Starting and running any business requires tough skin, grit, data analytics, and a long list of other due diligence processes too long to list here. However, technology has made some of those processes a bit easier while at the same time complicating others; and you will see how further down.
Today we are going to talk about starting and running a successful online dating platform. Thanks to the insights from Flirt.com, we can say the following tips are somewhat from the horse’s mouth. If you are looking to start an online dating service, the following are some of the things that ought to be in your checklist:
Laser focus on a specific niche
The world population is growing towards 10 billion people. You would think getting hitched to someone is easier than ever before. Well, that couldn’t be further from the truth. People nowadays are very choosy, have very unprecedented ideologies on what their special someone should look like, should come from, should be doing professionally, should be driving etc.
According to Flirt stratifying your target market will help your dating platform take off quicker. Put yourself in the shoes of your clients. Are they looking for someone from their region or outside of it, are they looking for someone who has attained a certain level of education, someone with certain physical traits, someone in specific religious or political ideologies?
Once you stratify your market and identify the market you can serve best, go all out and customize your platform to deliver laser-focused services to the given market niche. That is how you will quickly differentiate yourself from all the hundreds of thousands of online dating platforms on the internet.
Design a User-Friendly Site or App
People are squeezed for time and many don’t have the patience to study your platform. Rather, they want to first and fast see where they click and tap to get what they want. That said, it is critical you get a developer who will do a competent job in design and building the website and/or application.
Hiring such a competent developer may seem expensive at the start, but along the road, it will more than pay for the cost. As users find their way easily through your platform, finding incentives to bookmark your site, install the app, and share the content with others.
Monetization Strategy
Now, to perhaps the most important part of this article. How do you monetize your platform? Here, there is no blanket answer. As different monetization strategies work for different platforms, but not all the platforms. It would be wise to sit down and brainstorm on a foolproof monetization plan suitable for your specific platform.
Putting in mind considerations such as your market’s perception on monetization avenues such as advertisements versus subscription. Your choice of a niche market is critical in determining what kind of monetization strategy you will implement.
Keep Marketing your Platform
Promoting your platform is an ongoing process, and thanks to technology. Marketing yourself has never been easier while at the same time is harder. While the advent of social media has democratized the advertisement industry through various platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. The fact that it is also available to anyone with a smartphone and internet connection has made being seen in the trillions of daily posts much harder. To be seen, you need a competent social media management strategy to be seen amidst all the noise online.
Strict Quality Control
Most business startups tend to drop the ball once a steady stream of good income starts rolling in. That can be particularly dangerous, especially for a dating platform. That’s because people are sharing with each other contact information and possibly arranging meetups from your platform. Without a continuous quality control mechanism, cases of users with abnormal gratifications harassing other users, and even possibly harming others might begin cropping up. And that’s how your platforms ratings will begin to take a nosedive.
The above are just a few of the tips Flirt had to share with us. Obviously on one shoe fits all, but the above are nonetheless good pointers if you are thinking of starting an online dating platform. Be sure to check out Flirt.com for more insider tips.
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