I don’t think I will categorize matrimonial sites as social networks.

“you create a profile, you browse or search for other people with similar interests and you connect with them online or offline”

This is true, but one looks for a particular type of user (generally opposite sex), which means the user base is divided into 2 segments.

Although you can create a free profile with most of the sites (you can’t do much with it though), but the site’s aim is to funnel you into buying the *premium* membership. So, I think the revenue models are different than a regular SN.

There is no community aspect in matrimonial sites, which is the main focus of a SN. The relationships are based on one-to-one than being a group.

People visit Matrimony sites and Dating sites for a particular goal - get married or find a date. Once the goal is achieved, the user does not return back. Whereas SN are used for general communication and not to achieve a goal.

A lot of relatives/friends use matrimonial sites on behalf of the ‘user’, which beats the whole purpose of user interacting with other users.

Sorry for the long comment. I’ll write another comment on my take on Indian focused SNs.

@Danesh: Yes, I agree, great marketing will get people to sign-up for a service, but only a unique content or sevice offering will get people to stay and re-visit on a regular basis.

@Nitin: That may be true for twenty-something Indians like us living in a metro, because our social dynamics have more or less converged with the West. However, I’m talking about a bigger opportunity — to tap into the older, non-metro, non-English-speaking, non-broadband, maybe non-Internet user — that the present Indian social networking sites are missing out on.

Indian social networks can differentiate themselves along three different dimensions — social dynamics, language or access — and I haven’t seen much initiative along any of these.

Nitin
http://www.my2dimes.com/