(Online Dating Industry Journal) Online Dating Magazine has just posted a detailed interview with entrepreneur Michael Jones, the founder and CEO of Userplane. Userplane is a company focused on connecting users through innovative applications.
In his interview Jones gave his thoughts on how the online dating industry has changed in the past couple of years, what deceptive methods some online dating services are using in order to manipulate members, how to attract and maintain users, and the future of the online dating industry.
Here is a sample from the interview:
ODM: Converting users is vital and in your guest editorial you gave some good examples for conversions. Retaining a converted customer is also vital. What are your thoughts on keeping a person using (or coming back to) a service after they’ve become a member?
Michael Jones: I have not seen many sites using tiered membership structures, which many other businesses have found successful. We setup our applications to allow tiered features, with quick upsell opportunities for desired features. Most dating sites still seem to have a single cost offering, which is limiting.
Conversion and user retention is an ongoing issue with online dating, especially for sites that aim to build long term relationships, resulting in the loss of paying members. There are a few sites that focus on "long term relationship" needs, but most are currently ignoring this market opportunity. We often recommend that sites with retention problems take a look at how they handle user profile exposure and search, and even recommend they use our Sitesearch product. Search, being the key to many sites, is often overlooked, and long-time members lose exposure and interest over time while search primarily features new users. In our experience, having a system that keeps both older and newer users "in-the-loop" helps with member retention.
To read the full, in-depth interview with Michael Jones, click here.
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