4 ms·
8. Dating. Current dating sites are not the last word. Better ones will appear. This problem falls under the classification of "critical mass" problems. I thin
by foompy_katt 18y ago
8. Dating. Current dating sites are not the last word. Better ones will appear.
This problem falls under the classification of "critical mass" problems. I think any solution that works for one of these types of problems, is likely to work for the others. "Critical mass" is when the problem is not in coming up with a good alternative, the problem is that having a critical mass of users for your solution is going to be an important part of the value you offer to your customers.
I've never been able to flesh this out enough to the point where I was sure I had a solution that would definitely work. But here's what I came up with so far: make a website, and a company, whose focus is solely on building critical masses of users for those "new alternatives". It would consist entirely of methods and social software that could be used to build critical mass.
For example, users could state how many other users would need to be using a new service, before they would try it. Or how many of their friends were doing it. Then, you inform them when those numbers are reached- when the 100th user is there, the 1000th user, etc. (whatever they named), the third user after they posted, etc. Ideally, you would have enough people who've registered their herd-desire, that you could set off a chain reaction from 0 to the number needed for viability.
Unfortunately, that probably wouldn't work for anything but what attracts the most savvy users. I think you might have to pay people to form flash mobs. I.e. people go hang out on the website, and they get a notice of "if you're interested, go to this dating site and fill out a profile, and earn $5. Each other new user you find earns $1 for you". Especially the more social it is, the more it would work to have a flash mob thing going on, where there's only one opportunity at a time. Then you hope that a temporary critical mass sustains itself- that if it's good enough, people will stick around and the rest of the nuclear reaction can complete itself.
To some extent, what I'm proposing is the Mechanical Turk thing Amazon does, but for user bases. And you'd probably have to do a lot of user verification.
- Tichy 18y agoIs the critical mass really a problem for dating sites? In Germany, the big dating sites simply spend a lot of money on advertising, which seems to work well enough. Also, I would expect that people frequently switch dating sites, so new sites should have relatively good odds of attracting new members.
- foompy_katt 18y agoI was just going off of what Graham wrote- "But no one wants to use a dating site with only 20 users—which of course becomes a self-perpetuating problem. So if you want to do a dating startup, don't focus on the novel take on dating that you're going to offer. That's the easy half. Focus on novel ways to get around the chicken and egg problem." Since I have no specific familiarity with dating sites, all I could suggest was a vague, general approach. Of course a big dating site might have a lot of money to advertise, but a small one probably can't afford it. But that's obviously one possible way to get some users.
- ideas101 18y agomay be i'm asking a stupid question but can someone clarify what is the chicken and egg problem with dating sites?
- gaius 18y agoIt's difficult to attract people to a dating site that has very few members. You have to implement a non-tech solution, such as a huge mass-media advertising campaign (e.g. Dating Direct have ads in the breaks in Gray's Anatomy), which is hugely expensive. Or you have to have a viral idea, like OkCupid offering quizzes to LJers and getting them to create profiles as an aside.
- danielsp 18y agoI don't think dating sites and "critical mass" are bound together forever. Change the game with a new approach. Dating sites are walled-off surroundings. That has to change.
- boardrider_99 18y agoSo 1000 poor quality users are 'better' and more valuable to a customer than 10 potentially great matches? You are right that a site must have a certain critical mass to attract other users. The exact number is unclear though; is 50 enough? 100? 200? At what point do people just start flipping through profiles to guage the quality of the potential matches as opposed to worrying about whether there's enough people on the site to justify their registration? I think viral ideas are the way to in terms of low-cost and high impact ways to attract users. The smart entrepreneur will always experiment with different ideas and use metrics to guage their effectiveness. The name of the game is new users for $0 if possible. It has been said that creativity is what happens when one removes a zero from the budget, so let the brainstorming begin! I am working on a few niche dating sites right now, and I plan to put a fresh spin on dating using the internet. Thanks for posting on this topic.