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eHarmony believes online dating stigma has died
By Brian FairbanksAugust 17th, 2010, 2:28 pmComments (4)
They may not be the best dating site by any means, but we have to hand it to eHarmony on making it to their 10-year anniversary without imploding in a fiery financial flameout.
Instead, the company rakes in $200 million per year with its 3.4 million monthly uniques views and 33 million registered users. Because of this, the New York Times deemed them worthy of a full profile in Sunday's paper, which unearthed some tidbits about the company's new strategy to dominate the world.
The company's latest TV spots were directed by Errol Morris and focus on telling people they don't have to do anything differently to find true love, they just need eHarmony to match them up with people who feel the same way. The ads used 100 unpaid "real-life eHarmony couples" in a Los Angeles shoot, plus 6,000 photographs of real-life eHarmony couples to plaster a billboard in Times Square in celebration of the new campaign.
Here's one of the ads -- what do you think? Does it actually make you want to use (shudder) eHarmony?
Meanwhile, the New York Daily News thinks the opposite is actually happening -- people are abandoning online dating sites and moving toward... some other weird thing.
Commentarium (4 Comments)
Awww, that ad is kinda sweet.
Is it at all surprising that an online dating site thinks that online dating is a good thing?
"What if you could just be you?" -- er, isn't a key component of every dating/jobsearch/self-improvement plan "Be yourself"? How and why would you ever be anyone else anyway?
I'm holding out for the jewishmatches.com launch so I can get me a hot shejew.
Punk-rock libertine that I am, I would still consider using eHarmony if they would let me. After taking their extensive "personality" test, I was disqualified. At least the site was frank in their reasoning: Basically, the site exists to match -- for the state purpose of marriage -- clearly-defined types. My "type" is not clear enough. I could get snarky and say it's because I have too much personality, but... okay, actually, I think it's because I have too much personality. Granted, this was a couple of years ago, but the taste remains.
Now you say something