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Analysis: How Do Free Dating Services Make Money?
By: Jonathan Fox
The big commercial dating sites make their money in the old fashioned way: fee based subscriptions.
The user pays a monthly fee to the online dating service for his membership.
Assuming an average monthly subscription fee is around $25-$35, just
imagine what it means financially to a dating service that has 3 or 5
million paying members or even more.
Free dating sites have a more complex income strategy.
After all, they're free, so it rules out member subscription fees as their source for income.
If that's the case, how do free dating sites make a living?
Here's how they do it.
Method #1 – Ad Networks
Some of the free online dating services blend text ads on their web sites.
These ads are being provided to them by large ad networks such as Google, Yahoo and others.
When a surfer clicks on one of these ads, the customer that originally
bought that ad from the large ad networks is being billed for that
click.
The revenue for that click is being shared between the ad network (that
provided the ad in the first place) and the dating site owner (which
acts as an advertising platform in this case).
If a dating site has a large
member base, it can result in a lot of money making clicks and that's a
major revenue source for the site operators.
Method #2 – Affiliate Programs
Another popular way of making money online is through affiliate programs.
Let's understand what an affiliate program is and how it makes money for the dating service owner.
The free site owner places a text or graphic ad for a big commercial service on his site.
When a surfer clicks on that ad on the free site, he's transferred to the pay site.
If he registers and becomes a paying member – the revenue from
the subscription is being shared between the commercial site and the
free site.
After all, it's the free site that brought the pay site a new paying customer.
Method #3 – Selling Member's Personal Information
Lots of companies (dating and non
dating related) are willing to invest a fortune to gain access to fresh
leads that contain personal information details like names, gender,
geographical location, email address, etc.
Free dating services practically
"sit" on a huge database of valuable information and selling it to
various 3rd parties is just another easy way to make money.
Method #4 – Selling Advertising on Their Site
This is the old fashioned way and the other 3 above are more popular these days.
Still, some free dating sites offer ad space on their sites as a source for revenue.
Article provided courtesy of Online Money Makers.
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