Dating App Marketing Strategy – 11 Hacks For 2024

Before we even begin talking about the likes of Tinder and their dating app marketing strategy, allow me to jog your mind a little bit.

Ever heard of OkCupid?

Yes, I’m talking about that famous online dating website. At its peak between 2012 and 2013, it had more than 10 million registered users. So, in a way, it was like the Tinder of the late 2000s and early 2010s. Google

But then something very interesting happened in 2014. OkCupid suddenly lost its charm and began bleeding users. So much so that by 2019, its popularity had almost completely waned.

And how’s that relevant to any dating app marketing strategy?

Well, here’s the thing. While OkCupid was dropping sharply, it turns out the opposite was happening to Tinder during the same period.

Yes, that’s right. Tinder was founded in 2012 and, subsequently, hit the ground fast enough to overtake OkCupid – a veteran that had been around for a decade – in just two years.

Currently, Tinder is reported to have a user base of more than 57 million users – with 7.86 million Tinder users in the U.S. OkCupid, on the other hand, has shrunk by millions – as it’s now hosting only 1.79 million U.S-based users.

Curious how the change of fortunes came about?

Well, it has a lot to do with the dating app market. This is one thing you’ve got to figure out how it works before you even embark on your dating app marketing journey.

The Dating App Market

Although OkCupid’s downfall can be attributed to a myriad of challenges the company was facing at the time, its biggest undoing was failing to respond to the progressive shift to mobile.

You see, in 2012, OkCupid was a popular online dating website that wasn’t very keen about investing in a corresponding dating app. It preferred just sticking to its comfort zone, ruling over Tinder and other mobile-based dating apps.

This was the time that, get this – smartphone uptake in the US had ultimately surpassed 50%.  People were increasingly shifting their online dating from PC to mobile.

Tinder, on the other hand, was quick to capitalize on this opportunity. It optimized virtual dating for mobile and invested heavily in mobile app marketing. And the rest, as they say, is history.

That said, it’s worth noting that the market is still ripe for new online dating apps. In the U.S. for instance, where smartphone user penetration is now well above 86%, it turns out only 30% of adults have used a dating app. Many of them are yet to catch up.

They won’t take that long, though. Based on the growth the likes of Tinder and Bumble have seen in recent years, it’s evident that smartphone users are exceedingly joining the online dating bandwagon. Seems like it’s only a matter of time before the dating app usage rate surpasses 50%.

Now, with such a huge stream of users up for grabs, this is the perfect time to engage your mobile app marketing gear. And to help you with that, here 11 thoughtful hacks that you might want to include in your dating app marketing strategy…

Top 11 Hacks For Your Dating App Marketing Strategy

1. Reach Out To The Media

All things considered, the success of your dating app marketing strategy largely depends on the reach of your marketing communication. The users sign-up rate is always directly proportional to the size of the target audience that you manage to engage.

Creating brand awareness through haphazard app marketing, however, doesn’t click. But then again, it’s possible to jump the line and take a shortcut. The trick is simply leaving your marketing communication to the very people who know how best to pass the word around.

Yes, that’s right. I’m talking about the media.

You could, for instance, have them release an app press release as part of your prelaunch app marketing, That alone should help you build sufficient momentum by the time you proceed to deploy your dating mobile app.

2. Find a Community To Start With

And speaking of skipping lines, you don’t have to wait until your online dating app is finally published on the App Store to get feedback from users

A great dating app marketing strategy will allow you to start with your family and friends, and then move on to app review platforms and more.

App review platforms are particularly effective, as they’re often frequented by enthusiasts across all app categories. You get the chance to create brand awareness while collecting feedback from app developers and users in the online dating space. You can then use this data to improve your app as well as polish your mobile app marketing strategy.

3. Paid App Promotion

While organic app marketing will get you a solid following, you should make paid app promotion a part of your marketing strategy for its effectiveness at getting those numbers rolling. Tinder itself has been using paid ads to market its features to prospective app users.

If you choose to give this a try, you’ll notice that there’s a wide range of paid mobile app marketing options across different platforms. You could, for instance, combine paid social media ads with influencer marketing, and possibly even Google AdMob.

And while you’re at it, you might also want to consider leveraging paid app installs to make the most of your marketing strategy. This alone stands to boost your organic app downloads by more than 150%.

4. App Store Optimization

As of 2016, the average Apple user in the U.S was spending about 33 minutes per month scrolling through the App Store.

Now that’s a heck lot of time to not get your online dating app noticed.

But, since the App Store hosts more than 2 million apps, you can’t really rely on users to find their way around. Instead, you’ll have to get the App Store search algorithm to direct them to your app. This is best achieved through App Store Optimization. Enter app marketing!

Now, for the sake of clarity, App Store Optimization – or ASO in short – is basically an app marketing strategy that tactfully enhances app elements that’ll get you noticed by the App Store Search algorithm.

App marketing involves working on your keywords, app title, app demo video, screenshots, app description, and more.

You could, for instance, set your app to rank for keywords like “online dating”, “virtual dating”, and “Tinder”.

5. Creatively Leverage Content

Don’t get too obsessed about the App Store search algorithm that you forget all about the ultimate search engine on the internet- Google.

This is where SEO and a sound marketing strategy fundamentally come into play. To get noticed by Google, you’ll have to capitalize on, among other strategies, content marketing – focus on posting blog posts, videos, and images on multiple platforms.

But, get this – since everyone is posting content these days, only exceptional pieces are known to quickly generate organic interest, and subsequently, rally a decent following. As such, you’ll need to wear your creativity hat while drafting the marketing content.

Don’t limit yourself, though. It’s also possible to market your online dating app using user generated content. This works best when you leave it to mobile app marketing pros.

6. Gamify User Experience

Come to think of it, online dating apps tend to apply the same approach to online dating.  Most of them are built for messaging and profile matching – you just need to sign up, edit your profile, and the app will help you find a partner with similar interests.

Now, with such a similar approach, the one thing that ultimately makes all the difference to users is your app’s user experience.

A poor user experience could lose you 80% of the users as soon as they install the app and sign up.

So, to prevent that, consider gamifying the dating interface with simple but creative elements like tap-to-like, shake-to-refresh-feed, emoji-texting, etc. These are some of the tactics Tinder employs to keep its users engaged.

7. Collect Data For Target Marketing

Gone are the days when app marketing professionals blindly targeted audiences with random promotion messages. Today’s caliber of digital marketing tools allows you to build a robust dating app marketing strategy. You can use it to extract user data and calculatedly use it to target audiences with personalized content.

You could, for instance, set your in-app tools to collect data on personal attributes like gender, height, weight, attractiveness, race, and age. Then with all that information, you should be able to customize your marketing strategy and user engagement.

That’s basically how Tinder manages to convert warm prospects. It assesses various profiles and then combines the findings with geolocation data to reach out to other singles that might be suitable candidates for pairing.

8. Embed Social Networking Functions

Because of the social quality of online dating apps, you might feel like you’re competing against social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, etc – especially now that Facebook is thinking of challenging Tinder with its own dating service.

Well, you could be right to some extent. But, don’t be quick to lock out the social media sites from your dating app.

You should, instead, take a step back and think this through. By taking advantage of their APIs to embed social networking features, you’ll be able to leverage social media sites for user engagement. How’s that for a future-ready dating app marketing strategy! 

9. Use Influencers In Your Dating App Marketing Strategy

As it turns out, influencer marketing is now generating 11 times higher ROI compared to traditional approaches to digital marketing.

If you doubt that, imagine the number of users your dating app would gain if, PewDiePie, for instance, broadcasted a live date on it.

So, you might want to include influencer marketing into your overall dating app marketing strategy before it becomes costlier in the next couple of years. Tinder is already making a killing through influencer marketing in today’s pop culture.

10. Get Your App Featured On The App Store

You’re not the only one who’d like to see your dating app growing. As odd as it sounds, Apple is also very much interested in facilitating its success. But then again, I guess that’s expected because Apple itself is a beneficiary of your app revenue.

Whichever the case, at least Apple is open to promoting your online dating app through App Store chart listings. To leverage this dating app marketing opportunity, you just need to ensure that it meets the criteria.

Having your dating app featured as “App of The Day”, for example, could bump up your app downloads by as much as 1747%. That’s partly how industry giants like Tinder invested in app marketing and quickly rose to the top.

Talk to us, and we’ll help you get yours on that chart.

11. Create a Viral App Video

Picture this. You post a funny and witty video of your dating app before going to bed. Then you wake up in the morning and find more than half a million shares and ten times as many views.

Now that’s the power of viral app marketing. It has the potential of pushing your brand to millions of users in just a couple of hours.

Check out the reach of these viral videos, for instance. In just 24 hours, they managed to attract all those views (in millions).

Well, the kicker is, viral marketing videos don’t come easy. There’s a certain amount of professional finesse required to create a video that has the capability of eliciting widespread organic interest. And when it hits the nail on the head, it can take your mobile app marketing to the next level!

 

Well, the kicker is, viral marketing videos don’t come easy. There’s a certain amount of professional finesse required to create a video that has the capability of eliciting widespread organic interest. And when it hits the nail on the head, it can take your mobile app marketing to the next level!

Dating App Marketing Strategy: Take-Home Points

To recap our dating app marketing strategy guide:

• OkCupid’s decline was not triggered by a drop in online dating levels. Not at all. The company, as a matter of fact, faced a myriad of challenges. However, all things considered, one of their biggest blunders was failing to respond well to the progressive shift to mobile. Timely and proper app marketing could have saved them!
• Tinder came onto the scene with pretty much the same online dating framework as OkCupid. But it had perfected what OkCupid couldn’t- building a great smartphone app and devising a clear-cut dating app marketing plan to leverage effective tricks to promote their dating app.
• Today, only 30% of adults in the U.S claim that they’ve used an online dating app.
• With an app press release, even as part of your prelaunch app marketing, you’ll be able to capitalize on an extensive audience of prospective users
• App review platforms help you collect feedback from real users, as well as grant you the chance to roll out your app marketing initiatives to a wide audience of prospective users.
• While organic app marketing will get you a solid following, paid app promotion is also effective at getting those user numbers rolling.
• Since the App Store hosts more than 2 million apps, you can’t rely on users to find their way around. You’ll have to get the App Store search algorithm with a robust app marketing strategy. This will direct them to your app by implementing App Store Optimization.
• App marketing doesn’t work in isolation. To get noticed by Google, you’ll have to capitalize on, among other strategies, content marketing- blog posts, videos, and images on multiple platforms.
• A poor user experience could lose you 80% of the users as soon as they install the app and sign up. So, to prevent this, consider gamifying the dating interface with simple but creative elements.
• Data on personal user attributes like gender, height, weight, attractiveness, race, age can be captured and systematically leveraged for creating a marketing strategy that targets the right audience.
• By taking advantage of their APIs to embed social networking features, you’ll be able to leverage social media sites to improve connections and boost your user base.
• Influencer marketing strategy is now generating 11 times higher ROI compared to traditional approaches to digital marketing.
• Apple is open to featuring your dating app on the App Store, as long as it excellently meets the criteria. Being featured as the “App of The Day”, for example, bumps up downloads by 1747% on average.
• There’s a certain amount of professional finesse required to create a viral app video that has the capability of eliciting widespread organic interest. It is, therefore, advised to work with experienced app marketing pros.

As seasoned mobile app marketing specialists, we’ll be glad to show you how best to seamlessly combine all these techniques into one solid dating app marketing strategy. Feel free to get in touch today.