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[amazonv]

Tips for single straight men on dating sites

Read her profile, introduce yourself with a quick question about something in her profile or at least a comment about it.

Simply saying hi, wanna talk, your cute, etc. will get you ignored

Don't proposition for sex, want sex? try adult friend finder or similar sites (there are many) that will be targeting only women who want sex, you'll have better luck

Try to use full works and not text massage speak, at least in your first few messages

Have at least one picture, try and have it of your whole face, forehead only is weird. A whole body shot (with clothes!) is also helpful. yes it is shallow but most people won't date someone they aren't physically attracted to. Admit it you do the same.

Comments

[hasufin]

I can't say for certain whether or not my experience is representative, though I suspect it is.

What you're suggesting are good first steps in general. But, following them doesn't actually help much, if at all. This is because they're almost all "don't". And don'ts are fine. These are all things that someone on a dating site probably shouldn't do.

Not doing any of those things, and the one do of showing that one has read your profile, don't really provide any impetus to respond.

So, knowing that I do as you suggest, I'm moderately confident that my messages aren't met with an eyeroll and "Oh god, another creep.". My messages are more likely met with "Huh."

But I still don't get very many responses.

Now, I have a suspicion that there really isn't any "strategy" that gets good responses. In many ways online dating is like online job boards, and like job boards, something that might be considered an asset to one person might be detrimental to another.

That being said, I think maybe you should ask not simply "What are these guys doing that they shouldn't?" but also "What do I wish they would do?" What would you like to see from someone's message that would make you want to respond? Beyond your turn-offs, what are your turn-ons?

[amazonv]

True this wasn't a what to do, I was just pointing out things that get people auto ditched.

it doesn't promise a response, but might get you not tossed with the rest of the trash.

People who have gotten emails from me sent a few sentences about a thing in my profle

example "hey, love the corset, it's a TARDIS right? i've seen the new dr who, who is your favorite doctor" or "That's greta like you like to go shooting, do you own your own guns? what are you favorite things to shoot"

call out a common interest and ask a question to prompt a response.

that generally gets me to read their profile

I may then not respond

If they want kids, seem overly catholic / religious / smoker / etc I toss them at that point but i have spent a few minutes reading and thinking

If things mesh I then try and answer their question, and follow up with some question i had about their profile...and it goes from there

as you pointed out - each person is different and one strategy may work on a few people but will fail on others

which is mostly why i gave don't b/c i think many girls (plus i talk to girls sometimes) will / do respond to these the same way....where each girl may "click" another way

[hasufin]

It's a lot easier to focus on the negatives, isn't it?

I guess I have a hard time wrapping my head around the fool things people do on these sites.

Personally I try to always respond; my feeling is that it's possible that the person who sent me the message is a shy person for whom managing to take the initiative is a significant expenditure of emotional resources - but, I don't GET very many messages, so giving each one a polite, personal response is not terribly difficult; that policy would probably go out the window if I suffered a deluge of messages. Sometime I am tempted to ignore, on account of "Why the FUCK did you message me? You're far-right, crazy denomination of Christian, you want lots of kids, and you live in Bumfuck, PA. Did you even look at my profile???" and I'm trying to find a polite way to say that. Though the ones I really feel like crap over are the moderately compatible sort that I just don't find attractive; I have yet to find a way to respond that I'm comfortable with.

What I find most frustrating about the whole process is that for the most part it feels like sending out messages in bottles - I drop it out there, nothing happens. I have no way of knowing if the message was received, if it was read, if the other person shares a language with me, if it got ignored due to an incorrect assumption, or a correct assessment, or what. There's no feedback, and there's no agency to get interaction. Which is just the way the system is set up, but it's terribly frustrating.