Why dating services are in decline ( Archived) (24)

First off, I'll state for the record that I'm NOT looking to date... but I am interested in the idea of running an intro service, just so I'd be able to do things my competitors weren't willing to do.

It's hardly a secret that the dating service industry has been in decline for the last couple of years, and as a person who owned 2 businesses before this publishing house, it's not hard to figure out why. The people who run dating services simply haven't been pushing the envelope.

After I read about the ways Henry Ford and Ray Kroc ran their business empires, I knew our dating services have been making some pretty bad moves. Henry Ford taught me that you should democratize your product rather than gentrify it (a powerful lesson Louis Chevrolet learned only after going broke), and Ray Kroc taught me that by coming up with a simple standard, you can buy out your competition or drive them out of business.

To elucidate... I'd start by calling my company United Introductions or something like that. It sounds big and intimidating if you're a competitor. Then I'd offer my equivalent of the Model T or the Big Mac: a standard, all-up introductions package costing no more than 300 dollars, aimed squarely at the working-class single who makes less that $70K a year. (The SoCal market is already glutted with high-end matchmakers who command fees of $3K at the very least.) There would be an online division, too, but it would have a catch: you'd need to show up in person at United Introductions' office for an interview, before being granted online privileges. That way, the staff would know whether or not you were a kook or a troll.

Who is going to have this special training, to judge who's a kook or troll? One thing that would accomplish, is you should be void of scammers.

See above.

Of my experience on them (since Dec. 2004 off and on), I had some luck and then I didn't.

One I really got along with real good and things were going great, until after the 3rd date he dropped off of the face of the earth. I think he said he was moving, but he never told me goodbye. Oh well.

I don't see the dating services as on the decline, your own words and ideas are proof of that.

I do see many charging fees for services they cannot deliver while at the same time offer you a discounted price if you can enlist others to join.

a major company I'll call GE is notorious for exaggerating their numbers of members even to the point of currently in litigation in several states by each States Attorney General.

If anything they should place guidelines and force these services to maintain a higher standard of customer satisfaction.

but dating services on the decline, Nope I don't see it. over saturation possibly.

You obviously haven't been reading their trade journals.

But I do believe a lot of them don't even read the profiles of someone, before writing a message to them. My last 2 dates didn't and wanted me to explain every little detail and stuff. Before I ever respond I read their profile first and then go from there.

Now, do you really think people on dating sites are reading trade journals? You joined one didn't you?

One person's kook or troll is another person's prince charming. Why should they be interviewed before being granted online access? That little guideline is a way of discriminating against people. Your staff would choose who gets on the site and who doesn't. They may deny someone based on their own preferences. What about the people who can't get to your offices? What are they supposed to do? I seriously think you need to put more thought in your grand scheme.