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OkCupid Answers Our Most Controversial Questions About Dating Apps
45 Plays3 years ago
Melissa Hobley, Global Chief Marketing Officer of OkCupid visits the pod to answer all the most pressing and controversial questions about dating apps from the FDS users. How do they measure success for their users? What happens when you report bad behavior from men on the apps? Are men and women at odds as consumers? What about the infamous 80/20 study that the incel movement cites? And more!
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Transcript
Introduction and Patreon Invitation
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey, Queens.
00:00:01
Speaker
Are you ready to level up?
00:00:02
Speaker
Then join our Patreon at patreon.com forward slash the female dating strategy where you can find weekly bonus content and FDS commentary on all the latest pop culture relationship and dating news.
00:00:15
Speaker
If you just want to listen to the extra bonus content, we have the lurker mode tier on our Patreon.
00:00:20
Speaker
If you want merchandise, access to the private FDS Patreon discord, as well as FDS merchandise, t-shirts, mugs,
00:00:28
Speaker
and the opportunity to discuss topics with the FDS Podcast Queens live, as well as submit stories for our Rose to Scope Queen and Nasus discussions on the podcast itself.
00:00:39
Speaker
So if you'd like access to all this and more, visit our Patreon at patreon.com forward slash the female dating strategy.
00:00:51
Speaker
What's up, queens?
Dating Apps Overview with Melissa Hobley
00:00:52
Speaker
Welcome to the Female Dating Strategy Podcast, the meanest female-only podcast on the internet.
00:00:56
Speaker
I'm Ro.
00:00:57
Speaker
I'm Savannah.
00:00:58
Speaker
And I'm Lola.
00:00:59
Speaker
And today we have a very special guest.
00:01:01
Speaker
Her name is Melissa Hobley.
00:01:02
Speaker
She's the Global Chief Marketing Officer of OKCupid.
00:01:07
Speaker
And we're going to get into some discussion about dating apps, a pretty controversial issue on FDS because our audience is very, very split.
00:01:15
Speaker
on the value of dating apps, both because some women have experienced like real trauma from people they've met on dating apps or just like dating app fatigue or exhaustion.
00:01:24
Speaker
And even our own audience, even though we've actually promoted dating apps on our podcast, even our own audience is a bit hostile when we do it.
00:01:31
Speaker
So we thought this would be a perfect opportunity to talk to someone who is intimately familiar with one of the most popular dating apps to get some more insight about how to use it, tips and tricks, what's going on behind the scenes, as well as answer some of the pressing questions we got from our Patreon subscribers about user safety, etc.
00:01:48
Speaker
Melissa Hodley, welcome.
00:01:49
Speaker
Thanks for having me.
00:01:51
Speaker
I am equal parts excited and nervous.
00:01:54
Speaker
I'm a fan of you all and I'm aware of the hostility, the dating app, hate.
00:01:59
Speaker
There's a little love.
00:02:00
Speaker
There's a little hate.
00:02:01
Speaker
But yeah, I'm excited.
00:02:02
Speaker
Let's get into whatever you want to talk about.
00:02:05
Speaker
I honestly want to say actually that I'm glad that you're a fan of us because I actually quite like I've said in the past that I generally don't use dating apps as much anymore.
00:02:14
Speaker
But I did actually use OkCupid previously and met to like long term boyfriends that I ended up dating over a year, both on OkCupid.
00:02:22
Speaker
And, you know, one of them was I would consider high value.
00:02:24
Speaker
The other one I'd consider like more average.
00:02:26
Speaker
But, you know, if this was like a Tinder representative here, it'd be a very different conversation.
00:02:30
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:02:34
Speaker
I love hearing that.
00:02:35
Speaker
Thank you for giving us a try.
00:02:37
Speaker
I'm glad you made some good connections.
00:02:40
Speaker
We can talk about how to find new ones or not.
00:02:44
Speaker
I also found a relationship on OkCupid.
00:02:46
Speaker
And I think one of the things we wanted to talk about is
00:02:49
Speaker
why there were specific features or the specific features of OKCupid that we think actually helped us vet men that's not necessarily present on the other apps.
00:02:57
Speaker
And then just kind of get an idea of like, you know, the thought process behind them.
00:03:01
Speaker
And I think one of the things that we discussed prior to recording was you talking about the fact that you guys have really been one of the few apps to promote a values-based dating system, like being able to post whether you're pro-choice or not and post your political opinions as part of your profile.
OKCupid's Values-Based Approach
00:03:17
Speaker
I appreciate you noticing, calling that out.
00:03:19
Speaker
I think OkCupid is a really interesting story too, in that, you know, here's, I find this interesting, you know, essentially there were dating sites, you know, and some of those are 20 years old.
00:03:30
Speaker
OkCupid's one of the OG players in this space.
00:03:34
Speaker
When Tinder came on the scene, it basically exploded the dating app world.
00:03:40
Speaker
All the brands grew.
00:03:43
Speaker
The stigma went away because you got on Tinder as a younger person.
00:03:49
Speaker
OkCupid is a little interesting because they never had a marketing team.
00:03:54
Speaker
you know, marketing teams are basically like, hey, let's help us.
00:03:57
Speaker
Like, what is the story?
00:03:58
Speaker
Like, what do we stand for?
00:03:59
Speaker
What do we mean?
00:04:00
Speaker
Why would we do an ad that's like meet hot singles now?
00:04:03
Speaker
Like we would never, by the way, we never do that.
00:04:05
Speaker
We don't do that.
00:04:06
Speaker
And so when I came to this company, but there was like some really special stuff here.
00:04:09
Speaker
And one of those special things that you touched on was,
00:04:11
Speaker
There was only one dating app in the world that was trying to bring more substance to the experience that was asking you, do you want to filter on your views on gun control?
00:04:22
Speaker
Do you want to filter on reproductive rights?
00:04:24
Speaker
Do you want to filter on Trump?
00:04:27
Speaker
And nobody else was doing that.
00:04:28
Speaker
And I thought, well, that's fucking cool.
00:04:30
Speaker
I think that's interesting.
00:04:31
Speaker
There's something there.
00:04:33
Speaker
Yeah, what you just called out.
00:04:35
Speaker
And here's what we believe is happening.
00:04:37
Speaker
We hope it's happening.
00:04:38
Speaker
We know it's happening more than it was a few years ago when I joined this brand is it does attract people that not everyone for sure, but it does tend to do a better job attracting people that want to bring.
00:04:49
Speaker
Like, bring your issues is kind of like this internal thing that we say, pun intended, of I want to feel like I'm not weird for saying on my profile, swipe left if you voted for Trump, which is what we saw thousands and thousands of people post after both elections, actually.
00:05:06
Speaker
Or I want to have, you have a filter on religion.
00:05:10
Speaker
If you're really religious, if you're not, if you want kids, if you're not, there are all these filters and we need to power the algorithm.
00:05:16
Speaker
Why is there not a function that says, I stand for reproductive rights, do not show me people that don't.
00:05:24
Speaker
And, and they let me do that.
00:05:25
Speaker
And they let us really lean in on that topic.
00:05:28
Speaker
And we've been doing that for over five years.
00:05:30
Speaker
And again, like, I totally get it.
00:05:31
Speaker
Dating is hard.
00:05:32
Speaker
Dating apps are hard.
00:05:33
Speaker
Okay, Cupid's not perfect.
00:05:35
Speaker
I think we do a better job than most other people out there.
00:05:37
Speaker
But we're also we're also never done.
00:05:39
Speaker
So I'm excited to also hear like, here's the stuff that you guys like about it.
00:05:42
Speaker
Here's what you think is awful.
00:05:44
Speaker
Here's what you know, why do you have this thing?
00:05:46
Speaker
And hopefully, I know all the answers.
00:05:48
Speaker
If I don't, I'll absolutely make it up and see if you guys can believe it or
Ensuring User Safety on OKCupid
00:05:53
Speaker
not.
00:05:53
Speaker
Maybe that's
00:05:55
Speaker
Well, to be fair, the vast majority of the questions that we got were tend to be things that are limitations on all of the apps, which are background checks and just like overall user safety.
00:06:07
Speaker
So what some of them are asking are like, what safety measures are in place for us to be able to report men who harass us either on the app or we go on a date and they harass us off the app?
00:06:17
Speaker
And is that something that OKCupid is aware of?
00:06:20
Speaker
Yeah, that's a great question.
00:06:22
Speaker
User safety is important.
00:06:23
Speaker
I think the category, I think all the apps are trying to do a better job of it.
00:06:27
Speaker
So that's a great question.
00:06:28
Speaker
So we do a couple of things.
00:06:29
Speaker
One is we have humans.
00:06:31
Speaker
I mean, this doesn't sound really weird, but you know when you like you have a problem with a product now with almost anything and you can't
00:06:37
Speaker
ever actually get to a human.
00:06:38
Speaker
And it's so frustrating, whether you're calling or emailing, they're like, check our FAQ.
00:06:42
Speaker
And you're like, I did.
00:06:43
Speaker
And I check our FAQ.
00:06:44
Speaker
And like I did, I just can I please just connect with a real person.
00:06:47
Speaker
And tech has gone the way of getting rid of real people to respond to complaints or issues or concerns or flags, and move to like, try to automate all of that.
00:06:56
Speaker
And some of that you can do.
00:06:57
Speaker
But like, for example, one of the things that you can
00:07:00
Speaker
build software around is looking for messages, looking content on profiles, messages to other daters that is inappropriate, hostile, harassing in nature, inappropriate photos.
00:07:12
Speaker
So that stuff we can automate and we've gotten much, much better at that.
00:07:16
Speaker
The question is a good one.
00:07:17
Speaker
If you tell us I had a bad experience or more, I was assaulted or I
00:07:22
Speaker
Anything like that, a human is going to review that.
00:07:25
Speaker
Thanks for letting us, you know, thanks for telling us, let us look at it, get back to you.
00:07:29
Speaker
So at least know, okay, this did go somewhere.
00:07:31
Speaker
Someone heard me.
00:07:31
Speaker
It's not just like into the void.
00:07:33
Speaker
We then look at the case and there's a whole team.
00:07:36
Speaker
There's a customer service team and there's also a trust and safety group.
00:07:39
Speaker
We look at that.
00:07:40
Speaker
Again, I'm not in this department.
00:07:41
Speaker
It's not my world, but what we tend to believe and support and say, okay.
00:07:46
Speaker
And then we take a number of actions.
00:07:48
Speaker
We may kick them off of our site.
00:07:50
Speaker
We may blacklist them permanently.
00:07:53
Speaker
There's a number of things that we can do.
00:07:55
Speaker
If you're on the app,
00:07:57
Speaker
And, you know, we've also tried to make it a lot easier.
00:08:00
Speaker
So if you're on the app and you see a profile or someone says you a message, you can report.
00:08:04
Speaker
And when you click report, there's like, you know, thanks for sharing that with us, what happened.
00:08:09
Speaker
And, you know, again, we try to make it easy so you can tell us what's going on.
00:08:13
Speaker
And then again, humans review that and we take it, you know, we take it really seriously.
00:08:18
Speaker
Again, I think we're better than where we were, but there's a meeting every other day on this issue and how apps can keep doing a better job of it.
00:08:25
Speaker
I can obviously speak to OkCupid, but how can we do a better job of it?
00:08:28
Speaker
Let's say what I have noticed even in the past year or so is that there are expanded reporting options on all of the apps that didn't used to be there.
00:08:36
Speaker
And so is that like an overall industry push?
00:08:38
Speaker
Do you know like when OkCupid started to really take it seriously?
00:08:42
Speaker
It is an overall industry push.
00:08:44
Speaker
I think it's like
00:08:45
Speaker
one or two on here's what we have to keep doing better, improving, investing in.
00:08:50
Speaker
So it's good that you noticed that.
00:08:52
Speaker
Again, I've been in this world for a minute.
00:08:55
Speaker
It's so much better than where it was.
00:08:57
Speaker
And then, you know, OKCupid is global.
00:08:59
Speaker
So depending on where we are in the world, we will dial, we may even dial that up further so that people feel supported and they have access to resources and all the things.
00:09:10
Speaker
I'll tell you what's interesting, and this was surprising to me, what happens more often than not, and I think you guys are driving conversations around this to chip away at that, is we feel shame.
00:09:21
Speaker
We feel embarrassed.
00:09:22
Speaker
People feel, oh, God, this happened to me because, and it's some ridiculous reason and holds themselves to blame.
00:09:29
Speaker
And they don't tell us because of those reasons.
00:09:32
Speaker
And so, you know, if you get nothing else out of this conversation, if anything happens, please do tell the apps.
00:09:38
Speaker
Because if you don't, if we're not told we can't do anything about it and fucking love kicking people off when they behave badly, get out of here and you are not welcome ever again.
00:09:50
Speaker
Can I just say it actually feels so good kicking off people who are being assholes?
00:09:54
Speaker
Like I felt the same way when that subreddit was open and someone was just going off in the comments or being an asshole.
00:10:00
Speaker
And it's like, boop band, I don't have to listen to you anymore.
00:10:02
Speaker
Bye.
00:10:02
Speaker
Bye.
00:10:04
Speaker
So it feels so good, right?
00:10:06
Speaker
So I think that's an important point.
00:10:07
Speaker
So acknowledging that, I guess the industry is trying to, even though a lot of women are maybe disgruntled about it, especially if they're going on prior experience, the industry is trying to expand its reporting options.
00:10:17
Speaker
Now, if you report something, especially something like an assault or even a harassment or something that would be against the terms of service or just being a decent human being, you can report it to OkCupid.
Combating Dishonesty in User Profiles
00:10:28
Speaker
They have someone...
00:10:29
Speaker
manually review it.
00:10:30
Speaker
And then like, is it generally like a one strike you're out thing?
00:10:34
Speaker
Is it like, you know, how do you prevent someone from just creating another profile and then starting all over again?
00:10:39
Speaker
Is it easy?
00:10:40
Speaker
No, that's a great question.
00:10:41
Speaker
So this is not like, I mean, it's a separate conversation, like the American justice system, but this is not a like, oh, you get three strikes and then you're out.
00:10:48
Speaker
No, get the fuck out.
00:10:49
Speaker
You're one and done.
00:10:50
Speaker
When OKCupid started, like again, like we're the OG in this category.
00:10:53
Speaker
We're like the underdog now.
00:10:54
Speaker
We used to be like the Nemeth, we're the underdog.
00:10:56
Speaker
And when you move to an app,
00:10:58
Speaker
And you know how most of the apps you put on your phone, they require a phone number.
00:11:01
Speaker
That's great for a number of reasons.
00:11:03
Speaker
And one of the big reasons is in formerly when app when dating apps were sites and not app, it was really easy for people to manipulate the system.
00:11:13
Speaker
Because if all you have to do is give an app your email address, it's so easy to just create a new and create a new and create a new one.
00:11:19
Speaker
And there are measures in place where I can ban IP.
00:11:22
Speaker
And if you ask me to go a step beyond that in a technical level, I will have to refer you to someone.
00:11:26
Speaker
But we can ban IP.
00:11:28
Speaker
So that helps us say, you know, we're going to prevent you from bad behavior just under a new identity, blah, blah, blah, blah.
00:11:34
Speaker
But requiring people to give a cell phone number also really helps because it's easy to create a new account or new profile if you've been kicked off or you've been, you know, blocked or whatever.
00:11:44
Speaker
Most people don't have endless cell phone numbers to do that.
00:11:48
Speaker
So that's been really helpful in OkCupid basically taking these safety and proactive steps, you know, another step further, you know, for making it harder for you once you've been kicked off to come back.
00:12:00
Speaker
That's good.
00:12:01
Speaker
That means we're doing the right thing.
00:12:02
Speaker
And sometimes people will say to us, listen, men and women, I was kicked, you know, they'll email us because we blocked them and essentially disabled their account.
00:12:10
Speaker
And they'll say, I really don't know what happened.
00:12:12
Speaker
I don't think I did anything wrong.
00:12:14
Speaker
I think this person was mad at me.
00:12:16
Speaker
It is complicated because I rejected that.
00:12:18
Speaker
And men and women will come to us.
00:12:19
Speaker
And then again, that's why you need humans to go in.
00:12:22
Speaker
And when the conversations, this is also like another little tip is when the conversations are on the app,
00:12:27
Speaker
obviously we can see that.
00:12:28
Speaker
So, you know, we can go to the tapes, we can go to the chat, we can go to the profile, we can look at that.
00:12:34
Speaker
When it goes off the app, it's harder for us to know that.
00:12:36
Speaker
But we do take it really seriously.
00:12:38
Speaker
And again, it's like a really big focus always.
00:12:41
Speaker
I don't think we'll ever stop being focused.
00:12:43
Speaker
So I'm glad to know that the phone number thing isn't just like an annoying data phishing feature.
00:12:48
Speaker
Because like, I remember when they started requiring phone numbers, and I was just like annoyed, like, oh, so much more data that these apps want me to give them.
00:12:53
Speaker
But that actually makes sense as a filtering mechanism.
00:12:56
Speaker
That makes a lot of sense.
00:12:57
Speaker
I mean, because it is actually harder for people to keep recycling their phone numbers, as well as like, obviously, if you have your phone, they can search your IP address unless you like...
00:13:05
Speaker
You have to go out of your way with like a VPN and then keep changing your number to try to bypass the features, the block features that OKCupid would have.
00:13:13
Speaker
And that makes sense.
00:13:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:13:14
Speaker
You're then getting into like professional scammer territory with like VPNs and like, you know, all your phone numbers and all of that.
00:13:22
Speaker
That's like next level.
00:13:23
Speaker
And there's teams that, you know, try to shut all that down often, you know, as well.
00:13:27
Speaker
But yeah.
00:13:27
Speaker
But yeah, the phone number is an annoying thing.
00:13:29
Speaker
It's like, enter the text we just sent to you.
00:13:30
Speaker
Well, we do that.
00:13:31
Speaker
Not to be annoying.
00:13:32
Speaker
I mean, it is annoying.
00:13:32
Speaker
But the goal is because we're verifying that you are who you say you are.
00:13:37
Speaker
So just off the back of that, Melissa, we, you know, and also talking about, you know, back contracts and keeping women safe.
00:13:44
Speaker
A lot of...
00:13:46
Speaker
Or an issue that comes up for a lot of women, both inside and outside FDS, is the fact that, and this is across all dating apps, not just OK Keepin in particular, is that, you know, people can say, you know, they're looking for a serious relationship and a casual relationship at the same time.
00:14:03
Speaker
Or, for example, they think that they are matching with somebody who's single, but then actually they've matched with a couple.
00:14:10
Speaker
and they're being unicorn hunted.
00:14:13
Speaker
When I was in the BDSM community, this was a massive, massive problem.
00:14:16
Speaker
And I just wanted to ask two questions.
00:14:20
Speaker
Firstly, is there a way to report people who are bypassing the system, so to speak, engineering their answers in order to attempt to attract a wider population who perhaps wouldn't be interested in them?
00:14:32
Speaker
And secondly, how
00:14:33
Speaker
Is there almost a way to, you know, to filter out the people who almost want opposing relationships, if that makes sense, or they want something serious and something casual at the same time?
00:14:42
Speaker
How can women filter that out?
00:14:44
Speaker
So this is basically the question of like men who lie about their age in the dating apps, right, as well as lie about their intentions, which is like the biggest problem that women identify is like some guy is actually 40, but he sets his profile to 29 because he wants to try to
00:14:57
Speaker
get with women who are in their 20s or they lie about wanting a long-term relationship when they're really just there for hookups because they know a lot of women wouldn't swipe yes totally and with the unicorn hunting as well it tended you know sometimes they would actually use the woman to almost be like the honey trap because they felt that the first thing the woman was physically attractive generally but secondly is that
00:15:20
Speaker
a woman would, you know, she's a lot more likely, you know, to let her guard down if she thinks she's conversing with another single woman.
00:15:27
Speaker
And we've had especially lesbian women saying, you know, I thought I was talking to the single woman and then she just brought her husband along to the date, like with her and saying, we're a couple.
00:15:36
Speaker
Yes.
00:15:38
Speaker
I, by the way, these are some of the most interesting questions that I've gotten.
00:15:41
Speaker
People are usually like, oh, what's the best day of the week to be online?
00:15:43
Speaker
I'm like, Sundays.
00:15:44
Speaker
This is so interesting.
00:15:46
Speaker
That's coming, Melissa.
00:15:47
Speaker
That's coming.
00:15:49
Speaker
It's kind of great.
00:15:50
Speaker
Great.
00:15:50
Speaker
Like what's the best profile picture to have?
00:15:52
Speaker
Well, the data says.
00:15:53
Speaker
So that's a great question.
00:15:54
Speaker
First, what I'll say is not all dating apps are created equally.
00:15:58
Speaker
And I think that you should look at what is not just what are all of your friends on, but what is the app that is right for the experience that you're looking for?
00:16:08
Speaker
Hinge is a great app.
00:16:09
Speaker
They're designed to be deleted.
00:16:10
Speaker
They are, you know, you should only be on Hinge, technically, if you are for a serious relationship.
00:16:15
Speaker
I think that what happened, what we say at OkCupid is we're high intent.
00:16:19
Speaker
We are not designed to be deleted.
00:16:20
Speaker
We have lots of people that are looking for short term.
00:16:23
Speaker
The majority of our users are looking for something serious.
00:16:26
Speaker
What I think is really good about OkCupid is it takes a few minutes to set up your profile.
00:16:30
Speaker
And if you are just looking for the gamification, the hot or not swiping, which I hear about all the time, and that's a real thing that people are just on the app.
00:16:39
Speaker
And we've seen those videos on TikToks where the guys are just, right, swipe, right, right, right, just as fast as humanly possible because the dating app, what we call it in the biz, is double opt-in, meaning...
00:16:50
Speaker
you have to swipe right and the other person has to swipe right or we won't let you talk to each other.
00:16:55
Speaker
And by the way, there's like the reason for that.
00:16:56
Speaker
But why OkCupid is tends to weed out some people that are just there for the pen pal or the hookup is because they won't bother.
00:17:04
Speaker
They will not bother with the time and the energy that it takes to answer questions, answer post profile pictures.
Importance of Detailed Profiles and Values
00:17:12
Speaker
So I think that's an important thing.
00:17:13
Speaker
And it does help us tend to find people that are
00:17:16
Speaker
a little more mindful, they're slowing down a little bit, they're happy that it's gonna, not happy, because also filling out your profile on a dating app is really, really hard.
00:17:24
Speaker
It's like harder than your resume or updating your LinkedIn for a job or whatever it be.
00:17:27
Speaker
I think, and I've heard about what you're talking about, here's what we try to do.
00:17:31
Speaker
We have this analogy that we use internally at OkCupid, which is like big, big tent, small tables.
00:17:36
Speaker
And then if you show up at the party, I want to get you what you're looking for.
00:17:39
Speaker
You're looking for serious.
00:17:40
Speaker
I should only show you to serious people, which is why we ask that question.
00:17:44
Speaker
You know, it is hard for us to, you know, make sure, are you being totally honest about that?
00:17:49
Speaker
That is hard to do.
00:17:50
Speaker
What I tell people is you can often get to that by spending a little more time on the profile.
00:17:55
Speaker
Right.
00:17:55
Speaker
So to use a like kind of overly simplified example, if you're looking for something serious and there's a guy whose profile you're like, OK, this captured my attention.
00:18:03
Speaker
And there's, you know, let's say, for example, there's very little on the profile.
00:18:06
Speaker
OKCupid does not want to be Tinder.
00:18:08
Speaker
We do not want you to have three words on your profile.
00:18:11
Speaker
Even if you're looking for a great Saturday night, you're interested or you're turned on because, oh, he you know, this guy's kind of interesting.
00:18:19
Speaker
He's talking about racial and social equity on his profile.
00:18:22
Speaker
Like, OK, that's interesting.
00:18:24
Speaker
You know, whatever it is.
00:18:25
Speaker
You know, I think, you know, look for if the guy has like, oh, he's like, I'm looking for something really serious and I can't wait to have kids.
00:18:31
Speaker
And there's nothing in his profile.
00:18:32
Speaker
And his photos are like Vegas pool selfies.
00:18:35
Speaker
Like maybe he's not being really upfront about that because it is hard to do that.
00:18:40
Speaker
What I also say with what is helpful, if you're looking for something serious on OkCupid is you power the algorithm.
00:18:45
Speaker
And we're unique in this way in that a lot of dating apps, it's location, they'll ask you a few things, but we have over 3,000 questions.
00:18:53
Speaker
You have to answer 15.
00:18:55
Speaker
The rest are optional.
00:18:56
Speaker
If you want to go down a rabbit on issues on social equity, on politics, on reproductive rights,
00:19:01
Speaker
You can and we'll let you do that.
00:19:04
Speaker
But that's another indicator of how serious someone may be about this, right?
00:19:09
Speaker
Like if they've answered lots of questions, and they've taken that time.
00:19:12
Speaker
And again, does that 100% mean they're looking for something serious?
00:19:16
Speaker
No, but it's an indicator.
00:19:18
Speaker
I have to say those questions have been 100% clutch because a lot of times you can see what we would consider red flags like right out in the open.
00:19:26
Speaker
Yes.
00:19:26
Speaker
Right.
00:19:27
Speaker
Especially you can see the deal breakers.
00:19:28
Speaker
And I have to say the questions as well as the ability to filter by specific traits and values that you look.
00:19:35
Speaker
want in a partner have been really, really useful.
00:19:38
Speaker
And I think actually sets, okay, keep it apart from a lot of the other dating apps as far as its efficacy for women specifically, because a lot of the things, it basically eliminates the need to go back and forth in your inbox to ask them very basic questions about values that you can see on their profile.
00:19:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:19:54
Speaker
I really appreciate you saying that.
00:19:55
Speaker
And I think that's so true.
00:19:56
Speaker
And I think it's wild that no other dating app will let you match on social and political issues.
00:20:03
Speaker
I just think that's wild.
00:20:04
Speaker
Why doesn't every single app have a question on how do you feel about abortion?
00:20:09
Speaker
Or what is your stance on reproductive rights?
00:20:11
Speaker
Right?
00:20:12
Speaker
Even that question is leading the witness.
00:20:13
Speaker
Or that you can't filter out someone that believes climate change is not real.
00:20:17
Speaker
I personally don't understand why.
00:20:19
Speaker
I mean, I do understand why other apps don't do that.
00:20:22
Speaker
I have a theory and you let me know.
00:20:24
Speaker
Oh, let's hear it.
00:20:25
Speaker
So my theory, and I've talked about this before, is once again, because some of these are public companies that essentially women are the product.
00:20:31
Speaker
And so the longer they can keep us on this app and basically incentivize men to keep spending money to talk to women who don't want to talk to them,
00:20:39
Speaker
then they can keep monetizing it.
00:20:41
Speaker
That essentially that the interest of women in matching and filtering their options is counter to the goal of the dating app, which is to get a large enough pool of women so that the men who overwhelmingly spend more in the app than women will keep spending.
00:20:54
Speaker
And so
00:20:54
Speaker
like part of our frustration, I think is just the reality of capitalism is that sometimes the capitalist incentive is not in line with the user incentive, especially as women.
00:21:03
Speaker
Some of the major apps have been somewhat dismissive of women or that they send you people that in no way, shape or form you would ever be interested in dating and waste your time trying to swipe on them.
00:21:12
Speaker
I honestly hit rock bottom with one app and I don't mean to brag on myself, but I have a master's degree.
00:21:17
Speaker
I take care of myself.
00:21:18
Speaker
I live a pretty nice life.
00:21:20
Speaker
And they sent me a picture of a homeless guy who lived three states away.
00:21:23
Speaker
And I was like, no,
00:21:25
Speaker
At that point, I was like, he was taking shirtless selfies of himself in a public library bathroom.
00:21:31
Speaker
And I remember sitting there being like, this is such a waste of my time.
00:21:33
Speaker
And I felt like actually disrespected as a consumer.
00:21:37
Speaker
And the app, I'm not going to say, but it rhymes with Cinderella.
00:21:39
Speaker
But it was a situation like that where I think women start to feel fatigued because we're like, and I actually went through just for research purposes, because I was thinking about writing an ebook about how to navigate like dating apps, like paid for all the extra features just to see what was working and what was not.
00:21:53
Speaker
And some of the other apps, they give you a bunch more access to your likes, but it's a bunch of guys you would never actually date.
00:21:58
Speaker
And that's just a lot of labor to go through and do all of the filtering.
00:22:02
Speaker
So I think the frustration, I think the fatigue, the frustration, and like why a lot of women are feeling sort of betrayed or like annoyed by the apps, because it does start to feel on our end, like, man, are we just like the meat market?
00:22:14
Speaker
And you guys are just not paying attention to women as consumers that you can prioritize men.
00:22:18
Speaker
Versus like, and I've found that at least with OkCupid, the filtering options are there.
00:22:22
Speaker
So like there's guys I know I'm never going to date, right?
00:22:25
Speaker
I know I won't date a guy who smokes weed, right?
00:22:27
Speaker
Like I don't smoke, etc.
00:22:29
Speaker
And that no judgment I ask people to do.
00:22:30
Speaker
It's just that like I don't smoke and I don't like allergies, etc.
00:22:33
Speaker
Something like that where I feel like I can just filter someone like that out.
00:22:36
Speaker
And it's not a disrespect to them, but you just don't like waste your time or you know, even things like height.
00:22:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:41
Speaker
Yeah, it's a compatibility thing, though.
00:22:43
Speaker
Like you are maybe not going to be as compatible with somebody that is like, you know, smokes every day.
00:22:48
Speaker
It's really interesting.
00:22:49
Speaker
You should totally do that book, by the way.
00:22:53
Speaker
I'll give you more insider stuff.
00:22:54
Speaker
Listen, I have a big mouth and I get in trouble for stuff, but I can, I can really understand that feeling.
00:22:58
Speaker
I can really understand.
00:22:58
Speaker
Like I think, and dating apps, it's interesting.
00:23:01
Speaker
Someone said, you're working at a dating app is the nightclub and bar analogy is interesting.
00:23:05
Speaker
It's much easier to get guys.
00:23:07
Speaker
You have to really think about the women.
00:23:10
Speaker
I do think that prioritizing that female experience is how, um,
00:23:14
Speaker
Like, listen, also say, OKCupid was totally irrelevant a few years ago.
00:23:17
Speaker
Like, I'm glad that you guys tried it and had a little luck, but it was hard.
00:23:21
Speaker
It was an app that people had stopped talking about.
00:23:24
Speaker
And to your point, only these questions and filters.
00:23:26
Speaker
I said this once and someone's like, what are you saying?
00:23:28
Speaker
But I said, we have Trump to thank.
00:23:29
Speaker
And what I mean by that is something really interesting started happening.
00:23:33
Speaker
And it was in the lead up to the 2016 election.
00:23:35
Speaker
And that is people got political on their profiles.
00:23:39
Speaker
And they started saying, and you could feel the anger from women.
00:23:43
Speaker
You could feel the worries about reproductive rights, which by the way, is like coming true.
00:23:47
Speaker
Like we were not overreacting.
00:23:48
Speaker
You could feel the trepidation.
00:23:50
Speaker
You could just, you could feel it.
00:23:52
Speaker
And so we started like these really amazing data scientists.
00:23:55
Speaker
I'm like, I need you to show me what's happening with people.
00:23:57
Speaker
Like how much are the phrases like swipe left if you support Trump?
00:24:01
Speaker
This is before the election.
00:24:02
Speaker
And it's less about like identify as this party or this, like, you know, these different, if you're not voting in local elections, please don't message me.
00:24:09
Speaker
If you are not engaged and showing up marches right now, like around Black Lives Matter, like shifted to a movement, then don't talk to me.
00:24:16
Speaker
And the increase in political phrases in just two years went up 4,000%.
00:24:23
Speaker
And we've been around almost 20 years.
00:24:24
Speaker
That's never happened.
00:24:25
Speaker
I also like looking and sharing data at OkCupid because we've been around a long time.
00:24:29
Speaker
We don't sell it.
00:24:29
Speaker
By the way, we're not in the ad revenue game.
00:24:31
Speaker
Like it's not how we make money.
00:24:32
Speaker
Data can be a scary word.
00:24:33
Speaker
So I think this cool shift of bringing these things to life in your profile, people felt
Image vs. Value-Based Dating on OKCupid
00:24:40
Speaker
uncool.
00:24:40
Speaker
They felt, oh, you don't do that.
00:24:42
Speaker
And, you know, why?
00:24:44
Speaker
Why don't you feel like you can say that on your profile, on Tinder, on one of these other apps?
00:24:48
Speaker
And so we just really tried to lean into it.
00:24:50
Speaker
And on the questions and filters, we add them every day.
00:24:53
Speaker
I think people are proud of their values.
00:24:55
Speaker
And I think there's nothing wrong with that.
00:24:56
Speaker
It just seems that most of the apps from our experience, even the ones that are trying to be female first, that they deprioritize the values-based dating in favor of the image-based dating.
00:25:07
Speaker
And I think that just, again, it could just be time spent on the app.
00:25:10
Speaker
If you post a lot of beautiful pictures as a woman and you keep incentivizing women to post pictures of themselves, you'll attract men to that type of app, right?
00:25:18
Speaker
That's
00:25:18
Speaker
The problem is comes when women are trying to date and filter this out.
00:25:22
Speaker
Now you have to try to match someone based on their values.
00:25:24
Speaker
And I'm not saying men don't have values too.
00:25:26
Speaker
And there's men that absolutely do.
00:25:27
Speaker
There's just like such a large pool of men that don't, but like they ruin it for a lot of people.
00:25:30
Speaker
So it's just that like, if you can't match with someone based on like how you feel about very important issues in your life, that clearly creates like a big barrier or you have to spend so much work like vetting this person to make sure they're safe.
00:25:41
Speaker
And then like, but if you meet them in person, you have to go through a lot of like basic questions.
00:25:44
Speaker
And then you're sitting at a dinner or you're talking to them on a coffee date, which we don't do.
00:25:49
Speaker
But like some people do.
00:25:50
Speaker
And like you're finding out a lot of things that had you known up front, like you would have never gone out with this person.
00:25:55
Speaker
Yes.
00:25:56
Speaker
And then what a waste of time.
00:25:57
Speaker
And when you are, I don't know, you're a single parent, you know, even going on the date is a feat between a babysitter or maybe your shift or whatever it may be.
00:26:06
Speaker
So yeah, don't waste your time.
00:26:08
Speaker
Because also on OkCupid, we have a match percentage.
00:26:10
Speaker
So if you're like, why are you showing me this person to you?
00:26:12
Speaker
Well, you can see it because it's like, oh, you're a 92% match or a 60% match.
00:26:16
Speaker
And this woman said, oh, we're a 60.
00:26:18
Speaker
It was, I don't know, something low.
00:26:20
Speaker
And let's see why that is.
00:26:21
Speaker
And she opens his profile and the video is, you know, would you date a feminist?
00:26:25
Speaker
And he's like, no.
00:26:26
Speaker
Do you support women's rights to choose?
00:26:29
Speaker
I forget what the exact language is.
00:26:31
Speaker
I think that abortion is murder.
00:26:33
Speaker
And she's like, oh, my God.
00:26:35
Speaker
But then she knew I'm not going to waste my time on.
00:26:38
Speaker
Yes.
00:26:38
Speaker
And I also am not a fan of the coffee date.
00:26:40
Speaker
From your lips to our ears.
00:26:42
Speaker
Yes.
00:26:44
Speaker
Everyone drags us for not doing the copy dates.
00:26:47
Speaker
No, I support the anti-copy date.
00:26:50
Speaker
That's awesome to hear.
00:26:50
Speaker
Can I just say that what I like about OkCupid is that it encourages men to just, I guess I haven't used Hinge either, but I guess it has a similar function where these prompts encourage men to lay out all of their red flags all out in the open so you don't have to waste your time.
00:27:06
Speaker
going on a date with someone who you know would then again like I've had so many bad dates that I met on like tinder other platforms where they're more like appearance focused and those dates end up becoming so bad that they become like comical like stories that I can tell on the podcast later kind of thing right so yeah you do save a lot of time but I guess you know you also miss out on some of those like you know crazy bad date stories that you can laugh about later
00:27:29
Speaker
I'm fine with that.
00:27:30
Speaker
You know, listen, if you're working on like your stand up, you will not want to overly vet your dates.
00:27:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:36
Speaker
And Hinge has avoided the political social issue territory, but they do proms that get stuff out there, you know, like embarrassing stories.
00:27:44
Speaker
Or they ask these sort of bait questions that a toxic man would put in an answer that would be a red flag to, you know, a well-trained kind of thing.
00:27:52
Speaker
Right?
00:27:53
Speaker
Yes.
00:27:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:54
Speaker
The other thing I want to say that really helps with vetting actually is the fact that OkCupid seems to have like a longer character limit, I guess, on the bios.
00:28:02
Speaker
And so when I was using OkCupid, you know, it was a red flag if a guy only had, you know, a few words in there.
00:28:08
Speaker
If it was like, oh, yeah, looking for a good time or looking for to have adventures or, you know, something really short, then I'd be like, okay, this guy's obviously lazy.
00:28:16
Speaker
And then there were the other guys where they're on the opposite side of the spectrum where they would max out that character limit and write like a whole novel about themselves.
00:28:24
Speaker
And that would just be too much.
00:28:25
Speaker
And I'm like, this guy's clearly narcissist.
00:28:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:28
Speaker
A novel.
00:28:29
Speaker
Yes.
00:28:29
Speaker
And you're like, wow, what is like long lists about, you know, the traits that he looks for in a woman.
00:28:36
Speaker
Like I've had a woman with like a waist to hip ratio of this amount or I, you know, a long list.
00:28:41
Speaker
Oh God, get out of here with that.
00:28:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:43
Speaker
So like long list what they like.
00:28:45
Speaker
So somebody asked this question, the Patreon.
00:28:47
Speaker
So is there like a spam filter function?
00:28:49
Speaker
Because they were complaining about the generic messages that Lilith's talking about where they just like list all the things they want and just spam a bunch of women with that.
00:28:56
Speaker
Is there some mechanism with that?
00:28:57
Speaker
Yes, there is.
00:28:58
Speaker
If you're copying and pasting messages, it's very cool.
00:29:02
Speaker
If that's happening in a certain speed, then that's obviously automated will kick you off.
00:29:07
Speaker
If we,
00:29:07
Speaker
It's funny.
00:29:08
Speaker
It's like someone said, well, can't you just kick them off?
00:29:10
Speaker
Even if it's not spam, but just lazy and boring.
00:29:12
Speaker
But like the copy paste message, you know, maybe that's like a new product is like just really bad daters are really lazy.
00:29:19
Speaker
But you know, these guys that send and by the way, I'm married with two little kids.
00:29:22
Speaker
I was single in New York City for 15 years.
00:29:24
Speaker
So I feel like I have...
00:29:25
Speaker
fucking earned my like, I know girls, I have been there.
00:29:29
Speaker
I get it.
00:29:29
Speaker
But I'm on dating apps around the world at any like right now I'm on like 24.
00:29:34
Speaker
And so you'll notice when the guy sends, you'll glance at it first like, Oh, this is like a nice, thoughtful message.
00:29:39
Speaker
He wrote like more than Hey, but then when you read it, it could have sent it to anyone like, Hey, you seem nice.
00:29:46
Speaker
I like that smile.
00:29:47
Speaker
I thought we could get together and go for coffee a little about me.
00:29:50
Speaker
I like travel bubble.
00:29:51
Speaker
It's like,
00:29:52
Speaker
And it's just so boring and says nothing.
00:29:54
Speaker
And it's probably a copy paste.
00:29:56
Speaker
If they don't say something specific about your profile or comment about something I think is lazy, I tend to say I don't engage.
00:30:03
Speaker
Yep.
00:30:03
Speaker
That's right on when the female dating strategy best practices tip.
00:30:07
Speaker
Yes.
00:30:09
Speaker
I actually had the opposite problem for a while.
00:30:11
Speaker
And I don't know why this is.
00:30:12
Speaker
And it could just be, you know, whoever I was swiping on where men would find some very small and minuscule thing on my profile to send me big paragraphs of arguments.
00:30:19
Speaker
And that was weird.
00:30:20
Speaker
But at least I knew that they weren't just like copy and pasting because they were very specifically wanting to argue with me about things that I was very curious.
00:30:27
Speaker
And it would be so random.
00:30:28
Speaker
It would just be like my specific TV show preference.
00:30:30
Speaker
And they explained to me like why it was inferior or something else.
00:30:33
Speaker
And it was just
00:30:36
Speaker
Oh God, did they get that?
00:30:38
Speaker
And they probably read it on some nonsense, you know, Hey, here's what you should do.
00:30:43
Speaker
Pick a fight and make her feel inferior about her, you know, stated loves or desire, whatever on her profile.
00:30:50
Speaker
So annoying.
00:30:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:51
Speaker
And I think this is before we had the double match on OkCupid too.
00:30:55
Speaker
Okay.
00:30:55
Speaker
Cause there used to just be like the single match, right?
00:30:58
Speaker
Yes.
00:30:59
Speaker
Wow.
00:30:59
Speaker
I love it.
00:31:00
Speaker
You know, the, you, you do know the product.
00:31:03
Speaker
I love it.
00:31:03
Speaker
Yeah, I was on it before and then I was on a relationship and then I was off it.
00:31:06
Speaker
And then like, I'd like recently rejoined, but yeah.
00:31:09
Speaker
I'm glad you rejoined.
00:31:11
Speaker
You have to tell me how things go or don't go or what you like and what you hate.
00:31:15
Speaker
And the other really great feature.
00:31:17
Speaker
So this is, I'm promising.
00:31:18
Speaker
I'm not trying to give it like an, okay, keep it out, but I'm just saying this because I, no, please carry on.
00:31:22
Speaker
I'm hoping on in the ether that people like catch on to what was really useful for me.
00:31:26
Speaker
Cause I've actually moved States.
00:31:28
Speaker
So the other thing that was really great was like looking to see like what was a kind of geyser around and what kinds of things were around in the state that I was moving to.
00:31:36
Speaker
You can search by zip code a lot easier on OkCupid, which has actually been a lifesaver, especially even the like around the world feature on OkCupid.
00:31:43
Speaker
But I like that, like I could actually scope out the environment I was moving
00:31:46
Speaker
into prior to me moving, which none of the other apps that you do that.
00:31:50
Speaker
It's all like based on your current location.
00:31:52
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:52
Speaker
We'll let you do that.
00:31:54
Speaker
That's awesome.
00:31:54
Speaker
That's a great tip.
00:31:55
Speaker
It gives you an idea of the city.
00:31:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:57
Speaker
I had a job that I traveled.
00:31:59
Speaker
So that was like, that was clutch because I never knew where it
00:32:01
Speaker
what I was getting into like prior to that but going on OkCupid I at least had like okay here's people taking pictures in front of this monument or like at least if I was talking to some guy I could meet someone and they like they would have you know discussions of certain things in their profile that was like really useful and that was something that was unique I think to OkCupid.
00:32:18
Speaker
That's really cool.
00:32:19
Speaker
That's awesome here.
00:32:20
Speaker
I think that is still unique to us and it's funny we're starting to see people do that to canvas to vote a little bit and that's interesting.
00:32:29
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:30
Speaker
Yeah, it's really interesting.
00:32:32
Speaker
And I also think that if you are far right, you're going to leave OkCupid pretty quickly because we send messages like, hey, in response to reproductive rights rollbacks, you can add a pro-choice badge to your profile.
00:32:45
Speaker
Every person adds pro-choice badge, we will donate a dollar to Planned Parenthood.
00:32:47
Speaker
But also it increases your chances of having like, anyway, if you're really far right, you're going to get turned off by that.
00:32:54
Speaker
And so it ends up helping self-select people out of the experience that whose values...
00:32:59
Speaker
And stances on issues may not align with your own or what, you know, most American women feel about certain
Balancing User Interests: Male vs. Female
00:33:05
Speaker
issues.
00:33:05
Speaker
But I like that.
00:33:06
Speaker
I will make a note and give that to my head of product to say, hey, let's make sure we keep that on.
00:33:12
Speaker
Good feedback.
00:33:13
Speaker
So I think we've talked a little bit about the user experience.
00:33:16
Speaker
And I kind of gave an overarching discussion already about like the types of things that women want, like from a consumer product or research standpoint, like
00:33:24
Speaker
Do you ever feel like the interests are adversarial between what men want and what women want on the app?
00:33:29
Speaker
Like, do you have mechanisms in place to kind of like balance it out?
00:33:33
Speaker
Yes and no.
00:33:34
Speaker
You know, what you do see things like a guy says, I'm looking for a serious relationship and you don't have to answer this.
00:33:42
Speaker
But if you want kids, don't want kids, you can say, I'm not sure.
00:33:45
Speaker
Yes, no, definitely.
00:33:47
Speaker
One day, maybe.
00:33:49
Speaker
And you can also skip it.
00:33:50
Speaker
We will see people that are like looking for serious, want kids, and then their behavior indicates something very, very different.
00:33:58
Speaker
It's hard to police that because some people has a good reputation in like the tech world because the engineering is good.
00:34:06
Speaker
And what also does happen is you have people that are incredibly introverted or incredibly shy, and it is hard to fill out that profile.
00:34:14
Speaker
And it is hard to know like what to say to people.
00:34:16
Speaker
And so sometimes that's the reality of what's going on.
00:34:18
Speaker
You know, what we try to do again is like, we have this feature in the app called iCupid, but it kind of tells you, hey, here's what the data shows about your profile.
00:34:26
Speaker
And here are like some things that would help increase your chances of matching or whatever.
00:34:30
Speaker
So we try to arm you with data on what you're doing and what may work.
00:34:35
Speaker
It is hard though to say, okay, are you, you know,
00:34:40
Speaker
We've not figured out how to do explicitly a better job of like, this guy is just looking to hook up and fool around.
00:34:46
Speaker
It is less of an issue though at OkCupid than other apps.
00:34:49
Speaker
Again, because if you're not looking for something serious and you're not engaged in like what's going on in the world, you're just not going to put up with us because we will not swipe and match without going through a certain number of steps on the profile.
00:35:02
Speaker
We will not let you do it.
00:35:03
Speaker
And that has cost us money.
00:35:05
Speaker
It's why we're not as big as other apps, but we know that gives a better experience.
00:35:10
Speaker
You know, I think what you pointed out is also fair.
00:35:12
Speaker
Like we are a business.
00:35:14
Speaker
And so we, you know, we're not a nonprofit.
00:35:16
Speaker
We are a business.
00:35:17
Speaker
We are for profits.
00:35:18
Speaker
We live in very capitalist America.
00:35:20
Speaker
However, I will say, and this has been my experience in OKCupid, you know, almost five years that we will make decisions that cost us money that, you know, will get you off.
00:35:29
Speaker
pun intended, like get you off, get you off the app, because that's the world that we live in.
00:35:35
Speaker
And it's also there's a real benefit when people say like, Oh, I met someone, it didn't work out, but they were really great.
00:35:40
Speaker
And you know, we're still friends, or I had a good experience, or I felt like I could talk about my passion for sustainability.
00:35:48
Speaker
And, you know, that didn't feel weird here.
00:35:50
Speaker
And so I think when you're out there, you know, how are you feeling in that experience?
00:35:55
Speaker
What's working for you?
00:35:56
Speaker
How are you finding folks?
00:35:58
Speaker
Because I'll also say this, you know, women will say men are so appearance based and blah, blah, blah.
00:36:03
Speaker
And I'm like, yeah.
00:36:04
Speaker
And that's, by the way, that's true.
00:36:06
Speaker
That's true.
00:36:06
Speaker
But then I'll say, let me just like, you know, open up your app and let me like, just pretend like I'm not here.
00:36:11
Speaker
And they will swipe as quickly as those guys will.
00:36:15
Speaker
Meaning they're not...
00:36:17
Speaker
clicking into the profile.
00:36:18
Speaker
They're not taking a minute.
00:36:19
Speaker
So I will also say that women are also not giving the mindfulness and the slowdown, you know, if you're looking for a serious relationship that they maybe think they are that they, you know, even my own friends, even my own single friends, I'm like, you are going so fast, you are making a snap decision on that guy's picture.
00:36:37
Speaker
And I know that you want people to take more time with your profile.
00:36:41
Speaker
And I know that when I read your profile and it's so funny and it's so interesting and like, oh, I would like to make out with you.
00:36:48
Speaker
So why don't you give that, you know, give that time and that attention to other people?
00:36:53
Speaker
And by the way, that's the thing that I also tell folks if they think that they're guilty of that is like, you know, sit with your friend and don't look at the profiles, but have her read, you know, maybe she does like the first vet.
00:37:04
Speaker
It's like, oh, this guy's the homeless guy down the street.
00:37:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:37:07
Speaker
He wasn't even down the street.
00:37:08
Speaker
He was three states away.
00:37:10
Speaker
That's where I was like, you know what?
00:37:11
Speaker
I'm deleting this out.
00:37:13
Speaker
Oh, God.
00:37:15
Speaker
I have no idea.
00:37:16
Speaker
That's what was so weird about it.
00:37:17
Speaker
I was like, maybe they super swiped on me or something.
00:37:20
Speaker
But I still was like, I feel like, again, as a consumer, I'd like my app to filter out things that would never, ever, ever work.
00:37:27
Speaker
Right?
00:37:28
Speaker
Like, I don't ask for much.
00:37:30
Speaker
Like the guy in Kansas, who is living in a van is not your speed.
00:37:35
Speaker
Yeah, it's like, how would he even get here?
00:37:37
Speaker
In his van.
00:37:38
Speaker
You know, I don't know.
00:37:39
Speaker
But...
00:37:41
Speaker
They're driving his van.
00:37:42
Speaker
Hey, at least he has a car.
00:37:44
Speaker
Not in these gas prices.
00:37:46
Speaker
Not with these gas prices right now.
00:37:49
Speaker
Sorry, but I think we're all trying to stay home.
00:37:52
Speaker
So, okay.
00:37:53
Speaker
So with that, how do you guys measure like your success as a dating app?
00:37:57
Speaker
If you're not necessarily doing it just based on like, how do you characterize success for OkCupid and for either both the app and also the users?
00:38:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:06
Speaker
So one is we call it happy delete.
00:38:09
Speaker
So if you go to delete an app,
00:38:11
Speaker
often, usually that happens, you know, you may have that conversation like, Hey, okay, are we going off the apps?
00:38:15
Speaker
Like this is going somewhere, right?
00:38:16
Speaker
Are we going off the apps?
00:38:17
Speaker
We're going to leave apps.
00:38:18
Speaker
And when you go to do that, we say, and this is maybe our most important metric.
00:38:22
Speaker
We say, Hey, Hey, before you go, could you, do you mind telling us, you know, why you're leaving?
00:38:26
Speaker
And we four or five options.
00:38:27
Speaker
And one option is I'm over it.
00:38:29
Speaker
I'm over dating.
00:38:30
Speaker
I'm taking a break.
00:38:31
Speaker
Another option is I met somebody not on OkCupid.
00:38:34
Speaker
Another option is I met somebody on OkCupid.
00:38:37
Speaker
And then it's like, I don't want to tell you, fuck off.
00:38:39
Speaker
And we often also know what that means.
00:38:42
Speaker
So we call it a happy delete if it's I met someone in OkCupid.
00:38:45
Speaker
And that's really, really, really important.
00:38:48
Speaker
It's a little tough for a dating app, though.
00:38:50
Speaker
And this is one of those things that I wouldn't have thought about until I worked here is if you think about that relationship, right?
00:38:54
Speaker
So you meet someone, you go on a few dates, you're probably still on the app.
00:38:58
Speaker
What a lot of people do is they'll stop using the app, but they won't delete it.
00:39:02
Speaker
And we don't know what's going on because we don't have a diary or journal.
00:39:05
Speaker
We say, oh, you know, we're on our seventh date or he's meeting the parents or whatever it is.
00:39:09
Speaker
And then you'll come back and delete the app when it's getting to a serious or again, you like you've had that conversation.
00:39:15
Speaker
But even that we don't.
00:39:17
Speaker
You know, did you move in together?
00:39:19
Speaker
Did you want to get married and you got engaged?
00:39:21
Speaker
You know, it's one of those interesting things where you just don't always know like what happens after.
00:39:25
Speaker
But happy to lead is a really important one in the biz, in the industry.
00:39:29
Speaker
We also talk about things like two ways, four ways and contact exchanges.
00:39:34
Speaker
And those are not sexual positions.
00:39:36
Speaker
Those are a two way is if you go back and forth.
00:39:40
Speaker
He messages you, you message him back four-way.
00:39:42
Speaker
It keeps going.
00:39:43
Speaker
Contact exchange is really important.
00:39:45
Speaker
That tends to be almost always is like at least a good metric because it means you're taking the conversation offline.
00:39:51
Speaker
It doesn't always mean you're going in a date, but it can mean that.
00:39:55
Speaker
At different points, we've also turned on questions like, hey,
00:39:59
Speaker
Did you go on a date with so-and-so?
00:40:00
Speaker
Did you go on a date with so-and-so?
00:40:01
Speaker
And that's a little bit hard because you want to get the data.
00:40:04
Speaker
You want to know.
00:40:05
Speaker
You guys had, you know, you had a contact exchange.
00:40:07
Speaker
We want to know if you went on a date.
00:40:09
Speaker
How was the date?
00:40:10
Speaker
But then the other, the flip side also is you don't want people to feel bad.
00:40:14
Speaker
Like, no, I didn't go on the date.
00:40:15
Speaker
And now I feel worse because you asked me if I went on the date or maybe you did go on the date and the date was terrible.
00:40:20
Speaker
Like, how did it go?
00:40:21
Speaker
So it is this funny balance of I want to know what's happening because I want to be a better app.
00:40:27
Speaker
I want
00:40:28
Speaker
Should we have more filters?
00:40:30
Speaker
Should we have more questions?
00:40:30
Speaker
Are we showing you people that you're potentially interested in talking to or making out with or whatever?
00:40:36
Speaker
On the other hand, you don't want to be too invasive.
00:40:40
Speaker
And we already ping you with things like, hey, you know, you know, like the notifications, push notifications, right?
00:40:47
Speaker
You go in your phone and it's often what you turn off.
00:40:50
Speaker
So that whatever app is not telling you every two minutes that there's a deal on Uber Eats.
00:40:55
Speaker
Like, I get it.
00:40:56
Speaker
It's great.
00:40:57
Speaker
Thank you very much.
00:40:57
Speaker
But, you know, you want that also to stay on because if so-and-so messages you back or you have a new message or you have new likes, we want to tell you that so you can, you know, check it out.
00:41:07
Speaker
So it is a little bit difficult.
00:41:08
Speaker
Those are, you know, are people on the app?
00:41:10
Speaker
Because liquidity is a thing too.
00:41:12
Speaker
Again, liquidity is like a bit of like a, you know, a biz term.
00:41:16
Speaker
It seems chemical almost.
00:41:17
Speaker
But are there people here for you to talk to?
00:41:20
Speaker
Because you should not have been shown a guy three states away.
00:41:23
Speaker
You know, are there enough people in this town?
00:41:26
Speaker
And I know Cupid is, you know, and tends to be more popular in cities.
00:41:30
Speaker
So I have actually a comment slash question about why I think I was shown this person.
00:41:33
Speaker
One of the repeated complaints that a lot of other women of color have on there is that sometimes if you swipe on someone who's like your same race, that they'll show you
00:41:41
Speaker
everyone of that same race.
00:41:43
Speaker
And it will basically disregard all of the other factors because once again, it doesn't seem like it's values more so than how a person looks.
00:41:50
Speaker
And then you'll see everyone of that same race.
00:41:52
Speaker
And so I think I'm guessing that's what happened because I was looking at that like, what?
00:41:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:42:00
Speaker
So that's what I think is the issue on that one.
00:42:03
Speaker
And once again, it didn't happen on OKCupid, it happened on another one.
00:42:06
Speaker
That sucks.
00:42:07
Speaker
And I'm sorry that happened.
00:42:08
Speaker
And yes, I do think it is a good thing to ask yourself, what is this app asking me in order to determine who to show to me?
00:42:16
Speaker
You don't want them to only ask location, which in your case didn't even work, is their algorithm.
00:42:21
Speaker
Yeah, it's confusing.
00:42:23
Speaker
And I think that's part of why I don't know you're not necessarily deep into the weeds of the algorithm.
00:42:26
Speaker
But I think that's part of why so many women don't know how to use the app because they're like, I don't understand why I'm being shown the things that I'm being shown.
00:42:33
Speaker
Right?
00:42:35
Speaker
Yeah, totally.
00:42:36
Speaker
I understand.
00:42:36
Speaker
It's not always an exact science.
00:42:38
Speaker
What has occurred to me, and at least like how I already explained it to you, is that it just seems that they're very much trying to balance the interest between men and men on the app, especially if it's like a quote unquote meat market app like Tinder.
00:42:50
Speaker
And that sometimes women come out on the losing end of the stick where they're favoring showing you a bunch of guys you would never be with just to have...
00:42:55
Speaker
first either give you more options or give them more options.
00:42:58
Speaker
And even paying for the premium features, which I did as part of my quote research, I just was bombarded with guys that I'm like, this would take me forever, like thousands of men, it would take me forever to go through all of this.
00:43:07
Speaker
So I think that's what it seems like for me.
00:43:10
Speaker
Yeah, it sounds like that was your experience.
00:43:13
Speaker
And it's interesting that even paying for that premium experience didn't make it easier.
00:43:18
Speaker
In some ways, it made it even harder because then there was so much to look at, it was overwhelming.
00:43:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:43:24
Speaker
So with OkCupid, what I really liked was like, I don't remember it was like either the popular stack or it was like they give you stacks of men that are like already pre-filtered, right?
00:43:33
Speaker
So what I really liked, and it was pretty low cost.
00:43:35
Speaker
I think it was like two bucks, but it was like filtered by things that I would actually be interested in, right?
00:43:40
Speaker
And that was actually way more useful for me than having... I think I paid for the premium on Bumble and as well as Tinder and just like having a bunch of guys like me.
00:43:47
Speaker
And I'm like, I don't give a shit about a good 90% of these men.
00:43:50
Speaker
So this didn't help me at all.
00:43:52
Speaker
So...
00:43:53
Speaker
That's really cool.
00:43:54
Speaker
And yes, I'm glad that you got you even know like, yeah, the term is stack.
00:43:57
Speaker
So you go in OkCupid.
00:43:58
Speaker
And again, it came out of real feedback from daters.
00:44:02
Speaker
And it was, I see that I have this like endless deck of cards, again, like the stack of people to swipe left or right on.
00:44:07
Speaker
But can you just like section them again, like you walk into a bar and like, what if you could say at the bar, here's everybody that's told us they're pro choice, which is one of our stack.
00:44:15
Speaker
This stack is organized by people that we're recommending because we think they're a good fit for you.
00:44:18
Speaker
here's another stack that is in your area or recently online, which is also another good thing because we turn off your profile.
00:44:25
Speaker
If you don't log in, I think it's two weeks.
00:44:27
Speaker
It's around that time.
00:44:28
Speaker
If you don't log in for two weeks, we stop showing your profile to people because I don't want, if I'm single, I don't want you to show me profile people that have not been on the app recently.
00:44:37
Speaker
Like what a letdown, you know, like they're taking a break.
00:44:39
Speaker
Maybe they met someone, whatever it is, they're not engaged.
00:44:41
Speaker
So that's really good feedback to hear.
00:44:43
Speaker
I'm going to give that, I'm going to
00:44:44
Speaker
also give that to my head of product, it does like siphon them off.
00:44:47
Speaker
And again, like I like the pro choice stack.
00:44:48
Speaker
So I, you know, I jumped into it.
00:44:50
Speaker
And I'm looking at like, who's in there?
00:44:52
Speaker
And obviously, you're hotter if you're for reproductive rights.
00:44:55
Speaker
And that's like, okay, I'll start here.
00:44:57
Speaker
I'll start here.
00:44:57
Speaker
Because that's the other thing, too, is I think dating apps, I mean, dating is kind of scary.
00:45:01
Speaker
And if you're vulnerable, and then can be really overwhelming, it doesn't feel intimate, it doesn't feel like there's community there often.
00:45:08
Speaker
And so how do you like pull out those things that will make it feel like
00:45:13
Speaker
community and it will make it feel, oh, I'm actually getting a sense of who you are.
00:45:17
Speaker
Maybe you're not for me, but I'm getting a sense of that.
00:45:19
Speaker
Or maybe, you know, maybe you are.
00:45:21
Speaker
Maybe that I want to like get to know you better, not on a coffee date.
00:45:26
Speaker
Okay.
00:45:26
Speaker
So I guess with this last part of the conversation, I'd like to, I think, get into your best practices, tips and tricks about how to use the apps.
00:45:33
Speaker
Like this, the stuff that people ask because it seems to me that it's partially part of the user frustration with apps is like our ignorance about actually how to use it.
00:45:42
Speaker
Right.
00:45:42
Speaker
Which is part of why I was kind of inspired to try to write an ebook on
Tips for Effective Use of Dating Apps
00:45:45
Speaker
it.
00:45:45
Speaker
And I don't know when that's coming out because we're kind of busy, but like
00:45:47
Speaker
The idea that like, okay, we need some kind of user education about like how to find what you're looking for in the apps in so far that it does exist.
00:45:54
Speaker
Like assuming that there are, you know, if you're a average quote unquote woman who just wants a relationship with an average type man, there's some discussion about like, if you listen to all the incels online and sorry, we wait, we traffic in that language of like incels.
00:46:07
Speaker
Oh, I listened to the recent, even like the femcel.
00:46:11
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:12
Speaker
Yes.
00:46:12
Speaker
I'm familiar.
00:46:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:14
Speaker
Well, okay.
00:46:15
Speaker
So one of the complaints they've had is like, I know OkCupid used to publish data, or actually I think they still do, but maybe not as frequently, but like publish the data studies.
00:46:23
Speaker
And there's a really infamous study that came out of OkCupid that showed that like, oh, 80% of the women are only attracted to 20% of the men.
00:46:29
Speaker
And they've been using that as like their Bible ever since.
00:46:33
Speaker
So I'm like, is that, I don't know.
00:46:35
Speaker
Actually, maybe I'll ask your opinion on it because I always wonder, like, it seemed to me that it might've just been a bit of a data misinterpretation or like, if we're really at that point as a society, like what does that say about us?
00:46:45
Speaker
I feel like if truly only 80% of women are attracted to 20% of the men, I don't think that's the case.
00:46:50
Speaker
I think it just has to do with the way the app was.
00:46:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:52
Speaker
Yeah, correct.
00:46:53
Speaker
It's not that way anymore.
00:46:55
Speaker
I know the blog post that you're referring to, and it's before my time.
00:46:58
Speaker
But yes, I think there were a number of reasons why I think how the data was interpreted, what dating was like then.
00:47:05
Speaker
And also, I think OkCupid has always been a little bit of a step ahead.
00:47:09
Speaker
But I also one of the only apps born and raised in New York City.
00:47:11
Speaker
And that does, I think you can feel that on the product.
00:47:13
Speaker
But I think the data would and does show that that's not the case now.
00:47:17
Speaker
But yes, I love giving tips and tricks because I do think it's
00:47:20
Speaker
No one has ever said to me, I've been doing this for a while now.
00:47:22
Speaker
And I talk to single people every day, all day.
00:47:25
Speaker
I love it.
00:47:25
Speaker
I genuinely like talking about this issue.
00:47:27
Speaker
And I like trying to connect people and no one has ever said to me, I've got it down.
00:47:32
Speaker
And so I've been doing this five years.
00:47:33
Speaker
I've had probably, you know, tens of thousands of conversations about dating and relationships and sex.
00:47:37
Speaker
And so here's a couple of like my favorites from like an insider perspective.
00:47:41
Speaker
One is like actually put the time in and women are like extremely guilty of this.
00:47:46
Speaker
Just like the guys, I'm really trying to find someone.
00:47:48
Speaker
And again, I think you guys hit on this, the why behind our views of ourselves and our views of dating interviews of men and misogyny, like why all of those things happen.
00:47:56
Speaker
It's related to that, but
00:47:58
Speaker
Part of what we, and I am not a sociologist or anthropologist, but I work with really amazing women who are, and by the way, we almost only work with women in that space of academia and research and anthropologists and sociologists and all the things to understand the why behind things and how do we use the app and the technology to address it and to make it easier, but people don't put the time in.
00:48:16
Speaker
And women will say to me, I'm having no luck.
00:48:18
Speaker
I'm like, okay, tell me how much time and energy you're putting into this.
00:48:21
Speaker
I'm like, let's talk about that for a minute.
00:48:22
Speaker
And I'll say, you know, five minutes a day, 10 minutes a day, you know, 10 minutes every other day.
00:48:27
Speaker
And they'll say, I don't know, 10 minutes a month.
00:48:29
Speaker
And I say, okay, well, that's your first problem.
00:48:30
Speaker
So one thing is like, you should put the time and energy in.
00:48:33
Speaker
Again, I have this theory that I...
00:48:35
Speaker
You know, women work that we do so much to achieve all these other things in our life.
00:48:39
Speaker
And we don't always put in that time and energy.
00:48:41
Speaker
And this doesn't have, I mean, I work at a dating app.
00:48:43
Speaker
It doesn't have to be a dating app.
00:48:44
Speaker
But are you putting yourself in situations where you're going to meet someone and you're going to meet someone that you have some compatibility with?
00:48:50
Speaker
So that's one thing.
00:48:51
Speaker
Another thing is like, make sure you're on the right app for what you want.
00:48:55
Speaker
Tinder is big in like almost every city in the world, but some apps are not that popular in other cities.
00:49:01
Speaker
So it may not be the right one for you.
00:49:02
Speaker
And also, you know, are politics and social issues important to you?
00:49:06
Speaker
You know, you should get on OkCupid.
00:49:08
Speaker
We're free.
00:49:08
Speaker
But what is the right thing for you in your area is a really important thing.
00:49:13
Speaker
Here's another like insider hacky tip, which is...
00:49:16
Speaker
You know how when you are new to like a cell phone carrier is when they treat you the best?
00:49:21
Speaker
Dating apps are a little bit like that.
00:49:24
Speaker
And the data point is that 70% of daters roughly will set their profile and then never update it.
00:49:30
Speaker
And when you update your profile, even if you add like a few words, like, you know, not like self summer, like a little about me, you say like, these are the trips I'm taking this year.
00:49:40
Speaker
or shows I recently binged, I will, you know, something like that.
00:49:45
Speaker
Even if you just add a few words, the algorithm lights up and like thinks you're a new user and you will be shown to more people.
00:49:52
Speaker
But also updating your profile as this like freshness and this like, oh, this person was just here.
00:49:57
Speaker
They're clearly engaged.
00:49:58
Speaker
They're clearly like trying to meet somebody.
00:50:00
Speaker
We saw a lot of that when we're getting vaccinated.
00:50:02
Speaker
Also, like if you're anti-vax, you're probably not on OkCupid because we push that shit so hard.
00:50:08
Speaker
And we're like, you're more likely to like find love and you know, whatever.
00:50:11
Speaker
And so, but it was, you know, if you saw someone like, hey, boosted, vaxxed and boosted and ready to go.
00:50:16
Speaker
I'm like, oh, this person was here in recent.
00:50:18
Speaker
So add stuff to your profile.
00:50:20
Speaker
Here's another data point that I think is a little bit interesting.
00:50:23
Speaker
If you only get on your app once a week, do it on Sundays.
00:50:27
Speaker
Sundays are the busiest day.
00:50:28
Speaker
And that's like across every app.
00:50:30
Speaker
in every category.
00:50:32
Speaker
It's really interesting.
00:50:33
Speaker
You know, why partly is because Sundays are like chill days.
00:50:36
Speaker
You are like, you know, maybe you're like nursing your hangover, you're just hanging out, but it feels also like a little less pressure, a little whatever.
00:50:42
Speaker
A lot of women will say, I don't like to be online on like a Saturday because I don't want people to think like, I'm going to, you know, meet up that night.
00:50:48
Speaker
I'm not looking for that.
00:50:50
Speaker
I'm looking for like something serious.
00:50:51
Speaker
So
00:50:51
Speaker
Get online on Sundays.
00:50:53
Speaker
Other to other like good tips, like if you have more than four pictures or more increases your chance of having a mat on OKCupid.
00:51:00
Speaker
If you have the pro choice badge, you're twice as likely to get matches.
00:51:04
Speaker
Again, I think that's for a variety of reasons.
00:51:06
Speaker
But those are some of my tips.
00:51:08
Speaker
I also do encourage people to slow down.
00:51:11
Speaker
And if that means you have your friend hold your phone and you don't look at the photos, but they read you a little bit of the profile, like,
00:51:16
Speaker
Yeah, I like that.
00:51:17
Speaker
Or no, I do encourage people to sew.
00:51:19
Speaker
And I also tell women, like, if you come across a guy that's interesting, send him a message.
00:51:23
Speaker
There are a lot of we have a lot of people on OKCupid, a lot of men that are really lovely, kind, interesting humans.
00:51:29
Speaker
They also may be shy and a little introverted.
00:51:32
Speaker
And, you know, if you see someone interesting, drop him a line.
00:51:36
Speaker
And then my last tip, and then I'll shut up, is on that profile.
00:51:39
Speaker
So OKCupid profiles are more robust than others.
00:51:42
Speaker
We want that.
00:51:43
Speaker
We want it that way.
00:51:43
Speaker
We don't want it to turn into an Instagram or a Tinder where you feel like there's a few words and that's it.
00:51:50
Speaker
Here's what you don't want to do on a profile is don't do just like an easygoing, laid-back girl looking for...
00:51:57
Speaker
her partner in crying.
00:51:59
Speaker
Like it just says nothing.
00:52:00
Speaker
I don't even know.
00:52:01
Speaker
What do you even respond to?
00:52:03
Speaker
Like it just, and guys do this too, but like, please don't do that.
00:52:06
Speaker
And also what's really happening often is a guy is looking for something to ask you about.
00:52:11
Speaker
And so take the time to put that out there.
00:52:13
Speaker
And if people worry too much, like I'm not, I want to be funny, but like, I'm trying too hard.
00:52:17
Speaker
And like, just like, you just like throw that out the window.
00:52:19
Speaker
And one way to do that, that tends to help people is to list what could be albums that changed my life, books that changed my life, shows I binged in COVID.
00:52:27
Speaker
favorite trips ever.
00:52:28
Speaker
Like it doesn't always have to be like, oh, a French philosopher or like, you know, here's my take on liberal feminism.
00:52:34
Speaker
It could be podcasts that I could not live without.
00:52:38
Speaker
It can be a lot of things.
00:52:38
Speaker
But when you put that out there, you're increasing the chances that a guy who, because often like those great guys are a little bit shy and we don't think about that enough, but I work with like engineers.
00:52:48
Speaker
I feel like I'm
00:52:49
Speaker
I work with so many of that type.
00:52:51
Speaker
And so you're just making a little bit easier and you're increasing the chances that they're like, oh my gosh, you also love this obscure band.
00:52:58
Speaker
I love that obscure band.
00:52:59
Speaker
Did you see them in December in Austin?
00:53:02
Speaker
You know, you're increasing the chances of that because dating apps,
00:53:05
Speaker
are a little bit about like, what's the icebreaker?
00:53:08
Speaker
Like, how are you going to make it easier for somebody to reach out and say hi, which is why we have like suggested prompts or, and we're even, you know, leaning into that on the political and social side, but don't feel like you have to be like so smart and funny and clever and witty and like not trying too hard.
00:53:21
Speaker
Just like put stuff out there.
00:53:22
Speaker
You can always change it.
00:53:24
Speaker
Do change it.
00:53:24
Speaker
Like, but the more you put out there, the more you're increasing the chances that guys need help.
00:53:30
Speaker
Like they do, they need help.
00:53:31
Speaker
They need help.
00:53:32
Speaker
So make it a little easier for them to like say something.
00:53:35
Speaker
Yeah, we noticed.
00:53:36
Speaker
They need to.
00:53:39
Speaker
No, I actually will say that.
00:53:43
Speaker
It is a good idea.
00:53:44
Speaker
When I was using online dating, one of the things that did make it a little easier for both parties was I did include, you know, some kind of like opening or like, you know, oh, if you message me, tell me about something like I'll basically give them like a prompt message.
00:53:58
Speaker
to, you know, somewhere in the profile.
00:54:00
Speaker
I really don't like the people who are like, oh, tell me the code word, which is like lemonade or something to prove that you read my profile.
00:54:07
Speaker
Like, I don't know.
00:54:08
Speaker
I don't like when people, sometimes men do that too.
00:54:10
Speaker
And it just seems really like hostile and kind of jaded.
00:54:12
Speaker
I think a better way of getting the same thing of like, if you want someone to show that they've read your profile, somewhere in the middle of my profile, I'll be like,
00:54:19
Speaker
If you message me, tell me about like a project that you did recently or something, whatever, right?
00:54:24
Speaker
You know, give them a prompt.
00:54:26
Speaker
And then that shows that they read your profile.
00:54:28
Speaker
It also, you know, it's like invitation to approach kind of thing.
00:54:31
Speaker
And it also makes you seem more interesting and not like bitter and jaded.
00:54:34
Speaker
Yes, I like that.
00:54:35
Speaker
Or another one that I like, because I agree.
00:54:38
Speaker
And people do get really, yeah, you can feel how jaded and frustrated, annoyed they are.
00:54:44
Speaker
And it's like, you'll have to make sure you say this.
00:54:46
Speaker
So I know you read my profile.
00:54:48
Speaker
Yeah, it just seems so hostile.
00:54:49
Speaker
I'm like, really?
00:54:50
Speaker
Like, is that how you...
00:54:52
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know.
00:54:53
Speaker
I just don't like people like that.
00:54:54
Speaker
Putting that in like, oh, you might reach out like tell me something you're working on or something like tell me even putting on your profile, like tell me where's the best margarita in Austin or whatever, like something, you know, what's your favorite dive in town or something like that.
00:55:08
Speaker
And then yeah, you're making it you're helping them because they do need it.
00:55:12
Speaker
They do.
00:55:12
Speaker
So I have one last pie in the sky question.
00:55:15
Speaker
This is a suggestion from one of our users.
00:55:17
Speaker
What do you think about dating app term limits?
00:55:21
Speaker
Because she was remarking that like... I love it.
00:55:26
Speaker
Some of these guys need help getting the fuck off this app.
00:55:29
Speaker
And she's like, either because they're not having success.
00:55:32
Speaker
She was just wondering, do you guys either have a mechanism in place?
00:55:35
Speaker
Is that something you would explore?
00:55:36
Speaker
Helping the perpetual users on there to get off of the app?
00:55:39
Speaker
Or just like... I know actually now you do kind of... You hide their profile if they're on there with inactivity for a certain amount of time.
00:55:45
Speaker
But starting to kind of push users who maybe are not either using the active app effectively or if they're really, really not having any success.
00:55:54
Speaker
What do you do to help them, I guess, is the question.
00:55:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:55:58
Speaker
Again, it is hard.
00:56:00
Speaker
You start to get into territory, which is interesting.
00:56:03
Speaker
It's hard to know, right?
00:56:04
Speaker
And then you have to actually go into like, you know, we have millions of daters around the world.
00:56:08
Speaker
So you can't do that or you can't go into like every profile and say, oh, wow, you're just a terrible human or you really need help.
00:56:15
Speaker
So one of the things we do is like with every profile, whether you pay or you're a free user, we show, we tell you, hey, here's what would help.
00:56:21
Speaker
If you added one more picture, you're going to increase your chances of a match by 30% or answer more.
00:56:26
Speaker
Okay.
00:56:29
Speaker
Because this increases the likelihood that you and, you know, another person have something in common and you'll find something that you care about.
00:56:37
Speaker
We will also, for daters that it's clear they're having trouble and we know this if they're not having mutual matches or contact exchanges or four ways or, you know, some of those other metrics that we look at, we'll send them notes like, hey, because sometimes what happens is people have so many preferences and filters set.
00:56:57
Speaker
I don't have anybody that fits criteria.
00:56:58
Speaker
And by the way, women will do this either in the app or with their own list of like, I only want six feet tall.
00:57:05
Speaker
I want to go to university.
00:57:06
Speaker
I want a good car.
00:57:07
Speaker
And like, you've just eliminated like 90% of the men like that are out there.
00:57:12
Speaker
And so we will send messages and say, Hey, we think we've got some more people they might be interested in.
00:57:18
Speaker
Would you consider, um,
00:57:20
Speaker
increasing your distance.
00:57:22
Speaker
You know, I'm from the Midwest.
00:57:23
Speaker
So some, you know, some of my friends have had some luck doing that of saying, okay, you don't have to be within a one mile radius or five mile radius, but you can be a little bit further.
00:57:31
Speaker
And like New York city, that means like, you know, you'll be going from like Brooklyn to New Jersey.
00:57:36
Speaker
So people in New York are always like hesitant to do that, but in other parts of the world, that makes sense.
00:57:41
Speaker
So we'll tell them, Hey, can you think about checking your, your preferences or settings?
00:57:45
Speaker
We think we have a few people that
00:57:47
Speaker
you know, might be compatible with.
00:57:49
Speaker
Question with that.
00:57:49
Speaker
So I wonder if this is another area where like men's interest and women's interest might be misaligned.
00:57:54
Speaker
Cause I tend to think that like women tend to only swipe on the guys they're actually interested in, whereas men are more likely to cast a wide net, so to speak.
00:58:01
Speaker
Like, is that another situation where, okay, women makes her criteria really, really, really narrow.
00:58:06
Speaker
And then,
00:58:07
Speaker
All the guys that are swiping on her are like the 90% of them are going to be like outside of what she wants.
00:58:12
Speaker
But then it's like, is it then on her to like expand it if that's not what she really wants?
00:58:17
Speaker
Or like, again, is it like against the consumer interest or like a conflicting consumer interest?
00:58:21
Speaker
If like she wants to narrow it down, they want to expand it.
00:58:24
Speaker
How do you like then balance it?
00:58:26
Speaker
Is it more like you suggest to them?
00:58:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:58:27
Speaker
Like expand your distance or...
00:58:30
Speaker
Yeah, no, but exactly.
00:58:31
Speaker
And that does happen.
00:58:32
Speaker
And this is probably true at all the apps that men tend to say yes more than women.
00:58:37
Speaker
And women are more explicit and narrow in what they set their preferences to.
00:58:44
Speaker
Again, like the nightclub bar analogy of like, you're always looking at your gender balance, you know, the people that are that are straight.
00:58:51
Speaker
Obviously, we look at different things for the LGBTQ daters that we support.
00:58:56
Speaker
So you might, you know, we might say expand your, for guys that are not getting as many matches or they're not going on, it looks like they're not going on dates.
00:59:07
Speaker
We'll say, Hey, try, try this or try, you know, try this filter, but it is a little bit hard.
00:59:14
Speaker
You know, sometimes
00:59:15
Speaker
It frankly, like when I sit with people and I'll look at their profile and I'll say, Hey, tell me what moves you?
00:59:20
Speaker
Like, what do you think is a good fit for you?
00:59:22
Speaker
I don't love the expression.
00:59:23
Speaker
Like, what are you looking for?
00:59:24
Speaker
But like, you know, aversion, like, what do you think is a good fit?
00:59:27
Speaker
What do you tend to be attracted to?
00:59:29
Speaker
You know, in terms of like personality and, you know, these different things.
00:59:31
Speaker
And then what they do on the app is not the same thing as what they're
00:59:35
Speaker
telling me.
00:59:36
Speaker
So I also think, and you guys have like gone into these territories of what do you think you want or attracted to?
00:59:45
Speaker
And what are you actually doing in practice?
00:59:48
Speaker
At OkCupid, we try to shorten the distance between those things, which is why we ask questions like, could you date someone that doesn't vote?
00:59:56
Speaker
And then we ask you, how important is this to you?
00:59:59
Speaker
And we give you three answers.
01:00:00
Speaker
And so our algorithm is truly in your hands.
01:00:04
Speaker
We say someone important, a little important, super important.
01:00:07
Speaker
And that's how we, you know, and we'll weight that.
01:00:10
Speaker
So, you know, part of the goal and the design of how the OkCupid system works is to slow you down, to think about things a little bit more.
01:00:18
Speaker
I've been married for, I don't know, nine years.
01:00:20
Speaker
I should know that right off the bat.
01:00:21
Speaker
My husband would like to know that in four seconds.
01:00:23
Speaker
Like, I don't know, four years.
01:00:24
Speaker
He's like 11.
01:00:25
Speaker
But what I've learned in my own relationship and also working with relationship experts and therapists and people that study the space is what is a fit for you also may not be something that you tick on an app or even be aware of.
01:00:39
Speaker
You know, an example is like, if you can't tell, I don't shut up.
01:00:42
Speaker
I'm a bit extroverted.
01:00:43
Speaker
I do like my quiet time, my alone time.
01:00:46
Speaker
I always thought I needed someone really similar because, you know, I'm kind of out there.
01:00:51
Speaker
I'm kind of loud.
01:00:51
Speaker
I, I'm, you know, I can piss people off, blah, blah, blah.
01:00:54
Speaker
And I thought I needed that.
01:00:55
Speaker
My husband is not, he's a little more reserved.
01:00:58
Speaker
I mean, he's funny.
01:00:59
Speaker
He's Chinese.
01:01:00
Speaker
He's Australian.
01:01:00
Speaker
He's like interesting in like a different way.
01:01:02
Speaker
He's not extroverted in the way that I am.
01:01:04
Speaker
He doesn't, you know, he didn't draw energy from that.
01:01:06
Speaker
He can be, and he, you know, and that actually makes us a really good fit because I pull him my way a little bit and he pulls me his way.
01:01:12
Speaker
And so how do you, and I think that's the next frontier for OkCupid is really using what we're learning about relationships, about compatibility, about, because there's being in a relationship and then there's being in a happy relationship, right?
01:01:24
Speaker
And those are two very different things.
01:01:26
Speaker
And what are the ingredients?
01:01:28
Speaker
What are the circumstances?
01:01:29
Speaker
What are the things at play in that happy relationship?
01:01:32
Speaker
And then how do you go to the very, very beginning and say, okay, Ro, we know that you are, you
01:01:39
Speaker
You know, what it feels like is this is a little about you.
01:01:42
Speaker
This is what matters to you.
01:01:44
Speaker
This is probably a good fit with that.
01:01:46
Speaker
You know, how do you do that?
01:01:47
Speaker
And then, you know, make the experience even more thoughtful and pull out these things that matter to people or that they're thinking about.
01:01:56
Speaker
And again, like keep the substance there, but, you know, think about these different pieces.
01:02:01
Speaker
So I think that's one of the next interesting spaces that like, you know, we'll keep digging into.
01:02:07
Speaker
That's really interesting.
01:02:08
Speaker
I don't think it occurred to me before that, yeah, there could be a massive gap between what you do on the app and then like what you actually in your heart of hearts either want
Data Collection Journey and Community Engagement
01:02:17
Speaker
or need.
01:02:17
Speaker
And yeah, that's a lifetime journey.
01:02:20
Speaker
I could see how that would be really difficult from like a data collection perspective.
01:02:23
Speaker
So yeah.
01:02:24
Speaker
Thanks for that insight.
01:02:25
Speaker
This is a really, really helpful conversation.
01:02:27
Speaker
I hope we adequately asked and you gave great answers to all of the questions we had from our Patreon members.
01:02:33
Speaker
So thanks for everyone who participates in our Patreon.
01:02:35
Speaker
And this came from our Patreon Discord.
01:02:36
Speaker
So if you want to join that, that's on patreon.com forward slash the female dating strategy.
01:02:41
Speaker
And you can also ask us questions for future guests or future episodes.
Interview Conclusion and Tech Talk Enthusiasm
01:02:46
Speaker
Before we wrap, did you guys have any more comments, Lilith or Savannah?
01:02:49
Speaker
And then I'll go into her role.
01:02:50
Speaker
No, this has been a great interview.
01:02:51
Speaker
Thank you so much for joining us.
01:02:53
Speaker
Yeah, truly.
01:02:54
Speaker
Thank you guys so much for having me.
01:02:55
Speaker
And thanks for letting me laugh poetic about some of this.
01:02:58
Speaker
It's really interesting.
01:02:58
Speaker
And you guys have such an important and interesting perspective.
01:03:01
Speaker
I would love to talk to you like offline about, well, tell me more.
01:03:04
Speaker
What are your thoughts on this?
01:03:05
Speaker
For sure.
01:03:05
Speaker
So I really, I'd love to keep in touch and come back to talk about anything or be grilled or, you know, pick your off brains.
01:03:13
Speaker
We actually have quite a few tech savvy users.
01:03:15
Speaker
So I would love at some point to talk to like an actual algorithm person because I think they would just go nuts because they love all the techy stuff.
01:03:22
Speaker
Yeah, let's
Show Closing and Audience Appreciation
01:03:23
Speaker
do that.
01:03:23
Speaker
I think that'd be super interesting.
01:03:25
Speaker
So thank you so much for having me.
01:03:27
Speaker
I really, really appreciate it.
01:03:30
Speaker
That's our show.
01:03:31
Speaker
Join us at www.thefemaledatingstrategy.com as well as our Twitter at fem.strat and our Instagram account at underscore the female dating strategy.
01:03:41
Speaker
All right.
01:03:41
Speaker
Thanks for listening, Queens.
01:03:43
Speaker
And for all you immediate swipe lefts out there, die bad.
01:03:46
Speaker
See you next week.
01:03:46
Speaker
Bye.