Dating Websites

[Bobby H]

Have you used one? What do you think of them?

I'll give you my story real quick. They've been nothing but trouble for me. I click and click and click and click on women I'm interested in, but never once have I gotten a response of any kind from one. I clicked on one today to try to IM her, and she replied, "I'm busy" and disappeared. They won't even bother to look at my profile! Apparently my face is enough to scare them away.

I occasionally get a click from a girl, but I've never gotten one I was interested in. It makes me feel like a jerk, because my not responding is as bad as what happened to me.

And the other thing that always happens to me on these sites! The spam bots. It seems like I get messages from spam bots that are trying to lure me to inappropriate contentographic websites or steal money from me.

To summarize: dating websites have been nothing but a horrible experience for me for over 10 years now, and I keep coming back for more.

 

[Jupiter Drops]

I never used one.

To each to his own.

 

[Sketcher]

Some sites are better than others. Some of those sites are really bad, there are people who own dozens of those domains and share the content (pictures, etc) between them. Of course, this means that if one of them gets hacked, all of them get hacked. Which may or may not be justice.

Note: I do not know this to be true of the biggest names out there.

 

[PetLuv]

They are good for filling boring times in your life, but for any kind of actual contact with people - look for something else.
Friend of mine had good luck with "meetup". You pick an outing that appeals to you and you get to meet a small group of people and make new friends.

He's trying to get me to try it, but even just friends are too much for me to deal with now.

 

[FearlessHeart]

Never used one. Do you find it difficult to approach women in real life? Just curious

 

[sparkydave]

I've used them, I don't anymore. My experience was much like yours, very few replies. I found out that odds of getting a reply are generally low for most folks (less than 10%) anyway, so don't take it personally. I just decided life was too short to spend time and money fishing for someone on line, and the few things I actually hooked weren't keepers.

 

[yaeer1942]

The more you approche, more will reply. Never give up.

 

[Messy]

Apparently my face is enough to scare them away.

Hahaha, you're funny. Oh how I hate those datingsites. Never again in my whole life. The only ones interested were idiots.
No, I've found something else now when I feel lonely: I'm trying to convert atheists on a FreeThinker forum.

 

[JoyfulSerenity]

I've tried them before and met a few people from them, but it's never worked out for me. A couple times people didn't turn out to be who they advertised themselves to be. Thank goodness for always meeting in very public places.

 

[Messy]

Thank goodness for always meeting in very public places.

 

[JoyfulSerenity]

I doubt I will use dating sites again. It's been quite some time since I've last used one, and at this point, I'm content to let things happen as they will.

 

[Maka]

No way! I'm sure it works for some but the thought of meeting someone on a dating website makes me want to run and hide. Eeeks no thanks!

 

[NewUser777]

Have you used one? What do you think of them?

I'll give you my story real quick. They've been nothing but trouble for me. I click and click and click and click on women I'm interested in, but never once have I gotten a response of any kind from one. I clicked on one today to try to IM her, and she replied, "I'm busy" and disappeared. They won't even bother to look at my profile! Apparently my face is enough to scare them away.

Yes, that's pretty bad.

I was a member of ChristianCafe for a little while. It didn't work out very well. I was only interested in one girl in my area on the entire site. I typed out this long heart-felt message and sent it to her. She read it. No response. After a few days, I sent her another message. She never opened it. After a few days, I got so mad I deleted my account. Never went back despite ChristianCafe sending me email after email begging me to come back. I will not.

ARGGGGGG! You've got me all hot about it again, Bobby H! That girl would have been perfect for me. She was tiny and cute. She loved God and she was involved in music/drama ministry in her church. What was there not to like?!

Oh well. I guess some of use are destined to be single for a long time. Things haven't reached their end, though. We are still alive. There is always hope. I believe in miracles and God has always come through for me, giving me blessings I don't deserve.

I pray you get a great wife someday, Bobby H.

 

[nick garai]

I have tried craigslist.org and seem to be having some remote success.

 

[KitKatMatt]

Eh, I haven't really found anyone interesting on them. I've found creeps (loads of creeps, gah), some nice folk that I'm not interested in (but still talk to every once in a while, they know I'm not interested, we just talk to pass time), and then people who I'm interested in but who never reply or have signed up and just abandoned their profiles.

But hey, two people in my family have found their lifelong spouses on dating sites, so they definitely work for some people! One even started a long distance relationship with a man in Sweden. She lives there now with him and her three children They've been happily married for seven years.

 

[HorsieJuice]

There are some tricks to getting results.

First, you need good pictures. Like it or not, this is a real thing. If you don't have good pictures of yourself, get some. If you don't look good in pictures, work on that.

Second, women on these sites get TONS of messages, particularly the really attractive women (many of whom are not actually scammers). I've talked to women who've gotten well over 100 messages within their first 24 hours of signing up. No human can be expected to filter through that much material. Not only do you need to stand out in some way, but you may also need to set your sites a little lower than the smoking blonde that absolutely every other guy on the site is angling for.

Third, you need to make your profile witty and brief; interesting, but not highly specific. People don't need a full autobiography, just something to pique their interest.

Fourth, make your initial contact email also witty and brief - address something in her profile, maybe ask a related question and leave it at that. Three sentences is pushing it. I like to just make a goofy comment about something in their profile and ask no questions: one, maybe two sentences. People can feel uncomfortable if they're asked questions right off the bat. At times, I've also decided to not initiate contact with women I found appealing merely because there was nothing in their profile that I could work with to make a joke.

Fifth, if you're not in a large urban area, pickins are going to be really slim. I do live in a large urban area, but I'm out in the burbs and had to change my profile location to just say the big city so that I wouldn't get filtered out by women who live in the city, but set their search radius to 5-10 miles. Putting my real town (which is only 25-30 miles from the center of the city) was enough to noticeably reduce traffic to my profile.

I was a member of ChristianCafe for a little while. It didn't work out very well. I was only interested in one girl in my area on the entire site. I typed out this long heart-felt message and sent it to her. She read it. No response. After a few days, I sent her another message. She never opened it. After a few days, I got so mad I deleted my account. Never went back despite ChristianCafe sending me email after email begging me to come back. I will not.

ARGGGGGG! You've got me all hot about it again, Bobby H! That girl would have been perfect for me. She was tiny and cute. She loved God and she was involved in music/drama ministry in her church. What was there not to like?!

Yeah, you're pretty much the definition of the dating website creeper. Maybe in real life you're fine, but just in this post, you come of as really needy and overbearing. You poured your heart out to her after having had one unanswered email and zero contact? You deleted your account after being rejected by one girl? Come on. She may very well have been perfect for you, but based on your description, you probably wouldn't have been perfect for her. I felt uncomfortable reading what you wrote, and I'm a dude and you're not hitting on me.

Try toning it down. A lot.

 

[Sweet Melody]

I've never used one and I never will. I don't want to get attached to someone online only to find out they are entirely different in person.

 

[Messy]

Yeah, you're pretty much the definition of the dating website creeper. Maybe in real life you're fine, but just in this post, you come of as really needy and overbearing. You poured your heart out to her after having had one unanswered email and zero contact? You deleted your account after being rejected by one girl? Come on. She may very well have been perfect for you, but based on your description, you probably wouldn't have been perfect for her. I felt uncomfortable reading what you wrote, and I'm a dude and you're not hitting on me.

Try toning it down. A lot.

I love it. Reminds me of myself.

 

[Bobby H]

Thanks everybody. Good responses!

 

[yaeer1942]