Dear Anon-O-Box,
It is mentioned in several places that women on dating sites are inundated with emails and (ugh) winks. I don’t seem to suffer from this problem. I get absolutely no response; emails, winks, rotten tomatoes or otherwise. Not even creeps or scammers bother me.
I have a picture (it isn’t the greatest, but I don’t look like a swamp beast), and a passing grasp of the English language. And those are just the basic qualifications!
What am I doing wrong?
Signed,
Single Female Dallasite
e answers:
Dear SFD,
Hmmmm… well, you’ve certainly given me a bit of a stumper. Without looking at your actual profile, all I can do is make some random guesses. Let me put on my Miss Cleo outfit and my best faux-Jamaican accent and try to predict some of the things you may be doing wrong… and like a real psychic, maybe I’ll hit on a fact or two!
*crystal ball*
“I have a picture”
This statement leads me to believe that you have “a” picture on your profile, as in… ONE picture. I really hope this isn’t the case. You see, guys have noticed that profiles with only one picture tend to be scammer profiles. Especially if the woman is attractive. You say you’re not a swamp beast, which probably means you’re somewhat pleasant to the eye and attractive in the eyes of a subsection of the male population. Thus, guys who are attracted to that one picture may feel worried that you’re a scammer.
The alternative worry (and the one my male clients bring up to me frequently when they find a one-picture profile) is this:
“What if this is the ONLY good picture of her? She must be some sort of swamp beast if there’s only ONE good picture of her, right? I don’t want to email her saying I’m interested and then have to eat my words if she sends more pics and she’s totally a swamp beast.”
When given the choice of ignoring you or possibly hurting your feelings down the road, the majority of men will choose to ignore you. Give them everything they need to make an informed decision.
Moral: If you’re not a swamp beast and not a scammer, put up more than one photo. Four is the magic number: One face, one full body, one activity/travel shot and one of your choice.
“I don’t look like a swamp beast”
We’ve all gone the self-deprecating route, myself included. It’s a game we all play, in hopes that our friends will give us a little ego boost. We’ve all gone fishing for compliments and most of the time, we’ve succeeded.
But just like you shouldn’t write to a potential employer with the attitude of, “I’m not the worst accountant you’ve ever seen…” you shouldn’t go into online dating likening your appearance to slightly above a monster from a B-grade horror flick.
Whether you voice that opinion directly or not, it colors your writing. It makes little changes in the spirit of your profile and nudges the reader into thinking that you don’t think very highly of yourself.
When given the choice of a woman who projects self-worth and one who doesn’t, the majority of men will go with the more positive choice. Nobody wants to spend a relationship having to constantly boost the other person’s ego.
Moral: Focus on what you are and what you do well. Get rid of the negatives, the not’s, the no’s, the don’t's.
The inundation, not every girl gets it
While the average woman receives exponentially more emails than the average man, not every woman is going to suffer from a perpetually full inbox. I certainly didn’t. While I got my share of first contact emails, there were times when my mailbox was a bit lonely.
What did I do? I went out looking for profiles of men that interested me and I emailed them.
The men who replied almost always expressed surprise to have received a first contact email and said they hardly ever have women email them first. Want to stand out as a single woman online? Email guys first.
Moral: If you’re not receiving emails, start sending them.
How’d Miss Cleo Do?
SFD, if you’re feeling brave enough to post a link to your profile below, maybe we can all help you improve it a bit. Or hey, maybe the perfect Dallas gentleman will be reading this article… you never know!
About Anon-O-Box
Yeah, I’m curious about her profile, too
Dear SFD: If I lived in Texas, I would totally mail you, picture or no, because you seem funny and interesting.
Of course, seeing as how I live in Florida, I am half-tempted to write a profile titled “Swamp Beast seeking future Mrs Swamp Beast,” just to see the replies I’d get. It would probably be a thunderous apathetic silence, but hey….
I vote number 3!
One of the first women I contacted via online dating was not only not a swamp beast, but incredibly attractive. I mentioned something about all women being flooded with messages. She went so far as to post a list of her most recently received messages. I had been receiving more first contact messages their her.
Sure, I’d love to see her prof myself. As a seasoned web denizen and viewer of many a maligned and not so maligned dating sites I can personally tell you this; Trumped up profiles are just as annoying and bothersome as the neglected ones. Problem is, the profile is written by the person its about. AutoProf? This is a hopelessly flawed approach. Polishing the angle that everyone sees of you, and what you want them to see of you, is narcissism. Unfortunately, its not always futile; With the evidence of disrupted and destroyed relationships and families I’d say the goal is sometimes achieved. Furthermore proving what everyone believes and that is never true. Nobody is perfect. SFD, just be completely honest. Remember to point out what YOU feel makes you a good person, not what you think gets you dates. Someone should point out the difference between ‘Dating’ and ‘Relationship’ sites. And something of a thought, over glamorized profs totally make a person seem unapproachable. Far out of reach.
Here is an entertaining analogy; I work with trucks. One thing in our industry we have found is that people are willing to pay big bucks for trucks that LOOK good. They could and do care less about the maintenance and how efficient the thing runs. As far as they are concerned those are things they can fix themselves on a later date and at their leisure. Not to elaborate more but do you know how much that comes back to bite everyone on the butt? In the end, they could have gone older, uglier, heavier, but running with a powerful ‘heart’ and saved themselves a lot of grief.
>“I don’t look like a swamp beast”
>We’ve all gone the self-deprecating route, myself included. It’s a game we all play, in hopes that our friends will give us a little ego boost. We’ve all gone fishing for compliments and most of the time, we’ve succeeded.<
Where do you come up with that? I hate to tell you, some of us have been told we are nasty looking all our lives. Some of us are (unfortunately) and the more gullible of us believe it. For a lot of us that is what starts us down the path of geekdom (fortunately it has its rewards). Not only that, but it is by our very nature that (you people, not me) humans are always struggling to feel valuable by putting others down. So when we aren't 'fishing for compliments' our friends are usually 'good heartedly teasing' us with jabs.
I would agree with you that more pictures is a good thing. ESPECIALLY more pictures with other people. Indicating the ability to hold friendships and providing other clues to who the person is.
If you're looking for responses, I'll tell you what. Just drop a prof on a 'hookup' site. You will get tons of responses. NONE of them will you want to see to fruition.
I'm sorry I've proved myself definitely a geek right? Hehehe.