Known Uses Voice AI to Help You Go on More In-Person Dates

Celeste Amadon and Asher Allen were working on an app that used AI to book restaurants for dates when they stumbled on a bigger idea: encouraging people to meet in person. And now it's catching on with investors.
The duo created a voice-powered AI onboarding system for their app that enabled them to learn more about users without requiring them to fill out a form. What they discovered: People loved to talk, which increased the average onboarding session length to 26 minutes. That is how San Francisco-based dating startup Known was born.

"Our take is that for the first time, we could know enough about somebody to serve them a date that would make sense. And if we could do that much faster with less rejection rate, we could create a user experience that could get people out on more dates," she said.

And early results suggested they were on to something. During its test phase in San Francisco, Known reported that 80% of its introductions led to in-person dates, much higher than the rate for swipe-based dating apps. Buoyed by these signals, the startup has raised $9.7 million from investors, including Forerunner, NFX, Pear VC, and Coelius Capital. Notably, this is Forerunner's first investment in a dating app.

"Celeste is a really thoughtful founder who understands the mindset of the consumer, which is a young female, to be honest. There are other people who can be focused on the male demographic, but she is focused on the young female who has a lot of unspoken desires and needs that, if you put them in a profile, they would never say, this versus that. And I think in a conversation, you can get a lot of those nuances out, but in the past, the conversation required a $10,000 matchmaker," Eurie Kim, a partner at Forerunner, told TechCrunch.

Amadon said she has long been interested in social impact at scale and believes dating is one of the most significant problems facing her generation.
"There've been a million pieces written about the loneliness epidemic in the U.S. And I do really think that it's our generation's largest problem," said Amadon, who, along with Allen, dropped out of Stanford to build the startup.

The app, which is in beta testing in San Francisco, uses voice AI-powered onboarding to ask users several questions without requiring them to fill out any forms. Amadon said that, because of this modality, the startup can better understand users and provide them with great matches, with one user's onboarding clocking in at 1 hour and 38 minutes.
According to Known, when people typed their responses out, they would edit them. With voice, the onboarding is more personable. The company's AI can ask dynamic follow-ups based on the conversation. For instance, if someone has newly moved to the city, the AI can ask them what they like and dislike about their experience thus far.

Once the onboarding is complete, the AI suggests potential matches to users. They can ask AI agents about those profiles. If they like a profile, they can tap on "interested." When two people are matched, they have 24 hours to accept the introduction and 24 hours to agree to a date. The company said that, with this mechanism, the app aims to prevent lingering chats and ghosting while encouraging people to meet in person. After their dates, users can provide feedback to the AI to receive more refined match recommendations.

Known hasn't completely ditched the restaurant idea. The app also helps users pick restaurants based on their likes and dislikes. Using the AI chat and calendar integrations, users can also indicate their availability for the first dates. In the beta phase, the company charged $30 per successful date. However, the startup is not set on pricing and said it will experiment with different models to determine which payment model works best.

Today, the startup has three full-time engineers and four people working on go-to-market, with several contractors across all areas. Amadon, whose previous experience includes internships in politics, and Allen, who worked on product at the AI-powered online shopping app Phia, plan to bolster headcount with this funding.
Known is currently testing in San Francisco and plans to launch early next year.

Several other startups, including Overtone and Hingetter, are using the eusingeer and better, some users claim to offer bespoke matchmaking services that cost thousands of dollars at a fraction of the price. Incumbents such as Tinder, Bumble, and Hinge are also rolling out AI features to keep their user bases engaged. Despite the growing number of startups, Amazon welcomes the competition.
"When it comes to other startup dating products, I've been so happy to see a lot of people building in the space because I think it shows that it's time to shift away from a swipe-based model. And I think most of them that I've seen have been pretty different from what we're building at Known," she said.