Introduction
Tinder is a famous online dating and geosocial networking matchmaking mobile application. Tinder was founded in 2012 in the United States as a dating app which allows the users to find their match from around the world, virtually. Sean Rad, Justin Mateen, Whitney Wolfe and Jonathan Badeen are the joint-founders of Tinder. Match Group is the parent company of Tinder.
How does Tinder work ?
Tinder allows your social media account and email ID to make a Tinder profile. It then uses GPS technology to provide users with a set radius and have the option to match other users. Users use Tinder to make new friends, to meet new people for dating and relationships. Users swipe right to the profile they like and swipe left if they dislike. If two users swipe right to each other then it is a match and they can chat and share information about each other.
Rise of the Tinder
Tinder entered the international market in 2013 and now it is available in more than 190 countries. Tinder gained rapid popularity among college students in 2014 when it recorded 1 billions user swipes in a single day. Now, Tinder has an average of 1.6 billion swipes in a day and now Tinder has a strong user base of 9.6 million in 2021.
Tinder, in its journey, focused on localization of the app to customize its features and services as per the country where it is operating. Now, Tinder is one of the most valuable brands at present time. The progressive growth of Tinder started back in 2015.
Monetization and Tinder
Tinder started various new things in its business operation. The year 2015 was the turning point for Tinder. Tinder focused on monetization and developed various features in its app. Tinder started a premium subscription package to its users where swipes were unlimited and service was premium. Similarly, Tinder started to feature advertisements in its services. The first advertisement it featured was an advertisement of Budwieser, promotion of Bud light beer.
The company introduced an exclusive feature of ‘Super Like’ in its app. Such added features made Tinder more likable. Along with this, Tinder made various acquisitions to support its business. Tinder acquired Tappy in 2015. Tappy is a photo messaging application. Similarly, Tinder acquired Humin in 2016, a startup which focused on contact management. In 2017, Tinder acquired Wheel, a video sharing application.
Revenue Model of Tinder
Tinder has two ways of generating revenue: advertisement based revenue and subscription based revenue. With the advertisement in Tinder, advertisers can promote their products and services in creative ways. The advertisement campaigns like NYC puppy rescue projects, matched abandoned puppies to their new owners. Similarly, there are various iconic advertisements like Bud Light Project, Mindy Projects, Domino’s advertisements which were effective in Tinder.
Another approach to revenue is subscription based revenue. The company introduced the Tinder Plus with a subscription charge of $ 9.99 per month. Tinder Plus provided additional features to subscribers. Tinder plus allowed users to have unlimited swaps, flexible location selection, reviewing and revisiting the profile. Similarly, another paid feature is Tinder Boost which increases the reach and popularity of the users.
In 2015, the annual revenue of Tinder was around $47 million. In 2016, the annual revenue reached $169 million. The annual revenue doubled in 2017 and reached $403 million. By 2019 the revenue of tinder reached $1.15 billion. With the increase in user and preference in online dating tinder collected the total revenue of $1.4 billion in 2020. The users of tinder are increasing each year and revenue is also increasing side by side.
Market competition and Tinder
Tinder is the world’s top dating app. There is a lot of competition in the market. The main competitors of Tinder are Bumble, Badoo, Her, Stitch, Coffee meets Bagel and others. The new dating apps are more of messaging apps.
The early success of Tinder is due to its easy approach to create the profile. The users were only a few seconds away from creating a tinder profile by linking it to their Facebook. The other factor that helped tinder to succeed was its messaging system. Messages can be sent to match profiles but tinder messaging system eliminates the unnecessary message from users.
The online dating industry is getting very competitive and the capital investment in it is low. This has allowed the new entrants in the dating industry.
Growth and Challenges
Software based businesses like tinder do not have heavy capital investment. Such businesses are successful based on their unique concept and its execution. Entering into such a low-investment business is easy and does not require a lot of effort.
Tinder has gained a lot of popularity over the time. But it is a big challenge for Tinder to have growth and to stay relevant in the market. Apart from the stiff competition from other similar application, Tinder like apps are facing lashes from the community and society for promoting obscene content and pornography. Tinder has been misused in many different ways. There have been issues regarding misuse of personal information, scams,cyber stalking etc.
Conclusion
Tinder broke the social stigma related to online dating. With the introduction of Tinder, people were comfortable sharing their information online. Before Tinder, people were not in support of dating apps that shared the information.
Tinder is also a pioneer in monetizing the dating app. All the success of the tinder goes to its management. The easy and user-friendly system of Tinder is what attracts the users and which differs Tinder from other dating apps. Tinder has changed the entire online dating system.
References