I was recently catching up with one of my (self-proclaimed) “forever single” friends over drinks. For the sake of the story, let’s call her Sarah. During the second round, our conversation took the inevitable turn towards her dating life. Given the ideas rumbling around in my head about

Cheers

, I had more questions about her swiping experience than usual.

Sarah was using Hinge, Tinder, and Raya. We discussed the pros and cons of each, which she was using the most, and which she was most likely to pay for. Since she was mostly looking for a relationship, I asked

which app had long-term candidates she was most hopeful about.

“Hinge,” she said, without hesitation. “That algorithm is GOOD. Their Standouts section has my

exact type

pinned down.”

Sarah happily obliged my request to see her Standouts. I could practically hear her drooling from over my shoulder as I reviewed each profile. These weren’t simply hotties that 99.9% of people are interested in; a

very clear type

was being presented amongst this curated list. If I were to sum it up: bearded, stocky, lumberjack-y, outdoors-y. I found this noteworthy given that Sarah claims she will “never leave New York” and spends most of her weekends at art galleries and hunting for vibey new restaurants and bars.

“Are you regularly matching with guys like this?” I asked.

“A bit too regularly…”

Sarah went on to explain that dates with her Standouts were consistently bad. Most of them were really sweet, she said — the issue was a lack of chemistry, not having enough in common, or misaligned dating goals.

“So how does Hinge have the long-term candidates you’re most hopeful about?”

“Ummm, are we not looking at the same men?!?” she responded.

Clearly, we weren’t. And herein lies the problem:

The people we

want

to be compatible with often differ greatly from the people we

are

compatible with.

To Some Extent, We Are All Sarah

We don’t have much control over how our preferences are shaped, especially given the volume of influences we’re exposed to today. Also, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to nail down our “type”: some qualities inevitably appeal to us, and it’s good to understand what these are. The problem is, the “types” that we often default to — like the

lumberjacks

I mentioned above — tend to be deeply superficial. We might pretend not to take them seriously, but clearly they hold meaning in our society. Look no further than the I’m Looking for a Man in Finance TikTok, which currently has 59M views.

We should be wary of how these oversimplifying categories seep into our dating lives. We might not have personally molded it, but our “type” is a closely-held belief that is worth reflecting on and perhaps challenging.

Because remember:

to commit unwaveringly to a “type” is to drastically reduce the size of your dating pool, from the outset, often based on superficial qualities. People are terrified of pigeon-holing themselves in a specific type of job, or industry — why are we not scared about this in dating?

Dating Apps Have Reinforced Our “Types”

We believe that dating apps have done the opposite of encouraging us to challenge our “types”. We’ve all heard the argument about social media algorithms creating echo chambers. We would argue that the current popular dating apps have a similar effect: they take our initial, well-intentioned ideas of the types of people we want to date (based on swiping behaviour) and fortify these siloes. When the app shows us someone who doesn’t meet these criteria, we’ve been trained to dismiss their profiles, often in less than a second.

If the apps are showing you your “type” and you’re finding the resulting connections to be great, that’s wonderful! You can probably stop reading here. But stats like 79% Of Gen Z Report Dating App Burnout suggest that over-relying on these superficial ideas is creating barriers to our online dating success.

Like Sarah said earlier: these apps are really effective at figuring out your type. To some extent, that’s not bad. In fact, it

should

be

part

of the model — but maybe not 100% of it. Algorithms which try to mimic complex human behaviours have a tendency to flatten them out and strip them of nuance. As efficient as it would be for an algorithm to solve this problem for us, sometimes they work best when complemented by human intuition. ESPECIALLY when we’re talking about something as complex as our dating and relationship needs.

Enter:

THE FEEDBACK OF YOUR FRIENDS.

It’s Time for a Second (or Third, or Fourth) Opinion

There’s a good chance that if you know your “type”, your friends know it too. A more unique insight your friends might have — and that you might lack — is whether your “type” is really all that suitable for you. Your friends see you for who you really are, in a way that’s very difficult to see yourself. One reason we created Cheers is because we think this valuable insight from people you trust should be incorporated into the dating apps, ideally in the earliest stages of dating. From extensive early user feedback, we also know that your friends are thrilled to be involved!

The feedback of your friends is harnessed via the

Matchmaking

section of Cheers. Here, any user — single or otherwise — can set up their connections by voting on potential matches as a good fit (or not), or reviewing potential matches on behalf of someone in their network. If the user deems two people to be a good match, they can share their approval with either person in the party, or both.

Some people might be uncomfortable with the argument we’re making here.

Why shouldn’t I be able to trust my own dating instincts?

Here’s the thing: we’re not suggesting that your friends have all the answers to your dating problems, or that you have

none

of the answers. On Cheers, you’re perfectly welcome to decline your friends’ recommendations — at the end of the day, it’s your decision. But like most of the important decisions we make, it

certainly doesn’t hurt

to open the doors to a second, or third, opinion from the people you trust. Dating partners are undoubtedly one of such big decisions.

Not to mention

all the other benefits of making dating apps a more social environment

which involves your friends:

Cheers’ Home feed captures users’ life in real-time via updates with friends (like Instagram used to be), making the dating process fun, less stigmatized, and allowing potential matches to get an authentic feel for who you are.

When a match is made via a friend who introduced you in the Matchmaking section of Cheers, the connection kicks off with tons of momentum. This greatly increases the human buy-in of those early stages of online dating, minimizing the likelihood of ghosting and flakiness.

What About the Privacy of My Network?

Cheers discovers your network via your phone contacts — not unlike Instagram. When you first create an account, you are given the option to share all, some, or none, of your contacts. In other words,

no one from your contact list is ever shared with Cheers without your explicit permission

. Of course, Cheers works best when your contacts are using the app. Any contact shared is securely uploaded using encryption. If they are found to be already on the app, you’ll have the option to add them as a friend. If they aren’t, you can choose to invite them to Cheers. If you don’t invite them, they will never be contacted for any reason.

When using the app, you’ll be able to view the profiles of anyone confirmed as a friend, and anyone in your confirmed friends’ network. As more people from your network join Cheers, your extended network of potential connections grows safely and exponentially.

Conclusion

The antisocial process of swiping has turned many of us into hyper-critical auditors of potential dating partners, with overly-refined parameters for what our ideal partner looks like. A sprinkle of this was helpful — an avalanche of it has made the online dating experience

very

hard for everyone involved.

The human intervention of your closest friends offers a much-needed break from this self-absorbed process. Not only do your friends see you for exactly who you are, they might also help you think outside of the box in terms of partners that could be a great fit for you. Better yet, there might be someone in their extended network who fits the description.

At Cheers, we believe that a successful dating app needs to enhance the tried-and-tested dating processes that have been around for centuries, rather than trying to reinvent the wheel.

One of the most important signals dating apps lack is the social input of our friends. Sometimes, they have that magical ability to know what we want better than ourselves.