Show HN: I paid an engineer $4k to build a dating site
http://www.percodate.com/ - DO NOT PAY FOR THE SITE. Use code HEYHN if you want to sign up.
I've had some experience with website development, but I'm not technical whatsoever. So I went on craigslist (in Los Angeles) to look for an engineer to build a dating site.
Luckily, I found someone amazing. We agreed on $4,000 in milestone payments and $6,000 in potential bonuses if the site does well.
We recently launched the site and would love your feedback. I know the design is lacking, but any feedback would be appreciated!!
27 comments
[ 4.8 ms ] story [ 66.0 ms ] threadBut yes, I agree that done is better than perfect.
Second, I'd allow users to search before registering an account. But contact details are withheld until account creation. That way I can verify the efficacy of the matching and filtering functions before paying money. Or put another way - if I find someone interesting, I'm more likely to whip out my credit card and pay to get in contact with that potential special someone.
How it's different:
We let you filter your inbox with the exact same criteria as the search criteria (Ethnicity, Body type, Height, etc). This is mainly for women who normally receive a lot of messages on other sites.
We also let you know if you meet a certain threshold of what someone else wants (whatever criteria they are choosing to filter their inbox with). This is mainly for men so they don't waste time sending messages to women definitely not interested in them.
When all the other dating sites brag about number of messages being sent, we want to be the exact opposite. We're all about sending LESS messages.
For women especially, highlight the $50 fee as means of filtering out the skeezy, stalky losers that proliferate on other sites. Highlight the exclusive, higher-quality service you're trying to build.
The problem is this, that most people don't really know what they want.
Pretty much all the dating sites have filters on them for allowing you to chose which profiles you wanna see.
The outcome? Any woman who uses these filters message the same set of guys, tall, making decent income, same ethnicity, same religion, good looking(if you use OKC looks filters), etc etc. Most women I have dated, would never even find my profile on an online dating site(ethnicity, religion and height would disqualify most of them).
Similarly as a guy, if you qualify for most of these filters, then you end up staring at pretty much every girl out there. If you are just in it for short term dating, then its fine, but sooner or later you get fed of not being able to meet a girl you can talk to.
Yes, most people while looking for a partner look for these fixed attributes, but what most profile-centric sites miss is that most people do not actually end up with a six ft tall $100K+ making blond, blue eyed european model. When I meet a girl at Phish concert, she is not just another person who fits all my checklist, she is a person I found appealing, and I met her at a Phish concert.
Some sites such as HowAboutWe are kind of doing it right by moving away from profile-centric nature to activity-centric(but they still leave something to desire). I wish you understood that profile-centric sites(or rather MOST dating sites) are still hugely disappointing to men/women, attractive/average, straight/gay etc people alike.
Personally, I love and believe speed dating is the best option for most people. Even if you don't find someone you're attracted to, you can still have great conversations. Unfortunately, this is out of the comfort zone for most people (only if they knew!).
I'm hoping this is the next best option within online dating. People have checklists and I think it's only fair we indulge them. We give people options/criteria/fields for searching, so it seems plausible to apply the same to peoples' inboxes.
If people wind up being lonely or finding the wrong person due to their high standards, hopefully they'll adapt their standards or find a better outlet to pursue dating/love.
There's a lack of alignment between a person's explicitly declared preferences and the things which actually make them happy. This is so ridiculously true when it comes to dating on and offline.
I think this is the real, society advancing problem on which dating centric startups should focus. I'm all for indulging people (and making a buck), but sites like this one generally are useless, depressing, and alienating to a good number of their users.
Edit:
There's also a really harmful cycle of addiction which a lot of people get into on these sites. Quite often the proprietors design their dating sites to promote such cycles, and it's more than a little depressing.
To see what I'm talking about, read Ian Bogost's Cow Clicker post [1], and then imagine that the daunting chore of participating in the "social game" is directly tied to your self worth.
At the very least please don't do that to your users.
1: http://bogost.com/writing/blog/cow_clicker_1/
I completely agree with you. That was my original point. Nick's answer just didn't make any sense to me. How can you agree that people don't know what they want, yet say that that this is why he created this app, when the explicit stated intention is "dating sites for people who know what they want".
This is more like a "dating site for people who think they know what they want".
- The "Home", "Sign In" and "Sign Up" links at the top of the main page don't go anywhere. The "Home" link is unnecessary. The "Sign In" and "Sign Up" links should go to anchor tags at the sign in and sign up forms.
- The Birthdate drop down menus are broken for me on the sign up form. I only see a vertical scroll bar when I select the day and month, and I have both vertical and horizontal scroll bars when I select the year.
- The What I Want page should initially has nothing selected in each box. I think each option should start populated with "Anything". That way if I don't care about pets one way or another, I don't have to waste a few clicks setting it. Or do I need to actually change an option from "Choose Option" to "Anything"? It's unclear.
- When I finally select everything in the "What I Want" page, the red text "Please choose an option for each field." doesn't go away. Did I not select everything well enough?
- At the bottom of the "What I Want" page you have every percentage listed from 16/16 to 0/16. Is that really necessary?
- The Profile page has square images on top of other users, but when I resize my browser window too small horizontally they're squished into rectangles. In addition, those images are huge! It took a few seconds for them to load the first time I visited the page. They should probably be resized. Also, perhaps profile images should be stored as jpegs instead of pngs?
- Search form, perhaps it should be pre-populated with the options that I chose on the "What I Want" page? And again, even when I have every option selected, it still says "Please choose an option for each field."
- On someone's profile, under their Personality Type, there's a yellow circle that on mouseover says "They don't have your preferred personality type, but keep reading!". What? When did I specify a preferred personality type?
On a whole, it looks well done for a MVP. Some other people have criticized the lack of design, but personally, I like the minimalist look. These are just first impressions, I hope they help.
FYI, I'm using Firefox 29.0 on Linux.
I have all your comments saved and noted. To make a few responses:
I was worried people wouldn't understand the message filtering feature, so I probably overdid it with the 16/16 thru 0/16 copy.
The "Please choose an option for each field." copy is permanently there, but I can see why it's confusing after filling everything out so we'll have to change this.
The browser resizing has been a bit of a struggle. We're making it a responsive site, but we'll keep working on it.
Overall, thank you for your detailed response. It definitely helps. And I appreciate your comment on the minimalist look!
You have too much tiny text. Your signup form is not distinctive. Even adding a class of "bg-success" to your div with the id of "signup-form" (that will give it a greenish background) would be somewhat helpful. Spend some time reading http://getbootstrap.com and you'd be surprised how much you better you will get in a few hours once you understand which classes are available to you. It has a lot of decorator classes that will transform your colorless UI instantly.
Since you provided no test user credentials and I am not willing to skew your metrics by registering, I can't evaluate how the site functions for a registered user.
You featured a blog post very prominently and wrote it in a self-deprecating style. While I appreciate the creativity, that does not help in increasing conversions.
My biggest concern
I am not sensing product direction besides your innovative mailbox that filters by intent. This feels like "I wanted to try building a dating website and didn't think about a unique hook".
I agree that traditional dating sites have abysmal messaging. This can be a good hook.
Appreciate the UI feedback. We'll do some touch ups to liven it up a bit with the help of getbootstrap.com.
I'm a little bummed about the blog post not making at least a decent impression. My humor is all I have! (the blog post referenced - http://blog.percodate.com/we-built-a-dating-website)
The hook without a doubt is the messaging. The goal is to give women relief and men more time back/focus on who to message.
Thank you again!
Or buy a premade template and adjust it to your needs (if you want the cheap).
drawing first, writing later.
Is that the space you want to compete in? Are you positioned to win here? Step back and look at the big picture.