With all this buzz around Tinder Swindler on Netflix, the movie that shows the dangerous aspects of online dating, people still keep swiping left and right. About 40% of young people aged 18−35 in the USA use online dating services. Not that surprising after all, we are social creatures and need company. Tinder’s new provocative campaign 'You Are Not for Everyone' brought by the recently-founded creative agency Mischief to promote Tinder’s new hub within the app called "Explore'. The hub hosts a suite of interactive features that give users more control over who they meet.

I personally loved the ad — I thought it was hilarious and I could definitely relate to it with my own domestic struggles with zen! The bad news though is that I am not the target audience (they targeted GenZs) and I never use any dating apps (though never say never, right?). So my opinion doesn’t count. Let’s look at those whose opinion does count…

Did the young Americans get the ad? We surveyed women and men in the USA aged 18−35 to get their feedback.

What did we test? You Are Not for Everyone video ad.

Who did we target? National representative sample of Americans between 18 and 35 y.o.

How was it tested? We used the Video Test solution on the Fastuna platform. Online panel respondents were sent a survey link to their email. After watching the video, they answered our survey questions. We also added a bespoke question to find out if they understood the main idea of the ad, how easy or difficult it was to understand that the ad was for Tinder and also to see how many viewers actually use online dating apps.

Find the complete performance dashboard here.

Well, it seems that the video had almost a 50:50 swipe left / swipe right split.

The General Perception Score is 48 out of 100, which is a weak result, according to Fastuna’s standardized norms. Only 55% found it interesting and that means that in real life, not many people are going to actually watch it to the end where Tinder is revealed. That may cost the brand a loss of up to 50% of their media investment for this ad simply because people won’t watch it to the end. The relevance score was low too: only 40% found it relevant while about the same amount were eager to learn more or to try the platform. This indicates a love/ hate relationship with the ad amongst consumers.

When reading peoples' comments, the opinions about the ad were very polarized. Some people found it funny and engaging, but others found it unclear and even stupid. Swipe-righters thought it was funny.

Swipe-lefters thought it was weird or boring. Or both…

All respondents' quotes are here.

Ok, but the key purpose of this ad is to convey the idea that although everyone is different, on Tinder anyone can find their perfect match (even if you are a bit unusual!). So we asked consumers what message they took away from the ad. Turns out, only around 15% of all people interviewed really got the message right.

The rest either got it completely wrong 'I think it’s an app for yoga and calming yourself' or misinterpreted it as just being a generic Tinder ad 'Advertisement to use a dating app', 'To hook up on Tinder'.

Good news is that the majority told us that it was really easy to remember that the ad was for Tinder. Great news but… we forced people to watch the video. Will they watch it organically in the real world? What about that 45% who didn’t find it interesting in the first place and will not watch till the end?

You are, definitely, not for everyone. So is Tinder. Again, big thumbs up to Mischief from me personally and from a half of young Americans for creating such a funny ad. However, it is definitely not for everyone. Should you tweak the ad idea? Or should you redefine your target audience? This would be a great time to integrate a consumer feedback tool, such as Fastuna while you work on your creative. Something to think about, right?