Australian Consumers Rate Online Dating Sites

According to research commissioned by ratings agency Canstar Blue, one in six Australians have used an online dating site in the last 6 months.

The survey of 2500 people asked Aussies to rate their overall satisfaction with the free and pay for use online dating sites. The research also revealed how the different generations – Gen Y, Gen X and Baby Boomers – approach online dating.

Plenty of Fish was the winner of Canstar Blue’s customer satisfaction award, recording the highest five star rating for overall satisfaction as well as for ‘ways to communicate’.

Canstar Blue’s Rebecca Logan said “This is the first year we have looked at Online Dating Sites and our survey showed there were a number of operators in this category – each of them doing different things well.”

For example, Adult Match Maker received Canstar Blue’s five star rating for the number and relevance of matches and Oasis Active received five star ratings for value for money and site navigation.

The survey also showed Generations Y (35%) and X (34%) were twice as likely as Baby Boomers (17%) to have met their current partners through an online dating site.

“The younger generations also either have, or are more willing to admit to having, what could be described as ‘creative’ strategies for selling themselves,” said Rebecca Logan.

Canstar Blue found the younger their respondents were, the more likely they were to have used a photo-shopped image (Generation Y – 24%, Generation X – 21%, Baby Boomers – 11%) and exaggerated or lied when writing their online dating profile (Generation Y – 32%, Generation X – 23%, Baby Boomers – 13%).

Generations Y (44%) and X (46%) were also more likely than Baby Boomers (31%) to be looking for casual liaisons over long-term relationships when using online dating sites.