What is the key to a good date? How do you know if you should go on a second date? When is the best time to start dating?
Abby Rosenblum ’11 has answers to these questions (don’t worry, we’ll share them with you), and that’s why she quit her job as a TV news producer and started her own matchmaking business. It’s also how she found her own match.
Thanks to skills, intuition, and some good timing, her business—The Social: Modern Matchmaking—has taken off.
“My business grew exponentially in 2020 and has continued to grow,” says Rosenblum, who attended Colorado Academy from Ninth through Twelfth Grade. “The pandemic accelerated my business, because there was no way to meet anyone in person. People needed matchmakers more than ever before.”
Now, in addition to hosting a podcast and leading her own media booking company, she leads a team of four who work to help connect singles in Colorado.
“We’re bringing more love into the world!” she says.
From serial dater to happily married
While Rosenblum is happily married and a successful entrepreneur, the idea for her business was born out of her own frustrations in dating.
“I was a total serial dater,” says the fifth-generation Coloradan. “It was so hard to find a good guy.”
She met her now-husband through a dating app—it took 6 months and, according to her estimate, 75-100 dates.
“It was a saga to sort through all these people and find the right person,” says Rosenblum, who got married in September 2021. “I saw my single friends doing this too, and I thought, ‘Why isn’t there a better way?’”
She knew that matchmaking was often a part of Jewish culture, and she wanted to make it something helpful and accessible to anyone—an alternative to dating apps. So, she created her company, The Social: Modern Matchmaking, and she wants you to know, “Matchmaking isn’t just for celebrities and older people.”
How does matchmaking work?
Rosenblum says her work as a matchmaker is about half research and half intuition.
In her initial interviews with a client, she records their goals, values, dreams, and what they’re looking for in dating. She also feels their energy and tries to sense how they’ll “show up” on a date.
“I have a unique ability to help people feel comfortable in sharing information about themselves,” she says, “and my TV background and interview skills help me draw out each client’s individual truth, as well as get that great sound bite to tell their story.”
She works to help people figure out what they really want from dating—which may be different from what they’d originally thought. Sometimes, she incorporates astrology to make meaningful connections.
“There’s a lot that goes into it,” says the Syracuse University graduate, “but there’s no science to matchmaking. If I figure that out, I will be a billionaire.”
But business stats indicate her approach is getting close to scientific.
According to surveys, 100 percent of her clients feel comfortable on their first date and 75 percent of first dates lead to a second date.
Rosenblum and her team host singles events to give people opportunities to connect. They help clients get a great photo for their profile and connect them with additional resources to support them on their dating journey—from stylists and personal trainers to dating coaches and therapists.
“We provide a whole community to make people feel confident and awesome,” she says.
Dating tips to live by
When Rosenblum has located a match for a client, she sends them off with some dating advice. Here are her top three dating tips:
- The best time to start dating: when you feel really great about being single! When you’re content with yourself and being by yourself, you’ll be searching for a partner from a place of abundance, rather than a place of desperation.
- The key to a great first date: be present! Put your phone away, listen and ask questions more than you talk about yourself, and set an intention for your date. This intention could be very simple—to laugh, have fun, meet someone new, or try a new restaurant. (Your intention can’t be to “find the one.” Then you’re coming from that place of desperation.)
- How to know when a first date should move on to a second date: the 3 Cs! After a first date, ask yourself three basic questions: Are they cute? Am I comfortable around them? Am I curious to get to know them more? If so, you should continue seeing this person.
You can find more tips like these on Rosenblum’s podcast, Ghosted, about being single and navigating the modern dating world.
Reaching what seems out of reach
Rosenblum says she’s always been “a total people person,” all the way back to her time as a student at CA.
“I loved all the friendships I made at CA,” says Rosenblum, who has several fellow CA alumni in her family, including her father Greg Rosenblum ’78, her sister Emma Rosenblum ’13, an uncle, and a cousin. “I give credit to CA and its teachers for having that community closeness.”
Among her favorite CA memories are traveling with the Girls Tennis Team to state tournaments, being team captain her Senior year, and making her younger sister pick up tennis balls at practice. She also remembers a Senior-year project that related directly to her future TV career.
“We had to create something that showed what we wanted to do with our life, and I knew I wanted to be in TV, so I created a whole newscast,” she says. “That showed me that I could do something that seemed totally out of reach. At CA, they instilled the idea that you could do anything that you tried hard at.”
Now, she’s trying hard to spread more love through matchmaking. She’s even had some fellow CA alumni reach out to her for matchmaking services. And she loves helping others find love.
“Matchmaking can be difficult and very frustrating,” she says, “but when someone finds their person, it’s the most rewarding thing ever.”