Indian mobile telephony service providers are increasingly becoming matchmakers. With Reliance Infocomm, Airtel, Orange, BPL and BSNL offering services like chat, dating and find-a-friend, Cupid can now strike using SMSs or video messages.
Some of the companies have also tied-up with portals like Bharatmatrimony.com and Indiatimes.com, enabling access to user profiles through SMSs.
The telecom companies' have positioned these offerings under value-added services (VAS), which is not a revenue earner. VAS is an offering to retain users. However, the matrimonial services have begun to churn in revenues, albiet on a slow footing.
Reliance Infocomm provides its matrimonial services through R World suite of applications, which is accessible through its Reliance IndiaMobile (RIM) handsets. The suite has a database of profiles, enabling a user to search for a partner from any part of the country.
After finding a match, the surfer can send a message to contact the person and initiate talks. The company is also backing the facility with video conferencing and chatting through its Web World stores, that would help the users to interact with each other, before tying the knot.
Reliance Infocomm President (Applications and Services Group) Mahesh Prasad said, "The matrimonial applications on R World is simple, anytime, anywhere and cost-effective option. R World uses technology to narrow down a search with a set of criteria or broaden it (if required) to find a prospective partner."
The company charges Rs 25 for posting a profile and Rs 2 for sending an SMS. However, the Infocomm official claims that this is on a lower side as online registration with matrimonial portals for a limited period ranges from Rs 750 to Rs 1,500 per user.
Reliance WebWorld chief executive officer, Sarup Chowdhury said, "We have two products that can play a crucial role in bringing people together. One is the matrimonial service and the other is the video-conferencing facility and I recall 10 to 12 instances where our video-conferencing facilities were used by prospective groom and bride before finalising the marriage".
The Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Enterprises (ADAE) group company has also recently launched 'Video Mail', an extension of e-mail. This facility enables a user to walk into a WebWorld, record a video clipping and edit it and e-mail to another user.
Most of the GSM service providers function on an SMS platform, while some of these have also tied-up with portals like Bharatmatrimonial.com, Indiatimes.com, Yahoo Matrimonals, Rediff.com and Shaadi.com.
According to Sharad Arora, region manager-India of SmartTrust, a mobile device management company, the method of seeking a life partner through mobile phones increased considerably during the past couple of years.
"The service was launched in 2000, but was not a success during the initial years. However, due to increase in ownership of cellphones and due to its interactive abilities, apart from this being one of the cheapest and easiest method, mobile SMSing to find a partner has increased considerably".
These services, which are often advertised only through world-of-the-mouth, receives an equal participation from users in rural and urban India.
Mobile subscribers in rural Orissa and Bihar are also using these services to find their life partner as frequent as their urban counterparts, he claims.
SmartTrust along with AirTel had launched the matrimonial service 'Track Ur Mate', which is based on an online platfrom but is accessible through SMS.
According to Kunnal Ramteke, chief marketing officer of BPL, "The internet had introduced a host of applications, ranging from chat to mail and SMSes. Now with mobile phones gaining popularity and its penetration much higher than that of computers, these applications are moving over to handheld devices."
The success of online services like chatting, e-mail and dating have spilled over to handsets. The convenience and ease of use have helped in increased usage of SMS for courting, resulting it becoming one of the most sought after VAS, he said.
BPL, apart from its tie-up with a couple of matrimonial portals, had also introduced a chat facility over the mobile handset.
Operators like Reliance Infocomm also provide additional services like online web cast of weddings, booking of marriage halls, legal counselling, marriage-related purchases and even honeymoon packages. With other operators also looking to provide similar services, the telecom industry has come a full circle.
