Run a dating site - been going 4 years, surf and have profiles on all over major sites, paying and free and want to know what everyone is averaging for free to paying signs ups.

Have read quotes from Udate/Mel Morris pre-buy out that thei industry standard was 10%, and they hit 20% in UK.

DatingDirect.com just sent me an email saying next 5000 members to pay get month's sub for GBP2.00/USD1.5 or so!!! Desperate or what.

So, is the 10% a hidden myth to gloss over the fact that no one pays, or it is a much greater figure?

I've hit from 2% to 41% free to paying stats..what about some others?

You can charge for new memberships.

My suggestion is to make it reasonable:

a) Lifetime Mmebership (About $100-200)

b) 3 Month Membership

c) Monthly Membership.

Your price is dependent upon how many active users you have and how popular the site is.

Excluding eHarmony, most big sites charge $15-25/month.

Hope that helps.

Thanks, but i already charge, what I wanted to know from others is the average % of members than join then pay.

You r asking the most important question that the entire Internet (and not only) business comes down to. It's called a conversion ratio. As for the dating business, there r two of them:
1. visitors to profiles
2. profiles to payees
The average combined conversion ratio for e-commerce across the industries is considered to be around 1% from visitors to buy-orders.
The dating business used to have about the same. The average for the Dating industry was around 10% on each leg of the conversion.
NOT ANY MORE!
But the biggest mistake dating sites do from my viewpoint is trying to get higher conversion offering lower fees. These guys just don’t do math and have no clue about their customers needs (that's called marketing).
In terms of the marketing, it's not a price sensitive business. It is not! eHarmony shows why.
Now back to math.
What do you pay a click? In order to get some volume, one has to bid $0.50 to $1.00. Here is another stumbling stone. People won't stay on a site unless you have an alive community. And it's all about traffic. That's why bidding low is a waste of time.
Let's say you take a deep breath and bid $0.75. You'll get some traffic. Don't expect much.
Now it comes to $7.50 a profile and $75.00 a payees.
How much to charge?
Given to the fact that an average user's lifetime is 3 months, we have $75.00/3=$25.00 a month. That's what you have to charge just to reach the break-even point. Cool!? That’s exactly what staying afloat sites charge give or take.
Everything less will be a waste of cash.
Do people charge less? Yes, they do. Do they make money then? No, they don’t.
Is it possible to make money? Yes, if you manage to break through the initial stage when badly a populated DB causes much lower conversion ratios and much higher costs as a result.

At SweetDuet.net we offer a solution to this terminal problem.
Can you do it on your own? Yes, you can. But you'll save hundreds of thousands of $$$ and years of work with us.
What are the chances you'll survive on your own? It's 50/50 as always. Either you'll be around next year or not. We can improve your chances.

Regards,
SweetDuet.net

Please see this PPT presentation about how the U.S. market opportunity remains enormous. (page 6)

http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_fil ... sonals.pdf
or
http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zht ... tId=804120 (Select Personals)


Although the information is from NOV 2003, that leader company STILL has ONLY nearly 1% penetration of the whole U.S. market, because according to Census 2000 figures, there are nearly 89.3 million persons singles at the US, and nearly 1.074.500 are net paid subscribers of that leader online dating site (From http://www.iac.com/iac_q1_05.pdf page 6)


If you add net paid subscribers of all U.S. dating sites, perhaps the total is less that 10 million. There are 76 million waiting for quality at affordable cost
(Perhaps USD 300 first year. Note that OffLine Chains charges USD1,500 minimun)


Cordially,

Fernando Ardenghi.
Buenos Aires.
Argentina.
ardenghifer@gmail.com

Thanks, know what you mean about the 10%, I always had it down as a myth.

Yes people are getting desperate, DatingDirect.com sent an email round to member saying first 5000 would get membership for GBP2/USD1.50 - desperate or what.

I agree on content, it's why I keep profiles on wheresmydate set up so that if you don't login you don't get shown, simple and means new members see active users.

We get high numbers joining in UK but about 2% going onto pay and this has dropped over the last 3 months, seems more want to window shop. User fall into many caetgories, those who join to window shop, those unsure, time wasters and actully those who want to meet somone, then there is the lot who expect others to write to them, or get in touch when they write little and have crap profile!!

MyHong Kong site is rocking! The paying % is really high and we are breaking into the market here, last month it hit well above 20%

I dont bid and happy not to as my rankings are very high, by not bidding I keep costs low as when I started I burned lots, didn't we all!

I agree on costs I run at $16 a month or $29 for 3 and that is fair, people are funny some will not pay if it is cheap.

Forget and put aside all the stats simple problem is that physcologicaly people will not pay for dating, they will joing, look, search and not pay - the numbers are irrelevant and you just need to look at how others have to expend into other revenue streams to make it work.

I've kept and will keep online, it's easier and costs less, if you venture into parties the only ones who make are bars...trust me I used to operarte a few!

So how can we make people pay! We don't they will soon all bitch meeting and finding someone so it is a matter of digging deep, theer is no such thing as niche marketing, we all in dating and if we stick to online dating an not venture from that then we will soon capture those who eventually will pay. Me I'm off to China, massive dating market there, all mobile orientated too!

Would like to hear from more about free to paying members stats and %'s - it will help us all, we're all in the same boat.

What 2% and what 20% are you talking about?
You have 300 visitors a day on each your sites. What's rocking?

If you decide to bring your sites to life don't hesitate to contact us at http://www.sweetduet.net

Have a nice trip to China

Regards
http://www.sweetduet.net

Many online dating / social networking sites believe that their business model is to provide contents, and also many dating marketing executives invented NEW fakes PROFILES every day to increase traffic, but they are terrible wrong.
An online dating site / social networking site is a CONTACTS PROVIDER, same as offline chains / offline dating agencies.
For any person (visitor, user, client) the main objective is: to successfully find compatible contacts, be part of a community. To invest time and effort building a personal relationship with future in mind.

An online newspaper / magazine site is a contents provider.
For any person (visitor, user, client) the main objective is: to be informed / updated (information with expiration date)

A search engine site is an information provider.
For any person (visitor, user, client) the main objective is: to find the information / knowledge needed (most information without expiration date)

A job recruitment site is a service provider.
For any applicant / candidate the main objective is: to find a desired job.
For any company / recruitment agency the main objective is: to find the correct applicants / candidates.

An online bid site is a service provider.
For any buyer the main objective is: to buy a desirable product / service.
For any seller the main objective is: to sell a desirable product / service.
Although persons are contacted, only for buy / sell goods or services, mostly only-one-time-transaction.

An online store site is a product provider.
For any client the main objective is: to buy desirable products (books, clothes, computers, gifts, etc)


If any online dating / social networking site believes that its business model is to provide contents, it will fail. The only way to increase "conversion rate" is to morph / metamorphose from contents to contacts provider business model.

Fernando Ardenghi.
Buenos Aires.
Argentina.
ardenghifer@gmail.com

the 2 and 20% are percentage ratios of those who join and then go on and pay.

I migt get 300 visitors a day but not everyone joins, there are a lot of time wasters out there who visit dating sites jsut out of boredom and a curiosty factor.

So, I am saying out of every say 100 that join as free members 2 (2%) then go on and pay in my UK site and in my hk site out of every 100 who join 20 (20%) go on and pay.

It was widely publiscised that this ratio was 10% but what I have been trying to ask is what do you other sites achieve? I am not bothered about unique visitors, and so on all i would like to know from those who also run dating sites is what is the % ratio of those that join to those that then go on and pay, nothing more, nothing less - just a simple request.

Thanks

Can you expand on the following:

If any online dating / social networking site believes that its business model is to provide contents, it will fail. The only way to increase "conversion rate" is to morph / metamorphose from contents to contacts provider business model.

Despite running a dating site it makes no sense to me!

What do you mean by 'provide contents' and 'from contents to contacts provider business model'?

Simple business model of online dating is converting those members who join to paying members, and that's accross all forms and methods of dating!

Can you expand for me.
Cheers