Online Personals Watch: News on the Online Dating Industry and Business

Match Group Q1 Results - Revenue up 20%, New CEO

MATCH GROUP - Total Revenue grew 20% YOY to $799M. Operating income was $208M, an increase of 10% YOY. Payers increased 13% to 16.3M, up from 14.4M in the prior year quarter. Tinder Direct Revenue grew 18% YOY, driven by 17% payers growth to 10.7M. All Other Brands collectively grew revenue by 22% YOY driven by 14% RPP growth and 7% payers growth to 5.6M.

Key points from Match Group's letter to shareholders:

• Match Group CEO Shar Dubey is stepping down. She will remain as a director and advisor to the company, and Bernard Kim will resume his role as CEO.
• Match Group has published its 2nd annual Impact Report to share its progress on social, environmental, and governance initiatives.
• In Japan, Tinder launched a co-marketing campaign with Netflix for the dating reality TV show Love is Blind: Japan.
• Tinder Coins, its in-app virtual currency, is on track to launch globally this summer.
• Hinge is on track to launch in its first non-English speaking market, Germany, in Q2.
• Hinge is on pace to more than 10x revenue from 2019 to 2022.
• Match, Meetic, Pairs, and POF all successfully leverage tech features from Hyperconnect into their products.

See the top news on Match Group

Match Group Financial Results - 2021 Revenue Just Under $3B

MATCH GROUP - Total Q4 Revenue grew 24% YOY to $806M. Operating income was $232M, up 9% YOY. Payers increased 15% to 16.2M, up from 14.2M in the prior year quarter. Tinder Direct Revenue grew 23% YOY driven by 18% Payers growth to 10.6M and RPP growth of 4%. All Other Brands collectively grew Direct Revenue 26% YOY, driven by 16% RPP growth and 9% Payers growth to 5.7M. In 2021, Match Group's Total Revenue was just under $3B with operating income of $850M. Tinder generated ~$1.7B in Direct Revenue in 2021, up 22% over 2020. Hinge produced $525M of Direct Revenue in 2021, achieving a 91% YOY growth rate. Hyperconnect saw better performance in December compared to the preceding months. Several Match Group brands have begun to leverage Hyperconnect's technology. Meetic opened online video cafes, and Match is offering 1:1 video chat on its app. Pairs and POF intend to leverage Hyperconnect's tech into their apps in early 2022.

See full article at Match Group website

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International Tech Platforms Open up to Independent Scrutiny

PR NEWSWIRE - Jan 26 - The Internet commission launches Accountability Report 1.0. The year-long independent review, with the participation of the BBC, Sony Interactive Entertainment, Popjam, Tinder and Meetic looked at how organisations take decisions about online content. The report demonstrates that large organisations can open themselves up to independent scrutiny and benchmarking of content moderation processes, in a collaborative way and across borders. The Accountability Report 1.0 is available at inetco.org/report.

See full article at PR Newswire

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Meetic Is Launching Video Calling

TUEXPERTOAPPS - June 4 - French dating app Meetic is launching new video calling feature. To activate video calls, users have to first exchange at least four messages.

by Antonio Bret
See full article at TuExpertoApps

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Confinement: Dating Apps Are Getting Better Thanks to Video

L'EXPRESS - Apr 19 - Before the coronavirus, dating was held over a drink. Now, they take place by camera. Nothing stops the quest for a soul mate. Not even containment. Dating apps are running at full speed.

"Among all dating players, we are witnessing a 20 to 40% jump in activity, whether it is the number of messages exchanged or new subscribers," notes Mark Brooks, consultant and president of Courtland Brooks & IDEA.gp. Tinder even beat its record "swipes" at the end of March.

"There was indeed an air gap at the start of confinement," says Clémentine Lalande, director of Once. "But it quickly gave way to a lasting rebound in interactions between users".

"The week following the announcement of confinement by Emmanuel Macron was marked by a marked drop in activity," confirms Héloïse des Monstiers, France director of Meetic. "But very quickly, discussions resumed. On Easter Sunday we even registered 20% more [users] than Valentine's Day."

by Sébastien Julian
See full article at L'Express

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Meetic/Match Launches "If Commitment Is Your Thing" European Campaign

MEDIA POST - Jan 7 - The "If Commitment Is Your Thing" campaign, developed with Publicis Groupe's Marcel, uses one overarching message that opens with what is thought of as a romantic moment before revealing two individuals who are actually engaged in mundane activities, such as hanging a picture on a wall or dancing with a baby. Each snippet is designed to appeal to a core membership target, including single parents as well as same-sex and interracial couples. "In a society that values casual dating and one-night stands, it feels good to tell the world that more serious relationships and commitment are as cool and sexy," stated Youri Guerassimov and Gaetan du Peloux, executive creative directors at Marcel Worldwide. The campaign will roll out in France, UK, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Norway, airing across TV, radio, social and digital.

by Larissa Faw
See full article at Media Post

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French Senate Approves 3% Digital Tax on Big Tech

MEDIANAMA - July 12 - The French Senate has approved a digital tax, known as "Les GAFA" - Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, on digital companies that have a revenue of more than €25M in France, and more than €750M worldwide. This bill is likely to be signed into law by French President Emmanuel Macron within two weeks. The tax is expected to yield €400M in 2019, and €650M in 2020. It will affect ~30 companies, including GAFA, Meetic, Criteo, Instagram, and Airbnb. Other EU countries, including Austria, the UK, Spain, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Italy have also announced plans for their own digital taxes.

by Aditi Agrawal
See full article at Medianama

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Meetic Is Launching a New Serious Dating App - Affiny

LE JOURNAL DU DIMANCHE - Dec 18 - Meetic is launching a new dating app for serious relationships, called Affiny. New users will be asked to fill 137 long questionnaire. The app will be charging 39.99Eur/month for 3 months and 29.99/month for 6 months. Affiny is launching this week in France and in the UK before the end of the year. During its testing period, the app has mainly attracted users who were 35-50 years old.

See full article at Le Journal de Dimanche

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Dating Apps and Advertising on Snapchat

VERDICT.CO.UK - Dec 8 - With dating apps accounting for £11.7B of the economy last year, and 30% of 18-30 year olds in the US signed up to at least on service, the online dating market is extremely lucrative. Dating apps are looking to reach a young, tech-savvy audience, and many have found a match with Snapchat. Spending by dating services in the UK on the Snapchat platform has increased 13x from Q1 to Q3 this year. Since partnering with Snapchat more than a year ago, AI-driven dating startup Hily has seen a significant increase in the number of registrations. To coincide with Meghan and Harry's Royal Wedding, Meetic ran a campaign on Snapchat in an attempt to increase the number installations. Through this, Meetic reportedly reached ~3.5M unique users driving a 28% increase in app downloads on the day. Meetville ran an advertising campaign using Snap Ads to coincide with Valentine's Day, and 90% of the new UK iOS users who installed the Meetville app in February did so having come through the Snapchat app.

by Ellen Daniel
See full article at Verdict.co.uk

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Artificial Intelligence Is Progressively Entering Online Dating

WORLDCRUNCH - July 20 - Back in 2014, Justin Long started working on Bernie.ai, a robot that used facial recognition to select profiles on behalf of the user. If there was a match, it started the conversation with an opening line. The start-up LoveFlutter relies on Twitter and Facebook posts to match users. By teaming up with Receptiviti.ai, a company that specializes in the automated analysis of people's psychological states based on language use, the dating app promises to connect compatible personalities. Xavier de Baillenx heads innovation at Meetic. He developed the personal assistant Lara while co-running the start-up Pretty Fun Therapy, which has since been bought by Meetic. Today, Lara has ~50 distinct pieces of advice to give, suggesting locations for a date, what to wear, or how to overcome shyness.

by Basile Dekonink
See full article at Worldcrunch

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Summarized by the IDEA team

Can Match Fend Off Facebook And Bumble?

FORTUNE - June 27 - Globally, there are 600M singles online - a number that's expected to jump to 700M by 2020 - yet the industry's biggest player by far, Match Group, is estimated to claim just 10% of that. If Match Group wants to stay No. 1, it will need to defend its turf. Those who know Match Group CEO Mandy Ginsberg say she is likely to be up to the task. She knows the industry inside and out, and she takes Match's mission almost as a personal responsibility. The company's biggest competitors include eHarmony, Spark Networks, Badoo and Bumble. Bumble claims 34M total registered users. Of its active users, roughly 10% are paid; last year the company is said to have pulled in $100M in subscription revenue. It has a Goliath-size backer: Wolfe Herd created Bumble with the help of Andrey Andreev, the founder of Badoo. Andreev owns 79%, Wolfe Herd 20% (the remaining 1% is split between two additional employees). For a few years, Tinder and Bumble coexisted but things recently turned testy. In March, Match filed its suit against Bumble, accusing it of patent infringement and stealing trade secrets. Four days later, Bumble fired back with an angry letter. A few days after that, it filed its own suit against Match, claiming Match had fraudulently obtained sensitive information during acquisition talks. But both companies were hit with a much bigger tsunami of news on May 8, when Zuckerberg made his announcement. Match Group is working on new female-friendly features, like a Gentleman's Badge, a designation recently added into its European Meetic brand that men earn through certain behaviors, such as filling out an entire profile or engaging in lengthy email correspondence; men with the badge get 33% more attention from women.

by Leigh Gallagher
The full article was originally published at Fortune Magazine, but is no longer available.

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See all posts on Facebook Dating     See all posts on Tinder

Summarized by the IDEA team

DisonsDemain.fr: Meetic Launches Dating Site For 50+

01AMOUR - Mar 29 - Meetic has launched a new dating site for people 50+. There are ~9M singles in France that are over 50 years old.

See full article at 01Amour

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Q&A With Thomas Hadjadj, Meetic

LIFTOFF - May 17 - Thomas Hadjadj is the Head of Display Europe for Meetic. He's been at the company for ~8 years. He holds a business law degree and a Masters in Marketing.

Q: What do you like most about mobile marketing?
A: It moves forward very quickly. It forces us to remain attentive and always find new ways to work.

Q: What does it take to succeed in mobile marketing?
A: To have a great app! You need to be able to track the performance of your app. You have to be very data-driven. Stay alert of trends and technologies and test a lot of new things.

Q: What does a quality mobile user look like to you?
A: The one who will use our product as often as possible; they'll use it like a natural reflex and if they pay, it's even better

Q: What strategies work best to convert installs into engaged users?
A: Again, try to have the best app as possible, make it intuitive, try to avoid bugs and crashes.

Q: What have you done in the past year to help better monetize your app?
A: We're spending a lot of time on optimization and we are tracking way more things than in the past.

Q: What is the biggest challenge in marketing your apps?
A: Finding the right balance between volume of downloads and ROI.

Q: How do you stay ahead of changes in technology?
A: I stay informed with newsletters, LinkedIn, my colleagues and network.

Q: What do you see is the next big thing in mobile marketing?
A: 5G and connected objects.

See full article at Liftoff

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Meetic And Attractive World Sanctioned By CNIL

LA SIGNARE - Jan 3 - Meetic and AttractiveWorld.net has been fined by CNIL (The National Commission for Computing and Freedom) for processing sensitive personal data of its users without their consent.

by Gerome Betterncourt
See full article at La Signare

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team

Match Group Under Scrutiny

SEEKING ALPHA - Dec 7 - Match Group is known to favor acquisitions to counter competition. Since January 2009, it has invested ~$1.3B to acquire 25 brands for its dating portfolio. Match Group went public a year ago and is worth ~$4B. Currently, its portfolio consists of 45 brands. Analysts are concerned over its dependence on Tinder. In Q3 2016 Match Group dating revenues jumped 22% to $287.5M, driven by strong contribution from Tinder, Pairs and PlentyOfFish. Average paid member count grew 33% to 5.5M, with strong contribution from Tinder, Meetic and PlentyOfFish. Average revenue per paying user declined 8% to $0.54 primarily due to the comparatively low revenue rates for Tinder and PlentyOfFish. Match Group expects revenue growth of 15% to 20% next year.

by Sramana Mitra
See full article at Seeking Alpha

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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team