Ok, Slightly Frustrated About the Dating Website Thingy

Whats the USP of your site?

Pretty strange that why are nt you getting sign up even you are bribing alot. :S

Where is the link to your site?

3 days and you're frustrated? Probably not a great start

Here's my idea..

Start a viral contest. Who's the sexiest geek alive? Once people vote for the their favorite geeks, ask them to share the contest with their friends and earn more points. On the results page, you can suggest signing up to your site.

Other potential viral ideas.. Secret celebrities married to geeks .. Celebrities that really are geeks and you didn't know about it ... etc

If you focus on getting guys to sign up to the site, a sexy model who plays Diablo 3 could be a powerful incentive in geek-rich environment

If you're not getting signups, then probably your targeting wasn't that great to begin with.

Also, there is one element that might have an impact on your dating niche. What if people don't actually like being called geeks? Then they would not sign up to a geek community.

-Gabriel

This is tricky, dating sites are like forums. You need activity to get activity.

1. I would hire a sexy girl to maintain a profile. Or pay for a photo shoot or two and run the fake profile yourself. Then highlight this profile in your ads etc.

2. Get users who will be active. Don't pay all out for best quality here yet unless you have a big budget. We want people who will join, fill in profile, upload a picture. Anything else is gravy. More is better since your site is empty.

I am very awesome at populating dating sites, as well as have plenty of custom photo buying experience. Sig if you need help with either.

You gotta get seriously social mate.. FB, Twitter, DeviantArt, everywhere..

I don't know exactly how it can be done, but we know it can - all the other dating sites started with 0 profiles

I just signed up for your site and created a profile. That's a start.

I think he was onto something when he said he was going to add a call to action to the homepage. It could really use one. It should have a big, visible button that invites people to "Create a FREE profile now" or something like that. Or maybe even "Find Your Dream Geek Now!"

First, I wouldn't be freaking out about no signups after 3 days...that's a little premature in my opinion. How many visitors have viewed the landing page?

Secondly, you are competing with Match, eHarmony, and other large dating sites that have enormous marketing (online and offline) budgets. You're probably going to need to dump a lot more money into this thing if you're really wanting it to grow.

Lastly, you need to change the stock photo...immediately! It shows two "cool" looking young adults that are wearing sunglasses. That's not your target market at all. Like someone else said, I would have a photo slideshow of attractive, nerdy looking people. Also, I would try to get a logo professionally made. You're going to need the branding on this to be unmistakable.

You need to offer something different and relevant in your site. To me, it looks like a generic dating site aimed at 'geeks' in name only. Think about your target audience, what they like to do online, how they like to interact with the opposite sex online, what they think is missing from online dating right now, etc.

Perhaps you could run an advertising campaign aimed at geeky women asking them what they would like to see in a dating site and then use their suggestions. This both gives you insights into your demographic and gives you a 'pre-launch' type of buzz. Just be clever in your creatives and you might get a good response from. You could do amedia buying campaign on sites where geeks hang out (Project Wonderful might work if you have a low budget).

But seriously, you shouldn't be using other dating sites as the template for your landing page so directly. It looks very generic and scammy at the moment, and could be easily fixed by putting something together that is fully designed to appeal to your target audience, even if it looks nothing like a regular dating site. Also, you need to rewrite the URLs. Geeks are sure to notice that your login page is wp-login.php?action=register and not be impressed.

I think there is potential for your idea but you need to be very creative and clever to stand out above the competition and you need to know your audience back to front.

The look of the whole site was just not what I expected. The design and images you should need to be consistent with the "geek" feel. Like others have said, it's not coming across that way and it could be putting ppl off.

My first impression was "untrustworthy". It reminds me of those parking pages for domains for some reason where someone just threw some generic thing up for ad clicks etc. Which I guess this is sort of that. It doesn't instantly grab me to say this has something real to offer.

If you're pushing the geek thing you really need to exaggerate it way out. Geeky images of guys in dorky glasses, wearing pants too tight for them sitting nervously next to an equally geeky girl or something. It needs to resonate with these geeks that you're targeting.

Also, please change the colour. Purple = mystical/magical, not geek. I would suggest hiring some proper graphic designers to push for the geek message through typography, colour and style on top of the images you'd use.

Bigger, bolder call to action button. This button should be the first thing people notice. The second should be the feel of the page (geekiness), the last should be words people read. In that order.

Place more content on the front page and once you get profiles, highlight those. Also maybe quizzes, questionares or something to get people involved on the first page. Just some ideas.

Hi Rod,

May I ask why is it an org?
You don't have to offer them anything such as free hosting, etc.

The problem is you're competing with an averagely-saturated market and you need to have an innovative idea to trigger the huge traffic. Live oustide the box.

It's an .org because that's the domain I preferred. Free hosting is a great promotional vehicle, but I get what you are saying. Thanks for your help!

The problem is that it's a ghost town. It's going to be very hard to get someone to join unless their initial search shows hundreds of the opposite sex in their preferred age group that live near them.

Now you can do the same thing almost all dating sites do when they are new and don't have a million dollar budget for a saturation launch.

1. Create hundreds of thousands of fake profiles. You can delete them as real users replace them. Age, sex, location.

2. With almost all fake profiles you need to provide added entertainment services. This is where the fake profiles flirt with the real users and message them. Makes the inside look active and gets the member to stick around until real people eventually start flirting.

3. Contact other dating sites and buy API joins. This is where when someone joins another site, they are also registered as a member to your site in the background. Your system then sends them a welcome email with their login data.

Dating sites are extremely hard to get off the ground any other way unless you can invest enough in advertising to hit a good saturation level in a matter of days. Yes I said days.

I know it's not what you want to hear, but the above is the norm for the dating business.

Re's
Rob Whisonant

As my past experience, I would like to suggest you to use social networking site.
This kind of site can play most effective role. most people are there for relationship and they are seeking to some one for friendship like relation so you can target your site there.

Put some interesting profile on your home page to attract people and extend their stay there. Use instant messaging system and email messaging so any one join with Gmail or yahoo ID you can get all its contact list and send them mail to join too. Try some unique Idea like create poll, use prize and free gift.

The poster above is right, your site does look like a missing domain placeholder.

Geeks are the toughest market to crack online. They're smart and very resistant to advertising.

I can't believe people are recommending fake profiles. Is this blackhatworld? If you're charging users, then you'll get your sorry ass hauled up in front of a judge. And your reputation would suffer if you get rumbled. Ha ha ha, of course geeks are the most likely people to rumble you.

My own dating site now has 4000 members. It's hard work, and you'll have to get your credit card out and pay for advertising. There's no way SEO alone will populate a dating site - people will leave quicker than you can replace them.

why did you not just link in a white label platform and use that, instant membership and platforms to work with / all done for you.

I also do not think they need free hosting and stuff / not for a dating site

no aff links / the second one is owned from memory by a warrior here /

http://www.whitelabeldating.com/

http://datingfactory.com/

Also, a huge thanks to Ash and Seth.Since they were bold enough to be the first, I gave them free hosting and SB coffee! I will be giving out more hosting accounts today!

See this thread for details:

http://www.warriorforum.com/warrior-...r-contest.html

It looks just like another social network. Not a dating site. You need to get creative, social and viral.

One problem you will need to solve as soon as possible since you want to rely on viral is...

When someone joins and does a search for the opposite sex in their area and no results are returned.... What are you going to offer them, entice them with, keep them entertained and wanting to return on a regular basis until there are people in their area to flirt with?

Dating sites are the same as forums. If they don't get immediate satisfaction, they forget all about it and never return.

That is the problem you are going to face. You need to figure out WHY someone should wait for their satisfaction. That would be your USP.

What are you going to offer members that makes it worth their wait? Answer that and you just may have a chance.

Re's
Rob Whisonant

Thinking of putting some dating eBooks on the website, but can't find any. Does anyone have an ebook on dating they want to sell?

Sent you an email about the dating ebooks. :-)

Thanks Ash. I found 1 on here, but need some for guys.

Not to bump the thread, but just to mention I'm now having a contest for the best profile on Truegeeks, and giving away a $25 gift card from Walmart plus free web hosting for the next 6 people paid for 1 year.

http://www.warriorforum.com/warrior-...r-contest.html

try Offline marketing. It consists of using traditional marketing strategies like news paper ads, cards, fliers, radio and TV adverts. Whereas some of these strategies are much more effective for established dating businesses, it won't do you harm to try them as well. Of course, if it's going to hurt your budget, then you have to stick with online advertising which is generally cheaper compared to most forms of offline advertising.

Thanks Affninja for the reply. Capital I'm not too worried about, but the ROI is a concern. TrueGeeks is a niche website, and actually is a beta for another dating website I'm developing. I'm just learning the ropes to see what works and what really doesn't. So far, giving away free money and free hosting doesn't seem to work well with online marketing with dating websites. The issue isn't joining either. We have member sign ups, but lacking making the profiles severely. We're still just gathering all the demographic marketing data for our future targets.

If you dont have any profiles at all i would suggest you create a few with the help of friends and family. In my experience, no one cares to join a place that is completely new. People usually want to see someone is already there, and you need to get that initial content in there no matter what.

Without knowing your monetization strategies, it's hard to give exact ideas.
But offer something really, really VIP for charter geeks such as: always free for
the first 250 profiles, or free for a year for the first 100.

Hire a copywriter for geek speak content and advertising.
Tell them no false profiles here (as far as you know).

Advertise/market in the geek worlds, such as webhostingtalk, Drupal
and Magento, etc. communities. Public libraries. Sponsor targeted
MeetUp groups.

What are you doing to get targeted traffic? You need eyeballs so you can test and improve your conversions.

As someone who has been in the "dating" market for over a decade, I can tell you most of the niche dating sites are failures because they've narrowed the market too much or they don't have ample traffic sources or they don't offer a visitor something truly unique or different than the big two:

eHarmony

Match.com

Jason Moffat hit the nail on the head more than once. Just because you're a geek doesn't mean you can necessarily relate to them or know how to reach them. Personally, I would broaden your USP and your approach. I would not target geeks only, unless you have a really sound and proven strategy, which at the outset doesn't appear like you have one.

RoD

You are a glutton for punishment wanting to go against how the majority of dating sites start. AKA fake profiles. I'm going to think outside the box here...

1. You need to limit your site to people in ONE town. Select a small to medium size college town.

2. Find out where the college kids hangout. Bar, coffee shop, sushi bar etc.

3. Contact the owner of the hangout and see if you can setup a kiosk there. Put up some signs that every girl that fills out a profile at the kiosk (have a laptop or two with Internet access) you give them a coupon for $5 off their next purchase from the business you are setup in. Of course you make a deal with the business owner about these coupons. Try to exchange free advertising on the site for the coupons.

4. Once you have about 100 girls in the system, you open it up to the guys. But they have to pay for a membership. This will help recoup your initial expenses.

5. Once this first college town is on autopilot, select another college town as close as possible to the first one.

6. Repeat, repeat, repeat as you expand.

Re's
Rob Whisonant

PS Bring a digital camera to take profile pics. They can change their pic later when they get back to their home or dorm.

Up'ed the loot and it's now $50 dollars via Paypal, a Free Developer Hosting Account, and a $25 starbucks card for the best profile on True Geeks (DOT) Org | Where Geeks Can Meet Online A winner will be announced to 03/20/13 and YOU CAN CREATE MORE THAN ONE PROFILE. I'm legit, I spent $200 on a contest on my fanpage just a month or so ago. My facebook is facebook.com/fbmancave and talk to my friends to find out that I am totally legit...real company, real contest, real money, and real fun!

PS: This is the thread:

http://www.warriorforum.com/warrior-...r-contest.html

I know this is a very old thread, but I just had to reply and your website is still live. I don't know if you still work on it, but here's my 2 cents.

I see you still haven't changed the profile and it still looks like a very cheap, 90's website.
I checked how many members there are and there are 2 in the United States. You don't necessarily need a huge budget. Marcus from pof.com started with nothing and look at pof.com now. The thing is, he offered something different, something that didn't exist at the time - a free dating site. He didn't have money to burn; the website was run off of his computer for quite a while, until he switched to a hosting service provider. But he learned about the dating industry every day. In an interview, he said he would learn and try different things and build the website slowly. He ran free ads in newspapers. Read about how he started to learn more about the industry.

Now, I see a huge mistake you're making. You're offering people hosting and coffee to sign up. That has nothing to do with dating. If people want to find someone, they could care less about hosting. You need to give them something that is related to dating. You need to create that fuzzy feeling in them to make them WANT someone and you need to convince them that your site is a perfect place to find someone.

Imagine this:

You're in a rush, you go to a store to buy a shirt and someone offers you a free face cream if you take 15 minutes to sign up for something. Guess what? Most people wouldn't. They came to buy something else, they don't care about your product and many don't have time. Many don't want to give away their personal info, either. BUT... if they came to buy a shirt and you offered them a free shirt if they signed up, how many more do you think would say YES? I think many, many more. So, giving people hosting to sign up for a dating site is pretty much useless in my opinion. Give male geeks cute females, and give female geeks cute boys and they will sign up.

Did you notice how old this thread is? The search was set up in that way because of lack of sign ups in the beginning so it's really not a "bug", but thanks for noticing. Gift certificates is a good idea. Again, there's a possibility to repurpose the website to a different target audience, and I have done a decent job at it in the past when necessary. My company makes around 19k per year from IM (I wonder where does that rank me with the IM'er on the net? It's a great way to make a living I think - kudos to those who do!) so it's really not what we depend on to make a living on the web, but hey, it's always good to get input on a not so recent project. Thanks!

No, to be frank, I really have not given it very much attention. I have a lot of peers including some of the experts on this thread that does very successful dating websites, but I don't think I am prepared to take away that much energy from other projects that do work for me. I agree that the niche is very specific, and building the audience may look very different than the way it's set up now.

Keep going @quick_silver these things take time to build!