Interview: Skip – 2024’s Newest Dating App

On the first day of 2024, new dating app Skip launched across the USA and Canada. Global Dating Insights spoke with the platform’s founder to find out more about what makes the platform unique and what we can expect from Skip moving forward.

Skip is looking to refresh the online dating space with a unique proposition – making new connections in a seamless way…but without chatting. The idea came to Skip’s Founder, Scott Avy, while he was working at Indeed, Inc.

Sean Nolan, Senior Reporter at Global Dating Insights, had the pleasure of speaking with Scott to find out more:

Sean: Can you tell us about Skip and what makes it unique?

Scott: Skip is a whole new twist on dating apps, so much so that we believe we are creating a whole new category we are calling matchmaker apps instead of the traditional dating app. We dove deep into finding out the main problems people have with dating apps today and it came down to the following:

• Dating safety (46% of people view online dating as unsafe.)
• 1 out of 3 people get ghosted
• Time it takes to get a date (4 Days)
• The # of first dates that lead to a second date (5% success rate)
• AI’s recent advancements makes it so you don’t know if you are talking to an AI bot or a human

Our solution was to automate the screening, scheduling, & communications for our users which led us to a totally unique app with no chat whatsoever. No chat means we also have no ghosting, no bots, no d*ck pics and people are more easily able to experience the magic of organically getting to know each other in person again. 

Of course, with no chat we had to find a way to ensure people were going on quality dates with those who would be a good fit for them so we added in what we call “Deal Breaker Questions.”  These are a set of totally customizable questions that users are able to write in themselves (For example: is your credit score above 750 or do you like dogs) and their match is required to pass 100% of their questions before they are able to propose a date with them. 

We conducted hundreds of 1:1 user research interviews and surveys to test if this would be something people would be interested in and the results were amazing to see, nearly everyone was ecstatic about the idea and so far our app downloads with our launch out of Beta are supporting this as well.

Sean: What insights did you take from your experience with hiring technology about how to improve dating?

Scott: The idea came to me while I was working at Indeed, Inc leading a product called Indeed Hiring Platform. We were addressing the problems of the time it takes to get to an interview, the number of job seekers ghosted and candidate quality.

After helping grow the business from $30M – $100M, I had some good data showing how powerful this kind of solution was and I thought to myself, you know the dating world really has similar problems, I bet we could apply a similar solution to dating apps and really make a difference there as well. 

As I mentioned before, I spent time collecting data through user research 1:1 interviews and surveys to ensure my assumptions were correct and that’s how I confirmed people were majorly burnt out on Dating Apps and needed an outside of the box solution that actually addressed their problems.

Sean: What are your goals & targets for Skip in 2024?

Scott: Great question! Our goal for 2024 is to help as many people as possible get quality dates faster. We will also be focusing on continuing to build out our safety features and screening capabilities to help ensure our users have the best possible dates.

Sean: How can our readers find out more about Skip?

Scott: Readers can reach us at info@skip.dating or visit us at https://www.skip.dating/

In terms of trust & safety tools, the platform enables singles to leave anonymous date reviews to help remove unsafe users. It also deploys photo verification capabilities and helps users to share the details of a date with their friends and family.

The Skip App released its beta version in January 2023, serving singles in Austin, Texas, where it received over 10,000 downloads. On January 1st 2024, the platform went live on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store across the US and Canada.