Tinder CEO Talks Facebook Dating in Yahoo Interview
Tinder CEO Elie Seidman has been interviewed by Yahoo Finance, facing questions on Facebook Dating and ad revenue.
The interview took place on the same day that Facebook Dating began testing in Colombia. The Tinder CEO mirrored the mindset of Mandy Ginsberg, Whitney Wolfe Herd and Jean Meyer, by stating that he wasn’t worried about the threat of the new service.
Seidman said to Yahoo Finance: “We think of competition with ourselves – we’re inspired by our own creativity. We’re the category expert by far, both within Tinder and more broadly within Match Group. I think we understand the psychology of this consumer, the needs of this consumer, functionally and emotionally, better than anyone else in the world.”
Despite being prompted to, Seidman refused to comment on whether or not users would be comfortable associating Facebook and dating because of the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
Instead, he believes that users would want to keep Facebook and dating apps separate because they are both designed to serve different functions.
He continued: “I think how you approach dating is just different than the core of where Facebook spends most its time.
“Dating is its own category, it’s different from posting pictures of your pets in their feed, or doing one of the things in their groups. It’s just a different beast.”
The conversation moved on and Seidman was questioned about what financial incentive there was to find users the best matches. The point was made that if Tinder successfully starts a relationship then the company loses a customer and a source of revenue.
Seidman explained to Yahoo Finance: “The data from just purely a business model perspective shows that our interests are directly in line with our members. We actually don’t make the majority of our revenue from advertising.”
He said most of the revenue comes from users buying premium subscriptions, which are designed to make their Tinder experience more effective.
Seidman then revealed that there almost four million premium members.
