Ever imagined about creating an app that can draw millions of customers from across the globe and you earn as if you’ve fetched a magic lamp? This application will act like a gold mine, wherein you ask something, but it returns in manifold. Such a site must be popular among a large mass of people. In case of youngsters, a dating application can turn out to be most popular. Indian App Developers have been looking towards such ventures that can turn out to be engaging for them.
Figure 1: How much does it cost to create a social media application?
Where did the need for a dating website arise from?
Many people realize the need to meet their prospective soulmates and get into conversation with them before getting engaged with them. Finding a partner via dating websites attends to the needs of such people. They essentially need a social media platform for dating and easy flirting. Features like multimedia enabled chat messenger, photo and video sharing and user profile search are important options. Interface of the website must be user friendly with alleviating look and feel.
Essential Features of the Online Dating Application
It is important to find a perfect niche before jumping on straight into the online dating market. With plenty of competitors around like eHarmony, Match.com and PlentyOfFish etc., it becomes all-the-more difficult to outperform from existing players in market.
- Developers of the application must understand the requirements of the niche for whom they are creating this application. Does the user want to see girls, guys or maybe both genders? What should be the age range of the candidates?
- In addition to this, there must be an option to highlight the websites that have already been visited and those that have not been touched at all.
- Moreover, the scope of the application can be extended to cover the search criteria to search people from other cities as well.
- Two people who swipe right after expressing empathy towards a profile must be sent a notification that both are interested in each other. In case people switch over to next profile then they are not sent any notification from the system.
- Users of the application must be able to scroll through the pictures and complete contact details of the user in case they are registered members.
- Users who are just viewers of the system can just browse through the profiles of the guys / girls they are looking for.
- Marketing of the website must be done in a manner such that it fits to the needs of the users for whom it is intended for. Marketing and promotion of the website can be targeted according to the interests, needs, income and other preferences of the user. A dedicated advertising effort and targeted marketing must be practiced luring more customers. This can even include extension in network by giving joining credits to new comers.
- A website must be built upon a business model. It can be a subscription-based model or an advertising model or in other cased it can be a hybrid of the two. A subscription-based model suits well for small scale sites as users start expecting more from the sites if they are coming there after making a payment.
- A dating application must keep a track over user’s psychology in addition to their dating preferences. For this they must require them to fill out a questionnaire that checks out their state of mind and perception from their prospective partner.
- Quality of such applications must be maintained such that they are able to cope up with sexual harassment and bad behavior from dating counterparts. It must include appropriate privacy policies and decline the membership privileges of abusers.
- Such applications must always have a membership contract that will release the owner from the liability for the real-world results of online matchmaking.
How should an ideal dating website be rated?
A website needs to fulfill certain criteria in terms of User experience and interface design. If answer to all these questions is assertive then it will be a popular one:
- Is the interface easy to understand and use?
- Is it interesting and fun to work upon?
- Does it engage the audience?
- Is it useful for its users?
In addition to this, a dating application must also allow the users to Register / Login by their Facebook Id, must allow messaging in real time, show percentage of profile completion, geolocation of the user, recent and past encounters, favorites and bookmarks, guests and black lists etc.
Cost of a Dating Application
A simple dating application would cost around USD 20k – 30k, according to average estimates.
Also read: The Cost of Building an App Like Tinder
Conclusion
Mobile App Development Agencies must keep these essential features of a dating website in mind so that it stands out from crowd and create an addiction amongst users:
- Forms must be easy and more fun to fill out.
- It must be easy to share emoticons on chat.
- It must be easy to wink, select favorite and like any comment or picture.
- Percentage of profile completion must be marked and indicated on the homepage of the website.
- All the email or chat conversation between the two users of the website must be secured on server.
- The interface of the website must be delightfully simple. Every single task must be clearly visible, and the theme of the website must be customer centric.
- It must feature flashy content like “find your soulmate”, “lifetime love”, “deep matches” etc., that all traditional sites promise.
- Linking of other social media profiles must be allowed but only to certain extent so as privacy is maintained.