You might not personally be the type to find that special someone or at least a date via the web, but according to Tinder CEO, there are 10 million people per day that don’t mind getting matched up with others through this service. Sean Rad(that’s right, his last name is “Rad”. Does yours feel inferior now?) is Tinder’s founder, and he spoke out about the growth spurt that the app had received since the end of last year at the Upfront Summit today. As of December, there were only about 5 million people per day using Tinder and getting matched up. That number saw a huge surge upwards in just a couple months. Is everyone just eager to meet up and mingle after the holidays? Perhaps, but that wouldn’t have been the only reason as to why more users started meeting matches through Tinder.
Likely some of the credit has to go to the exposure that Tinder got at the Winter Olympics. It seems that there were a number of users of the app that were participants in the games. Olympic Gold-Medalist for women’s Snowboarding Jamie Anderson was one of them, and she openly admitted to using the app at the games. However she also admitted to having to delete the app because it was becoming a distraction to her because of all the “cuties” as she put it. Once word got out that Olympians were using Tinder, it’s no surprise that other Olympic participants started using it as well, and lets not forget about the massive amounts of people that were simply watching their favorite Olympic athletes and thought, “why not?”
Tinder got even more exposure once someone had created a Tumblr account to advertise the various Olympic athletes that were using the service, and seeking matchups. Whether some of the users were simply looking for a match only while they were in Sochi for the games, or for extended periods of time, it’s no doubt that users found this to be an enjoyable app. Tinder has been popular since it was created, but this recent boost in traffic and users is in large part because of usage from notable icons. As with pretty much anything else, a little celebrity backing can go a long way.