Trueflutter, a Nigerian dating startup, makes over 1,000 matches per day

Trueflutter, a dating and matchmaking app for people from emerging markets, is a Nigerian startup that is focusing on the local market and making over 1,000 matches per day.

Trueflutter, which was founded in 2018, assists people looking for committed relationships in finding compatible partners who share similar values and backgrounds.

“We observed the cultural norms that influence how people in our markets date and translated these into features and filters on our mobile app,” Ayo Olatoye, the startup’s co-founder and chief marketing officer (CMO), told Disrupt Africa.

Trueflutter was inspired by the frustrations Ayo and his brother Dare, the startup’s CEO, experienced while trying to use Western-built dating apps in Nigeria.

“He could see what was missing, and because no other app had it, we decided to collaborate and build it for our market,” Ayo explained.

Trueflutter launched a basic MVP in 2019 to validate the idea and business model, but its full feature platform will not be available until January 2021. The startup earns money through premium subscriptions, but it is also developing an advertising module. Ayo explains the market gap it is attempting to fill.

“Nigeria has a population of over 200 million people.” There is a significant socioeconomic and cultural divide, and most people date people from similar backgrounds. Regular dating apps require a painful trial and error process in which you must first match with a user before determining whether or not you are from “the same world,” he explained.

“Another significant flaw is the lack of security features to weed out catfishers and fraudsters.” We’ve created a one-of-a-kind system that allows us to detect fraudsters and ban them based on their device ID, preventing them from creating new fake accounts from the same devices.”

Trueflutter, which was initially bootstrapped, received $160,000 in angel funding last year, which it used to build the product. Trueflutter’s early adoption has been impressive, with over 40,000 users and an average of 1,200 matches per day. It has over 300,000 unique matches, with two couples marrying and 20 engagement proposals.

It is now looking for additional funding to expand its user base, which extends beyond Nigeria.

“We have been operating primarily in Nigeria, but we have a lot of organic downloads from Ghana, as well as Nigerians in the UK, US, and Canada.” “We intend to expand to Ghana, Kenya, and South Africa,” Ayo stated.