NEW YORK: Tinder, the dating app, is leveraging the same kind of data that enables it to pair up users with potential matches to help marketers like 20th Century Fox and Bud Light connect with its members.
Sean Rad, Tinder's co-founder/president, discussed this subject at TechCrunch's Disrupt NY 2015 conference.
The company, he reported, has introduced its first marketing products, which include video ad units and mock profiles that brands can upload – with Bud Light and 20th Century Fox already having tapped such tools.
"We collect a lot of data, and there's a whole team that's continuously looking at different pockets of data we can capture and using that to generate more relevant matches," said Rad. (For more, including examples of early ad campaigns on the app, read Warc's exclusive report: Tinder encourages consumers to "swipe right" for brands.)
"[The] data we use in generating better recommendations: that extends to advertising, our goal being to get you better people recommendations, but also better content recommendations through ads."
Perhaps the best-known aspects of the Tinder experience is the fact its users swipe right on a photo of a nearby match to indicate their interest, and swipe left to move on to the next option.
And, according to Rad, its members have instinctually applied a similar logic when presented with ads, offering the firm a stream of useful information about their preferences.
"The way we designed the system, if you swipe left or right, that's actually a signal we use. Once there's more [of a significant] volume of ads, it will be leveraged more," he said.
"But it's interesting, because we didn't tell our users that's how it works, but instinctually people just figured it out, which was just great to see."
Combining this swiping data with the demographic details that users provide while joining Tinder, and information the company can glean from Facebook – which is linked to the sign-up process – provides another layer of insight, too.
"There's a set of implicit signals that we know about you based on your behaviour and whatnot, and some explicit signals based on information you give us when you sign up," Rad said.
Sean Rad, Tinder's co-founder/president, discussed this subject at TechCrunch's Disrupt NY 2015 conference.
The company, he reported, has introduced its first marketing products, which include video ad units and mock profiles that brands can upload – with Bud Light and 20th Century Fox already having tapped such tools.
"We collect a lot of data, and there's a whole team that's continuously looking at different pockets of data we can capture and using that to generate more relevant matches," said Rad. (For more, including examples of early ad campaigns on the app, read Warc's exclusive report: Tinder encourages consumers to "swipe right" for brands.)
"[The] data we use in generating better recommendations: that extends to advertising, our goal being to get you better people recommendations, but also better content recommendations through ads."
Perhaps the best-known aspects of the Tinder experience is the fact its users swipe right on a photo of a nearby match to indicate their interest, and swipe left to move on to the next option.
And, according to Rad, its members have instinctually applied a similar logic when presented with ads, offering the firm a stream of useful information about their preferences.
"The way we designed the system, if you swipe left or right, that's actually a signal we use. Once there's more [of a significant] volume of ads, it will be leveraged more," he said.
"But it's interesting, because we didn't tell our users that's how it works, but instinctually people just figured it out, which was just great to see."
Combining this swiping data with the demographic details that users provide while joining Tinder, and information the company can glean from Facebook – which is linked to the sign-up process – provides another layer of insight, too.
"There's a set of implicit signals that we know about you based on your behaviour and whatnot, and some explicit signals based on information you give us when you sign up," Rad said.
Data sourced from Warc
