Archive for the ‘sex.com’ Category
How Match.com Changed The World Of Dating
NEWSWEEK – Aug 31 – In 1993 Gary Kremen founded Electric Classifieds, to bring classifieds to the net, raised $200k and launched Match.com in April ’95. Today Match has 1.7 million paid subscribers, with sites in 30 countries and 8 languages. 1 in 5 relationships and 1 in 6 marriages are between people who met through a dating site. According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project, 74% of the 10 million Web users who are single and looking for a partner have turned to the Internet to find someone. 850 services make up the multi-billion-dollar dating industry. Match consistently comes in among the top five based on traffic.
Kremen received $1.5 million in venture capital. In ’97 Match’s investors sold the startup for $8 million to Cendant who sold the company to IAC/InterActiveCorp the next year for $50 million. Kremen got $50k from company stock. A combination of joint ventures and innovation helped Match to flourish. In 2001, the service partnered with AOL and MSN. Today, smart phones are Match’s fastest-growing channel, according to Match CEO Greg Blatt. “We’re trying to be wherever our users are,” whether in the waiting room at a doctor’s office or in line at the grocery store, he says. The company now lives up to its name, using complex formulas to recommend users to each other.
“People have become more willing to open their wallets to find love,” says Mark Brooks, editor of OnlinePersonalsWatch.com, a consulting firm for the online dating industry. That’s partially because Match’s fees ($35/mo) are relatively modest, and it also helps, Brooks says, that the site has really “stocked its shelves” and continues to do so, with more than 20,000 singles registering on Match every day. In 2001, a judge awarded Kremen $65 million in a dispute over the domain name sex.com. Kremen also married the woman of his dreams. FULL ARTICLE @ NEWSWEEK
The Relentless Visionary Behind Match.com, Sex.com – With Gary Kremen
MIXERGY – Aug 6 – Gary Kremen got Jobs.com, Autos.com, Housing.com,
Sex.com and other domains for free by recognizing that the internet
would be a powerful business platform long before there was even a fee
for acquiring domain names. FULL INTERVIEW @ MIXERGY
Q: You were one of the first people to get domains, right?
A: Yeah. I guess sometimes luck is good. It’s better than being smart. I just was earlier than others.
Q: You bought Match.com for how much? My research says for $ 2,400.
A: That’s an accurate statement. What I bought more of was the email addresses. I saw the value of email addresses. I started noticing, in the early ’90s, more women on email and I said, “Hmm. I wonder if I could convince those. women to get their pictures scanned as an attachment at Kinkos and I could sell access to them.” Just like the 900 numbers. That was the genesis of the idea. I was doing a lot of dating using the 900 numbers in the newspapers. I met a programmer and I said, “I want you to build an email-based dating service. I had an implementation of that running in 1994 and it was growing. Then we were forced to sell it.
Q: Why? Tell me a little about that.
A: I raised some Angel money first in early ’95. Later, I raised venture capital and I think they saw the content and got embarrassed. Venture firms have limited partners who are conservative institutions and people were a lot conservative back then.
Q: What happened at the end of Match.com?
A: The board, over my objections, decided to sell the Match business unit for $7M to a company called SendIt. SendIt, nine months later, sold it to Citysearch/Ticketmaster/IAC for ~$15M. One of the things that we created was this idea of web pages that change based on who you are and web pages that change based on a database. We got an issued patent for that.
Q: What drove you? What was the drive that just kept you going when there’s so many setbacks here in your history from Sex.com being taken away from you to Match.com being sold for a penny?
A: I think it was an older desire and a continuing desire to prove myself. Now I am less driven. Until recently, I would never, ever hire a married person.
Q: Frankly, when you are a single person and it’s your only thing in life, you’re so much more productive than when you’re married. Aren’t you?
A: I would never hire a developer who has a girlfriend or smells good. If they have time for a girlfriend, to go to concerts, they’re not focused on the PHP.
Q: What was your most successful hit?
A: After I left Match, I co-founded a company called Net Angels with two guys. We merged that with a company called Firefly and sold it to Microsoft. Then I made some small investments and started company called Resonate, that went public.
Q: What are the big lessons you’ve learned?
A: I would’ve done some more early exits if I could have, even if I would have left a bunch of money on the table.
Q: One of the things I admire the most are these brilliant ideas. Is that just a gift or is there a system? Is there something you could teach us from that?
A: It’s a curse. It’s not a gift. Everyone has ideas. Implementation is a different thing.
Q: Last advice for entrepreneurs out there?
A: Don’t give up. I think a lot of people are close and they give up their ideas. They give up. Go get the free book “Patent It Yourself.” I can’t speak enough about that. Harder in the software world, but if you’re thinking of a physical thing, good thing to do on your own. You can do it pretty cheaply.
Q: So, what’s coming up next for yo?
A: I am thinking a lot about the energy space. A lot bigger than the Internet. I got some investments already.
