Dating Sites Try Adaptive Matchmaking

TECHNOLOGY REVIEW - Dec 27 - ~40M Americans are members of dating sites and in China the number has grown to 140M. Matching up millions of members is a major technological challenge. Joseph Essas, VP of technology for eHarmony, has developed a new matching algorithms based on Yahoo's system for targeting ads to specific users who have revealed preferences and behaviors over time. Adaptive algorithms are a powerful tool because what people say they want and how they actually behave are different things. "We can piece things together without having to ask you," says Sam Yagan, CEO of OKCupid, a free online dating site.  New techniques are based not on questionnaires but on other kinds of "recommendation engines," like those used by Netflix and Amazon, says Gavin Potter, CTO of IntroAnalytics, a company that develops software for both e-commerce and dating sites. PlentyofFish is asking members who leave the site whether they entered a relationship with another member. This information is added to the company's predictive model, which also includes information from personality tests and user behavior. FULL ARTICLE @ TECHNOLOGY REVIEW

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Comments

[Mark Brooks]

Match also runs exit surveys with users. All dating sites should. Feedback is the breakfast of champions.

Mark Brooks
OnlinePersonalsWatch
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