MCCLATCHY TRIBUNE - July 10 - The internet dating market in the United States is booming: more and more websites are targetting particular social groups, and such specialization brings with it many curiosities. Geek2Geek.com is one of the countless US dating websites aimed at a niche. There is also Ivydate.com, named after the academically elitist Ivy League. At Horseloversconnection.com owning a horse is no must, although profile photos often show one. JDate.com, aimed mainly at the Jewish community, is one of the oldest niche-targetting sites. As of last year, there were "more than 1,500 dating sites" in the country, according to Mark Brooks, an advisor to several such sites. "Many of the new sites are niche dating sites," Brooks says.
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Less than 1% of the "more than 1,500 dating sites" actually make any money.
Why is that point never mentioned in all the excitement, Mark?
Posted by: Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com | Jul 11, 2011 at 08:50 PM
That's because most of them have very few real people with actual"active"profiles.
Posted by: JB | Jul 12, 2011 at 06:54 AM
How do you estimate that only 15 dating sites make money?
Posted by: Mark Brooks | Jul 12, 2011 at 10:11 AM
I am talking profit, not revenue. Let's be generous and say 2%, or around 15-30.
Name them for me.
Even 100 (doesn't exist) would still only be less than 7%. And, that many wouldn't be saying much. It would mean 93%+ don't make anything.
Posted by: Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com | Jul 12, 2011 at 12:30 PM
Here's a link to the top dating sites in the USA...
http://www.onlinepersonalswatch.com/news/internet_dating_rankings.html
IDEA has 450+ idating members. I'm sure a good portion of them are getting wages, and making money. :-)
I'd say no more than 20% of dating sites make any profit. No less than 10%. Alas, their numbers are private. But you can be sure, they wouldn't exist with any level of traffic, if they weren't making some kind of money.
This is why White Label Dating has an attractive model for entrepreneurs. They take away the risky cost base and help entrepreneurs focus on marketing, and test their channels, before they blow their cash trying to build a dating site, and build to critical mass. (Full Disclosure: WLD are a client of Courtland Brooks).
Posted by: Mark Brooks | Jul 12, 2011 at 12:47 PM
Mark,
Are you kidding me with the top US dating sites? Many of these may be making money, but they are mostly full of scammer/spammer profiles. (eg. datehookup.com)
What a joke!
Posted by: EuropeanKiss | Jul 12, 2011 at 01:22 PM
Mark, your "Niche Dating U.S.A. Rankings" list is actually made up of only a few companies who are in the niche business, e.g. all the peoplemeet ones. And, there is no proof that any of those make profit.
It's the same with our friends at Spark Networks. They have 30+ niche sites, but only one makes them any profit (JDate), which carries all the rest, i.e. remove JDate and the rest would collapse.
As for 450+ iDating members, how is that related to profitable online dating sites? I suspect the vast majority of them aren't dating websites at all. They are mostly vendors trying to sell to us.
And, let's be honest here: with all due respect to the owner of Geek2Geek.com or Horseloversconnection.com, those will never make it. Sure, they are nice hobbies, but as viable businesses? Not a chance.
Posted by: Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com | Jul 12, 2011 at 03:17 PM
Sam, just a point from my perspective on those niche sites like those you mentioned - it's very difficult to make money unless the site owner outsources the development, customer care etc and focusses on Brand + Marketing = profit. Only the larger niches (such as yourself) can profitably run their own technical development and customer care - the smaller niches are best placed to use a platform (which to be honest is the reason why we've grown so much - people launching niche sites on our platform and just focussing on the brand and marketing (which to be honest I think is the hardest area anyway!)).
In terms of viable businesses - these sites can certainly generate profits sufficient enough to afford a very comfortable standard of living for their owners, even the very smallest sites can generate US$10k/month profits after a year or so if they remain focussed.
If they sold businesses this side, it probably wouldn't be enough to retire on, but it would certainly be a life-improving amount of money - eg. enough to chip off a chunk of the mortgage or put kids through college.
That said, I would generally agree that the figures quoted aren't correct - for example, we've got almost 6,000 sites around the world on our platform and almost none of those are counted by the measurement companies.
I look forward to Google offering a measurement service based on Google Analytics data, that would certainly be interesting,
Ross
Posted by: twitter.com/rosswilliams | Jul 14, 2011 at 03:06 AM
If we talk about profit and loose from the website then it's totally depends on your website business area. particularly for dating website it is one kind of social networking where you can chat, post etc etc. if you are seriously want to make profit from the dating website then you should have big budget and make your website as a business purpose not for profit purpose on initial stage.
Posted by: Russian Brides | Jul 14, 2011 at 04:24 AM