Where the Women Are Online
Valentine’s Hookup: Some dating sites are more trafficked by women, study says.
February 14, 2007 By Scott Martin
Ever go to a bar and say, "What a sausage party"?
Internet
dating sites can be the same way. But a Hitwise report based on
Internet visits suggests there are a few online dating destinations
with way more women.
Don’t get too excited. The largest percentage of women flocked to Love
Access, Don’t Date Him Girl!, and SeniorPeopleMeet.com, which had
female visitors numbering 87.4 percent, 80.9 percent, and 80.8 percent,
respectively. It should be noted that Don’t Date Him Girl!, however, is
actually more of a date complaint database.
Still,
among more widely trafficked sites, eHarmony has a far higher ratio of
women to men, with 68.6 percent of visits coming from women. “It’s a
boon for men,” LeeAnn Prescott, research director for Hitwise, said of
eHarmony.
What
else are women attracted to? They appear to be into sites for local
hookups, Catholic dates, Latin men, and sugar daddies. That’s judging
by the popularity of such sites as LocalHookUpz, 69.2 percent female
visited, CatholicMatch.com, 72 percent, LatinAmericanCupid.com, 72.9
percent, and Sugar Daddie, 68.3 percent. Sugar Daddie’s web site boasts
a service for millionaires, CEOs, lawyers, and benefactors.
The
numbers don’t tell the entire story though. For instance, the actual
number of registered users could be far different. And women and men
have far different habits online when it comes to how and how long they
use dating sites. On average, dating site surfers spent 14 minutes
online, according to Hitwise. “Men are really into the quick hit.
They’re more about playing the game by numbers,” Ms. Prescott said.
“But it’s really the woman who’s in control with online dating.”
Unless, of course, you’re gay or your taste is for mail-order brides.
It's Raining Men ...
Gay
dating sites had the largest percentage of male visitors, followed by
sites where men look for an overseas match with a woman.
World
Gay Men was 90.5 percent trafficked by men, followed by ManHunt.net,
90.4 percent, Gay.com Personals, 90.1 percent, and Adam4Adam, 85.8
percent.
Men
looking for women online were frequenting the online equivalent of
mail-order bride sites. Among those sites were AnastasiaWeb.com, 90.6
percent male trafficked, Cherry Blossoms, 87.1 percent,
FilipinaHeart.com, 85.5 percent, A Foreign Affair, 85.3 percent, and
GlobalLadies.com, 85.1 percent. According to Hitwise, there were no
known mail-order groom businesses on the Internet.
The
Hitwise results tracked data on the top 100 sites in its dating
category for the week ending February 10. Hitwise came up with the data
from measurements of 10 million U.S. Internet users.
The top three most visited sites were True.com, Singlesnet, and Yahoo Personals, according to Hitwise.
Traffic
year-over-year for the dating category in general is flat, the research
said. Where the shift is occurring is in the different types of sites
people are visiting. For example, True.com has been doing a lot of advertising on social-networking sites such as MySpace and YouTube that has been driving the dating site’s traffic growth.
Hitwise
said there is heavy churn at dating sites in general. “The point of an
online dating site is to get people to stop using it,” Ms. Prescott
said.
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