Seeking Arrangement

Some people say money can’t buy you love or happiness. Other people say any sexual or romantic relationship is actually just a business agreement at heart. The folks behind Seeking.com seem to agree with the latter, or at least they expect you to. The top of the landing page says it’s Where Beautiful, Successful People Fuel Mutually Beneficial Relationships. That’s a little vague, but the next section talks about Sugar Daddy Benefits.

For the dense, retarded or undermedicated, let me spell it out: this ain’t a dating website for poor folks. Well, poor chicks are free to sign up, provided you look good or at least suck a mean dick. Potential sugar daddies looking to score on Seeking.com will need money in their pockets.

What Sugar Daddy Benefits?

First of all, the odds are stacked in favor of dudes. They’ve got a cute little icon to explain they’ve got “4 Sugar Babies Per Sugar Daddy.” A cutesy pair of scissors cutting a string redefines the expectations of the relationship in clip art format. There’s a glowing heart that looks almost religious with text offering “upfront and honest arrangements with someone who will cater to your needs.”

Below that are the Sugar Baby Benefits. The ladies can Find a Mentor, Date Experienced Men, and Be Pampered. These are illustrated with a cartoon sign pointed toward SUCCESS, what looks like the graphic from a novelty tuxedo t-shirt, and a shopping bag with a red ribbon on it.

Basic expectations about a sugar daddy relationship really make a hell of a sales pitch, especially when coupled with the web 2.0 graphics. Some young designer made his parents proud and helped a lot of rich guys get blown.

Anyone can offer anything, but Seeking lets you know they’re legit by mentioning all their mentions. They’ve been featured in The New York Times, Forbes, CNN, and a few other big ones. Plus, they’ve been around since 2006, so they’re no fly-by-night operation.

You’d think a site revolving around rich dudes getting laid would at least charge the rich dudes, but the button says I can Join Free. They’ve got to get their buck somewhere, but I’m curious how far I can get for free. Who knows? I might decide I need a sugar baby of my own.

Sugar Daddies, Sugar Mommies, and Sugar Babies

It’s an inclusive site, so they also ask if you’re into Men, Women, or Both. I guess tranny fans are out of luck, though they’re easy to find on any traditional escort site.

The final question before you get a profile asks you to sign up with your Facebook account or an email address. You can get a free upgrade just by using an .edu email address, because college girls are beautiful and in need of a wealthy gentleman’s financial help and stiff penis.

Most of the profile information you’ll enter is typical dating site stuff. They want to know when you were born, where you live, how much schooling you’ve had and how much you drink. Don’t worry, the options are kind of vague. You don’t have to confess that you butt-chug a pint of whiskey every night.

The final set of questions starts nailing down what you’re looking for in a relationship. These are slightly different depending on whether you’re trying to become a sugar daddy or sugar baby, but boil down to time commitments, how much emotional connection you want, and whether you’re going to provide or demand a luxury lifestyle.

Seeking’s whole design demands less of the polite dance people do when trying to get into a relationship. This is for people who not only know what they want, but are willing to say it outright at the very beginning. It seems like this can save people a lot of time, but it does require a certain amount of bending against social norms. No big deal for somebody reading ThePornDude, am I right?

That said, nothing feels overly business-like. The arrangements are in clearer black and white terms, but it doesn’t feel like an escort site. This is just a dating site for a couple of specific demographics that meet in the middle, bonding over money.

Thirsty, Broke Bitches Looking

By default, Seeking shows you members in a 250-mile radius. That seems wide, but it goes up to 1,000. It makes sense, because rich motherfuckers are definitely willing to travel for it. The default works for me, though, because I’ve already got 306 results to choose from.

A bunch of the ladies had blank profile pics, so I filtered those out, leaving a couple hundred. Next, I narrowed them down to ages 18-29, leaving about a hundred. I filtered out about 20 non-drinkers because they usually don’t do anal in my experience. Another 30 got cut because they had rugrats running around.

That still left 40 broads. You know what? It really looks like there are a lot of college students here. The filters on the side of the screen show options for background checks, premium or diamond accounts, or chicks who have viewed me. I can choose height, education or hair color, but some options are locked.

The Relationship Status, Ethnicity, Income, and Net Worth filters are all locked for Premium users only. You can’t search the profile text with Premium access either, which could be a real bummer. On the other hand, shouldn’t the kind of guy aspiring to be a sugar daddy have a few bucks to spend getting there?

What’s A Few Bucks Get You?

The regular price is about twenty bucks, billed every month. There’s also a 90-day option that saves you a few Washingtons a month. That’s an appetizer at a fancy dinner. If you can’t afford that, you probably can’t afford to date any of the women here. They’re looking for dudes who can buy them better food than chicken nuggets. This is the cocaine crowd, not the meth set.

The Premium Benefits include those search filters, read message receipts and better privacy. The upsell mentions an ad-free experience, but apparently my AdBlock took care of that for me. The spam tally in the corner of my browser says 22, but I didn’t see any ads.

If you’re trying to get laid on Seeking, a membership has to be worth it. Do you think any sugar baby wants some broke-ass loser who can’t even afford a Premium membership on a dating website?

Seeking.com definitely isn’t a dating website for everyone, and it knows that. One of its major appeals is that it cuts through a lot of the bullshit you expect when looking for any kind of relationship. That’s reflected all over the site, from the profile setup questions to the fact that Net Worth is displayed in the search results right next to height and body type.

Traffic is the biggest indicator that a website does what it claims to, and Seeking got almost 7 million views last month. Rich dudes looking for sugar babies will find a rich source of them here.