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ZACH HUDSON
Friday, May 11, 2007
A $10 million ad campaign for Chemistry.com, a matchmaking website, asks why a competing site rejects certain groups of singles, including gay men and lesbians.
The “Rejected by eHarmony,” ads, which will be seen online, on television and in print during May, include an eyebrow-raising TV spot that shows a man intently engrossed in the pages of a nudie magazine, which features a scantily clad woman on its cover. After a moment, the man shrugs and declares his intent in the next beat. “Nope. Still gay,” he says before the screen freezes on a red stamp that reads “Rejected: By eHarmony.”
A female narrator’s voice then asks, “Who knows why eHarmony has rejected over a million people looking for love? But at Chemistry.com, you can come as you are…”
Both Chemistry.com and eHarmony.com use personality profile indexes for matchmaking. Singles looking for matches through eHarmony must first complete a 436-question survey which extrapolates their compatibility in areas like “emotional temperament,” “values and beliefs,” and “key experiences.”
The eHarmony survey was created by site founder Dr. Neil Clark Warren, a psychologist who has written numerous self-help books, including three published by Focus on the Family, an anti-gay religious and political group. When Warren launched eHarmony in 2000, he used Focus on the Family’s daily radio broadcasts as his primary marketing tool, according to his online biography.
IN 2005, WARREN began distancing his name and his brands from Focus on the Family, including buying back the rights to his Focus-published books. In a May 2005 story in USA Today, Warren is quoted as saying that eHarmony tries to reach “people of all spiritual orientations, all political philosophies, all racial backgrounds,” explaining the move to sever ties with Focus on the Family.
But eHarmony’s outreach to diversity still does not include sexual orientation. The eHarmony compatibility index will not measure users who are seeking matches with their same sex. The site’s media relations contact, Lou Casale, received questions from Southern Voice for this story, but did not respond to them by press time.
In 2003, Dr. Steve Clark, director of research and product development for eHarmony, told Southern Voice that including matchmaking for gay men and lesbians would alienate straight users.
“We are trying to be sensitive, but you get to the dilemma of trying to make everybody happy,” Carter said. “A lot of the core audience for the service are the Christian religious conservatives who would be turned off.”
CHEMISTRY.COM site manager Mandy Ginsberg estimates that the site, which puts users through a 50-question profile survey, already serves about 100,000 gay men and lesbian customers, with more on the way.
“Since the campaign started April 30, we’ve seen a huge increase in that,” she said.
The Chemisty profile generator was developed by Dr. Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist, who has also published research and books on relationship issues. Fisher’s survey attempts to measure s personality types in categories like “explorers,” “builders,” “directors,” and “negotiators.”
The survey asks users certain questions — including measuring the length of their index and ring fingers — to measure physical characteristics which are indicators of brain chemical levels like dopamine, testosterone and estrogen. Chemistry.com users are affixed with compatibility quotients based on the users’ personality types.
“At the heart of our brands, we exist for people who are looking for a relationship on their terms. One person might want to get married and have children, while another is looking for a companion and friend,” Ginsberg said.
Chemistry.com, which launched in 2006, is a branch of online dating mega-site Match.com. According to Ginsberg, Match.com has included gay men and lesbians in its profiles since its launch in 1995.
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