True.com: Another Look
Mike Orren brought up some interesting points about the strategy of online dating service True in his comments on our post Wednesday.
We do think it’s intuitively contradictory (watch our Gunning-Fog index soar with that turn of phrase) that True:
1. Is positioning itself as the only online dating service that does background checks — in fact, it is working to get legislation passed that would require competing online dating services to “place prominent warnings on all their e-mail and personal advertisements stating that they have not conducted felony conviction or FBI searches.”
2. Seems to focus on sex, rather than relationships, in its ads.
3. Is doing lots of advertising on MySpace, a site with a young membership which is under heat for being a stalking ground for pedophiles and predators. True’s MySpace ads feature very young-looking models.
We haven’t talked with True’s marketers, but our guess is there’s a method to the apparent madness. Namely:
1. Herb Vest’s legislative gambit with True is a genius move. It’s similar to his strategy at H.D. Vest Financial Services, where he helped push through regulatory changes to enable accountants to receive commissions on the sale of mutual funds. Before Herb, bodies like the AICPA considered this practice a conflict of interest. Herb’s leading of the charge enabled H.D. Vest to be the first mover in this budding market.
2. Sexy ads, especially on MySpace, might seem sketchy. But … if True is actually the only online dating service that does criminal and marital background checks — and if it is pushing legislation to make the rules tougher — then True has an opportunity to position itself as the only dating site that can safely solicit daters from the MySpace population … right?
It all comes down to whether True does what it says it does. If it does these checks to ensure safe online dating, any undesirables coming over from MySpace should be weeded out. Then, it’s just a question of whether True’s ads are effective in building a dating community. If they’re not, we would assume True will eventually stop running them.
Boy, our Gunning-Fog is through the roof now. Our fingers are sore from all that pontificating.
(Parody ad from Commercials I Hate)
That model needs to eat a large bowl of pasta. Make that two bowls.
pornificating…? What?
;-p
Even with the warnings, wonder how long it’ll be before someone sues True or myspace for having either a bad date, or worse.
Before anyone thinks it can’t happen, it’s the next step in this overly litigious country.
People sue McDonald’s over hot coffee even though there’s warnings on cups.
People got cancer from smoking and blamed the tobacco industry, then sued.