Purchased by Penthouse for an estimated $500 million in December of 2007, it would be a mistake to call this site an “internet dating” site. Although having the word “friend” in the name of the site implies a somewhat innocent environment, this site is anything but that! Whatever your pleasure you’re likely to find it at the largest adult personals site in the world, and the intent of the site is clear; SEX. If you’re looking to get laid, in person or through the wonders of cyberspace, this is the site for you. However, those seeking relationships that encompass more than the physical are advised to avoid this site.

It is clear from searching the profiles that men outnumber the women by a very large margin. Adultfriendfinder is notorious for the amount of fake profiles including professionals in search of paying clients, and those less than savory individuals looking to part you from your money by tugging on your heartstrings and pocketbook.

Annoyingly, there is no opportunity to perform a search without creating a profile. The homepage has a simple search (Search our Hot Members) and when you fill in the fields and click “Search”, you are immediately taken to a page to create your FREE account. I’d like to be able to at least have a peek at who and what is available before giving the site an email address.

For some bizarre reason, when I created my profile, the site would not accept a “gmail” email address. No reason was given. I was simply requested to enter another email address. I really detest uninformative messages like that. A look at the Help section indicates that gmail should work, so what gives?

Profile creation is easy enough and one aspect of the process that I really liked was the “Instant Profile Writer”. If you’re the type that has trouble putting together a paragraph about your best points, this takes the guesswork out of it.

The site design is rather generic and utilitarian, with the option of customizing the colors.

The search function works well; however, it is severely limited with a free membership in an effort to encourage you to hand over your credit card. If you haven’t, you’ll only be able to search by age range and state/province. In addition, there’s no indication as to how many matches the search has found (perhaps this is different with paid membership?), and having to scroll through all the profiles quickly becomes tedious.

The Help section is extensive and the fact that there is a search function within the help section makes finding the answers to your questions rather easy.

There are technical issues with this site. Even though I had received an email indicating that my profile for a free membership was approved, I was unable to access certain functions, such as chat; “You may not broadcast until your profile has been approved by our review team.” Huh??

All in all, this site is clear confirmation that sex sells, sex is big business, and there are far more people than I ever thought possible that think nothing of putting their most intimate parts on public display. It’s going to cost you; fees are as follows; 1 Month $36.29, 3 months + 1 month free $71.54, 12 months + 6 months free $181.69.

Launched in 2002 after getting its start in phone based personals in 1987, Lavalife is one of the most established internet dating sites and has a particularly heavy presence in North America.
Lavalife offers subscribers three different communities in which to post their profile; Dating, Relationships and Intimate Encounters. Members may post a profile to one, two or all three without affecting the cost.
Pros

1. This site offers free memberships that include more than what is normal for a paid dating site. You do not need to be a paid subscriber in order to reply to emails or instant messages that have been sent to you.
2. “My account” information is easy to find and edit. The extensive account controls regarding communication from Lavalife allow users to regulate how often the site contacts them.
3. There is a separate site prime.lavalife.com that caters to men and women over 45. No offense to the “kids”, but sometimes the grownups want to play in a room all by themselves!
4. For those who want anytime, anywhere access a Lavalife2go subscription, in addition to your regular subscription, allows access via your mobile phone.
5. Easy to use tab layout gives you quick access to each community as well as the forums, the Entertainment Lounge (horoscopes, city guides and the Lavalife Party.

Cons

1. The biggest, annoyance with the site is the inability to turn of Instant Messaging. This is a major downfall as a constant barrage of IM’s can be very intrusive.
2. Though the idea of three separate communities is a good one, but don’t let it lull you into a false sense of security; it does not prevent “crossovers”. If you’ve placed profiles in the Dating and Relationship communities, you may still be contacted by someone from the Intimate Encounters community.
3. We can all understand that Lavalife is a business and as such it is out to make money. However, this site gives new meaning to “double dipping”. Revenue is generated through their subscription service, in addition to site advertisements, LOTS OF THEM. And they’re not just unobtrusive text ads, no, these are GREAT BIG BANNER ADS along the top, side and bottom of search results.
4. I found the overall look and feel of the site to be cluttered with too many different colors. Combine that with all the advertising and it comes to resemble an undercooked Western Omelet!
5. Cost; one month $29.99/month, three months $18.99/month, six months $14.99/month.

Started in 2004 by a former Vietnam vet who earned millions from the sale of his financial firm, True.com is one of the more controversial for profit dating sites.

Critics have accused it of; pandering to people’s fears by assuring its clients that all subscribers are subject to background checks for felony convictions and marital status, possessing a “we have your credit card info, so we’ll give you service when we feel like it” attitude, which according to some is never!, sexually provocative advertising and generating automatic messages to those who have yet to pay for a membership.

But a site that rakes in a substantial share of the internet dating market’s subscription fees also has its share of positives.

The Pros

Overall the site is easy to use and offers conversation bubbles to aid the novice.

The extensive Help/FAQ section is written in easy to understand language and provides step by step instructions for the basics such as uploading photos, videos and voice files.

An at a glance compatibility chart lets you know instantly how well you are matched with a member when you click on their profile. The “black book” feature allows you to save your favourite profiles for easy reference at a later date.

I have to admit that the “Who is looking for me” feature is cool! A kind of reverse search, it allows you to search for people who are looking for someone with your details.

The Cons

During a five day review of this site, the pages were excruciatingly slow to load, regardless of the time of day or night. Perhaps a diversion of funds from the advertising budget to server infrastructure is in order?

The “free” three day trial is only “free” if you provide your credit card/billing information. Excuse me, something is free only if it costs nothing, and is exempt from conditions, which this clearly is not!

Those who complain about bogus winks and emails are right on target. No sooner had I completed the most basic of profiles then I had three emails including one that was dated the previous day (however did they know?? LOL). I also had an immediate invitation to join a chat room. The catch? You guessed it, credit card information required. So I bypassed the credit card information page, clicked on my mailbox, and can you believe it, no emails after all. I’m crushed, truly crushed.

Reams of emails to your external email account urging you to take advantage of the “free” trial, which magically turned into a seven day trial after I hadn’t logged in for 2 consecutive days. You can choose to turn this off in your settings, but really, this bordered on spamming!

Fees range from $49.99 for one month, $79.00 for three months and $129.99 for six months. Were I a paid subscriber I would be most annoyed at seeing paid advertising all over my inbox. It’s very distracting. Once you’ve paid for a subscription, you can only cancel by telephone. If true.com is capable of offering such features as video and voice clip uploads and reverse searches then surely it can offer online cancellations that don’t subject their members to the hassle of having to pick up the phone and perhaps incurring long distance charges??

As with any internet site requiring a membership fee, do your homework before handing over your financial information. It really is buyer beware!

Take the Yahoo web portal and internet dating and you have Yahoo Personals, available with 15 country specific sites. If you’re a regular Yahoo user, the Personals page will be very familiar to you.

Let’s dig in;

You must have a yahoo mail account (yahoo.com or .ca, ymail or rocketmail) to create a profile. If you don’t already have a yahoo mail account, one can be set up from the profile creation page. Since your yahoo mail account and your yahoo personals account are accessed using the same user name and password, it can get a bit confusing going from page to page and it is particularly annoying to have your password requested multiple times without ever leaving the yahoo site.

The search function is top notch. Besides the usual age range and location searches, you can also specify ethnicity, height, body type, hair color, and many more criteria. Once you select any of these additional search parameters, you can mark them as “must have” or “nice to have”. This will come in very handy if you’ve done a basic search that returned a large number of profiles and you want to narrow it down, or if you’re just VERY particular in what you’re looking for.

You can make your profile “non-searchable” or hidden. Great if you’re going away on vacation or you think you’ve met someone (but hey it’s early days yet) and you don’t want to cancel your membership just yet, but you’d rather not be included in search results. You can also make your profile searchable on “partner websites” and although an example is given, it is not at all clear just what those websites are.

The profile section is easy to complete, and not overly long.

The help section is well designed and easy to use. If you cannot find an FAQ listed that relates to your issue, a keyword search is available.

The 5 star safety program is Yahoo’s assurance to its members that there really are people behind the scenes to screen all profiles for posting violations. Profiles are reviewed before they are searchable, so when you create a profile, it is posted right away, but it will not be made searchable until it has been verified. If you make changes to your profile, they may also need to be reviewed before others can see the changes.

The “corporate speak” such as Member guidelines, Code of conduct etc. are written in easy to understand English, not “legal speak”. For those who want all the legal nitty gritty, it’s there too.

Membership fees depend on the length of the term; $15.99/mo for 6 months, $19.99/mo for 3 months, and $29.99/month for a monthly membership. There is a “free” 7 day trial, but you still have to provide your credit card information to take advantage of it, and you will be billed for whichever plan you choose UNLESS you remember to cancel your account before the trial period ends. If credit card info is required, then as far as I’m concerned, it’s NOT free!

Sporting a global membership of over 5 million members, and unique monthly visitors exceeding 8 million, Singlesnet.com is one of the most visited internet dating sites in the world.

The site’s design is good if a bit generic with a pleasing use of color. It’s easy on the eyes, though some of the font sizes, particularly those on the menu bars, could be bigger.

When I first loaded the home page, I was offered a “limited time free trial membership”, no credit card required. Once I created my profile, references to this offer were non-existent. Even clicking on “upgrade” did not reveal how to take advantage of this offer. My questions regarding this matter to customer service went unanswered. I can only assume that this process is automatic with the creation of a new profile. I hate assumptions!

Those whose computer experience is limited will find this site frustrating. There are only five questions in the help section, three of which are password/login related, and any other assistance must be sought by telephone or webmail. My question to the support desk had not been answered after 24 hours, despite their claim that support is available Monday to Friday from 9 am to 5 pm EST.

Singlesnet.com claims a 30 second sign up process. In and of itself, that’s true HOWEVER after doing so, you MUST complete the remainder of your profile before accessing the site. This will take you anywhere from one to twenty minutes depending on how you answer the questions (most of the questions on the registration page will lead to even more questions!!) and how much time you want to devote to telling the world about yourself.

The “search” – I use quotes here deliberately because this is not a search in the traditional sense. You may only search geographically by “my area” (although there is no indication given of how wide an area this actually is), or by county then state or province. Searching will only reveal those profiles that the system’s matching technology chooses for you in terms of matching traits and similarities. If you’re a gal looking for a guy whose 6’1” or more with red hair, good luck, you’ll have to plow through all the profiles that the Singlesnet.com system matches you with.

Prices are reasonable when compared to the competition. A one month Singlesnet.com membership costs $24.95, three months $19.95 per month and a one year membership costs $7.49 per month. Both the one month and three month memberships will auto renew.

Besides the profiles, there is nothing, and I mean NOTHING, on Singlesnet.com to keep you here. There are no forums, no articles, no links to dating tips or advice, and no online chat. Basically, your membership buys you email rights, and not much else. The online help section is practically non-existent, and if my experience with customer service is anything to go by I don’t recommend holding your breath for a reply. Considering the size of the membership, the number of visitors this site receives every month, and the fact that one must pay a membership fee, their customer service and support is woefully inadequate.

The team that launched Perfectmatch.com previously built and managed the Match.com site until it was sold to InterActive Corp in 2002.

The site is easy on the eyes, but lacks punch, possessing a bit of a dull corporate feel.  Free to join and browse, you must purchase a membership before communicating with others.

Pros –

• Rather than having a user forum, Perfectmatch.com posts weekly polls to which members can respond.  The results are posted online and are an interesting indication of popular opinion.
• Users who do not have a digital photo, or those who are unable to upload a photo, may send their photo either as an email attachment or by mail to Perfectmatch.com who will post the photo for the user.
• The Help section is well laid out and documented with a lot of FAQ’s and is easy to navigate.
• The “In My Words Section” is the part of your profile where you can go to town in telling the world about yourself.  What I liked about this section is that the site designers have created eight separate areas each with its own broad question.  Completion appears to be optional, but filling out the whole thing should result in a well rounded profile.

Cons

• It’ll cost you big time to join Perfectmatch.com.  New members will pay the following;
  • 1 month - $59.95 per month, $719.40 per year
  • 2 months - $39.95 per month, $479.40 per year
  • 3 months - $36.95 per month, $443.40 per year
  • 6 months - $28.95 per month, $347.40 per year

Renewal pricing is slightly lower

• The “Live & Lovestyle” section of a user’s profile, which details hobbies, reading and music preferences,etc, is very limiting.  Most categories allow for only two selections.  I couldn’t possibly describe my some of my likes and dislikes in only two words.
• The “Perfect Match” section is very outdated making it appear that it doesn’t get much attention, which is odd because that is what the website is all about, finding that “perfect match”.  This review was written in August of 2008 and the first page of the “Perfect Match” section has a couple due to be married on November 18, 2007 listed as engaged.  Well, did they tie the knot or didn’t they?
• You cannot use any of the Search Tools until you have purchased a membership, although you are advised of compatible matches with a free membership.  So if you want to search for profiles that do not meet the specifications set out in your own profile, your credit card will need a workout.

Perfectmatch.com is a well designed site with a large user base.  Navigation is easy, and using it will leave a hole in your wallet.

Based in Dallas, TX, Match.com got its start in 1995 and has become a global online dating service that, while free to join, costs plenty if you want to use more than a basic search and nudge. The home page has a modern, clean look, while the website in general is well laid out, with good use of color and layout.

Pros

• Large member base – Match.com claims to have over 15 million members in 37 countries. That’s a lot of people! To put that into perspective, the population of New York City is just over 8,000,000.
• Six month guarantee – Their guarantee is that you will “find someone special in 6 months, or we’ll give you 6 months free”. There are a number of rules and conditions that must be adhered to, but it is good to know that they stand behind their product.
• Easy to sign up – to create an account takes less than 30 seconds. The profile one must create can take a while to fill out though (it took me over 20 minutes) so best to give this some thought prior to completing it.
• Changes to your profile and account settings are easy to do and if you run into problems, the help section is easy to find, well laid out and contains answers to the most frequently asked questions.

Cons

• You HAVE to create a free profile before prices are disclosed. Match.com fees range from $16.99 per month with a minimum six month subscription to $19.99 for a three month subscription and $34.99 per month for a one month subscription. Even using the most cost effective route, that comes to over $200 per year. Ouch.
• Automatic membership renewal. Watch out for this one. If you don’t cancel your account before your membership expires, you membership is automatically renewed and your method of payment charged. There are no prorated refunds, so if you cancel your membership in the middle of a period, they keep the dollars.
• It took a bit of searching to find out how to contact customer service. “Contact us” can be found at the bottom of most pages, buried amongst the links to the Privacy Policy, Terms of Use and other legal stuff, in text so small it’s easy to overlook.
• If you’re not a paid subscriber, paid subscribers can email, nudge and IM you BUT you can only view who has nudged you. You cannot view or reply to email or IM until you have purchased a subscription.
• Dressed in what looks like a nightie with only the barest hint of breasts, the “Lolita” on the home page is disturbing and distasteful. This photo does not belong on the front page of a dating service that one must be 18 years of age or older to join.

Match.com is well put together with a global presence, but get out your credit card, ‘cause it’ll cost you plenty!

There’s no arguing that Plentyoffish.com is one of the most successful free internet dating services in the English speaking world. The question remains does a site that is so successful have to be so unappealing? The owner of the site says he runs the whole thing out of his apartment and claims to have one employee.

The Pros:

1. It’s free. Like Datepad, Plentyoffish is 100% free. Once you’ve created a user name and password, the only “must” for using the site is the completion of the two page registration form. Depending on how well you know yourself, this shouldn’t take more than 10 minutes.
2. There are plenty of members, as well there should be. Having launched in 2003, the owner has had more than five years to perfect his business.
3. Mail filters are easy to use and give a certain peace of mind in that you can block users meeting specific criteria from communicating with you. For instance, you can choose not to be contacted by anyone who has messaged others for an intimate relationship. It’s a good way of ensuring that you will only be contacted by people looking for the same type of relationship as yourself.
4. The forums are standard in design but have tons of posts, you can really spend a ton of time searching through plentyoffish’s forums.
5. New matches sent on a weekly basis. Great if you’re lazy and don’t want to do any searching yourself. The email is clean and easy to read, no logos here just a text email.

The Cons:

1. There has been very little thought put into the design and layout of the site. Plentyoffish.com is a jumble of text and advertising that makes it necessary to read every single piece of text on a page to figure out where to go next. Very annoying and unnecessary.
2. Navigation is painful. Again, due to the layout of the site, it can be very difficult to figure out where you need to click to get to a particular page.
3. The mail system is cluttered and unappealing. Before you can get to your mail, you have to scroll through a list of Plentyoffish get togethers and social events and pictures of members who live within 50 miles of you. It can be difficult to find your “sent messages” because of the jumbled site layout. I only found it by searching the page for the word “sent”!
4. The Help section needs an overhaul. Once again, the layout of the site is amateurish and content appears to have simply been added onto the back of what was already there. The use of different sized fonts makes it hard on the eyes.

This site has a good backbone and a large user base. If you can get past the lack of design for the layout, it can be a lot of fun to use, but please bring your patience as you will need it.

We have another review and this time it’s one of our competitors, well kind of……there is one huge difference, it costs money and lots of it!

eHarmony, without a doubt, is probably the most nationally recognized online dating program there is, due to their massive television campaigns. They attempted to set themselves apart from the rest of the online dating sites by creating an algorithm that is based on scientific data about successful relationships or so they say. First you complete a massive personality profile, and based on your answers, they match you up with compatible people. When we say massive it’s nearly 100 questions and takes the average user 45 minutes to complete.

If a dating site is truly based on creating relationships, not just one-night stands, then requiring a personality profile might just help keep those on the prowl for a one night stand to another site. There’s nothing wrong with people looking for sex, but each dating site has their own goals, and for eHarmony, solid connections was theirs, not just sexual encounters. eHarmony is an anomaly in the dating world, in that most of their users are women, whereas most dating sites have more men than women.

Once you’ve completed the long personality profile when signing up to eHarmony, you begin receiving matches based on their personality algorithm. But, you don’t have the ability to contact your matches right away. First, you need to answer more questions! The questions are 5 questions in the following categories: personality, relationship, or character. Next, you submit a list of the qualities that you must have in a partner and the qualities that you must not have in a partner. Lastly, each of you sends 3 open-ended questions that each other must answer, in order for you to be able to communicate with each other. Are you confused yet? At any point during this questionnaire process, either person may end the match for any reason. But, if you each pass all of the questions, you can communicate with each other. This is of course if you have both now paid their rather hefty monthly subscription fee!

Keep in mind a paid member cannot communicate with a non-paying member, no matter how compatible they are.

All in all, eHarmony is a successful dating site and given their TV marketing presence they are growing. We believe that there is a better way to find that special someone. Not only is Datepad 100% free we have just launched the datepad attraction in action survey system.

To continue with our theme of reviewing other competitors in the free online dating niche, Datepad took the time to review OKCupid.com. Datepad believes that by showing you everything that our biggest competitors have to offer, you can make up your own mind as to why Datepad is the best choice. Today’s competitor review is a dating site called OKCupid.com. OKCupid has a neat clean design and a bold logo. Next to their name is the logo of a glass beaker, presumably filled with some sort of love concoction. The site features a lot of calm colors, including blue, purple, white, and black. Now for the good stuff, here are a few things that we here at Datepad like about OKCupid, as well as a few things that we think they could have fixed.

Pros

1. The site is a lot older than Datepad, so it is much more established with a plethora of questions, answers, users, photos, and especially quizzes.
2. The site offers support for multiple languages, venturing away from just the English speaking daters.
3. The homepage is short and to the point, converting you into a member very quickly.
4. The company is well staffed, and has a very informative about page.
5. The site has a very vibrant and active forum.

Cons

1. You are not allowed to see the entire site or use all of the features until you have signed up as a member.
2. There is a lot of text in the footer of the site that is white on a light blue background, making it very hard to read depending on how bright your monitor is.
3. Once you have signed up and started looking at other people’s profiles, you will notice that they can be extremely cluttered and somewhat “Myspace like.”

In conclusion, OKCupid is an exceptionally nice free online dating competitor of Datepad, and in our opinion, the second best one out of all of them in existance. They are working hard to grow, much like we are, and they will prove to be a worthy adversary on our goal of building the internet’s largest free online dating community.