The UK is slowly emerging from lockdown, blinking, into the early summer sun, and stumbling straight into (where else?) pubs up and down our fair isle. The nation’s capital is once again alive with the sounds of laughter, dropped pint glasses, endless chat about the British weather, and it’s bloody wonderful. Soon we’ll also – finally – get to hear the sounds of live music again, as concerts make a return and nightclubs throw open their doors to revellers, ravers, rockers and everyone else. As we return to some sort of normality, those looking for love ask themselves: where do we start? What do we want to do? And with who? Do we dance the night away after a few too many pints? Go for a slightly awkward candlelit dinner for two before watching our favourite band? As the chains fall and our social lives can finally include more than a walk around the local park alone, the UK’s most hotly anticipated new dating app is set to launch, what better way to lose yourself in two of life’s greatest gifts – love and music. Time to introduce POM!
POM truly believes that music is the food of love and that by harnessing the Power of Music, we can create real and organic connections that are built to last. While dating apps are continuously updating and developing, they are often superficial, gamified, and impersonal. POM focuses instead on users forging connections through their shared music tastes, allowing their users to see a person’s true, emotional profile instead of a series of facetuned photos and misleading bios, bringing back the organic nature of meeting someone. POM not only want to help their users to find love, its more than that. It’s about creating and delivering genuine, life changing moments and through the curation of perfect end-to-end dating experiences.
POM users sign up and connect their music streaming service (the initial launch is compatible with Spotify and Apple Music) to their profile, allowing their tastes to then be analysed by POM’s algorithms. Simple to use but seriously advanced under the hood, it’s not as simple as “you like this, I like this, we’re a match” – POM goes deeper, and is smarter. POM uses a first of it’s kind algorithm in order to determine the users emotional profile based on the music they listen to. A dating app unlike any other, they are set to launch on 27th July, but the website www.discoverpom.com and socials are already live. Within just a few days of the waiting list going live, thousands signed up, driven by a flurry of marketing activity including billboards all over London and competitions on social media. Spaces will be limited to 25,000 users on launch to ensure a smooth and safe onboarding.
Exclusively inclusive, POM wants to help you find love, no matter your gender identity or sexual orientation. If you’re a music lover, you’re welcome on POM. As well as inclusivity being imperative to POM, they also ensure that safety is prioritised above everything. POM has been designed to be a safe-place – it is extremely important to the creators that they go above and beyond to protect their users, both on the app and in real life. They have implemented multiple features, including users being able to leave anonymous feedback about their real-life date, various reporting features and additional verification methods.
POM was created by young, up-and-coming entrepreneur Vihan Patel, who teamed up with his now co-founder Vladimir Ignatyev. Vihan recently graduated from Cardiff University where he had hosted a range of club nights around the country and was running an event featuring a music genre different to the other events he’d put on previously. This experience delivered a eureka moment and showed Vihan that the music we listen to has a fundamental impact on who we are, from what we wear, drink, who we spend our time with, and especially who we create relationships with. Vihan was inspired to think about creating an app that utilises the power of music to help bring people together. He felt that too many dating apps today focus purely on the way someone looks, or a competition of who has been on the most glamorous holiday. There were no dating apps that were truly forging meaningful connections on the one most important thing, emotion. Vihan knew what he had to do, and POM was born. POM is about being who you are, and there’s no escaping that.
“The beautiful thing about music is that it transcends race, religion, language, and every other barrier you care to think of. Music is truly universal. I could play a song to 100 different people from 100 different countries and they would all be able to feel it and take something away from it emotionally. POM is fundamentally built to be global and to change the way people approach and think about dating apps. Superficial means of dating are a fad and real, genuine connections are the ones that last” Vihan Patel, POM’s Founder and CEO.