Melbourne, Australia – 24 November 2010 – Club Intimate announced today it has won the 2010 Red Herring Asia Top 100 Tech Startup Award. Club Intimate was initially selected as a finalist for this award in October 2010. Following the presentation by Club Intimate’s Founder & CEO, Arshad Khan in Shanghai, Red Herring announced its Top 100 Asia Award in recognition of the leading private companies from Asia, celebrating these startups’ innovations and technologies across their respective industries.

“We are quite thrilled and proud of our accomplishment”, said Arshad Khan. “Winning of this ward was no easy task; Club Intimate was selected as a winner from hundreds of companies across Asia. Attending the event also gave me the opportunity to meet the brightest and smartest entrepreneurs from Asia”.

Red Herring’s Top 100 Asia list has become a mark of distinction for identifying promising new companies and entrepreneurs. Red Herring editors were among the first to recognize that companies such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, Yahoo, Skype, Salesforce.com, YouTube, and eBay would change the way we live and work.

“Choosing the companies with the strongest potential was by no means a small feat,” said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. “After rigorous contemplation and discussion, we narrowed our list down from hundreds of candidates from across Asia to the Top 100 Winners. We believe Club Intimate embodies the vision, drive and innovation that define a successful entrepreneurial venture. Club Intimate should be proud of its accomplishment, as the competition was very strong.”

Red Herring’s editorial staff evaluated the companies on both quantitative and qualitative criteria, such as financial performance, technology innovation, management quality, strategy, and market penetration. This assessment of potential is complemented by a review of the track record and standing of startups relative to their sector peers, allowing Red Herring to see past the “buzz” and make the list a valuable instrument of discovery and advocacy for the most promising new business models in Asia.

Melbourne, Australia – 25 October 2010 – Club Intimate announced today it has been selected as a Finalist for Red Herring’s top 100 Asia award, a prestigious list honouring the year’s most promising private technology ventures from the Asia business region.

“This is an amazing milestone for us. We are quite exited and humbled by this experience”, said Arshad Khan, Founder & CEO of Club Intimate. “This achievement further reinforces our resolve to continue to innovate and become a leading social dating service in 2011 and beyond”.

People are passionate about the things they do and it’s often hard to find people with whom they can share those passions, Club Intimate’s interactive features bring people together into communities of shared interests.

The Red Herring editorial team selected the most innovative companies from a pool of hundreds from across Asia. The nominees are evaluated on both quantitative and qualitative criteria, such as financial performance, technology innovation, quality of management, execution of strategy, and integration into their respective industries.

This unique assessment of potential is complemented by a review of the actual track record and standing of a company, which allows Red Herring to see past the “buzz” and make the list an invaluable instrument for discovering and advocating the greatest business opportunities in the industry.

“This year was especially difficult,” said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. “Despite the global economic situation, there were many great companies producing really innovative and amazing products that we had a difficult time narrowing the pool and selecting the finalists. Club Intimate shows great promise therefore deserves to be among the Finalists. Now we’re faced with the difficult task of selecting the Winners of the Top 100 Asia Award.

Finalists for the award are selected based upon their technological innovation, management strength, market size, investor record, customer acquisition, and financial health. During the several months leading up to the announcement, hundreds of companies in the mobile, security, Web 2.0, software, hardware, biotech, and clean tech industries sent in their submissions to qualify for the award.

The Finalists are invited to present their winning strategies at the Red Herring Asia forum in Shanghai, November 15-16, 2010. The Top 100 winners will be announced at a special awards ceremony on November 16 at the event.

About Club Intimate
Club Intimate is a global social dating service that caters for people seeking serious or casual relationships or just looking to make some new friends. Club Intimate brings a fresh approach to online dating industry by combining traditional features with new interactive features of social networks providing better user experience.

Club Intimate currently operates localised websites in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdom and United States.

About Red Herring
Red Herring is a global media company which unites the world’s best high technology innovators, venture investors and business decision makers in a variety of forums: a leading innovation magazine, an online daily technology news service, technology newsletters and major events for technology leaders around the globe. Red Herring provides an insider’s access to the global innovation economy, featuring unparalleled insights on the emerging technologies driving the economy. More information about Red Herring is available http://www.redherring.com.

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Skype is a little piece of software that lets you make free calls to anyone else on Skype, anywhere in the world. Even though the calls are free, they are really excellent in quality. If you and your friends are using webcams, you can also make free video calls. Millions of individuals and businesses use Skype today. Every day, people everywhere also use Skype to make low-cost calls to landlines and mobiles.

Since recently, eBay had controlling interest in Skype. On 19 November 2009, eBay announced the sale of Skype in a deal valuing the business at $2.75 billion. The buyer, who will control an approximately 70 percent stake, is an investor group led by Silver Lake and includes Joltid Limited and certain affiliated parties, the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Andreessen Horowitz.

We decided to use Skype at Club Intimate due to its superior quality of voice and video calls and because of the fact that one could maintain their privacy by not giving away their email address to other Skype users. Skype uses usernames to connect to other Skype users.

We have integrated Skype API to provide a seamless communication tool to Club Intimate users who use this service as instant messenger, for webcam chat and for sharing files.

Instructions below will help Club Intimate users download, install and use Skype on Club Intimate.

How do I download and install Skype on my computer?
Go to Skype.com. Click on the ‘Download’ button in the header menu, Skype will automatically detect your operating system and prompt you to download Skype. Click on the ‘Download Now’ button and then chose ‘Run’ to download Skype. You will be asked to select ‘Run’ button again and then follow the instructions provided on the application to install Skype.

How do I use Skype with Club Intimate?
Start by clicking on ‘My Home’ in the top navigation menu from any Club Intimate web page. On your personal home page, click the ‘My Skype Settings’ link found on the right hand side of your primary photo. On the ‘My Skype Settings’ page, enter your Skype Name and Password. Select appropriate Skype Privacy Settings and then click the ‘Update’ button to save your new settings.

How do I Skype with other Club Intimate members?
You can initiate a Skype session with other members directly from their profile pages or from other pages such as ‘My Friends’, ‘My Favourites’ and ‘My Private Pass List’. Just click the ‘Skype Me’ link. This will launch the Skype session between you and the other member.

Happy Skyping!

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“Ping.fm is a simple and FREE service that makes updating your social networks a snap!” This is how Ping.fm promotes its services on its front page of their website. So about ten days ago I decided to take up the offer and signed up. Anyone who uses services like Ping.fm or Hellotxt will understand the value of updating their social profiles on various different social networks and bookmarking services with one click. This is exactly the outcome I was hoping to achieve.

So on the day I signed up, I set-up my social profiles at Linkedin, Facebook and Plaxo with Ping.fm. Setting up these networks with Ping.fm was a breeze.  I also tested the service by sending one status update and a blog post. To send RSS feed of my blog, I first created an account with Twitterfeed to push the feed to Ping.fm. In turn, Ping.fm sends my feed to the social networks that I have linked. Everything has worked as it should and I was very pleased with the fifteen minutes I spent setting up these services.

To my surprise however, last week I could not login to my account at Ping.fm. Initially I thought that I may have forgotten password or may be using an incorrect email address to login. Well, this wasn’t the case, Ping.fm has either deleted or suspended my account and they have done this without sending me any notification. Needless to say I was pretty upset. One would understand if I were to abuse their services or didn’t comply with their terms of services then they would have all the rights to suspend my account but this is not the case. By the way, Ping.fm does not have any terms of service document on their website. One would think that a large service like this would tell their users how their services are meant to be used. This beats me!

Feeling upset and dejected, I decided to contact Ping.fm through their contact page and asked if they have suspended or deleted my account and if they could provide a reason for doing so. One week on and I am yet to receive a reply from them.

So all in all, my experience with Ping.fm has been very poor. Well if you ask me, I am not totally surprised of the service levels I have received. This is what happens when a couple of developers set-up a successful web service who has no experience in customer service or understanding the value of a having a customers’ charter. They are probably good programmers but have no idea how to service their clients. This is probably one of the reasons why there is no terms of service document found on their website.

For me, there is always Hellotxt.

Join Club Intimate today!

Search Engine Optimisation remains a key element of internal marketing strategies for any organisation who wish to have a decent web presence. In fact, organisations spend thousands of dollars hiring SEO experts so that the volume and quality of traffic to their web site from search engines can be improved. But most of you would already know the importance of SEO optimised web sites.

In the last few days, I have been working on optimising Club Intimate pages. Whilst I could have outsourced this task to the experts, I decided to this myself. And the reason for this is, in my view,  if one wants to learn the ins and outs of a technique or a method then one must get their hands dirty by doing it themselves.

Given that Club Intimate has presence in four different geographies, all fours websites need to be optimised individually. So far I have been able to optimise two sites, Club Intimate Global and Australia. Websites for New Zealand and United Kingdom are still needing be done.

It is suffice to say that a SEO expert could have optimised Club Intimates sites quickly and perhaps with better results however I would have missed the opportunity of learning something new.

The new website is now launched. It was launched yesterday (8 September) at around 8:00pm AEST. It took about 3 hours to complete the launch process, this also included migration of user data from the existing site to the new site. No major issues were encountered. Users were able to login and use Club Intimate as they usually do.

Since the launch however, we have been engaged in the quality control process to make sure that all functionalities are working as they should. There are some known minor issues which we think will be resolved this week.

The engineering team was working till late last night and I thank them for all their efforts. This has been a long road but a major milestone has been achieved.

In my view this is the start of the journey. From next week we will start working on marketing and promotion of Club Intimate. Over time I have come up with some unique marketing concepts and will put them into practice soon.

I would also like to thank you Club Intimate members for their support and well wishes. Without their support this major milestone wasn’t possible.

Eight months in the making, Club Intimate is planning the launch if it’s new website this week. This launch could happen as early as tomorrow depending upon if the engineering team gives the go ahead.

From design to development, a lot of hard work has gone in to this new site.  This new site will represent the aspirations of its loyal users, the engineering team and my friends, family and well wishers.

During the design of this new site, I have taken into account of two major components, users’ feedback and additional interactivity between users.  I need to dedicate another blog just to talk about the new features of Club Intimate. For now, please enjoy a sneak preview of the new site.

Many people rush through the process of creating their dating profile but this is not something that you should hurry.  Your profile is the way that you let other people know who you are, what you like, and what you are looking for.
Those that rush through the process of creating their profile will find out that it is much more difficult to meet the type of people that they want to meet than it should be.  One of the most important elements of putting together a great profile is choosing the right photo.

How to Choose Your Photo
Choosing your photo for your online dating profile is actually very simple, if you let it be.  First of all, you should choose a very current photograph.  Many people have a picture of themselves from ten years ago that they really love, and while it is a great picture for your parents and your friends to have of you, it probably isn’t really representative of who you are now.  We all change as we age and the more current your photograph the better.  A good rule of thumb is not to use a picture that is more than nine to 12 months old.

Next, you should make sure that your picture is representative of who you are.  If you are a really introverted, private person you shouldn’t attempt to post nude or really sexy photographs.  Your photographs should compliment what you write on your profile, so make sure that whatever picture you post that it goes along with what you have written.  For instance, if you hate being outdoors you shouldn’t post that one picture of you when you were forced to hike with a friend!

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and this could not be truer than it is when it comes to online dating.  Your picture is often what will draw people in and allow them to learn more about you, so have a picture that is representative of who you are, and could stand alone if it had to.

A lot of people make the mistake of trying to post pictures that show their entire figure.  The main picture that you choose should be one that shows your face, front and center.  If you have the ability to post more pictures you can post full length pictures, but this isn’t necessary.  If you hit it off with someone you can always send them more pictures through email.  Just remember that if you do post many pictures to leave something to the imagination!

Join Club Intimate today!

Club Intimate takes pride in being a featured pack social dating service. Whilst Club Intimate was built in 2006, still today most of other online dating sites do not offer a comprehensive list of features as Club Intimate.

Club Intimate is a totally free service and stand tall among other free and paid dating services. Why would anyone want to pay $50 per month to a dating service where all you can do is to send offline messages and post a few topics in their forums? For those who do that, I would say ‘you are a bloody idiot’.

Listed below are some of the features currently being offered by Club Intimate. More features are coming soon.

100% FREE to Join & Use: At Club Intimate you will not pay a membership fee, because we believe that the best things in life should be FREE. Utilise all of Club Intimate’s features without paying a dime.

Join Exciting Communities of Like-minded People: Join one or all of the six exciting communities based on the kind of relationships you are looking for: Activity Partner, Dating, Friendship, Intimate Encounters, Relationship and Travel Partner.

Manage Photos: Post up to eight photos in the public folder and up to eight photos in the private folder. You decide who views your photos in the private folder. You are in total control.

Search for Matches: Search for people with interests and relationship needs similar to yours in one or all of our six communities. Like other online dating services, you can also search by region, personality traits and physical traits to find people you’re interested in meeting.

Save Favourite Searches: Like the results you found using particular search criteria? Save your favourite searches and reuse them again when you need to.

View Compatibility Results: Our advanced matchmaking system eliminates the guess work from looking for compatible matches. Easily view profiles of other members with compatibility scores similar to yours.

Send Winks: Don’t know what to say when contacting another member for the first time? Send Winks to them as icebreakers and let them respond. Select your favourite Wink message from our huge selection; there’s one to fit everybody.

Send Messages: Send and receive messages to communicate with other members through Club Intimate’s secure messaging system. No need to give out your personal email address and risk your privacy. You may also save incomplete messages in the ‘Drafts’ folder.

Live Webcam Chat with Skype: Chat with other Club Intimate members over Skype’s instant messaging service. Enjoy superior voice and video quality from Skype without revealing your identity or personal contact information.

Invite Friends: Invite your friends to join Club Intimate and make it a deeper and richer community.

Rate Photos: Rank and rate photos of other members. Give top marks to your favourite members and increase their popularity. Include your own photos to photo ranking and become popular and well-known.

Write Blogs: Blogs are the easiest way to express yourself on the Web. Blog space is free with your profile and Club Intimate makes it easy for your friends to find your Blog and know what you’re up to!

Participate in Forums: Be heard. Participate in forums and write and reply to other members on topics close to your heart. Let the world know how you feel on a certain subject.

Create Events: Having a birthday party or just want to get together with friends? You can create events and invite your friends to attend. Receive RSVP alerts and read your friends’ responses and comments.

Manage Friends: Manage your friends’ profiles from one convenient location. Send them messages directly from the ‘My Friends’ page.

Manage Favourites: Identify and manage your favourite profiles from one convenient web page. Add or delete profiles of prospective matches.

Receive Matches by Email: Select your match preferences and ‘Matchmaker Mail’ will send you matches by email.

Opt-in to Receive Hot Deals: Opt-in to Club Intimate promotions and receive hot deals from our business partners. Save a ton of money on products and services useful to you. Cancel opt-in promotions at any time-you are in complete control.

Quality Control: Quality members are essential to the success of the Club Intimate communities. We individually screen every member’s profile content and photos to validate their legitimacy and prevent dangerous and undesirable people from interfering with your Club Intimate experience.

Privacy & Security: Your privacy is of great importance to us. Our technology, platform and policies are designed to protect you and your personal information and are used only in accordance with our Privacy Policy. You’re in control of who receives your information at all times.

Join Club Intimate today!

Welcome to the official blog of Club Intimate!

Our aim is to keep you abreast with Club Intimate news and updates together with online dating industry news, social web and technology in general.

Club Intimate was officially launched on 16 December 2006. Since then thousands of people from around the world have joined Club Intimate and have enjoyed the best social dating experience one can get.

So what is Club Intimate? Club Intimate is a global social dating service that caters for people seeking serious or casual relationships or just looking to make some new friends.

Club Intimate has set itself apart from other online dating services by combining traditional features of online dating with new, interactive social networking features that allow you to easily find people with common interests and get to know them. We’re building communities in which you can participate and socialise online.

Club Intimate has localised presence in Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom and United States. Local site for Canada is coming soon.

Club Intimate is 100% FREE to join and use!  Yes, that’s right; you don’t have to pay a membership fee.  All of Club Intimate’s features for finding and meeting the person of your dreams are completely free.  Advertising revenue maintains Club Intimate’s daily operations, expansions and future enhancements, so checking out the ads at Club Intimate directly benefits your online experience.

Join Club Intimate today!