offer to the list.
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eLove Accepts Fat Rejects From BeautifulPeople.com
MIAMI NEW TIMES - Jan 8 - After posting their holiday pictures on BeautifulPeople.com, 5,000 so-called fatties were shuffled once more into the ratings system for re-approval. Only a few hundred were allowed back. Mark Brooks, an analyst and consultant for the online dating industry, says it's normal for online networks to exclude people, but only as a matter of certain obvious preferences, like sexual orientation. "I think the BeautifulPeople tactic is rather amusing," he remarked. "We've been accustomed to magazine cover culture for over 50 years now," he said. "We need to break away from that. People have been aspiring to unnatural extremes of physical beauty." Paul A. Falzone, CEO of International Dating Ventures, which owns eLove, also believes that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but clearly he shines a different light. "We think everyone is beautiful, and frankly, were disturbed to hear about the way that these people were treated," said Falzone in a statement. eLove is coming to the rescue, opening its doors to all the rejects from BeautifulPeople. FULL ARTICLE @ MIAMI NEW TIMES
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New Casual Dating Site Launched
PRESS RELEASE - Jan 7 - CityDate has launched a dating site, SensualityDating.com, which caters to women seeking romantic experiences without commitment. SensualityDating features a virtual dating app which allows people to get to know each other in a virtual coffee shop or a restaurant, flirt and explore their chemistry. SensualityDating is “100% Free for Life” for every member that signs up before March, 31st 2010.
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New Book: Kissing Frogs In Cyberspace
OPW - Jan 8 - Jan 5 - Dianne Sweeney wrote a book about online dating Kissing Frogs in Cyberspace. Her memoir takes the readers on a hilarious, often poignant journey of 83 online dates, dumps, and disasters. You can order your autographed copy here.
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