Luv@FirstTweet Blog

We thought it would be cool to create some tag clouds to visualize the frequency of responses we get for certain questions.  To kick things off, the first tag cloud was generated using responses from the question “If you won the lottery, what would you do with the money?”

From the responses, it appears evident that many people would buy things like a house or save/invest the money, but it was refreshing to see how many people would donate it to charity.

Hi everyone, we’re demoing Luv@FirstTweet tomorrow at the eAmore NYC Innovation Summit.  If you’re around Brooklyn, come check it out as it should be a really interesting and fun event.

eAmore NYC Innovation Summit –Tues 6/28/11 at 6PM

http://www.meetup.com/eAmoreNYC/events/17137645/

The summit will showcase innovation in the online dating space, spanning topics such as funding/exits, pivots, social, local, mobile and much more.  Speakers include: RRE Ventures (Adam Ludwin), SNAP Interactive (Cliff Lerner), OkCupid (Sam Yagan), HowAboutWe (Aaron Schildkrout), Ignighter (Dan Osit), MeetMoi (Andrew Weinreich, Alex Harrington), myYearbook (Geoff Cook), The Hotlist (Chris Mirabile), and Online Dating Insider (Dave Evans).  Featured demos are: Luv@FirstTweet (Jon Lehr), Clique in NYC (Christy Purington), Moonit (Dana Kanz), Brainiac Dating (Lawrence Chernin), Parlor.fm (Joel Schwartz), LoKast (Boris Bogatin), MeepMe (Matt Newberg), eFlirt Engine (Laurie Davis), eMatchopolis (Theresa Williams) and Refreshing Note (Geoff Menegay & Svetlana Lebedeva).  Come listen to the keynote & panels, vote on your favorite demos, enjoy the photobooth and afterparty, as well as meet other entrepreneurs, technologists, investors and service providers!

We’ve set out with the ambitious goal to revolutionize online dating.

There are a ton of posts as to why people join online dating, including having no time, being fed up with meeting people at “Meet Markets,” and wanting a singles environment, among other things.  You can read here an example, but of course there are tons of posts on this topic.

From the get-go, our stated goal with Luv@FirstTweet has been to make online dating fun, easy, and quick.  We’re working to solve many of the problems associated with online dating, as explained well in a blog post by Adam Smith here.

Our goal is to increase the signal to noise ratio for online daters.  By answering our match questions and thus building a dynamic profile about yourself, when we match you with someone and show you their photo and their answers to some of our questions, it enables a more meaningful introduction to them.

We’re not saying that by matching on these questions that you’ll instantly be compatible and should get married tomorrow.  That would be nuts, and no dating service can offer you that.  But isn’t the opportunity to start a conversation based on a shared interest in a niche movie that none of your other friends like, or a skill that you both wish you could learn but haven’t taken the time to yet, or some mutual values that you both share, a nice way to get to know someone.

We have many friends, especially female, who served as the inspiration for this site and find this a nicer way to introduce oneself than a typical message like “hey you’re hot we should meet up.”  And don’t forget about my fellow men – when women aren’t getting inundated with messages then you don’t have to mass send them in hopes of getting 1 or 2 responses – instead you can get back to living your daily life and sending less, but more thoughtful messages which are more likely to get responded to.

Quite simply, we want to give you your life back.  This should not be confused with “laziness” on the part of an online dater – rather, it is a more focused effort on a fewer potential matches of greater likeness.  Since you’re not endlessly browsing profiles and messaging people, you’ll have more free time to live your life some more.

Ready to try the new way to online date? Check us out at www.luvatfirsttweet.com.

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Want to know more about Luv@FirstTweet? Read below:

Luv@FirstTweet (www.luvatfirsttweet.com) is a free online dating service that is fun, quick, and easy to use.  As its name indicates, Luv@FirstTweet uses Twitter as its platform.  The beauty of Luv@FirstTweet is that you can build your profile anywhere you are.  All you need to do is tweet responses to our profile-building questions–and as any Twitter user knows–this can be done while you’re in line at the grocery store, grabbing a quick cup of Starbucks, or even if you’re bored during a meeting (just don’t let your boss catch you!)

When you follow @LuvAtFirstTweet, one question a day will pop up on your Twitter feed.  Answer as many or as few questions as you’d like, and our algorithm will use your responses to match you with someone we think you’ll like.  Obviously the more questions you answer, the easier it will be for us to find an ideal match.  And don’t worry!  We keep the questions interesting so that you enjoy telling us about yourself.

We believe that online dating should simplify life, not burden an already busy life with more tasks.  Participation in many dating sites feels like a chore, which often leads to stale profiles that rarely get updated.  What’s the point of having a profile that does not highlight the current you? Rather than listing your favorite bands on a profile—which will invariably need to be updated or changed—you can tweet from a concert or about a song you’ve been enjoying.

With Luv@FirstTweet, by tweeting (which we know you love to do anyway), you can simultaneously build your profile while getting one step closer to finding your next date.

Upcoming Features

We’re continuously trying to improve your experience with Luv@FirstTweet.  Here are some features which are coming shortly:

• Anonymous email and phone number for contacting your matches
• Multiple profile photos
• Match distance for our international users
• Nightly email recap of the daily question and the most popular answers
• Anonymously invite crushes to join the site
• …and more!

If you have any thoughts on features you’d like to see, please reach out to us at info@luvatfirsttweet.com as we’d love to hear your feedback and suggestions.

Power Tips

We’ve gotten a bunch of questions from you all, so we figured it’d be helpful to share some useful power tips to make sure you get the most out of Luv@FirstTweet.

• Tip 1: Be sure to upload a profile pic! When you get matched with someone they’re going to want to know what you look like.  People without photos do not get nearly as many confirmed matches.
• Tip 2: Make sure to turn on “text following” for @luvatfirsttweet to ensure that you don’t lose the daily Match Question in your Twitter stream.  By getting it texted you’ll be sure to see it and then can instantly respond
• Tip 3: Use Twitter to tweet via @reply or direct message your responses to the Daily Match Questions.  Note that you can only respond to today’s question via Twitter, and for older ones you need to login to the site at www.luvatfirsttweet.com

As we get more questions we’ll continue to share more tips to enhance your experience with Luv@FirstTweet, so keep on asking!

Hi all -

Just a quick note that we’re in the TechStars Startup Madness bracket where startups compete in a March Madness style head-to-head tournament until 1 is left and crowned the winner.

We’re in round 2 which ends Monday at 5pm EST and could really use your votes please! We’re up against eEvite and it’s a really close race, so please click here to vote for Luv@FirstTweet http://bit.ly/hRZWNP.

It only takes 1 minute to vote so please help us out.

Thanks so much for your support!

Between recently launching Luv@FirstTweet and actively trying to promote it, I thought I’d share my thoughts on tech networking events.  Since SXSW is just around the corner, the topic is extra relevant.

In college, while at parties and bars, everyone started off with the same question upon approaching someone new:

“What’s your major?”

It was the standard opener that everyone loved to hate, yet used anyway, since it was relevant to most anyone standing in a room-filled with college students holding $1 beer.  It just worked.  As a young-professional living in NYC now, I go out to bars and find myself  starting conversations with people in more creative ways; so much so that I couldn’t even tell you how I began talking to certain people…it just kind of happens. I’d like to think that I’ve developed some networking skills since my college years…

Going to more tech events after co-launching Luv@FirstTweet with Ari has posed another similar opener, almost as if I’ve lapsed back to college!  This time it’s

“What brings you to <insert tech event here>?”

Responses have varied from being entrepreneurs, journalists, or generally curious people interested in technology. I get asked it, and I’ll admit I resort to asking it all the time as an opener.  Everyone there wants to learn something and meet new people, yet I find a lot of people awkwardly glancing at their phones pretending to be busy.  They really want to meet other people doing innovative and interesting things but are often hindered by being too shy. But what can you expect from people who developed their technological acumen by opting to play with their computers instead of the neighborhood kids? The curiosity and ability is there, it just needs to be drawn out.

This especially rings true when you go alone — which I’ve done a lot lately since Ari is hacking away to keep Luv@FirstTweet running smoothly and develop awesome new features.  Even though we’re all obviously there to network, and it’s not like I’m hitting on the person next to me, it still takes a fair amount of courage and an outgoing personality to walk up to a stranger.  After all, we’re not all natural born salesman ready to chat up anyone we meet (although I wish I had that skill).

So here’s the point of my post and some advice – put down your phone and go talk to somebody. Chances are they are happy to learn about what you are up to and tell you what they are doing as well.  Maybe they’ll offer some useful feedback or make an intro – that’s what you’re there for after all: to meet new people with different viewpoints and experiences.  It’s a bit tough at times, but definitely worth it.

PS – if you see me at an event on my phone feel free to call me out…and that’ll make for a different opener than the norm

Hi guys, we were curious about our user base so far, so we checked out the database to pull some stats.  Here they are:

• 51% female, 49% male
• In terms of age, 18-25 year olds and 26-34 year olds are both tied at 34% each, followed by the 35-44 age group at 19% and those 45+ at 13%
• 48% of users are willing to meet a match within a 50 mile radius of their zip code, 24% would travel more than a 50 mile radius, 17% want a match within a 25 mile radius, 6% want someone with 10 miles, and 5% want someone with 5 miles.

We noticed that many of you haven’t uploaded photos yet, so please do so.  Remember that when you’re matched with someone you see their photo + several things you share in common, so make sure to upload a photo so people know who they are getting matched with.