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Why Business Leaders Fail

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Learn and Lead.

For Me, the Positions of Leadership can sometimes be a lonely place. My employees looked to me for everything. From celebrating the good times to blaming me personally, for all the bad. As a leader you are constantly under a magnifying glass.

Does this sound familiar?

Most of the leaders that I work with have spent millions on positive books, videos and classes. Yet, the best lessons I ever learned were from my failures. How about you? What lessons do you remember most?

Let’s take sometime examining the major faults of leaders who fail. Because it is just as essential to know WHAT NOT TO DO as it is to know what to do.

So here is a list of the traits shared by most business failures, as compiled by Nepolien Hill almost 100 years ago. Much of what he said is still true today.

Efficient leadership calls for the ability to organize and to master details. No genuine leader is ever “too busy” to do anything which may be required of him in his capacity as leader.

1. INABILITY TO ORGANIZE DETAILS.

Leaders show their faults in many different ways. Whether they are a president, CEO or even the leader of a tribe, a leaders often admits that they are “too busy” to change their plans. Some won’t even give attention to any emergency.

The successful leader must be the master of all details connected with his position. That means, of course, that he must acquire the habit of relegating details to capable lieutenants.

2. UNWILLINGNESS TO RENDER HUMBLE SERVICE.

Truly great leaders are willing to perform any sort of labor which they would ask another to perform. Matthew 11:23 tells us that. “The greatest among ye shall be the servant of all”. This singular truth is a common thread which all leaders observe and respect.

3. EXPECTATION OF PAY FOR KNOWLEDGE NOT ACTION.

My father always told me that you will get paid more for what you know then what you do. The arrogance of today’s leaders often will not pay men for that which they “know”. It pays them for what they do. Too many people in our workforce today tie their importance to what they do instead of what they have to offer.

4. FEAR OF COMPETITION FROM TRIBAL MEMBERS.

A leader that is hired for what he does instead of what he offers is a leader walking in fear. The leader who fears that one of his tribal members may take his position is practically sure to realize that fear sooner or later.

A good leader trains his employees so he can delegate responsibbilities to them when he gets busy. Only in this way may a leader multiply himself and prepare himself to be at many places, and give attention to many things at one time.

It is a sad truth in today’s world that CEO and Business Leaders receive more pay for their Ability to get others to over perform. Just look at any professional coach. Their pay is base on getting the most from their players and not for their efforts.

An effective leader may, through his knowledge of his job and the magnetism of his personality, greatly increase the efficiency of others, and induce them to render more service and better service than they could render without his aid.

5. LACK OF IMAGINATION.

Without imagination, the leader is incapable of meeting emergencies, and of creating plans by which to guide his tribal members efficiently.

6. SELFISHNESS.

The leader who claims all the honor for the work of his followers is sure to be met by resentment.

The really great leader claims none of the honors. He is contented to see the honors go to his tribal members, because he knows that most men will work harder for commendation and recognition than they will for money alone.

7. INTEMPERANCE.

Tribal members do not respect an intemperate leader. Moreover, intemperance in any of its various forms destroys the endurance and the vitality of all who indulge in it.

8. DISLOYALTY.

Perhaps this should have come at the head of the list. The leader who is not loyal to his trust, and to his associates, those above him, and those below him, cannot long maintain his leadership.

Disloyalty marks one as being less than the dust of the earth, and brings down on one’s head the contempt he deserves. Lack of loyalty is one of the major causes of failure in every walk of life.

9. EMPHASIS OF THE “AUTHORITY” OF LEADERSHIP.

The efficient leader leads by encouraging, and not by trying to instill fear in the hearts of his followers. The leader who tries to impress his tribal members with his “authority” comes within the category of leadership through FORCE.

If a leader is a REAL LEADER, he will have no need to advertise that fact except by his conduct-his sympathy, understanding, fairness, and a demonstration that he knows his job.

10. EMPHASIS OF TITLE.

The competent leader requires no “title” to give him the respect of his tribal members. The man who makes too much over his title generally has little else to emphasize. The doors to the office of the real leader are open to all who wish to enter, and his working quarters are free from formality or ostenta- tion.

These are among the more common of the causes of failure in leadership. Anyone of these faults is sufficient to induce failure. Study the list carefully if you aspire to leadership, and make sure that you are free of these faults.

SOME FERTILE FIELDS IN WHICH “NEW LEADERSHIP” WILL BE REQUIRED

Before leaving, your attention is called to a few of the fertile fields in which there has been a decline of leadership, and in which the new type of leader may find an abundance of opportunity.

This Is Not Your Grandfather World

In the field of politics, there is a most insistent demand for the new leaders; a demand which indicates nothing less than an emergency. The majority of politicians have, seemingly, become high-grade, legalized racketeers. They have increased taxes and debauched the machinery of industry and business until the people can no longer stand the burden.

The banking business is undergoing reform. The leaders in this field have almost entirely lost the confidence of the public. Already the bankers have sensed the need for reform, and they have begun it.

The industry calls for new leaders. The old type of leaders thought and moved in terms of dividends instead of thinking and moving in terms of human equations!

The future leader in the industry must regard himself as a quasi-public official whose duty it is to manage his trust in such a way that it will empower the individual, or group of individuals.

Has the Business Code of Ethics Vanished!

Exploitation of “the working men” is not a thing of the past. Let the person who aspires to leadership, in the field of business, industry, and labor remember that men and women are equals in the business world.

The religious leader of the future will be forced to give more attention to the temporal needs of his tribal members. The solution of their economic and personal problems may yet be unknown.

In the computer age, professions like law, medicine, and education, require a new brand of leadership, and to some extent, new leaders will become a necessity.

This is especially true in the field of education. Look how Cyber Online Schools have impacted today’s public and private schools. The leader in that field must, in the future, find ways and means of teaching people

How do we apply the knowledge we receive in these new Cyyber and Online Schools. A Leader must deal more with practice and less with theory.

New leaders will be required in the field of Journalism. Newspapers of the future, to be conducted successfully, must be divorced from “the special privi leged” and relieved from the subsidy of advertising.

News Media must cease to be organs of propaganda for the interests which patronize their advertising columns. The type of newspaper which publishes scandal and lewd pictures will eventually go the way of all forces which debauch the human mind.

These are but a few of the fields in which opportunities for new leaders and a new brand of leadership are now available. The world is undergoing a rapid change. This means that the media through which the changes in human habits are promoted, must be adapted to the changes.

The media here described, are the ones which, more than any others, determine the trend of civilization.

The information described here is the net result of many years of experience during which thousands of men and women were helped to market their services effectively.

With all that in mind, how can you start to compete in today’s world? What Leadership Skills will you need to achieve at least moderate success? Who will we compete against in this new world? Will the playing field be tilted for women or people of color?

Finding Your Place In The World

With all the advances in technology, people have never felt more alone than they do today. Human interaction is something that is practiced. Speaking to others is basically a few short bursts of words, like on Twitter. More and more internet terms and seeping into today’s lexicon. Gone are the days of letter writing and Cursive Writing.

I am here to assure you that you are not alone. In today’s business world a Business Coach can help you navigate the waters of communication. Having a Business Coach to confide in is just a standard thing that most business leaders have today.

You Are Not Alone Anymore!

If you find yourself needing to bounce an idea off someone or needing someone to listen to you, without judgment, a business coach may be the key to your future success.

Contact me if you want to talk more.

Sincerely,

Christopher Sciullo cdsciullo@gmail.com

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Important SEO Strategies For 2019

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SEO Strategies For 2019

WordPress is the industry leader when it comes to content management systems. In fact, at last check, 29% of all websites are built using WordPress (the next closest competitor, Joomla, stands at just 3%).

Not only is it arguably the most user-friendly platform, it’s unparalleled when it comes to SEO. Even right out of the box, all the basics of SEO are covered.

That said, with the help of a few other strategies, you can take your WordPress SEO to the next level. Following are 10 ways to make sure your WordPress site and content are optimized to the fullest.

First a note on WordPress.com versus WordPress.org
Please note: This post refers to sites or blogs built using WordPress.org.

While WordPress.com is a decent tool for building a quick, free blog, it doesn’t even come close to a self-hosted, WordPress.org site when it comes to versatility, branding and SEO.

The main SEO advantages to using WordPress.org include:

The ability to use SEO plugins
Access to thousands of responsive (SEO-friendly) themes
Ability to use Google Search Console (formerly Webmaster Tools)
Ability to alter code as needed

As already mentioned, your WordPress.org is pretty well optimized, right from the start. But these 10 strategies and plugins will cover the rest of your SEO bases!

10 SEO strategies for your WordPress.org site in 2019

1. Set your permalink structure to static
By default, the permalink (or URL) structure in WordPress isn’t great for SEO or for users. Right out of the box, it will look something like this: http://example.com/?p=N.

Fortunately, it’s easy to change your default settings to something more search engine friendly – like http://example.com/your-post-title.

In your WordPress dashboard, go to Settings –> Permalink Settings, and select “Post name”. This will keep your URL structure simple and clean, and will ensure that all your new post URLS are automatically optimized.

For some additional SEO-power, you can also customize your individual post URLs by modifying your slug. Simply scroll down on your post creation page, and add your target keywords in the “Slug” field. This will replace your default URL with the keywords you choose.

2. Use your keywords in the two most important locations: title & header tags
You should obviously be using your keywords (and variations of your keywords) throughout your content. Just remember: a well-optimized piece of content won’t simply use a single keyword again and again. Rather, it will include a wide variety of words and phrases related to the main topic of your post.

That said, you will likely have one main keyword phrase that you’re focusing in on. Arguably the most important location to use this phrase is in your title tag (which should by default also put your keyword in your URL). Preferably, use those keywords as close to the beginning of your title as possible.

Header tags (H2, H3, etc.) ensure Google and your readers know what your content is about. WordPress makes it easy to use header tags simply by clicking on the text formatting drop down box in your Visual Editor (Note: if you don’t see this box, click on the “Toolbar Toggle” button and it will show up).

By default, your page or post title will be your H1 (most important) tag. You should only have one H1 tag per page or post.

For the main sub-headings of my posts, I typically use the H2 tag. For instance, in this post, the main headings are enclosed in the H2 tag, while I used H3 for the numbered items. Any sub-headings beneath the numbered items would be enclosed in H4 tags.

3. Upload an XML sitemap
XML sitemaps aren’t, strictly speaking, a necessity for getting Google to navigate and index all your pages and posts. However, they can make the process more efficient, ensuring your new content is found as quickly as possible.

Fortunately there are some great plugins that will automatically generate an XML sitemap for your WordPress site. Some of the best are Google XML Sitemaps and XML Sitemaps. They will also notify Google each time you add new content, so your sitemap will always be up to date.

A word of warning about your sitemap: make sure you’re not telling Google one thing in your sitemap and another in your robots.txt! For instance, if you’ve blocked a particular page in your robots.txt file make sure you’re not then including it in your sitemap. For tips on how to avoid this, check out this great Moz post on the subject.

4. Make sure you’re set up with Google Search Console
If you haven’t yet set up your site in Search Console (formerly Google Webmaster tools), you might be missing out on important SEO warnings or notifications.

If Google experiences issues accessing, crawling or indexing your content, this is where you’ll be notified. This will also be where you’ll see any manual actions (penalties) leveraged against your site.

Your Search Console is also where you’ll be able to view some of the links to your site, as well as some of the keywords that drive traffic to your site.

5. Focus on the right content length for your keywords
There has been tons of research done over the past few years on the ideal length for content. Most of this research suggests that higher-ranking content tends to be in the 2,000+ word range.

The trouble, of course, is there are many examples of content that’s much shorter, and that still ranks near the top of the SERPs.

So, instead of focusing on your exact content length, focus on just writing really good content that answers the question(s) your reader is asking. Rand Fishkin of Moz gives three great tips for evaluating the optimal length for your content:

Investigate what’s working for your chosen keywords. Check out the top-ranking content and see how long it is.
Ask yourself: Can I do an even better job of covering that topic? If you can do so in less words, go for it! If you think a longer post would do a better job, then that’s the direction you should take.
Match your content to your readers’ goals. If they have a quick question they need answered, you should probably just answer it quickly in a 500-word post. If their questions are more complex, writing a 3,000 word+ post may be optimal for this particular topic.

6. Decide whether to stick with www or not
This is such a quick and easy tip that can have a huge impact on your SEO.

Google urges all website owners to choose their primary domain – namely, either https://www.yoursite.com or https://yoursite.com. Honestly, it doesn’t make a difference (SEO-wise) which one you go with.

Set your preferred domain in Google Search Console (above) as well as in your WordPress Settings

In your WordPress dashboard, you can specify this by going to Settings –> General, and setting both your WordPress Address (URL) and Site Address (URL) to your preferred domain.

You should also specify your primary domain in your Google Search Console. To do this, log in to your console, click on the gear icon, then go to Search Settings. Choose your preferred domain and you’re all set.

7. Switch your site to HTTPS
If your site gives your visitors the option to input text or other info through contact forms, opt-in boxes or payment fields, you need to make sure you’re using SSL (Secure Sockets Layer).

This will ensure any sensitive personal info your visitors leave on your site is encrypted and therefore protected.

But not only is this important for protecting your visitors’ private information, it’s now an official SEO ranking factor. In fact, if you haven’t switched over to HTTPS, Google may now show a “not secure” warning to visitors when they’re on pages with text input fields.

If you’re not sure whether you’ve switched to HTTPS, check with your web host. They usually offer an easy way to switch over and will be happy to help.

8. Optimize your WordPress site for speed
Not only is site speed a ranking factor, it’s extremely important for user experience. As you can clearly see on the graph below, as page load times increase, page abandonment increases.

One of the best ways to determine how quickly your site loads is to use Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool. It will analyze your WordPress site, giving you an overall speed rating out of 100.

It will also recommend specific fixes – like browser caching, image optimization and enabling compression – that will help improve your site speed.

I’d also strongly recommend using a plugin (or two or three) to tackle different aspects of your site speed. The ones I usually recommend are WP Super Cache, Smush Image Compression and Optimization and WP-Optimize.

9. You still need to build links in 2019
This post has focused largely on internal ranking factors (i.e., things you can do within your own WordPress site to increase your rankings). However, getting external links to your site is still a really critical strategy for SEO in 2019.

SEMrush recently found that links are even more important for sites focusing on keywords with less than 10,000 monthly searches (which let’s face it, is most of us).

And don’t forget about internal links! Linking to relevant content on your site helps spread link equity throughout your site, and also helps improve user signals like bounce rate, pageviews and time on site. And while user engagement may not be a direct ranking factor, the indirect benefits to your site and business are huge.

If you’re looking for some effective link building strategies, check out my posts 6 Link Building Techniques You May Not Know About and 7 Killer Link Building Strategies For Small Businesses.

10. Install the Yoast plugin
If you only do one thing on this list, it should be this one. Many of the strategies above can be covered all in one go using the Yoast SEO plugin.

Yoast SEO has been around for almost 10 years, but its creators are constantly updating it to address emerging SEO rules and algorithms.

Some of the major SEO benefits to using Yoast include:

Total content optimization*. Yoast will ask you to choose a primary keyword for your content, and then will make sure you’re using it in strategic locations. It will also help you optimize your meta description, so your content is more likely to get clicked in the search engine results.
Automatic XML sitemaps. Simply check the button and Yoast will create and submit a sitemap of all your post, pages and even images.
Automatic addition of links to RSS feed. Tired of getting outranked by scrapers who steal your content? Yoast automatically adds a link to your feed so Google will always know who actually created your content.
*The one feature I wish Yoast would add is optimization for multiple keywords. As already mentioned, SEO in 2019 isn’t about optimizing for singular keywords, but rather for many words, phrases and variations related to your main topic.

Final thoughts
After making sure the technical features of your WordPress site are optimized, most of your ongoing SEO work will be focused on creating excellent content that attracts links.

All of the SEO strategies that worked last year will still work in 2019, so if you’re already ranking well, keep doing what you’re doing!

The only major shift this year will be to make sure your site is moved over to HTTPS. If you haven’t already, I’d strongly encourage you to do this before the new year!


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The Perfect Store Concepts For Repeat Visits

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When they walk into the store, first, you want them to feel welcomed. Two, you want them to feel at ease – no pressure and to-the-point. Three, you want them to freely browse around and find something that they want from your store. Even if they leave without purchasing something from you, the feeling that you want them to leave with them is that they are more than welcomed to come back any time that they want when they are in the neck of the woods.
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Dropshipping Lies Debunked

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Dropshipping Lies Debunked

A few weeks ago a Facebook friend wanted me to check into this “New Online Money Making System”. The system he wanted me to check out, has been around for a long time. Successful Internet Marketers call it “Arbitrage”. Others refer to it “Dropshipping”.

How I made $250,000 a Year Dropshipping!

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Elementor and Gutenberg is There a Future

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Elementor and Gutenberg is There a Future

With WordPress 5.0 is just around the corner and a lot of people are wondering if we’ll see Gutenberg replace page builders like Elementor, Divi or Beaver Builder. In this post, I will speculate on what’s likely to come next for page builders in the world of WordPress 5.

Firstly, this subject is pretty hard to cover. I have to be totally impartial with my answers. So many Website Designers, such as myself, make my living from working with clients on building websites. Right now, we know that Elementor is writing hooks into Gutenberg, but will that be a mistake.

Is Gutenberg, WordPress’s last chance to Monetize?

Gutenberg has the look and feel of Elementor.  But does WordPress do a disservice by trying to be all things to everbody. I guess that owning the biggest chunk of Blog sites is just not enough. Perhaps the “Executive Spirit” of WordPress is just tired of watching all those around them getting rich. How much longer will WordPress be expected to offer and support a free platform open to all, enabling others to get rich, except WordPress.

Will Gutenberg Become Ransomware?

The though of a WordPress Lite scares me.  There is really no way to force users to become fans of Gutenberg Site Builder or Editor. Almost every feature Gutenberg uses has the look and feel of Elementor. Companies like WIX offers paid plans that give you added features. Medium is an option that is still lacking commerce. Who know what TheGrid.io is up to these days. Where do you turn after your client spends thousands on an eCommerce site with integrated email marketing.

Small Problems with Gutenberg Today

Like most page builders, when you “Deactivate” there plugin all the editing goes away as well. Below you will see a site that I set up quickly to show you what happens. These are actual images from that site. See how the Editing of the Text Fonts Change when Gutenberg is Deactivated.

 

This is the page after Gutenberg is Deactivated.

I’m sure this will be fixed soon. But until them upgrading clients to Gutenberg could spell trouble.

The Same Test With Elementor

When you Deactivate Elementor some if not all of your Editing continues to stay on the page.

The Only thing we lose by Deactivating Elementor is the Red Background Color in that section as seen in the image below.

So Where Do You Move Your Clients?

I don’t think it’s a stretch to think that we’ll see Gutenberg replace page builders. For some users, especially newbies to WordPress, Gutenberg will do the job well enough that they won’t feel the need to seek out a page builder. Where Gutenberg can end up replacing page builders is with the clients.

For the page builders like Elementor, Beaver Builder and Divi, they will see their lead over Gutenberg start to slip away. The page builders aren’t just waiting for Gutenberg to take the lead, they keep building and making headway with innovation and integration.

For that very reason I don’t see Gutenberg replacing page builders any time soon.  But don’t let too much time go by before you pull the trigger on Gutenberg take your time and invest in a test site. Tell us what you think?

 

 


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How Marketing Mix Can Help Small Businesses Grow

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If you are doing all you can to grow your small business but nothing is working, you might want to take a step back and reconsider your marketing mix. Doing the right type of marketing at the right place and at the right time requires some brainstorming, research and analytical approach. Take a look at what marketing mix is and how you can use this concept to grow your small business.

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3 Things to Consider While Selecting Your Marketing Automation Tools

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Marketing automation is a great approachto connecting with your customers in a highly personalized mannerand to increasing your marketing and sales qualified leads. Before you select the right one for your company, figure out what processes work for you and what’s holding you back. If you need help in figuring out what marketing automation tools would be ideal for your business, feel free to give us a call or shoot us a mail, and our senior consultants will be happy guide you

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6 Essential WordPress Plugins for Niche Sites – Niche Pursuits

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Essential WordPress Plugins for Niche Sites

After creating hundreds of niche sites with WordPress, I have tried and tested lots of different plugins.  Some of the these plugins are a lifesaver!  There is no way I could get my sites to perform the way I wanted them to without these very useful free plugins that I am going to discuss.  However, at the same time there are LOTS of other plugins that I could be adding to my sites to perform lots of other functions as well.  But for most basic niche sites, you will not need many more plugins that what I discuss below.

I also want to point out that there is no “magic bullet” plugin that will make your site zoom to the top of Google.  For more details on how to build links and how I have recently gotten my sites to the top of Google, you can read my ultimate link building guide here.  So, I just want to be clear here – this is not a definitive list of plugins and I expect there are others out there that could replace even the ones I have listed.  I am simply listing the plugins that I use on most of my niche sites.  Lots of my niche sites have nothing more than what you see listed below.  Here is a list of those WordPress Plugins along with a brief discussion on each:

List of My Top WordPress Plugins for Niche Sites

  1. All in One SEO Pack – This plugin is a basic search engine optimization plugin that allows you to input a custom meta description and keywords.  You can also specify and optimize your homepage title – which can be very beneficial for ranking in the search engines.  Overall, this plugin helps you to optimize your site for search engines.
  2. Contact Form 7 – A basic free contact form plugin.  This plugin allows you to quickly and easily create contact forms with a number of basic or custom fields.
  3. Yet Another Related Posts Plugin – I currently use this plugin on NichePursuits.com.  You will see the links below every one of my posts that shows “Related Posts”.  These links are generated automatically by the plugin.  I use this plugin on my niche sites as well, to help link to other relevant articles on my site to both provide ease of access for readers and good link structure for all my articles.
  4. Quick Adsense – I now use Quick Adsense to insert Google Adsense ads into my posts.  This plugin makes it very simple to insert Google Adsense that is just below the title of your articles (right or left justified), in the middle of your posts, or at the end.  In fact, you can even select to insert the ads after a specified number of paragraphs, plus a few other options.  Overall, I have found it very effective and easy to use to get my Adsense ads to appear where I want them to within my posts.
  5. ManageWP Worker – This plugin allows you to easily manage and keep plugins and WordPress installations up to date for all your sites.  ManageWP is currently free and is in beta.  However, they will begin charging very soon.  If you have lots of niche sites, its definitely worth looking at though because it allows you to update WordPress and plugins essentially with one click on all your sites.  This is a HUGE time saver over updating all of your WordPress plugins individually on each site.
  6. Date Exclusion SEO – I have not used this plugin extensively but did just recently begin using it on a couple of my sites.  Essentially it allows you to post without any dates.  I have to thank the Justin and Joe over at AdsenseFlippers.com for sharing this one! This plugin helps prevents your posts from getting dated in the search engines.

Overall, these are some of the basic plugins that I use.  Yes, there are lots of other plugins that you could add and perhaps even some that would make different aspects of your site easier to manage.  However, overall you really don’t need alot of plugins to get a site to rank well in Google.  Rankings are much more dependent on the quality of your keyword research and your ability to get links to your sites.

Source: 6 Essential WordPress Plugins for Niche Sites – Niche Pursuits


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How Bollywood Movies Help to Learn Marketing Lessons

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The digital world has introduced several new opportunities and ways to develop and enhance marketing of the products. The marketing strategies of the Bollywood movie offers a real-time platform to grasp the basics of the promotions and advertising. With focusing on the real fact, marketing gurus also justify the concept and strategies of marketing from Bollywood Movies.

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2018’s 10 best dating apps to help you find that special someone

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The best dating apps of 2018

10 best dating apps to help you find that special someone

The best dating apps of 2018

Dating apps kind of suck — just ask anyone between the ages of 21 and 35. Despite this, they’ve become the normal way to meet people and ask them out. This puts many of us in a difficult position. Because everyone else is using dating apps, it’s tough to avoid using them ourselves. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle.

To help you navigate the deluge of dating apps flooding the market, we’ve picked some of the best dating apps, as well as some of those that bring something unique to the table. And if that wasn’t enough, we’ll also offer our expert opinions on their accessibility, foibles, pratfalls, best-intended uses, and everything else in between. Hopefully, Cupid’s arrow is in your favor!

Bumble

Best Dating Apps: BumbleBumble looks eerily similar to Tinder, but functions a tad differently. The big catch with Bumble is that once two people of opposite genders match, the woman must message the guy first. She has 24 hours to do so before their connection disappears. Guys can extend matches for 24 hours, if they’re really hoping to hear from a woman, as can ladies, if they want to initiate something with a match but just haven’t had the time during the first day. For same-gender matches, either person can initiate the conversation first.

You also no longer need to have a Facebook account to sign up. Following Cambridge Analytica/Facebook Data Scandal, the company added an additional method to create a profile — by adding your phone number. You’ll then be able to upload photos and fill out your profile information the similar to the way you signed up through Facebook.

Profiles are concise and settings are also pared down, like with Tinder, but swiping up allows you to scroll through additional photos instead of super-liking someone. This means that just because someone twitched their thumb up on your photo, you won’t have to see their profile first every time you open the app, even though you swipe left on their profile every time.

Bumble also checks off the boxes for usability, a slick user interface, and easy setup. In addition, the relatively ballsy move of designing a dating app specifically with women in mind — but that is definitely also meant to be used by men — pays off. It’s also the only app that clearly states plainly and prominently that it prohibits pornographic material, requires its users to respect one another, and has a code of conduct in place specifically to make it a safe and friendly place. We only found one other dating app that had a code of conduct — and it was hidden within the Terms of Use, which no one reads. The 24-hour time limit to connect with someone adds just enough pressure to say “hello,” so that matches don’t languish and get reshuffled into the deck. And if you accidentally nixed someone? Just shake your phone to undo your rogue swipe.

However, if you’re a woman and you really hate being the first person to initiate a conversation, then Bumble probably isn’t for you. Profiles are also very short, consisting of a concise blurb and six photos or less. This can make it hard to gauge whether or not you’re interested, even at the most superficial level, in someone. Furthermore, because Bumble places the onus on the woman to initiate the conversation, we’ve found that it can attract a more passive crowd than other dating apps.

Coffee Meets Bagel

Coffee Meets Bagel does require logging in through your Facebook in order to create a profile. Once you’ve set up your profile and input your preferences, it will send you one “bagel” a day, which is essentially the profile of a potential match. You then have 24 hours to decide whether you want to “like” or “pass” on your bagel. If you like your bagel and they have also liked you, you’ll connect, meaning that you’ll be able to message one another in a private chat. That chat room expires after eight days, regardless of whether you’ve talked with your bagel or not. You can also earn “beans” that allow for extra app functions, either by purchasing them outright, recommending the app to your friends, or logging in on consecutive days.

Props to Coffee Meets Bagel for having the cutest name of all the dating apps. The service also offers more specific preference options, meaning you can narrow your choices to certain religious beliefs or ethnicities if those things are important to you. You can load up to nine photos and have a much more prolific profile, too. And if you’ve entered any icebreakers into your profile, the app will send one of them to a bagel you’ve connected with as the first message for greater convenience. The fact that the chat room expires after a week puts some pressure on you to exchange phone numbers or meet up in real life or to just quietly fade away without any fuss. The interface is also relatively user-friendly, with large photos and clean text.

Appearances can be deceiving, though. Although Coffee Meets Bagel allows for a range of super-specific preferences, the bagel it sends you may or may not match your specified preferences and, more often than not, if they do, they will be a significant distance away. The app can also be glitchy, often resulting in slow update and load times, and sometimes it’s frustrating that it sends you only a single bagel a day. You can speed things up a bit by using the “give & take” option, but it’ll cost you 385 beans to like someone who catches your eye.

The slow pace and infrequency of actually connecting with someone will make it all too easy to be super-passive in the app. In addition, once you like or pass someone, Coffee Meets Bagel asks you to specify your reasons for doing so, making you feel judgmental and kind of like a jerk if your answer is “unattractive.” The answers are only sent to the developers, who supposedly use the information to help better curate your resulting bagels. Still, weird.

Happn

How often do you cross paths with the love of your life before you actually meet them? Maybe you smile at your crush every day when you get your morning coffee, but you can’t build up the courage to talk. If so, then Happn could be for you. It’s a dating app that shows the profiles of other singles and pinpoints the last place and time you were near to each other. All your prospective matches are people you’ve crossed paths with, so you’re always starting out with something in common.

You can like people secretly, and they won’t find out unless they like you, too. If you’re comfortable being bolder, then you can tap the Charm button to let them know you’re interested. However, Charms cost coins which you’ll have to buy with real cash via in-app purchases. When you get a match — which Happn calls a Crush — you can start chatting with each other. It’s very quick and easy to set up and use. The profile creation is pretty standard. You add photos, age, profession, and interests, and you can also specify what you feel like doing, whether that’s taking a walk in the park, seeing a movie, or having a drink. Happn has some nifty integrations — you can use Facebook to set up your profile, hook up your Instagram account to automatically add photos, and add Spotify to see if your musical tastes align.

Happn uses the GPS functionality on your phone to track your movements. If you’ve been within 250 meters of a potential match, then you’ll see their profile. For that reason, it works best for city dwellers. People can’t contact you unless you tap the Heart on their profile. Happn never displays your position to other users in real time, and you can also block users if you have stalking concerns.

Hater

Hater is a different kind of dating app than what you’re most likely used to. Rather than relying on finding your soulmate using a flowery bio of all the things you love, Hater matches you with others based on things you both hate. You can set up your profile through Facebook or by using a phone number, and then you’re prompted to add your profile pictures and birthday. You can also change up your preferences by setting the gender you’d like to be matched, with along with their location and age range.

The app works the same way as other dating apps like Tinder and Bumble — swipe right for things, activities, and people you like or left if you hate them. Hater is also divided into three parts where you can swipe through topics or people, and then access your

messages. When swiping through topics, you’re presented with different things ranging from “tequila shots” to “babies,” which are accompanied by GIFs to make the experience more fun. When you swipe left or right, it’ll also show you the percentage of people swiping for each one. These are then logged and attached to your profile for potential matches to scroll through and see what it is that you love and hate.

When swiping through your matches, you don’t see the typical information that’s normally revealed on other dating profiles like your job or education. Instead, you see age, location, and the top thing they hate — which ultimately replaces the bio. It also shows you the percentage you match based on the things you both hate and love. For those who don’t want to wait until they match with someone, you can also send up to three direct messages every 12 hours.

Hinge

Hinge is kind of like Tinder. Okay, it’s actually a lot like Tinder, but with a few key differences that make it better. Interface-wise, it looks like Tinder’s younger sister. However, function-wise, it relies more on your Facebook friends to make connections for you. Hinge also connects you through friends of friends of friends, and shows you not just the people you have in common, but also all the things you have in common. It does this by having you answer a bunch of questions through a Tinder-like interface. Have you been to Berlin? Swipe right. Don’t play croquet? Swipe left. This makes answering questions far easier and less time-consuming, not to mention more fun. The questions themselves aren’t as asinine as those in some other dating apps, and give you a better sense of someone than 500 characters might.

If you want to know more about someone, you can always just ask the friend you have in common, which is a nice human touch that’s absent from most dating apps. Moreover, people can message you only if you’ve matched, so no unsolicited “greetings” from someone you would never match with. You can see what sort of relationship people are looking for, and while that doesn’t sound that revolutionary, it reflects the fact that Hinge carries more of a dating expectation than a just-hooking-up expectation à la Tinder. Furthermore, because of the friends-of-friends connection, you’re less likely to run across inappropriate photos. That’s a plus in our book.

You can only add photos of yourself from Facebook or Instagram, though, which is kind of limiting if you’re not very active on either. Also, while the friends-of-friends concept has a lot of benefits, it’s also restricting. It’s possible to run out of matches after 10 minutes of browsing, which is a letdown if you’re actually enjoying the app or are serious about finding a date.

Match.com

There was no way we could discuss the best dating apps without mentioning the granddaddy of them all. Match.com was at the top of the dating game long before the service ever released an official mobile app. Thankfully, you don’t have to log into the app via Facebook, though you will have to go through a sign-up process that requires you to add a few photos, answer some questions about your gender and preferences, and create a username and password. The same login credentials will work with the desktop version of the site.

The Match.com iteration of flirting is sending someone a “wink,” and you can search through the Match.com database to find people to wink at. The service will also provide you with personalized matches on a daily basis, which take your interests into consideration. To really make the most of Match.com, however, you’re going to need a subscription, which can get a little pricey — the cheapest option currently available will run you $21 a month for six months. A premium subscription does allow you to see who’s recently looked at your profile and who has liked your pictures, though, and includes a host of other features.

The Match.com interface is also pretty sleek and minimalist, but it’s not as easy to use as, say, Tinder. It utilizes a set of tabs that run along the top of the display — i.e. “matches,” “search,” “viewed me,” and “mixer” — which break up the service’s various functions. It’s not an overly complicated app, but it does take a few minutes to get used to.

OkCupid

OkCupid is one of the few dating apps that doesn’t require Facebook to sign up. You create a username and fill out a very long profile, which you can link to your Instagram account if you choose (which is, admittedly, almost Facebook). You can answer questions, giving both your answer and what you’d like your potential match’s answer to be. This creates a percentile score for users that reflects your compatibility. You can also choose to make your answers public and note how important they are to you.

All options, including those for accessing the settings and viewing profiles, are located in a slide-out menu. To browse for someone you like, you merely tap the “matches” option. This option, oddly, does not show you the people you matched with but rather the people you could potentially match with. If that interface is too chaotic for you, tap the “quick match” option, which restricts the results to photos only. You can like people or message them in a similar fashion to Tinder, but messaging is your better bet: Users can see who has liked them only if they have upgraded to “A-list” status.

OkCupid has as many downsides as Tinder, and fewer positive ones, with the exception of learning a lot more about your potential dating partners. The interface is extremely clunky and the photos are a little small. You also have to tap on a user’s small image to see a larger version and the person’s profile, which is simply too large for an app. It might work on a dating website where that much information would presumably be read on a larger screen, but it’s overkill on an app, and the amount of scrolling required makes it annoying to access. When you exit back to the list, there’s no guarantee that it’ll be in the same order or that it will return you to the spot you scrolled down to, making it extremely obnoxious to keep track of what you’ve already viewed. Worse, you can’t see who has liked you unless you pay for an upgrade.

Sadly, you also will only be able to see the five most recent visitors to your profile unless you pay for an upgrade and — worst of all — anyone can message you. Anyone. And they can message anything to you. If you don’t reply, they’ll probably just keep on messaging you, too. Frankly, some things can’t be unseen. Facebook verification helps block a percentage of bots and catfishers from creating accounts, and without it, OkCupid loses a level of reliability.

PlentyOfFish

If you’ve not been on this app before, then you probably know someone who has been. PlentyOfFish (POF) is one of the oldest dating services out there, and it’s certainly the biggest, after hitting 90 million users in May 2017. With that many users, you’re more likely to find matches quicker as PlentyOfFish likes to point out, saying that users are 2.7 times more likely to be matched in their first 24 hours.

That sort of massive following is a selling point in itself, but PlentyOfFish has more going for it than just pure size. It’s something like a “lite” version of many other dating apps, including Tinder’s swiping mechanics, and the ability to see matches near to you, like Happn. It does have its own little twists on the formula — POF’s “Spark” system allows users to quote any part of their amour’s profile, making icebreakers that much easier.

Much like other dating apps, POF has you take a chemistry test of your likes and dislikes, and it quizzes you about your wants and needs from a relationship, so you can be sure that you’re likely to be matched with people who are looking for similar outcomes to your own.

And the best part of it? It’s completely free, and doesn’t charge to message or browse your matches. That makes it the ideal app to download if you’re in the market, but maybe aren’t actively searching for love. And if you’re going out of your way to find someone, then you’ll find no larger market than here.

Tastebuds

The only iOS-only app on this list (Apple users don’t like matching with Android users, apparently), Tastebuds is a dating app that uses musical taste to guess who you’re compatible with. You can link it to your Facebook account if you like, but you’re not forced to. You can also make your profile as detailed or sparse as you like — character limits for each question, mostly centered on music, are pretty high. Once you’re set up, you can flick through individual profiles to view all the information the user has included, including song clips from artists they like. You can “like” a person if interested, or simply “skip” them. You can even send a song or a message before they accept a response from you.

The overall experience is also enjoyable. The user interface is clean and simple, and creating your profile is uncomplicated, allowing you to use both Facebook and non-Facebook photos. Even if profiles are a bit long, they’re never cumbersome and only include what you actually filled out. Listening to a song that the person likes while scrolling through their profile is also an added personal touch, as is being able to send someone a song. It’s the updated, truncated version of making someone a mixtape. Moreover, a lot of people use the app to find friends and concert buddies, as well as dates. Of all the information dating apps use to determine compatibility, music seems the least arbitrary.

Unfortunately, Tastebuds is not without its drawbacks. There isn’t a place in the app to see all people you’ve matched with — just those with whom you’ve started a messaging thread. The app also only plays clips of songs and they occasionally stall, which is annoying, especially when someone has a longer profile and a good song selection. Possibly our biggest complaint with Tastebuds, though, is that it is very easy to accidentally skip someone you didn’t mean to skip. There are a few reasons it’s easy to unintentionally skip someone, most of which have to do with the way the app is laid out. Simple fixes, such as positioning the “like” button on the right and using a different motion to view additional profile photos, would help immensely. We can dream, right?

Tinder

Tinder is one of the most famous dating apps out there, and the obvious first choice on our list of the best dating apps. As successful as it is at forming long-distance relationships and successful marriages, Tinder is the king of the dating hill for a reason and the first port-of-call for many daters.

The Tinder app no longer requires you to have a Facebook account in order to enable it, but you do have to be older than 18. Once enabled, you can set up a concise profile that consists of a 500-character bio and up to six images (we suggest always including a photo). You can still choose to create a profile using your Facebook profile if you want. You can also link your Tinder account to your Instagram, and include info about your employer and/or school. Discovery settings allow other users to find you if desired and set a few preferences regarding who you see. Then the real fun begins.

Tinder shows you a photo, name, and age. You can tap on the photo to see additional information regarding the person and Facebook friends you share (if you’re logged in through your Facebook account). You can also choose to swipe right (to like them), left (to pass), or up if you want to use one of your precious “super likes” to show them you really really like them. If you and another person have both swiped right on one another, a screen will appear showing that you’ve matched and inviting you to send them a message. But most of the time, the Tinder experience will consist of flicking through profiles like channels on the television.

Tinder actually has one of the best user interfaces of any dating app around. The photos are large, the app is — comparatively speaking — svelte, and setting up your profile is pretty painless. Overall, Tinder gets an A for its usability. Also, no one can message you unless you have also expressed an interest in them, which means you get no unsolicited messages. While there are a fair few people on Tinder who use it strictly to collect swipes, many people are actually inclined to meet up in real life, which is not always the case with dating apps. Tinder is one of the most popular dating apps, too (hitting almost 50 million users back in late 2014), meaning the likelihood of matching with someone you’re interested in who doesn’t live super far away is greater than with apps that have fewer users.


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