Dating has to be one of the most fun categories to do marketing for. Customers are emotionally invested, there is endless psychology to investigate, and the topic is actually interesting. It’s no wonder the category is filled with great campaigns.
Hinge’s ‘Designed to be deleted’ captures attention with a bold statement that Hinge’s success also means that their app becomes obsolete:
Hinge is ‘Designed to be deleted.’ Source: The Drum
Empowerment-focused Bumble uses marketing to establish their values and position Bumble as a safe place for women:
Bumble honored the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg with a print campaign (Source: Adweek)
My recent favorite comes from indie agency Mojo Supermarket for Match.com. Match was a sleepy app I associated more with my parents than my generation. And for good reason: the site is credited with launching online dating back in 1995 (!). The Mojo and Match team took that status and made it aspirational by relaunching Match as the dating app for adults.
Match’s new campaign ‘Adults Wanted’ shows why you want to date someone with bit of life experience: emotional maturity, respecting boundaries — and positions Match as the place to find them:
Source: Clio
Source: Clio

Differentiating the dating apps

Dating apps are often categorized by how much they associate with serious relationships (e.g. Hinge) vs. more casual dating (e.g. Tinder).
But dating apps have two other marketing messages to convey:

Job 1: You will be successful in this app.

Success in online dating typically involves designing a profile, finding a worthy match, getting them to match you, engaging in conversation, securing a date, planning a date, liking your date… oof. Dating apps need to convey that their app is where you will be successful along all these steps.
Hinge’s ‘Designed to be deleted’ conveys Job 1: our app is going to be so successful at finding your partner that you will no longer need us.

Job 2: Your ideal match is here.

Since dating apps are used to meet people, the dating apps must convey that ‘good’ matches (however you define that) are present.
Application-based apps like Raya and The League also market Job 2, emphasizing that their app is where to find ‘elite’ matches.

The jobs reveal the differences in marketing strategy among dating apps:
Positioning of dating apps. Source: Author

Which marketing strategy is strongest? Let’s see the data 🤓

Since I work for ad testing platform Swayable, I decided to test campaigns to see which marketing is most effective.

Metrics

I tested the following metrics:

• Successful dating: I will be successful in my dating goals on this app
• Good people: There are good people to date on this app
• Likelihood to download this app

The campaigns

I looked at ads for (5) brands: Match, Bumble, Tinder, Hinge, The League.

1. Tinder: One Night Stand: this ad conveys the breadth of dating opportunities on Tinder (with a fun twist at the end):

2. Bumble: Find what you’re looking for this summer: Here Bumble sells all the relationships you gain from a Bumble match: a copilot, a dance partner, a reason to adventure:

3. Bumble: Kindness is sexy: Bumble’s most recent campaign is less about their app, and more of a statement on how to attract a mate in general:

4. The League: Meet your equal: Application-based The League shows off the kind of people you meet on their app: ambitious, successful, good at fencing:

5. Hinge: Designed to be deleted: Hinge anthropomorphizes their logo in this campaign about deleting Hinge as soon as you find your match.

6. Match: Adults Date Better: Match makes a bold, emotional statement about the benefits of dating as an adult.

How did the ads perform?

Well, first, predictions.
🔮 Which did you think would perform the best? 🔮

Let me note: all the ads did extremely well. Every single creative drove positive lift on the two marketing jobs (successful dating and good people), as well as the key business metric: downloads. But one did better than the rest: Bumble’s Kindness is sexy:
Lift in each metric is the difference in survey results of an audience who saw the campaign vs. one who did not. Source: Swayable.
Kindness is sexy scored at the top of Swayable’s brand metrics:
Bumble scored in the top quintile of Swayable’s benchmark for brand campaigns. Source: Swayable
Swayable’s brand benchmark includes a history of ads from Airbnb, Nike, and Amazon, which makes Bumble’s results all the more impressive.
Kindness is sexy also did well across all audience groups, scoring evenly across genders, and particularly high among older cohorts:
Bumble’s Kindness is sexy, performance by demographic. Source: Swayable
I created a segmentation for relationship status: Funny enough, people in ‘it’s complicated’ relationships were most likely to download Bumble after seeing the video. Maybe they are most in need of kindness…
Bumble: Kindness is sexy, performance by relationship status. Source: Swayable

Why did ‘Kindness is sexy’ do so well?

The main actor is a celebrity (Adam DiMarco of White Lotus fame), and good looking, so I thought that might have helped. But all of the campaigns featured attractive people. I went into the qualitative comments, and found zero mention of White Lotus or Adam DiMarco, so I am ruling celebrity out.
Adam DiMarco of White Lotus Season 2. Source: The Face
What was clear from the comments about “Kindness is sexy”: People liked Bumble’s message:
Qualitative question: Do you think the app in the video is a good dating app? Why or why not? Source: Swayable

How about the other ads?

Hinge’s Designed to be deleted took second place for brand metrics, driving strong scores on successful dating, good people, and likelihood to download. The most interesting thing about Hinge’s results might be how consistent they are across audiences: Hinge’s ad resonated evenly across ages, incomes, ethnicities, and relationship statuses, signalling that Hinge has a strong brand platform:
Lift from Hinge ‘Designed to be deleted’ results. Source: Swayable
On the other hand, Match.com’s Adults Date Better did best among younger cohorts, signalling that Match.com’s campaign will be successful at attracting younger audiences:
Lift from Match.com’s ‘Adults date better’ results. Source: Swayable

What can marketers take away from this study?
If you’re marketing in a crowded field, differentiate with your values (not just your product features).

Most dating apps are fairly similar: you can upload a profile, indicate who you like, and contact them. The top ads (Bumble’s Kindness is sexy, Hinge’s Designed to be deleted) did not sell the product features of Bumble or Hinge. The design of the product barely came up at all. Instead, both campaigns communicated the values of the company (kindness, putting the user before profits).
One, this builds trust in these brands. Trust and safety is of particular concern for dating apps, given that you might meet a stranger.
But another reason for conveying values is that values build aspiration. Any brand with a social component (whether its a fashion brand with a visible logo, a restaurant you invite your friends to, or a bottle of alcohol you bring to a party) is not just selling product benefits; it is selling an aspirational story about yourself that you are conveying to others. For example, Nike spends millions sponsoring athletes in ads, many of which do not even show Nike shoes. But these ads end up selling Nike shoes because people want to be associated with the values of Nike, and are happy to convey that by wearing a Nike swoosh.
Dating apps are as social as it gets. By joining Bumble, you are both telling a story about yourself to other members (I, too, find kindness sexy) but also putting yourself in a pool of people who share those values.
Tinder’s ‘One night stand’ ad presents a cute shift from Tinder as a place for casual dating, but fails to convey values around Tinder or the people on the app. For the team at Tinder, it might be worth digging into the values of the company, and/or what the Tinder target audience finds aspirational. (And then testing those ideas).
Now, if you’re marketing something completely new (say, Tinder in 2012 when the brand introduced mobile swiping) then marketing the product feature makes sense. But once awareness is there, and your category is competitive with similar products, great brands emerge by differentiating on values.

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