Bae: Before Anyone Else; The Answer to Mobile Dating for the African Diaspora

As online dating becomes increasingly popular, millions of people across the country utilize various dating services that allow them to meet, chat, date, and develop meaningful relationships with people they would probably not have met otherwise. While mass market dating apps work well for the majority of online daters, and while many niche dating apps have been created to target a number of specific demographics such as the Jewish population, Southeast Asian population, farmers, homosexuals, etc., the African-American market has been largely underserved. African-Americans have the worst experience on mass market dating apps due to negative racial bias, and before Bae, there was no modern, ubiquitous dating app that specifically targeted the African American population. Bae attempts to fill the market gap by providing a mobile first, modern dating app curated specifically for African-Americans. I will discuss our process of building our MVP product, and the technical challenges of improving on it to provide the best user experience and achieve scale with a growing user base. Finally, I will discuss Bae’s successes, areas for improvement, and possible next steps