With the Valentine’s day around the corner, people are excited about the prospect of finally meeting up and dating physically. By Sakshi Sharma
The pandemic altered our lives in unexpected ways — redefined dating rules, navigated virtual and socially-distanced dating etiquettes, and adapted different approaches to relationships. But what remained constant was the inherent human need to seek and build meaningful connections.
Now that Valentine’s day is almost here, people are excited about the prospect of dating in real life again and have taken the next step from just scrolling through various dating apps, updating their dating profiles to figuring out new rules of meeting and hanging out. Here are a few key trends:
More meaningful connections
As single Indians have now started settling into the changing times, they also want to stay in touch with the connections made during the lockdown. “More than one in two chats turned into something more meaningful with a large number of messages being exchanged,” says Samarpita Samaddar, Bumble India PR Director.
The pandemic continues to fade the lines between our digital and physical lives. Today, it would be hard to deny that ‘real life’ is both physical and digital. Rashi Wadhera, Director of Communications at Tinder believes that social distancing has helped everyone understand that a connection formed entirely through digital means is just as meaningful as one formed in person. “We can still share how we feel and who we are, through a screen and it’s incredible how quickly happy hours and video dates have become normal and meaningful,” she adds.
Slow dating
As opposed to endless hours of swiping, slow dating is the new way to meet engage with people. They now go on ‘pre-dates’ where they use video dates to get to know one another before meeting in-person. “We are observing increased usage and extended video chat times with people in India spending roughly 20 minutes on an average on video calls or voice chats,” says Samarpita. This has led to more virtual communication before the relationship is taken offline.
Spike in smaller towns
Since a lot of people went back home from metros, tier 2 and tier 3 cities have seen a spike in online dating. “At present, India is one of our fastest-growing markets and the rate of growth in smaller cities is twice the rate of growth as compared to bigger cities,” says Rashi. Snehil Khanor, Cofounder & CEO, TrulyMadly says and adds, “In the last 12 months, while our overall revenue has grown, in cities like Patna, Bhubaneshwar, Guwahati, Surat, Gwalior etc we have grown north of 10x. The maximum revenue growth is now coming from beyond T-1 cities. We have been observing this trend even before the pandemic but reverse migration, due to the pandemic, definitely fueled this trend.”
Virtual dating is here to stay
Recently, a dating app survey revealed that 40 per cent of single Indians want to opt for virtual dating this Valentine’s. People want to feel more secure as they are connecting with one another. They want to have fulfilled conversations that could lead to a new connection and video calls are proving to be a great way to form these connections.
The rise of “New Dawn” daters
A recent internal research of a dating app revealed that one in two people in India are likely to be “New Dawn Daters” – people who are newly single after experiencing a break-up during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Season of gifts
Most of us are planning to pamper and surprise our loved ones with chocolates, perfumes and flowers. As per a study done by an e-commerce giant, there’s an upsurge in purchase of gift packages filled with love, chocolates, scented candles, roses and personalised gifts.
Self love
A matchmaking platform conducted a survey to understand the sentiment around the occasion of Valentine’s Day. It said that 46 per cent singles feel that one of the most annoying things about Valentine’s Day is being asked about their plan. “Societal pressure makes it hard for singles on Valentine’s Day. We are urging people to take the pressure off this day and discover the joy of love and togetherness regardless of the day,” says Adhish Zaveri, Senior Director – Marketing, Shaadi.com.
Another dating app has teamed up with actor Ananya Panday to encourage singles to move on from their past relationships and fall more in love with themselves.