S15E7:  Putting the Data in Dating w/ Michael Kaye from OKCupid

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The dateable podcast is an insider's look into modern dating that The Huffington Post calls one of the top ten podcasts about love and sex. On each episode, we'll talk to real daters about everything from sex parties to sex droughts, date fails to diaper fetishes and first moves to first loves. I'm your host UA Shu, former dating coach turned dating sociologist. You also hear from my co host and producer Julie Kraft chick as we explore this crazy dateable world. Hi Friends, welcome to another episode of the dateable podcast. We are here to be in this together, so nobody feels alone in this dating journey because we know dating can be not so easy these days, right, Julie. Slightly, I don't know what made you think that UI. I thought it was a walk in the park, right? Piece of cake. Yeah. Yeah. Everyone's super happy. You could cue the sarcasm if you can't already tell, but we are so excited because we are officially data today. Officially, the misspelling has come true for us. Looking at data, you all love data. We've seen our episodes where we talk about the science of dating, the psychology of dating, the numbers behind dating, you all love the shit and we do too. So you're gonna really love this episode. Yes, and we have a great, great guest today. Steve is Michael K and he is the head of PR and communications at OkCupid. And OkCupid in my opinion is kind of the OG of having data. I think of their blog or at least publishing data. Like probably match and all the other ones had it, but they weren't as transparent with the data. So when we got the opportunity to speak to Michael, he was more than excited and that was his thing, was to talk about all the data and all the points and you know what better way at a dating app because they get to see what's showing up in profiles in they have mass numbers to look at trends. They can see behaviors. They can see trends in profiles. They can see who's matching with whom and what profiles get more matches. He has all that data, but I think more importantly, end of the day, just to put it all in perspective, is I have to say this again, we are so privileged to be where we are in dating. As much as we can complain about dating and the cluster fuck that is the dating industry, we are so lucky to have the choice in who we want to love and be with. I was at a wedding last weekend, and it was a gay wedding. And during their vows, one of the grooms said, I just have to say that this right now is when I was a kid, I never thought this day would be possible. I never thought I could come public with my love for other men. And I never thought I would have the opportunity to legally marry. And that was just, it's not that long ago that we tricked that your choices in the matter of the heart, where I've restricted by law. And now we're at a point where there is full freedom to find love and to love whoever we want. So yes, we can complain about, again, this clusterfuck that is dating. But we have to ground ourselves in the fact that we are so privileged to be where we are. Yeah, I think we'll put it in perspective for me, Michael brought this up on the episode too, because he is a gay man and met his partner on a day to gap. And it also makes me think of your friends. Did they meet on a dating app that you just went to their wedding? Yes, they did. Yep. Okay, so them, and then it also makes me think of the episode we did with rob, your friend, from last season. And I think in all of these situations, I don't think it until talking to all these folks, really registered to me fully. This is like, you know, my hetero normative view here is how difficult it can be to find people like you and especially depending on what environment you're in. One of my friends he moved actually past guests also. He moved to Montana and he's like, yeah, there are like no gay people here. But with a dating app, it extends your reach dramatically. And you know, even if you are straight, like I was thinking about this myself, before I met my partner on hinge, like I was at an age that a lot of my Friends were coupled off, I didn't really want to go to the bar seat. Go out to bars all the time. And when I did, it wasn't like I met people that were quality dates. A lot of times the people were like half my age, or just completely fucked up, you know, looking for hook up, or maybe they were looking for more, but the context we were meeting in. It just wasn't the right context at all. Plus it gets exhausting to have to go out every single night. So I feel like, you know, we kind of like over romanticize meeting in the wild, meeting in real life. And you know it doesn't have to be an either or we're definitely not saying that, but I really feel like someone has we don't give apps enough credit of the benefits of what they do for us because there's no way I would have ever met my partner in that world.

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Like there's no way. Absolutely no way. We hear some of you complaining. I've dated half of Manhattan, you know, or I've dated everybody in my city. Well, you are fucking lucky that you had the choice of dating all these people. I mean, for a lot of gay audience, they couldn't say that. You know, just a few years ago, they had to go to specific locations and bars and be introduced by friends to feel safe enough to meet others who are also looking for the same things, but as heterosexual daters, we haven't had these limitations. So yeah, if you're like, so frustrated, I've dated pretty much everybody in my city. Well, then count your blessings. You know that you have this choice. Exactly. And I have alluded before we have a secret project that we are hard at work on. And one of the things that it's done has it has opened us up to more daters to talk to other people that may not be the stereotypical audience of current data. And what we're finding is a lot of them are really anti apps. Don't want to use apps. But then they barely go on dates. And that's the downside of it, right? It's like we firmly don't believe dating is a numbers game. We've said that over and over again. But that being said, you still have to meet people. Like if you have one person that you're meeting all year, that's a lot of pressure for that one person. It can't be like you just have no one coming into your orbit. I don't think that's what we mean about. It's not a numbers game. It's maybe like a rectified statement that it's like, it needs to be a little bit of a numbers game to at least get enough people that you can like meet people and see what develops. Yeah, seriously, we can't sit there and passively complain if we're not active in the game. It's so easy to complain passively. That is the default method for everyone, but it is a lot harder to make an effort and to be actively participating. So we just have to check ourselves. We always say this right. Give your complaining about something. Check yourself first. We're just asking you to check yourselves first before you wreck yourself. The song goes. Check yourself before you wreck your sub rarer. Scratch. You gonna get a check yourself. Do we just age ourselves too? I wonder if Gen Z is we even know what that reference is, but whatever. Look it up. I will tell you. I saw like a statement of people that were complaining about data gaps, like someone being like, okay, boober. It's like, that's the reality in today's world, but that's where most people meet. It is very baffling to me when people are always like, I don't know what I'd ever say on a dating app. It's like, just go with it. You know, this isn't archaic and weird anymore. And I don't want to minimize it. I know it's hard, and there was a recent New York Times article that came out. You see that one about how some people have been at it for 5 years plus, and it really sucks your soul. And you know, if that's the case, I don't believe it's the dating apps. I really believe there's something deeper going on. And that doesn't mean there's a problem with you or anything like that. I don't mean that, but it's worth taking a step back from dating apps and probably dating in general if you're in that headspace and realizing what is kind of what is holding you back and it's typically not the app dynamic. It's all about the headspace of how we feel going into these. And you know, maybe you do realize that dating apps aren't for you. We're not going to say you have to use data gaps or we're never going to say that, but just realize you are cutting off a big source of meeting people in today's world. It's kind of the car analogy, if you think about it, dating apps are a vehicle for meeting people. But you still have to drive that vehicle. We can't go to self-driving car yet. If we're hitting things and getting into accidents, it is a driver's fault, not the car's fault. So the car open up our geographic limitations so we can drive to farther places and explore different parts of our city, but the driver needs to be a good driver in order to navigate that route and if you get stuck along the way because you keep hitting the curb or you're hitting people's houses, that's on you, right? That's on you boo. So think about that like we are the drivers of dating apps dating apps are there to work for us. And if you feel like it's working against you, you as a driver is doing something to make it work against you. I love the quote choose your hard because that really is what it comes down to. Dating apps aren't easy. No one is going to say that they can't be an ego plow. It's going to say it's fun to sit there and swipe all day. That's hard. It sucks. It's hard, but also going on no dates, not meeting anyone.

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Even just going out to networking events and bars and social functions. That's hard too. That's a lot of energy. So how do you choose what that hard is? Yeah. We did another interview. It's a future episode, but I think this guest said it so well. He said, I have been using dating apps as a way of learning more about myself. And he turned it into a personal development exercise. So I think that's just so energizing to see it in that way and it's like on every swipe and every interaction, what am I observing about myself? And this just creates a much more energetic feeling around the apps versus like having a drain your energy and your soul. Okay, we have been praising the apps. I will say though, why haven't they been updated in ten years? Tinder just hit its ten year anniversary. 2012, I was one of the proud first users. But the whole structure of swiping on a face, that has not changed in ten years. No. And you know, I am all for dating apps. I think they're a great vehicle to meet people outside of your range. That being said, do I think that the most effective way is to sit there and swipe on faces? Probably not. I think what we're saying is let's work with the tools we have. That being said, I would love for someone to innovate in this space because I think it's right for innovation because it's not the most natural. It's not the most fun. Like what if, oh my God, this is my idea and I really want someone to do it and I'm putting it out there because I don't even care if you take it. I just want someone to do it. What if you were in a coffee shop and you could set your alert or a bar anywhere that you're like open to chat or there's some way that you can see the person, even if it's on the screen and if it's a mutual match, you're there in person to go meet them on that minute and you know I think Tinder kind of started with some geolocate and you could argue that might have been a failure, but what if there's ways to kind of like cross technology the digital world with the real world a little more? I feel like there's a lot of opportunity there. Yeah, there was an app long time ago, Julie. I remember it was basically alert you of all the people on the app happened. Was that it? Was it something? And you kind of have to scroll through, but what backfired was that people, I lived in New York at the time. So there's 50 people at any given moment that are right next to me and what happened was it's like you feel like it's an invasion of privacy because you are going to keep running into these people because they are your neighbors. They live on top of you. So that was kind of the, I guess, the pushback, but I'm so on board with you saying daters are thirsty for something new. There is pushback because some of us are just a little bit afraid to try that something new. There was another app I heard about called swarm. Have you heard about this one? Your photos pixelated and the more you chat, the less pixelated your photos get. So it's less on the visual. It's cool. But it takes a certain personality to say, I'm ready for something new to try. It's like beta testers, right? Not every dater is a beta tester. They want to go to what's tried and true. So maybe that's what it is. We just have to have this group of beta testers, maybe within the date of group. You just go out there and be brave and try these new apps at our coming out. You know, the more we're talking about it, I feel like there were others too that just never they basically shut down because they didn't have a user base. There was that one where your friends would swipe for you. I think that what it was called. But yeah, you're right. There have been some innovations there. I still think there could be something hybrid real world. I think that would be the ideal. I think the ones you were saying, it's still too far of a fetch to be like, I'm on the same street. I'm just going to start talking. I feel like you need to be in the same environment. You know, 500 brushes, I feel like was a great idea. It was horrible to run, and definitely wasn't my calling. Logistics. And I think that's why grouper stopped. That was also a great idea. That was the one where three friends went out with another three friends. I feel like if someone could get the logistics down with this stuff, there could be more right in person type meeting, fueled by digital devices. Okay, if you're thinking about dating apps, we just gave you some really great friends and others app developers that are target audience listeners here. If you build it, they'll come, right? There you go. If you're complaining about will come, you know? If you build a will come and we'll bring our people because we know our listeners are brave and courageous. And they're speaking of brave and courageous. We're about to actually we've just relaunched our 22 day dating app challenge.

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A challenge that's designed for you to use the dating apps for you and an opportunity for us to look at your profiles and give you one on one feedback. So this we have not launched this in a while. We think now with the beginning of cuffing season with the weather turning the season turning, that this is such a great opportunity to just revamp the way you look at dating apps. This is not just about your profile, though. It's about your mindset, it's about how you use it. It's about messaging. It's like the whole gamut of the online dating experience. So that is on live right now through the end of October. Yep, Michael definitely inspired us to restart this. We were talking about cuffing season. I think one of the myths that was busted for me is that cuffing season is everywhere in the sense that people, even if it's not cold where you are, people want that connection over the holidays and so forth and he was talking about how on we all know that the first Sunday of January is the busiest day on dating apps. He also said the weeks between Halloween and Thanksgiving are also super, super popular and a lot of activities. So that's why we were like, this is the perfect time to relaunch the stadium challenge. Let's get you set up. Let's get you ready to go like you always said it's a lot about just how do you optimize using dating apps in a way that makes it more fun, makes it more enjoyable, but will also review your profile. So there's a lot of really great stuff in this challenge and go to finding your person dot com slash apps and sign up today and it'll be live until the end of October, so we only have this for one month. Again, to set you up before the busy season. Setting you up for success. There we go. Well, I feel like that is enough for announcements this week. It's a big one and hopefully people could take advantage of this again because we got a lot of really great feedback last time. How is people were able to change their mindset, change their mentality and it really helped them out. So we did announce bids. Let's take a minute to hear from some of our sponsors. This episode is made possible by the book in the event of love by Courtney K, offering a steamy queer spin on the feel good tropes of hallmark movie, the sweet, funny RomCom is the perfect end of summer read. Morgan Ross can plan world class events, but she didn't plan on returning to her hometown that broke her heart 7 years ago and rediscovering the girl of her dreams with her career as a Los Angeles event planner imploding after a tabloid blow up, Morgan Ross is headed home for the holidays. Now enters Rachel Reed, her one time best friend turned crush who broke her heart. Looks like Rachel acquired sexy new lumber Jane muscles from running her family tree farm, but the farmers struggling and could use some serious help from Morgan. Casey put her heartbreak aside to save the farm by planning her best fundraiser yet, thinking delicious vanilla lattes, acoustic guitars under majestic pines, a cozy barn surrounded by brilliant stars, the perfect setting for a renewed romance, right? Find out more about Kourtney K's in the event of love at Kensington books dot com or wherever books are sold. Okay, let's get into it with Michael from OkCupid. So many times when we have these conversations about people's experience with online dating, it's all from a person's perspective, their own experience. But what is actually happening on the dating apps and what are some stats to support people's experiences. I think that will help shed some light on what is happening and why it's happening. So we're so honored to have Michael cave from OkCupid joining us today. He is the head of communications for the dating app. He's 30 years old, lives in New York, and he's in a monogamous relationship. Welcome to dateable. Thank you so much for having me. And I'm in that unique space where I work at a dating app. I get to help find people love around the world, but I'm also a former dating app user. So I'm a success story also. That's what I was going to ask you. Did you meet your partner from OkCupid or another data gap? So I'm at my partner on Tinder when shortly after I graduated college. And I was still in the closet. So for me, as a gay man, dating apps were the only place that I could go to to meet other gay men in a discreet and safe way because I just wasn't out of the closet. There was no way in hell I was going to meet a guy in person. It would actually be years before I even went into a gay bar at that point. Dating apps are where I turn to and it was right after college graduation. And I heard of a couple of friends. This is 2014, so it's not like everybody was on dating apps.

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And I remember hearing about Tinder towards the last few months of college. And I was like, this is so weird. You are talking to a stranger online, and then you're going to meet up with them, and then what, 8 years later, and here I am at a dating app, but still dating someone I met on a dating app. That's amazing. We can't escape it. We always forget the benefits though. I think your story is such a good example of it would have been really hard to meet people in your situation and the fact that dating apps gave that outlet and I've experienced that too. It's as you get older, maybe you don't want to go to bars as much or maybe you don't have single friends that want to go out all the time. The fact that you can just load up this dating app and meet singles at your disposal is awesome. Yeah. And that's a great point. I hear all the time people complaining about dating apps. They're complaining about dating. They love to hate on it. But dating apps really are a convenient way to meet people. What I find interesting is, I don't okay Cupid, I get to work with data scientists and behavioral psychologists and sociologists and what we hear time and time again from these experts is that yes dating apps work, but this is why they work. Generations before us, people were going to church, they were going to temple. That's where they were really meeting people in these type of environments, but millennials and especially Gen Z, they're just not going to these places anymore. So dating apps are just the most convenient way to meet people. And especially if you're in a city like New York City or LA or wherever you are, if you're in a hustling and bustling city, I mean, we're all working. People just don't have time anymore to go to a bar and spend a couple hours there and see if they meet someone, but you can swipe between meetings. You can swipe on your morning commute. If you're not driving, be safe. Good caveat. Yeah. There's got to be a way. There's got to be a way for someone like a robot autonomous swiping or something like that as your autonomous driving. You don't have to sell less on dating apps because we love dating apps. We actually tell our listeners, nobody created a dating app trying to make data more frustrating for people. There's always the best of the intentions for these dating app founders. And for you personally, I would just love to hear what do you think has been the biggest difference from when you first got on the apps to today? Yeah, when I first got on the apps, I think what people were putting out there is very different than what we're seeing now. It was very basic. Really, really stripped down. You really were only reacting to a couple of photos of someone, their name, maybe how far away they were from you. And now people are really making sure that they're creating robust profiles. And they are putting everything out there. They are telling you how they vote, what political side they lean on, how many children they want, what's important to them. They really want to make sure that if they're spending this time connecting and talking to someone, that it's someone that they're compatible with. Over the past 8 years since I've been on a dating app, I would say that's the biggest change is that people are just becoming more vocal and honest about what they're looking for. I mean, I think about my parents who I'm adopted by my grandparents. So my parents are a little bit older. My mom's a lifelong Democrat, my dad's a lifelong Republican. I don't even remember them talking about politics in the household. And now when I'm helping my Friends swipe on their dating profiles, it's so interesting to see how politically driven what people writing really is, how they're not shying away from talking about social, cultural issues. So I would say people are a little bit more honest about who they are and what they're looking for, which is good. Yeah, the whole political thing. I mean, especially in 2020, that definitely became the time where that was so essential on your profile. Have you seen that persist from your stats and data at OkCupid? Outside of now we're done with the big election with Trump and Biden, but are you still seeing the political reference on profiles? Yeah, absolutely. Recently, there's actually been 10 million people on OkCupid who have said that they like to discuss politics with their romantic partner. You know, that's a big thing for them. And again, this is a huge change from older generations, and we're seeing young daters really lead the charge here. So more than half of Gen Z and millennial daters on our platform actually prefer that their date shares the same political views as them. And I think it's more than 2 million Gen Z and millennial daters said that they could never date someone with strong opposing political views. So one trend we're seeing is that people are really dating within their party. I think it's a little bit different when you think about it by generation. I think millennials tend to focus more on if someone's conservative or liberal or whatever their party affiliation is. I think the younger daters that we look at, I think for Gen Z, in my opinion, it's less about politics and your political leaning and it's more about how you feel about certain issues. So that's the generation on our platform that's really driving conversations around. Do you believe climate change is real? Because if you don't, I'm not going to swipe right on you or were you during the pandemic marching in the streets for Black Lives Matter where you donating to these organizations.

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I think they're more issues driven, where maybe some of the a little bit older daters were more focused on I'm conservative. I want to date someone who's conservative and I'm liberal and I want to date someone who's liberal. I think it's more issues based now. Interesting. I'm very curious about that because I think about how we've come full circle with dating apps when online dating first started. I remember my first match dot com profile. I spent like 5 hours on that thing because I wanted it to be robust. I wanted to find the man of my dreams at age 22. I don't know what I was thinking, but I spent a lot of time on it in the messages that were sent where novels, pages and pages long. And then when Tinder was introduced, we went into the short profiles, the quick thinking, the vanity swipes, and now I think we're back again to more robust profiles, people spending more time to look at people's profiles with these political issues aside, what else do you think is driving daters back to spending more time and being more intentional when it comes to online dating? I think especially with the younger daters, we're dealing with the most progressive generations in history. I think that's really the why behind it. This is why it's so important to them and probably why we're starting to see a shift towards, again, more robust profiles. And on OkCupid, that's sort of how our app is really designed. We have tons of prompts for people to fill out. We require our daters to answer 15 matching questions before we even show you to someone else. So I think the people that we're seeing on OkCupid, this just makes sense for them. This comes naturally to them to me that compared to maybe someone on other dating profiles. But even to your point, you mentioned Tinder and how that was a little bit more stripped down, but even on that platform now, we're seeing pro choice. They are seeing their users lean into these issues as well. So when I think of OkCupid, I always think of the infamous study in 2014. Yes. That was looking at race data on dating apps and on OkCupid, specifically. And we've referenced this. We've had guest reference this for years now of how it basically showed that black women and Asian men were kind of the least quote unquote desirable in terms of having matches on dating apps. Do you still study race and gender on OkCupid dataset and how is that changed over time or you still see similar trends? I'm actually so happy you brought this up. When I first joined OkCupid, I looked at this study and I was so disheartened. You know, it was deeply upsetting. And I looked at the data and then I looked at the date. And it was almost a decade ago. So I tried to take a step back and put myself in the mindset. I mean, there are times that where I'll rewatch shows like Friends. And I hear the characters say something. I'm like, oh my God, I watched this as a kid. Totally inappropriate and thought it was okay. Yeah. I didn't think twice about it. So I think we've evolved so much as a society and when that data is referenced by anyone, I would encourage them to take a moment and realize that this is from almost ten years ago. So put yourself in that mindset. Over the pandemic, we've actually seen a complete switch in our users that people right now on OkCupid are more open to dating outside their race, but also outside their religion, more than ever before. And they're no longer connecting based on shared similarities when it comes to maybe religion or ethnicity or race. Again, it ties back to those issues that we talked about. That's what's more important to people. You know, we often say that tall dark and handsome is not the go to anymore for people. It's to support Black Lives Matter. Are you voting in your local election? Is climate change? Do I do believe climate change is real? You know, it's going to a new place of substance and compatibility. And that's what's really important to people. And people just aren't caring about what they may have in years past. That's so refreshing to hear. What I do appreciate about that study from almost a decade ago is that it brought to surface what is happening instead of people feeling like maybe it's happening or is it just me? So because of that data that came out, I think there were groups that were formed like the black Asian alliance, black women dating Asian men. It was kind of a motivator for people to bring this issue to light and say, let's focus on why this is happening. So in today's dating, as we are more open minded, maybe the pandemic really did help open some of our minds and our hearts, what are some other trends that you're seeing on OkCupid specifically? One trend we're seeing is that people are looking for love, but they're also increasingly interested in casual sex. So we have an app questions. They cover everything related to dating relationships and sex and basically every issue that's top of mind for Gen Z millennial daters. So when I reference data, this is really where it's coming from. More than 35 million people and set our in app question regardless of future plans.

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What's more interesting to you right now? And 69% of people in 2022 this year said love over sex, which is actually down from 71% in 2019 and 73 in 2016. So there's definitely still a majority of people who are prioritizing love over sex. But I think people are becoming more open with what they're looking for. And they're not letting themselves be shamed anymore. They're totally fine to say, yeah, I just want to hook up right now and that's really not a big deal. Yeah. I mean, some of it because we heard stats that it was actually different in 2020. And this could be overall on all dating apps versus OkCupid. So there could be some bias there too, but I wonder if some of it is just pent up sexual energy from the pandemic also. That we're seeing. We kind of discussed this in 2020. We're like, is hookup culture dead? Is it felt that way during the pandemic? But it's interesting to see that maybe people don't want it to be dead fully and feel like that actually has been missing from their lives in the last couple of years. We've been through two really significant moments. So first in 2020, I don't know about you. I was petrified. And I'm not dating, but I was not seeing anybody besides my boyfriend during that spring that summer, especially being in New York City, I was scared to leave my apartment. I was like, don't look outside. I feel like I'm gonna count here. And then it started, we started to see the trend shift a little bit. But now we're in a unique situation. Again, and I'm interested to see what happens over the next few months, now that we've seen the abortion ban happen. And I'm really interested in how that's going to impact casual sex and hook up culture. Now that people might be in states where an abortion, if they wind up pregnant, that's not a possibility anymore. It'll be really interesting to see this change in behavior and relationships over the coming months. Yeah, we're also very curious with our listeners because we're in constant contact to seeing if there's any changes in behavior, but also just views towards sex. And with that, have you seen any new buzzwords pop up on dating profiles? For so long, those personality tests that I'm ENFJ or whatever they are, people were putting that on their profiles, love language. Their love language, yes, another big one. Any other themes that you're seeing profiles lately. This is a little bit separate from terms, but and keep in mind that most of our users, especially in the United States are in huge metropolitan cities, their tend to be on the younger side, definitely more progressive. Right now, we're seeing a lot of conversation around the upcoming midterm elections. Oh. It's still so interesting to see how engaged people are about politics in a place like a dating app, but one thing we're seeing is that midterm voters are more attractive on our platform. Our data is showing that if you are voting in local and midterms elections, you're getting more likes and matches than people who aren't. And it's just, I mean, it's great to see. And it's really interesting, but people are using their dating apps to signal to others that this is important to them. And they want to make sure that the person that they're talking to, meeting up with, whatever it is, that they are exercising their right to vote as well. That's a huge turn on for daters. That's so fascinating because I know personally I'm much more engaged and even midterm and local elections than I ever was before. And I wonder if some of it's like post pandemic, your communities, there's a lot of challenges that we're facing right now and all these major cities. So I wonder if some of it is this feeling of like, I want to be with someone that cares about the community. Cares about what's happening in the world. No, totally, and it's not only about voting, right? There's a lot of issues that are at stake in these elections specifically that impact so many people. The majority of our respondents in the U.S. said that the most important cost of them is reproductive rights, but we're seeing a lot of people say climate change, gun control, LGBTQ rights. And if we break it down by gender, not super, super surprising, but men are really concerned about climate change. That's actually their biggest cause that their vote is for in the midterms. People who identify as women are prioritizing, reproductive rights. That's the biggest issue on the ballot for them. And for our daters who are non binary or LGBTQ+, they're really nervous about LGBTQ rights, especially following the abortion ban because we do think that's going to snowball into a threat to marriage equality and whatever it is. So I think it's less about that data's want to match that's voting in a local election or a midterm election. And more about really what's on the ballot for them and how that impacts their lives. What other buzz words are you seeing outside of politics or social issues is probably the larger word. But is there anything else that you're seeing that's kind of unrelated that stands out to you? Yeah, I would say confidence, confidence is really sexy. We've said that for years, but it's still true today and I want to remind people there's a difference between confidence and cockiness. Yeah. So definitely distinguish those two, but daters are really looking for someone who recognizes their own self worth.

00:35:05 - 00:40:02

Not someone who's constantly doubting themselves, our data shows that more than 9 in ten people this year said that they have an average or higher than average rate of self confidence. And those people are just doing better on the app. So I would say when you're on a dating app, make sure that you're showing up not only Azure self, but you're showing up in a way that just makes you feel confident. Not what you think a match is looking for, but how you feel your best self. Let's hold that thought for a quick message. This episode is brought to you by gobble, gobble delivers Gourmet, freshly prepped 15 minute meal kits right to your doorstep. Their chef designed meals are easy to prepare with simple recipes and fresh ingredients that have been chopped, portioned and simmered so that dinner is both fast and flavorful. Gobble combines the convenience of takeout with a health satisfaction and freshness of a home cooked meal. It really is a perfect solution for anyone who wants to save time cooking, but don't want to compromise on quality or health. Also, gobble feels extremely customized with every new menu, their technology learns more and more about your tastes and preferences to effortlessly deliver fresh seasonal dishes you'll love. Just like having a personal home chef. Some of my favorite dishes have been the chimichurri fish tacos with shredded cabbage and the butternut squash ravioli with spinach and pecan sage Brown butter. Now for our listeners, you can guess 6 gobble meals for just $36, just visit gobble dot com slash dateable 6 three 6 and get your first 6 gobble meals for just $36. Again, go to gobble dot com slash dateable 6 three 6. Have you ever thought about how much better dating would be if you had a whole army of people supporting you along the way? We know that dating can be frustrating and lonely, but it can also feel fulfilling and fun. Have you recently decided you want to make some changes to your love life? Maybe you've recently reentered the dating scene. Maybe you've gone on one too many dates that went nowhere, or maybe you're just ready to take your current relationship to the next level. That is exactly why we created the sounding board, a true extension of our podcast that delivers a personalized experience, which includes monthly office hours where you can drop in and chat with us about anything. Weekly sound offs with guided discussions and regular virtual happy hours, allow Julie and I to become your dating sherpas to provide real-time guidance and wisdom in a more intimate way so we can all navigate dating and relationships together. Join the sounding board today by going to dateable podcast dot com slash sounding board. Again, that's dateable podcast dot com slash sounding board. In your opinion, what are some ways people can show confidence in their profile without explicitly saying, I am confident. No, that's a great question. I would say the first place to do that is your photos. I mentioned that I'm always looking at different profiles. I'm doing it for my job. I'm helping friends. And when I see a profile where someone is wearing sunglasses or they're in a group photo and there's a lot, a lot of group photos in the album. It tells me that they're hiding behind something. They're shying away a little bit, whether it's a sunglasses that are hiding their face or they might not feel confident in their appearance and that's why the group photos make them feel more comfortable because they're hiding behind some of their friends or their family. I would say photos are a great way to showcase confidence. And that does not mean that you have to wear something that society tells you is overtly sexual. That's not it at all, but highlight who you are, that's what people are there to see. They're not there to see your friends or your family. They'll meet them at some point if everything goes well. But show yourself off. And show yourself off in a way that makes you feel feel really great about yourself. I love athleisure. I love sweatpants. Yes. That makes me feel good. Sometimes I wear that to the office. I do it in a little bit of a chicer way. But that makes me feel good, it makes me feel confident. You know, this is super fascinating. Confidence as a whole because I feel like we've even noticed that in our podcast too of just the importance of really recognizing what you bring to the table, my prediction is that part of it was to do with the pandemic. A lot of people had a lot of this time to reflect, to really work on themselves and now come out saying I want someone that also enjoys their life and someone to share it with. You kind of address this a little bit earlier that people aren't necessarily looking for someone tall dark and handsome anymore or whatever the stereotype was in the past. What do you think are the most important qualities in addition to confidence that you're seeing now be top of mind for daters? Yeah, I would say communication. I mean, taking a step back, there obviously has to be a mutual attraction. Right. That's never going to change. There has to be something about the person physically where you're like, well, they're so handsome, more beautiful or cute or whatever it is. There has to be some level of attraction there. But going beyond that, communication is really important to people. A majority of our daters said that they're really great at clear verbal communication.

00:40:02 - 00:45:02

And that's what they're looking for in a partner as well. In fact, people who said that they were good at clear, verbal communication on our app, received 40% more conversations than people who aren't, and they're also receiving more likes. So communication, top of mind. And I don't think there's a universal way to communicate. My boyfriend and I have very different communication styles, but we've learned to meet in the middle and sort of create a style that works for both of us. I think the best example is when we're mad. My boyfriend, when he gets mad, he wants to talk about it and address it right away. For me, I replay arguments from my parents, and my dad would just get so mad, and he just blow up and say, he was just say things that he regretted. Then he'd be over it really quickly. And my mom would be like, wait a minute, I'm not over it. That was kind of shitty of you. So for me, I'm really mindful about everything I say. I never want to say something that I'm going to regret because people never forget the words you say to them. So if we're in an argument or if something bothers me, I need a moment. I have to go to another room. I got to send in silence. I got to go for a run. Sometimes it'll take me two minutes to be able to chat about it. Sometimes it'll take me 20, sometimes it might be the next day at most. But that's my communication style because I'm mindful that I don't want to say something that I really don't actually mean, but we've over the years found a way to say, okay, we're going to talk about it. Here's a timeline of when we're going to talk about it. He knows me now. So he'll say, I know you need a moment, you don't want to talk about it right now. Go into the other room, but we're going to chat about it soon. But that works for us because we matched our communication styles together. Communication is so big, but it's also very difficult to get to know someone's communication style when you're just meeting them through an app or online dating. And what we often hear is people say, well, I match with someone and we started talking and then the conversation died. The communication just dies off. Do you see this happening on OkCupid? I'm sure you do, and then what can people do to stop this from happening so that communication can start continuing? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we definitely see it. And it happened with me and my partner and I'm always going to bring real life examples into the conversation because I think that's what resonates with people. At least I see from my own circle, people only talk about the good parts of a relationship. They never talk about the challenging parts, and it makes a lot of us feel isolated in any issues that we're battling. So that's why I like to talk about these things now. But when we first started dating, I felt like I was constantly texting. And I was like, oh, I need a little bit more from you. Why aren't you answering right away? I brought it up. I was like, hey, I feel like I want to chat. More than you want to chat and sometimes I don't know if it's like pulling teeth, or if I'm doing something wrong, and he was like, oh, I'm just not a big tax writer and realized that you felt that way. And we were young. He was in college. He was a senior, and he was interning, and had jobs, and I was still waiting to start my career and constantly interviewing and so I had more free time. So for me, it felt like I was constantly being ignored, but as soon as I brought it up, he was like, oh, I'm sorry, and it changed like that because we had a conversation about it. And I said what was bothering me? He explained his side of it. And we moved forward from there. I totally agree that it's hard to tell necessarily on an app outside of how much someone talks, like in chats. You're not going to get into major conflicts, usually, or if you are at that stage, probably not a good sign. That usually comes later on in a relationship that you just wouldn't know at that stage. But I do see even on our podcast communication comes up all the time. And the fact that people are even open and saying that's important to them is really important. And then I think therapy is another one. And this is probably a matter of our generation. In past generations, therapy would be seen as a weakness and communication wasn't necessarily a priority. Do you see that as a trend that people are talking about therapy and finding that attractive? Yeah, people have been talking about mental health more and more, especially over the last couple of years on our app and they're really looking for someone who is open to going to therapy and people who are going to therapy are, I mean, they're also performing better on the platform. In fact, a majority of our data, it was 99% of almost a million and a half people on OkCupid said that mental health is just as important as physical health. This is really top of mind for people. And I would say the pandemic really accelerated this trend for sure. What about relationship structure, monogamy, non monogamy? What is a trend with that? People are more open to having open relationships. So while monogamy is definitely not dead, we're seeing that there's more and more willingness to be part of an open relationship. And I think this kind of just goes back to people being more open with what they're interested in. You know, we've seen a ton more non binary transgender bisexual users coming to the app. That's not because there is some spike.

00:45:02 - 00:50:02

There's something in the water and we're having more non binary people now. It's because people are more open to talking about these issues. Queer people have been around forever. So have open relationships. There are couples in my life where I find out there in the open relationship I'm shocked because no one talks about it. But they're talking about it now. And we feel that no matter what type of data you are, what type of relationship you're looking for, we need to make sure that our app works for you. Whatever that is. But definitely a rise in people who are looking for an open relationship, whether they are looking to get into an open relationship or they're in a relationship and they're opening it up. That's really fascinating because pockets actually started as data gets San Francisco because that's where we both were. We're non monogamy and open relationships where I wouldn't say mainstream that everyone was doing it, but I'd say more out in the open and we heard in New York, for instance, it was more of an underground type of thing. And like in other places in the country, clearly not talked about at all. Do you feel like you're seeing this trend all over the country? Or is it still isolated to the major metros? I haven't looked at it on a geographic level in terms of what cities or what states this is happening the most in, but overall last year users on our app that were seeking non monogamous relationships increased 7%. And we actually saw mentions of terms like non monogamy and throuple in users profile. So this is what people are actually writing into those prompts that we offer. Those went up over 20%. Wow. We've only seen that trend really continue throughout this year as well. Do you see any generational differences? Now that gen xers are old enough to, I guess, day and get on dating apps. Are they dating differently than millennials? There's a lot of similarities between Gen Z and millennials more than we would really think. I think the biggest changes are what we see between gen X and millennials and definitely between gen X and Gen Z and I was actually at an event recently where they talked about this and I thought this was so interesting. I think millennials and Gen Z are so similar, but they frame things and they talk about things in very different ways. So we're often talking about how Gen Z is the most progressive generation we're seeing. They are prioritizing racial justice and that's new. That's buzz worthy. But millennials and gen X also did, but they called it civil rights, so we have these different phrases and terms. And yes, as we get younger and younger or as we look at younger younger generations are getting more and more progressive, but they are prioritizing the same type of things. In terms of the issues they care about or the relationships that they're looking for, I mean, there's definitely differences and percentages and how many people are looking for what or care about XYZ. But there's more similarities than we think. I think it's interesting too because millennials kind of straddle the two. They straddle the new way of thinking and the old way of thinking more traditional. One of the things that we see, even with our listenership and community, is that despite feminism and realizing that women should just bake the move. If they see someone, that's interesting, reach out, but there's all this, I'd say baggage of all the rules we've been told and as women, what we've internalized for years of lowers your value or you don't want to be seen as desperate. Are you seeing any shifts in changes of who makes the first move and who reaches out first? First of all, I hate that this is even a thing. I know. That people have said it actually makes no sense to me. Especially as I mentioned, I'm adopted by my grandparents, so my parents are a little bit older. My mom proposed, and this was in what 1963. Wow. And I was like, wait, you proposed, and she was like, yes, I wanted to get married. And I asked him. And I was like, that is such a boss move of you. But over the last couple of years, we've actually seen women start to send the first message more than we've ever seen in our almost 20 year history. Wow. What's more interesting is that when a woman sends the first message on OkCupid, that those conversations last longer than ones where someone who identifies as a man starts to conversation. So I would encourage anybody who identifies as a woman, go out and make the first move. You don't have to wait for someone to message you. If you're interested, go for it. Because you have no idea if the person on the other side who's really nervous and they're waiting for you to make the first move. It does not matter. And chances are, you're going to have a better and longer conversation because of it. Any guesses as to why those conversations last longer? Everyone wants to feel like someone is expressing interest in them. And I think it's a really big ego boost when someone sends the first message, regardless of gender or identity, it makes someone feel a little bit more confident and get excited. I don't remember in my relationships who sent the first move, but I do remember who initiated moving off the app and going straight to phone, and that was me.

00:50:04 - 00:55:02

And that was my actual my first date. And I stretched that first date into over 8 years. So send the first move or make the first move. I mean, I have a couple theories. I think one is that women have been so suppressed for so long. Like I mentioned, we've been fed all these rules that we have to follow. And I know for me, my dating life, I was always very passive. It was always like, who likes me or who's going to reach out to me, but that kind of makes you not as invested because you're just, you don't really have that feel of this is someone I necessarily want to be talking to. So I almost feel like it's the swing of feminism and empowerment. To be in that driver's seat and to be reaching out and if you're reaching out to someone, you probably want to talk to them. So I think that goes into maybe my second theory is that we already know that there are typically more people identifying as men on dating apps than identify as women. And there's studies that women get inundated by messages and all that more than men do historically. Of course, everyone's different. But overall, it's sad to say, but it's like if you have a bunch of people in your inbox that you feel met on, but you've made the move on someone that you're more excited about. Of course you're going to start talking and follow through on that and probably all those other people are going to fall to the wayside. I think there's just more weight in a woman messaging because as a woman, when you get a message from a man, you also wonder how many other women, as you sent this message to. But when a woman messages, it's like, okay, there's a lot of weight to this, and I think she is actually interested in me. So let's see where this goes. You take him more seriously. Yeah, I think there's also miss of men don't want this to happen. When my partner, what I reached out to him, he was almost relieved that didn't fall all on him. And I think we think that we're going to be seen as less desirable and valuable, but I don't think that's actually reality. I think people, like you were saying, Michael, everyone wants to feel good and feel like someone is interested in them. And I think all these games and rules that have been drilled into us for so long, like men don't feel good in that situation either when women are playing hard to get and doing whatever historically we've been told to do. There's no space for games in dating and relationships. I don't understand why people do it. And I feel like it always backfires and no one wants to deal with that either. It makes someone feel so terrible. I think in general, this has been going on for years. I know for me, when I stopped doing all these games, that's when I actually had relationships. But I think even in 2022, there's less of a tolerance for it. Like you were saying earlier by people are busy. We have stuff to do. There's so many people out there on dating apps that are kind of there as options. Why would you get hung up on someone that's being lukewarm with you? It just doesn't even make sense anymore. I totally agree. You don't have to do it. There's so many options out there. I don't get it. But stop doing it. Please. Are there a specific dating seasons? We hear cuffing season. Here, breakup season. Do you see these seasons translating into the data you see on OkCupid? Yeah, absolutely. So dating is definitely seasonal. People are doing it all year round, but there's definitely, as you mentioned, key moments where it's just spiking. Actually, we're about to lead into one of those moments. So our data experts are actually predicting that this is all grounded in data, which I love. Sunday, November 6th is going to be the official kick-off to cuffing season. And what we're expecting is to see the biggest spikes in matching happening between Halloween and Thanksgiving with roughly 25% jumps in matches at the highest points during that period. So during summer, we tend to see a little bit of a slowdown in dating. People are still dating, but it's a little bit more focused on hookups or not looking for something super serious, and then as soon as the weather changes, people are like, the holidays are coming. And I don't want to do this alone. Yeah. And my family is going to ask me why am I not in a relationship? And if you're single through the holidays, the actual biggest dating day of the entire year is always the first Sunday in January right after new years because people are like, oh, I just went through Hanukkah or Christmas by myself, and then I had New Year's Eve, and I kissed that random dude. I didn't get to kiss anyone or I had to make out with my friend again. Again. And they all download dating apps. The same way sign up for gym membership and we say we're not drinking for the entire month. Dating is wrapped into all those things. So that's actually the biggest day. And just pro tips, Sundays, all throughout the year are the best day of the week to be on a dating app. Definitely be on in multiple times a week because you don't want to miss that message asking you out, but Sundays are when we see the highest traffic.

00:55:02 - 01:00:00

Oh yeah, Sundays would be the day that I did it all the time when I was on them because it's overwhelming to go on every single day, but Sunday felt like the most time where at the end of the weekend people are just chilling using data gaps and you got the most responses. For sure. Yeah. I'm curious on this cuffing season because I get the holidays that's kind of universal everywhere. But cuffing sees it I think is definitely more of an east coast thing or cold weather thing, like in the West Coast. It's not referenced nearly as much as we hear people in New York and D.C. talking about cupping season. Do you see this still as a universal trend because of the holidays everywhere or do you think it's more climate specific? I think the way we talk about it tends to be focused on east coast because of the colder weather. We sort of frame it as like it's getting a little bit colder and you know people want to be with someone who's going to keep them warm at night, but it is a trend that we're seeing across the nation. So it's not really specific to east coast or West Coast or even certain cities. We do see it across the board because we all celebrate the holidays around the same time. There's no difference there. That's good to know. Cuffing season exists regardless of the weather or lack of weather changes. Any surprising data you found recently that you saw you're like, what? I would say we kind of alluded to this a little bit earlier. And I don't know about you, but I feel like I have a lot of friends or coworkers who are a little bit more conservative, not in a political sense. But one thing we're seeing is that people are becoming more open about how kinky they are. No. That's not something that people are shying away from. They're talking about it on a dating app. And they're doing this through the questions that we offer. So this isn't someone being super creepy in their messages to other taters, but jeters are showing us through responding to our questions that 97% of them want to have sex every day or every other day or at least once or twice a week when they meet someone. When they start a relationship with them, 90% of our data is like sex toys. And 8 in ten singles really enjoy using a sex toy with a partner. And this isn't small groups that care about these things. Over 4 million people on our app in the U.S. alone believe things like foreplay is necessary for good sex and I just love that. This is a number for it, but 69% actually like four play. More than checks. And for me, when I see this data, like my face turns red, we're on camera now, and I feel my face coming up. But people are talking about it. They're like, I don't feel the need to hide literally anything about me anymore. And that's really nice. It's wonderful. It's nice. It's empowering, I think. Yeah. Totally. The sentiment of dating and dating apps has definitely changed a lot in the last couple years. I feel like we've almost aged ten years of modern dating in the last two years because of the pandemic. Where do you think people are today? Are people feeling hopeful or are you feeling that they're discouraged? They're looking for something new. What's the sentiment that you're seeing at least in your world? People are seeing now that dating apps do yield success. About 3 million people on our app actually said they know someone who married someone, they met on a dating app. And we've seen a huge transition in perception around dating apps. Like I mentioned, when I first heard about Tinder in 2014, I was so creeped out. I was like, I can't believe this is a thing. I remember being an ocean city Maryland with friends, and I was like, oh my God, you don't know this person. And you met them on your phone and you're going to see them, how is this happening? Yeah. And now I have friends who are like, oh my God, there was a guy last night who came up to me in the bar. And I was like, well, what did he say? And that's not the point. He came up to me. So that's so different, and it's so new, but I think we're just seeing that more and more people are flocking to the apps because of its convenience because they see it working. If they're LGBTQ+, my community have been early adopters to dating apps, and they're only continuing to do so. So people are just finding success on it. And sex, and sex. Sex and sex toys. In the interest of time, I know our listeners are dying to know your tips for how to make dating apps work for them. I guess specifically how to make OkCupid work in their favor. First, I would say, when you're making your profile, ask your Friends for help. We're always asking our friends about an Instagram caption or a TikTok video before we post it. I asked my coworkers about my resume and my LinkedIn. So why wouldn't you ask for support with your dating app profile? You don't have to do this by yourself. And your friends, your family, they really know you best. So definitely ask them for help. Another thing is be positive with everything you're writing in your profile prompts. I'm looking at profiles literally every single day and I have to admit, the biggest turn off is when I see swipe left if Blake. Yes. Yes. I totally understand that we all have things that are really important to us.

01:00:01 - 01:05:07

But instead of focusing on your deal breakers, try to focus more on your deal makers and everything you're putting on your profile. So what makes you swipe right on someone, why do you want someone to swipe right on you? That's really what you need to be highlighting in your profile. You don't really want to be negative with it because it just gives off a bad vibe and it's really your first impression. Also treat everything on your profile like it's a conversation starter. And that's the purpose it needs to serve. So one tip I always give Friends is make lists with anything you're adding to your profile prom. So the thing about writing out the books that changed their life or that you recently read lists the songs that people can find on your Spotify playlist right on the vacations that you still want to go on. This gives something for people to respond to if guys see something on your profile where it says Michelle laid back woman, looking for a man they don't know how to respond to that and ladies. You got to give guys as much help as you can. So everything you're putting in there, make sure it's something that people can react to. And that also goes to the photos. I see profiles that have the same type of selfies over and over again. You want to throw one in fine by all means do it. But upload photos of things you love doing, upload a photo view at a Taylor Swift concert or a selfie on a run, because that is going to show me and give me something to respond to. I'll ask you your favorite Taylor Swift album. I'll ask you if you've ever run a half marathon or a marathon or if you've ever traveled to run. You know, it's a conversation starter. It's easier for me to spark up a conversation that doesn't begin with as high or hey, because we know historically that that tends to be ignored at a high rate and insider tip from someone who works at a dating app. Don't create your profile and forget it. If you add something new to your profile every two to three weeks and that is not mean you have to start from scratch, just add a new photo or change a prompt. It actually tricks the algorithm and the app, no matter what app you're on, this is not just an OkCupid type. This is any dating app, it gets confused, and it thinks you're a new user. Oh. It'll start showing you to more and more new people all over again. At least shows your active, too. Right? Right. Totally. I mean, there is some profiles that I read where it's like, just started this brand new show, and I'm like, that show has been out for 5 years. Right. And as a dating app, you don't want to be showing inactive people to people either. So I think it helps the dating app too. A 100%. We put so much work into curating an Instagram feed, our LinkedIn profile, what we post on Twitter. You have to treat your dating app with the same level of care. So just minor changes. Every couple of weeks is really helpful. And then the last thing, this is more for people, less of like a tip for your profile. But think about that checklist you have. We all have a checklist. I don't care if you say you don't, you do. And that's the checklist of who your ideal partner is. And it's so important that you know when you're dating what type of person you're looking for, what type of relationship, yes, but being too specific is so detrimental to your dating experience. I don't recommend scrapping your checklist. What I recommend doing is breaking it up into two sections. What's your must haves and what your nice to haves. I love Harry Potter. I have multiple Harry Potter tattoos. I love Taylor Swift, have multiple Taylor Swift tattoos, but I don't need my boyfriend to be chest as big of a fan. I'm Jewish. He's Catholic. We work because we're aligned on what our must haves were. We both want to live in New York. We both want to have two kids. We both think traveling is really important. So we aligned on what our non negotiables were, our must haves. And we have some nice to haves in common and some not. He loves big brother. I can not make it through an episode. I watch 17 different cities of The Real Housewives and he's like, why is this happening every night? But you know what? That's more of a nice to have. I love that. Well, this has been so great. I mean, I have so many takeaways from this conversation. I think first and foremost, I love how open people are becoming on day day gaps and how authentically themselves they're showing and the swing from not having much on your profile to putting it out there and not being afraid to turn off the wrong people is so essential for dating, whether you're on apps or whatever. We can't market to everyone because then you end up appealing to no one. So I love this whole unapologetically myself. I'm going to own who I am and I'm going to show the confidence in my dating profile. So I think that's my biggest takeaway. My other one is that we have to remember how beneficial data gaps are to helping us connect. All of the tips you are giving to and we were talking about earlier, all of this is just meant as a starting point to put you in front of people that you can connect with and to fuel conversations. We can't expect dating apps to do all the work for us, but remembering the fact that we can get a glimpse into someone's life. We can't get a glimpse into their values, but it's up to us to form that connection and to continue getting to know them as a person, not just a profile.

01:05:08 - 01:09:41

Well said, I think my biggest takeaway in addition to Julie's takeaways would be you have to give the dating apps the same energy that you want back. So if you're getting on OkCupid or turning on an app and you're just like, oh, not this again, or let's see what losers I'm going to find today. Well, guess what? I think the algorithm will magically deliver those losers that you're looking for. So if we can love the apps as much as we want the love back, that probably is the best way we can spend our energy. And if you're a feeling on a day that you're like, I'm not going to send this app any good energy, don't get on it. Because what's the point? You're just going to be wasting your time. And I love this idea of constantly updating your profile, not just a trick the algorithm you can definitely do that, but just to let the universe know that you are still looking. You're still relevant. And that this is something that is priority for you. So it still goes back to giving that same energy to the apps as you do back. Now, this episode is not sponsored by OkCupid, but we do want to plug okay Cupid a little bit here. We've heard many people meeting significant others from OkCupid because of the extensive profile and the prompts. But you have to spend time to do it. You can't create your profile on the toilet in two seconds. So it is really nice to have a different way of looking for someone online that just it requires more time and investment upfront. So thank you, Michael. Thank you for having me. And for anybody who's out there who might not have tried OkCupid yet, if you download the app and create a profile completely for free, send an email to subscriptions at OkCupid dot com. Let us know where you heard us. And I will happily upgrade you to our premium version on us as an add in gift. Oh hey. So say dateable podcast. That's where you heard it. Yeah, subscriptions at OkCupid dot com. Yes. I've heard it on dateable. Well, thank you so much Michael for this enlightening conversation. We're glad that we're able to get some updated data from the 2014 study as we mentioned earlier. And we can't wait to hear how our listeners are reacting to this episode. I'm sure they're going to love it and have some really great takeaways for all of our listeners. Thank you all so much for coming along for this ride. And if you can give us a nice rating and review and Apple podcast, we highly appreciate it. It's like we send you the love and you send it back, you know, it's just like, love is what makes the world go round and on that note, we're gonna wrap up this episode. The dateable podcast is part of the frolic podcast network. Find more podcasts you'll love at frolic media, slash podcasts. Want to continue the conversation? First, follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter with the handle at dateable podcasts. Tag us in any post with a hashtag stay dateable and trust us. We look at all those pose. Then head over to our website dateable podcast dot com. There you'll find all the episodes as well as articles, videos, and our coaching service with vetted industry experts. You can also find our premium Y series where we dissect, analyze, and offer solutions to some of the most common dating conundrums. We're also downloadable for free on Spotify, Apple podcasts, Google Play, overcast, stitcher radio, and other podcast platforms. Your feedback is valuable to us, so don't forget to leave us a review. And most importantly, remember to stay dateable. Hear that. That's the sound of a patient whose health data is protected from a cyberattack. And that, that's the sound of a financial system that's digitally secured from bad actors. Right now, there's an invisible war being fought on a digital battlefield that impacts what we do every day. That's why at periton, we do that can't be done to help protect the vital systems we rely on because if we don't, the alternative is unimaginable. Periton. Hi. Welcome to your neighborhood pharmacy. Hi, I've got a prescription for diabetes test strips. How much is the copay? Well, it depends on your type of commercial insurance. And back to being in your yearly spend, subtracting the deductibles, also depending on your month. Why can't there be a better option? Or you could try contour next test strips, a 35 counts only 1999 over the counter and proven to be highly accurate. Go to contour next dot com slash radio to see if over the counter strips are a more affordable option for you. I think I'll try contour next.