The sad truth is you aren’t a woman. Based on 2 firsthand testimonials (i know thats not a ‘real’ survey) of people who put ads up and had female friends put ads up, the women got about 20 replies a week, the men only got about 1 or 2. Maybe.
Basically (and i could be totally wrong here. If i am, tell me), women get swamped with emails from men, and most likely they just ignore 99% of them or just view them as a self confidence booster rather than an opportunity for a human relationship.
I honestly don’t know how to crack that nut, thats why i abhor dating rituals. I don’t know how to avoid coming across ‘another guy who wants me, i must be pretty’ and become ‘that guy is interesting, i want to talk to him’.
I guess you have to find a way to keep them interested in you as a person for a few weeks before you propose a telephone number. This supposedly involves listening to what they say, and giving it back to them. It builds rappaport & trust.
Just a follow-up. I showed your profile to a several women friends of mine, all but one Christian - though they are not devout. They thought you looked nice and liked the profile overall, but the Christian bent was a turn off. This is not to say that you shouldn’t have it in your profile - you should. It’s just that it may be another factor that will limit many responses right off the bat. Again, this is good because you obviously want to attract a very specific segment of the dating population. So don’t be discourage by a low turnout. You set the criteria specific enough that you are going to weed out a lot of people, I should think.
I think it’s good that you put the Christian thing in, given that it’s important to you. It would be a deal-breaker for me, but that’s just me. I’d rather know about it up front. I think it would make a devoutly Christian woman much more likely to respond, which is a good thing for you.
As far as the income thing, I was always taught that income was not to be discussed publicly.
I was inspired by this thread to check out some online dating sites. I searched using my own real criteria (except for the part about being married of course) to see if I got any hits that I would have responded to. I actually didn’t like what I found at match.com at all. I don’t think I would have responded to any of the ads. At Nerve.com, on the other hand, I got a lot of really great results. On just the first page I found 3 or 4 that I would have responded to! Maybe Nerve just attracts people who are more like me than the people at Match. Who knows? I just thought I’d report my findings.
So then, jsut for giggles, I put in criteria as if I were my brother. He doesn’t do personals, but I thought it would be fun to do some window shopping on his behalf. Anyway, one of the ads that popped up was someone I knew in college! I hadn’t thought of her in years, and then for some reason she came up in conversation with my best buddy lastweek. And then I found her ad. Weird, huh?
One thing I noticed about your ad (and this may be nitpicky, but it would be a negative point for me) is that you have a lot of sentence fragments that disrupted the flow of reading your ad. Oh yeah, you spelled “fundamentalist” and “skeptical” wrong - that would almost automatically eliminate you from my dating pool. I am as strict on spelling and grammar for these things as I would be on a résumé.
I didn’t really like this part:
“Sometimes I’m a contradiction. A poet of order. A skepical fundementalist. A pragmatist who chases ideals. I am a riddle in search of an answer; perhaps the answer may be you.”
I think there is a better way to say this - this kind of had me rolling my eyes, and I didn’t understand what you were trying to say.
Over all, good profile. You had some specifics requirements (good idea to meet a good match) and some of your personality showed through; I give it 3 1/2 stars out of five. And I agree about losing the specific amount of your income; just say “professional” or “unspecified” if the profile allows that. I would also put a few more quirks in; things that will make a potential reader relate to you as more than just a pretty face :D.
I just wanted to say thanks, and follow up. Your advice has really helped a lot; I’ve had considerably more responses since I changed the emails I’ve been sending, and made a few other adjustments. And thanks for the heads-up about my spelling, Featherlou!.
Matt, if you find your ad, use the “email this to a friend” feature, email it to yourself, and post that link, it won’t time out.
On responses, something simple, but not always obvious, it to use a non-generic subject line. If a woman opens up her mailbox, and has 20 responses, the one that says something other than “Hi,” “Hello” or “I liked your ad,” will be opened first.
Sounds like you’re already getting a better response though!
For the record, this is from a gay mans perspective.
I had absolutely awful experiences with them. Lots of lies, lots of shallow people, and LOTS of flakes. I had pretty much sworn off of them, regarding them as a huge waste of time.
Then, right as i was about to give up on them, I met my current boyfriend. He is the most amazing person I have ever known and we are very in love. We have been together for 6 months and it just keeps getting better.
All in all, it was a hell of an investment of time. Then again, I despise the club scene and don’t have many other outlets to meet people. I’m glad I stuck with it as long as I did because it paid off.
