URGENT: Making $$$ with a dating site

Thx for you replies

It's an online dating membership site. What niche I'm in? Well, I'm targetting women and men who are looking for a serious relationship. How's this niche called? I'm a total noob here, so please forgive me if I ask silly questions.

My site is targetting people in Slovenia (Europe). Yeah, SEO is good and I will start doing it, but here I need to learn what to do and how. A good mentor would be great, maybe someone is interested? Maybe we can find a win-win opportunity? I don't know. If someone sees an opportunity, just PM me.

I'd like to invest my last few hundred bucks in paid advertising, but I want to invest it smartly - so that I get in return more than I invested. I know that's totally possible, because my competition is already doing it, you just have to know where and how to advertise. That's why someone who has experience would be great!

You can take a look at the site here tinyurl dot com /7yw6bqf . It's in the Slovenian language - use Google chrome to translate pages to english while you browse them. Use these usernames to log in: 'male1' OR 'male2' OR 'female1' OR 'female2' . The pass is always the same: 'user' . male1 and female1 don't have a paid subscription, male2 and female2 have a paid subscription. The site is still in testing mode. The payment system will be completed in a week or two. Do whatever you want on the site, hack it, destroy it, I don't care - if you manage to destroy or hack something, just tell me how you did it so that I can correct the problem.

Anyway, thanks for your advice, I will consider every option you mentioned. The problem here is that I just don't know what will work and what won't work and my budget is limited as hell.

So, dear friends and blessed fellas, I'd like to find a mentor who will teach me how to make some serious money out of a dating site. I'm open to partnerships and other ideas. I'm gonna do whatever it takes to succeed. Whoever will help me on my endeavour, I promise, I will give twice as much back. May it be money, knowledge, whatever.. Right now I don't have much to offer, but in a year or two I'll build an empire and that's when you will get a lot in return. If anybody would like to help me out or partner with me, I'm ready to do whatever you tell me to do - just show me how to make a living out of a dating site like mine as I don't have money to learn by myself on my own mistakes.

Peace brothers

Where can I find "dating forum"?

If you can find marketers who are in the same niche as you, try getting some of them to do a mail-out for you, like an adswap, but you pay instead of swapping e-mails.

You might look here in the Warrior Classifieds section for someone in your niche.

There are a few other similar places on the net, but I can't call the names at the moment.

Hope this helps.

Robert

I don't see how that's possible, since you get what you pay for...

Woww thx for you help. That's really nice.

Just for the record, I can't send PMs because my post count is below 50. If anybody wants me to contact you, write me a PM and put your contact details in there. Thx.

Yeah I have a plan, but it's just that I'd like to make money with more "legal" types of advertising, like google ads, banner ads, media buys... and all the other free types of advertising that you suggested. I'll definitely consider all the options you mentioned. I know I can convert free signups into paid memberships, but right now I don't know the exact numbers.

I think I'll try Facebook ads first as I can target single women and men from a specific country and in a specific age group. I'm assuming that Facebook ads would work the best. So I'm going with Facebook.
I'll also join some dating forums and give advice on how to meet someone on the internet. I hope people will find my info useful and click on the link in the signature.

About marketing the site... I guess it's all trial and error - test until you find an advertising method that works. That's what I'll do. I'll read, learn, try and see if it works. Sooner or later I'll find something that brings money. I'll keep you posted on my learning journey.

You people are giving me so many good ideas, thx

I think getting people on the site will not be a problem, but what do I know, maybe I'm wrong and my plan wont work? So I'm doing everything I can to make it as good as it can be.

The site has a few hundred profiles that I got from a friend's dating site (these profiles are not active, but are there and the site looks populated with activity). When somebody pays for a membership, they also get access to the lectures section where they can find advice on meeting women or men online. I have more than 250 pages of advice for each sex, male and female. Just as Jas Kaur said, members also have a chance to win prizes, but in order to be eligible for the prize, they have to invite at least 3 friends to the site first.

My plan is to give new members free access to the lectures. Hopefully this will motivate them to sign up. Once they signup, I'll make sure that they get contacted by the opposite sex, so they will have a reason to pay for the membership.

I'm preparing a landing page that I'll use for advertising on Facebook. I'll show you how it looks like before I start my campaign on Fb.

wvdploeg. Besides forums, do you know any other places where I can find potential buyers for my dating script?

Anyway, if I succeed in my project, I will post how I did it so maybe we can learn something new here.

I understand this thread is old, sorry for reviving it, but since I have a personal interest and stake on dating sites I will share my experiences.

as you said, there is a good chance that he failed, I wouldn't say 99%, but is very possible. Or perhaps he is laughing his way to the bank.

I am still trying to get my dating site off the ground. I spent more than I care to spend, but I still think I have a shot to make it. I was tired of building countless EMD(exact domains) and MFA(made for adsense) mini-sites and making $50 dollars a month.

But I have to agree and disagree with you, it was probably a mistake not doing more research on his niche, or even getting a bit more deeper on the dating niche (which is very broad), but if you want to do something that will stick it takes time. You might not see any success in the first year or eve the first couple of years.

For me, the quick money scheme of the web is over. You need to build long lasting web properties to really see real money, the kind of money that you will be able to stop working and make a career out of it.

As others said wisely, the really sticking point on dating sites is to get the "ladies" interested in your site... men will come dime a dozen... and that is the real problem that I am facing right now. for every 30 or so men signing up I have 1 or 2 ladies signing up. Another thing is to get the ladies uploading their picture .... as of now I have no problems with men signing up.

I have done some facebook ads with some degree of success. as of now the site is free, and to access premium content they must pay (men), of course ladies are free ..., I have yet to get a penny from my site, but I think my biggest issue is to drive the interests of women. Once they are signing up with at least the 3 for every 7 men ratio, I think I will start making money.

Yes of course.

I begun my dating site with a clear very laser specific niche. I think the part where I went wrong was when I tried to get things done on the cheap. I bought a dating script (which was okay) but very soon I realized I needed to get my site visually compelling, so off I went to hire an web designer and then a programmer.

Looking back, I would have done things a bit different.

1st - I would not have purchased an script, and would have done the site from the ground up (as a contractor told me to no avail).

2nd - I would first draw a very good mock up of what I wanted in the site and get a quote from contractors (never go with the cheapest. try to stay on the middle of the price spectrum), contractors from Eastern Europe are very knowledgeable and affordable.

3rd - don't be cheap. a good quality dating site will set you off a good 3K to 5K. Depending on how much you are willing to spend. Of course before you spend that much, make sure to take the time to research your niche and make sure its viable. You can always get a site done for under 1K, but you get what you pay for. You have to remember that dating site will allow you to do a number of different things, and these things will take your contract a while to build. the other option is to learn to program yourself, if money is really a big issue.

4th - Always think mobile first - this is where the growth is. this is where people will be accessing your site - you need to have a good responsive design site.

and 5th - keep in mind that no matter what you do, you might fail. Be mentally prepare to fail. Don't go into a venture thinking that you will fail, but remember failing is a possibility. In my mind internet marketing is my passion, if this venture fail, I already have a 2nd venture planned and researched.