Online Dating Looks Overseas for Growth

As far back as the Paleolithic era, there have been matchmakers. Primitive man probably exchanged their daughters for a excellent spear or loin cloth at some point. In the middle ages, families exchanged their daughters for labor, land, goods, and even reputation.

Some know them by the Yiddish term “Shadchen.” And you probably thought the right term was “Yenta,” but it’s not (I admit I did too). A Yenta is simply a gossipy woman. In nearly every society, a community limb set himself or herself up as the self to set up unions.

Enter the Internet. In the late 1990′s, online dating started to take market impart from the dominant matchmaking tool of the time–newspaper voice personals. The internet could simply do some things better. After all, corporal attraction is a huge part of the equation and the internet could show a picture, even if the photo was full ten years or thirty pounds ago.

Today, there are over one thousand internet dating sites in the USA alone. They vary from the highly shown brands like eHarmony and Match to niche sites like JDate that cater exclusively to Jewish singles–without the Shadchen. Proprieters vary from large companies to entrepreneurial sites run off of entrepreneur’s home office laptops.

The internet dating industry rang up $649 million in sales in 2006, and eclipsed $700 million in 2007, according to Juniper Investigate. Of the 92 million unmarried adult Americans 18 or older, 16 million have tried online dating, according to the Pew Internet and Social Lifestyle Study. That’s a lot of clicks, or people in suspense to click.

Internet dating has been around since the late 1990′s, but it exploded in 2003 with a 77% growth rate. Growth has slowed to 10% recently partly because of competition from the recent phenomenon known as social networking sites. With sites such as Facebook, you can in effect flirt for free. Just like in the Paleolithic era.

In the face of declining growth, online dating brands such as MatchLink, operated by Spark Network Services, are looking overseas for growth. Expanding internationally, but, comes with some cultural challenges. In Japan, for example, it isn’t really necessary to question for hair color, because there really aren’t too many blondes. Then, there’s cultures like China and India where it’s vital to adhere to the local traditions.

International expansion is certainly the way to grow the industry. “We’ve enhanced our offering to include a more international dating database,” said Bob Bentz, boss of marketing for Spark. “You really need to reckon global and act local in today’s online dating world.”

Like with most products, the real jewel for international expansion appears to be China and India. Sixty million internet users are of marrying age in China, according to iResearch, and that market segment alone will grow to 128 million by 2010. By now, 14 million Chinese use online dating, but only 500,000 pay for the service, thus making a marketplace where advertiser-sponsored services must be the norm.

In India, where up to 90% of all marriages are arranged, local online dating companies are by now racking up some impressive numbers. A local site, Shaadi, by now boasts having arranged 800,000 marriages. Online dating revenues in India are growing by 50% per year and hit $30 million in 2006.

The growth in China and India prove that when it comes to online dating, like needs no version.

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