The Algorithm of Love: As Explained by Match.com CEO

Match.com has been in the dating game for over 25 years and as expected, the online dating industry has had some major changes along the way. While most people used to have a negative, skeptical view of online dating, most people today it now as a practical way to meet potential partners.

One indication of the industry's growth is the sheer number of dating sites out there. Match, which is owned by IAC, is the sister company to many dating sites, including OKCupid and Tinder. Even though we've come a long way in the online dating world, Match CEO Sam Yagan says we are still "decades away" from actually predicting the chemistry between two people.

Yagan believes that the more people you have to choose from, the more likely you are to find the most compatible person for you, but there's a catch: you have to be using the right algorithm. If you're just sorting through a 100,000 or a million people, you're never going to find someone.

However, Match.com helps to weed out potential partners based on three main factors taken from the initial personality test. Those factors are

• Personality
• Lifestyle
• Personal preferences

At the very least you're going to eliminate a lot of people that show very little promise for compatibility.

Yagan, a Harvard math major, is always trying to keep on top of dating trends to perfect Match's algorithm. To do this, there are three things he looks at:

1. What the customer is doing
2. What the competitor is doing
3. Where the technology industry is going

There are constant changes and tweaks being made in order to ensure that users on Match.com are getting the most out of their experience. Whether or not you subscribe to the notion that love can be found with an algorithm, you can't deny the popularity of online dating and the ease of its connectivity.