A Simple Trick Successful Online Daters Know

A Simple Trick Successful Online Daters Know

I'm surprised no one's refreshed a certain classic '80s hit with a modern update. "Online Dating Is a Battlefield" would do well on iTunes, don't you think? Here's one secret that can make online dating easier: Put way less effort into your messages, says OkCupid cofounder Christian Rudder in Dataclysm: Who We Are When We Think No One’s Looking.

I picture successful online dating and think of well-crafted messages a few paragraphs long that prove you've read a guy's profile. Surprisingly, the average message users fire off only comes in at 100 characters. The ones that garner the most responses are even more bite-size, racking up only 40 to 60. I'd be terrible at this since I struggle to keep my tweeting within limits! Even though short messages say less, it can actually be harder to make them seem effortless. Rudder has some advice on that front: Don't overthink it!

People aren't agonizing over the best short message to send. It helps to think it through a bit, but spending more than two minutes trying to write a message between 150 and 300 characters didn't bump up chances of a response. Rudder explains an easy way to cut down on your composing time is to send "memorized digital pickup lines" by copying and pasting a message that seems tailored to the user but is actually a template. I raised an eyebrow when I read this, thinking there's no way that can be actually work. Isn't it always obvious when someone's blasting tons of users' inboxes with the same exact thing? Not quite. Copying and pasting first messages is only about 25 percent less successful reply-wise than composing them for each person! That's no surprise when you check out this example:

"I’m a smoker too. I picked it up when backpacking in May. It used to be a drinking thing, but now I wake up and fuck, I want a cigarette. I sometimes wish that I worked in a Mad Men office. Have you seen the Le Corbusier exhibit at MoMA? It sounds pretty interesting. I just saw a Frank Gehry (sp?) display last week in Montreal, and how he used computer modelling to design a crazy house in Ohio."

This gentleman sent the above to 42 women who were into cigarettes and art. If I received that, it would never cross my mind that he was sending the same exact thing to lots of women. It's a far cry from the suspicious "hey girl u cute" variety that's obviously one of many. This guy got five responses, which doesn't seem impressive until you think about the fact that those replies were from the exact kind of person he was looking for. He got five great matches with relatively little effort and a few strokes of his keyboard. Makes this tactic kind of tempting!

What do you think? Will this research change how you date online?
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Changing Your Attitude Can Bring Online Dating Success

Changing Your Attitude Can Bring Online Dating Success

Successful online dating can happen when you change your attitude!

If you are ready to start dating, what is the first thing you think about? For most singles, it is online dating. Online dating is easy to do and you can begin dating right from your living room. Each day, you receive new potential partners delivered to your inbox. You have your choice of many great sites to help you find the person who is right for you.

If so many singles have tried online dating — how successful is it for finding true love? Here are the facts. There are 54 million singles in the United States and 40 million of those singles have tried online dating. That is a pretty significant number. Recently, Match.com did a survey of people who married in the past three years and 17 percent of those surveyed met their partners online. 

It seems obvious that online dating is a great vehicle to meet other singles looking for love. So, what does it take to successfully date online? Well for one, you must have the right attitude. If you choose to try online dating, there's a chance you just may have the following experiences.

1. You will meet people with poor dating skills, who will approach you in ways you find unattractive.
2. You will get excited over someone you like, only to have him disappear without a word.
3. If courageous enough to wink or email someone you find attractive, he may not respond.
4. You will encounter a nightmare date, who argues with you or lashes out at you when you indicate you are not interested.

So, if all this could happen, why would you want to try internet dating? As you now know, 17 percent of married couples met online and 40 million of the 54 million singles have been online. To be successful at internet dating, you just have to develop a "thick skin" and perseverance. 

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Tips for Successful Online Dating

Photo: Whitebox Weddings 

In 2000, Brenda Allison graduated from law school and moved to Chicago. There, she found a supportive group of friends, an apartment within walking distance of the city's hottest spots...and absolutely no time to date. 

"I'm a lawyer, and it's a job that takes up a lot of time," she says. "I didn't know how I was going to meet someone, especially when with what little free time I had I wanted to spend it with my friends."

Heeding advice from friends living in New York City, Allison turned to the Internet. "There weren't a lot of people using the Internet to date back then," she says. "I had to go to Kinko's and scan in a picture of myself for my profile." Soon after that, she was on a date.

"I met this guy for drinks, and everything was going fine. I have a tendency to mess with my hair when I get nervous, so I start running my hands through it. An hour or so into the date, he looks me straight in the eyes and says: 'You have got to stop touching your hair because it's driving me crazy. I don't know if I'm going to be able to control myself!' I didn't know what to say to that, so I told him my friends were at the back of the bar, which they were. I never went out with him again."

For Allison, that night was the beginning of series of dating travails. Despite a few duds and near misses, her perseverance—plus an online connection seven years later that resulted in a marriage proposal—would eventually reaffirm her belief that online dating is an ideal way to make a real connection with another person. "Meeting someone in a bar never quite worked out," she says. "The bar scene was always about 'Hey baby, you're hot' after a few drinks."

Though once considered the sole province of the nerdy and socially challenged, online dating has come a long way. According to online dating site Match.com, more than 20,000 people register to use the site every day. eHarmony says it has 20 million registered users on its roster and according to a recent study it commissioned, the dating site is responsible for 2 percent of all marriages in the United States.

How are all of these people finding success in love online? According to experts, honesty, patience and a well-thought-out profile are all anyone needs to find true love.

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