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Comment by wishawa | Hacker News Reader

> admission rate is in the single digits

> expects to receive its millionth application by the end of 2021

> subscription fee of $7.99 per month (now $9.99)

To still turn a profit after paying 40 staff members and all the costs of maintaining and developing an app, this thing would need at least 50% of its registered users to be active. I really doubt this is possible for a dating app. Curious what other revenue streams they might have.

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It's not a typical dating app though... I don't know if it's still true but supposedly it had 6-12 month subscriptions to start. It's also mostly used by celebrities and people adjacent to celebrities. For those folks - it probably pays for itself and they're not hurting over $10/month. It's also highly selective and so if you get selected then of course you'll pay - it's a relatively cheap status symbol. There are probably a lot of networking opportunities on it beyond just the dating aspect. A lot of other industries are very dependent on "who you know" for anything to happen.

I'd gladly be a longer term subscriber if there was an app that A) connected me to people (most dating apps just don't do this to start for most straight men) and B) connected me to people who were what I'm looking for (very few people on dating apps I look at and feel drawn to). As it stands - all the dating apps right now are extremely disappointing. The filters I would like in an app just don't exist. I would legitimately pay $100+/month if I knew the apps would lead to dates with people I was interested in or if I would be able to connect with likeminded individuals that lead to real world interactions.

If I was a celebrity or adjacent to celebrity stuff - I would gladly be on an app like Raya because it sounds like you could at least filter out the overwhelming majority of people who you're not gonna line up with.

You’re right. Even if they don’t use it these folks probably don’t even remember they have recurring subscription.

I don’t think what you’re saying you want in the second paragraph is quite like Raya. A small and exclusive platform would filter out a lot of noise, but it would also exclude a lot of people like-minded to you. What you described sounds like a LinkedIn with much more intelligent recommendation/matching algorithms.

> I don’t think what you’re saying you want in the second paragraph is quite like Raya. A small and exclusive platform would filter out a lot of noise, but it would also exclude a lot of people like-minded to you. What you described sounds like a LinkedIn with much more intelligent recommendation/matching algorithms.

I do think I want something similar to Raya. Something where there's a hard filter that you have to pass. Someone has to look at you, your profile, etc. As it is - current online dating has no review mechanism or hard filter for people to pass. I really do want something where there's just a more curated pool with higher quality candidates.

I would bet people are staying on over 50% given the acceptance rate and self selection there, but that's 12M in revenue even at 100% active paying and 10% acceptance rate.

That's 200K per employee - server costs. Seems like they're likely near break even, but even if not, they aren't burning a ton is my bet. VC's would be head over heels for that audience for even just a whiff of influence or monetization being dangled in the future.

What sort of monetization do you imagine? From my perspective, ads probably won’t work well because it would ruin the premium feel of the platform. Shady paid-for influences (such as making something appear up high in some listing without being labeled as an ad) might work, but if they’re caught the user base would not be happy.

I don't imagine any would work that I can think of, but I imagine some VC's will bite at some idea, hence the very careful language there on the original post :)

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