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2) What are the differentiation strategies, offerings and value propositions of key players in the global market for online dating/dating apps?
Overview
The global market for online dating sites is largely dominated by five sites. Match.com, Plenty of Fish, Zoosk, OkCupid and eHarmony, with the next closest competition having more than a million fewer unique visitors per month. The top 5 sites also show significant differences in traffic — Match.com shows more than 35 million unique visitors per month as compared to eHarmony's 7 million. Match.com distinguishes itself as a high-quality website through its sophisticated, well-developed services. Plenty of Fish and Zoosk highlight fun, casual dating, where their websites and apps track user preferences and matches to provide evolving matches over time. OkCupid takes on a more math-based approach by advertising its highly mathematic algorithms and heuristics to provide the most accurate matches. eHarmony advertises in a similar fashion, focusing much more on its scientific approach to draw users.
Match.com
Differentiation Strategy — Match.com focuses on those looking for long-term relationships and has done so since its inception in 1995. Match.com bases its advertising strategy on this focus, but it also differentiates itself based on its sophisticated features. Its profile matching, search tools, and communication avenues are designed to provide higher quality results than other dating sites, giving Match.com its trusted reputation. Additionally, Match.com offers a live chat option that allows members to connect casually with no strings attached. In order to further differentiate its services, Match.com offers different approaches and features depending on different country cultures. This allows it to tailor its services for the 24 different countries and territories with a combined 15 different languages it covers.
Features:
1. Personality test — Designed by their sister site, Chemistry.com. Match.com markets their personality test as an in-depth analysis of your personality. This is then used to match you with people who possess characteristics their analysis has shown to be compatible with yours, instead of simply those you share characteristics with.
2. "Deal Breakers" — Search criteria that lets you narrow your results based on characteristics you DON'T want in a partner.
3. Testimonials — Match.com lets you include testimonials from your friends, family, or even former partners, in your profile.
Plenty of fish
Differentiation Strategy — Plenty of Fish uses the same "personality analysis" angle used by Match.com, but without nearly as much focus on finding a long-term partner. PoF positions itself as a middle ground between "hook-up" sites like Tinder, and "marriage" sites like Match.com and eHarmony. Its best feature is its Chemistry Predictor, a test that can determine how compatible two people are based on in-depth personality tests. One unique thing about the Chemistry Predictor is that it evolves with the user, tracking views and matches to change its suggested matches over time.
Features:
1. Chemistry Predictor — A personality test that uses the "5 key factors" to successful relationships.
2. Tracking and Adaptation — Plenty of Fish tracks which profiles you look at and modifies its results based on that data.
3. "Meet me" feature — A search filter that lets you limit your matches to an adjustable geographic area.
Zoosk
Differentiation Strategy — Zoosk takes the same middle ground strategy as Plenty of Fish, but it focuses heavily on the personalization and ease-of-use aspect of its website. Like Plenty of Fish, it provides smart matchmaking to learn individual preferences and provide better matches based on user actions over time. Zoosk also stresses its wide international user base (80 countries vs. Match.com's 24) to set it apart from other dating sites.
Features:
3. Profile Personalization — Zoosk offers a deeper selection of personalization options than most dating sites.
OkCupid
Differentiation Strategy — OkCupid positions itself as the geeky, smart way to match with people. Its advertising highlights its use of advanced and highly accurate algorithms, formulas, and heuristics far more than other dating sites. It also sells itself as a fun, quirky take on dating, with personality tests like "The Nerd, Geek, or Dork? Test".
Features :
1. Match Percentage — Personality test-based matchmaking that assigns each match a percentage based on how many tests results have matched with your own.
2. Importance — OkCupid's personality profile questions let you rank how important or unimportant you find that characteristic in a mate.
3. Double Take — A mobile feature similar to Tinder that lets you scroll through the pictures and information of matches close to you in a geographical area.
EHarmony
Differentiation Strategy — eHarmony positions itself as a direct competitor to Match.com. Like Match.com, it focuses on using personality analysis to find people a long-term partner. However, eHarmony differentiates itself based on the science behind its personality tests and their ties to different fields of behavioral science. Their matching is based on a 29 DIMENSIONS® model that they claim is based on scientific research into successful relationships — something that other dating sites don't do.
Features:
1. 29 Dimensions model — eHarmony's personality test and matchmaking model it claims is rooted in behavioral science.
2. Background filters — Search filters that narrow results based on a person's background (Asian, Jewish, etc.). This esentially creates niche dating sites within the larger eHarmony community.
3. Advice and community — Support for those looking for a relationship or for those in a relationship.
The ResT
Badoo (6) — The site does little to differentiate itself from its larger competitors when it comes to features or strategy, but it does boast better location based services and availability in 190 countries. Its user base is about 6 million.
ChristianMingle (7), Our Time (8), BlackPeopleMeet (10) — Niche dating sites focused on peoples of different backgrounds or ages. None seem to offer any features not seen in their larger competitors, and seem to rely simply on their niche member bases to differentiate themselves. None have monthly user bases above 5 million.
DateHookup (9) — A dating website that seems to differentiate itself only by the fact that it is entirely free to use. Maintains a monthly user base of about 3 million.
Conclusion
The top 5 dating sites use several methods to differentiate themselves from their competitors. Match.com focuses on the quality and sophistication of its technology while Plenty of Fish and Zoosk highlight the casual, fun, and personalizable nature of their websites. Plenty of Fish and Zoosk also adjust their suggest matches based on continuous user data, which is something other sites do not advertise. OkCupid and eHarmony advertise themselves as more scientific websites, where OkCupid has a much more math-based strategy and eHarmony focuses on scientific research to provide the best matches possible.