In line with the growing popularity of online dating, South African gay lifestyle portal Mambaonline.com has launched an online dating service aimed at the local gay market. Named the Meet Market, the new service is described as the only independent online dating service focusing on the gay market in SA.
The service has been developed specifically for the gay market, says the producer, Underdog Entertainment.
Lisa Beddard, Marketing Manager for mambaonline.com, says other local online dating services tend to be "boxed solutions" that have defaults such as "I am a man looking for a woman", and often share profiles between sites.
Beddard says this could lead to embarrassment for some subscribers. Meet Market will allow for confidential and niche online dating, she adds.
"We felt it important that we tailor Meet Market to match our South African audience`s needs, instead of forcing them to adapt to an off-the-shelf product," says Mambaonline.com`s editor, Luiz DeBarros. "We can also easily evolve the site to accommodate our visitors` suggestions."
The dating site went live two weeks ago, and is currently free, although membership fees might be introduced at a later stage if necessary. With no marketing, 250 people have registered on the site so far.
"Our page impressions have risen considerably too," says Beddard. "Mambaonline usually has around 22 000 unique visitors per month. Our page views have gone up from 66 000 to 93 000 recently, so more people are coming to the site and spending longer on it," she says.
The Meet Market site allows users to post their profiles online, browse other users` profiles and message one another. It also includes tips and guidelines on meeting people on the Internet and how to handle first dates.
"Online dating is becoming one of the most important ways of meeting people in today`s increasingly fast-paced world," says DeBarros. "With 45 million Americans having visited online dating sites last month, from about 35 million at the end of 2002, online dating certainly no longer has the stigma it used to have," he adds.
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