I think this is going to work differently for men and women.

I only e-mailed somebody once. Usually I just winnow through the ones that I get, and respond only to the ones of those that interest me most. I'd say yeah, that might be 20% or 25%, certainly no higher.

The reason for the passivity (not really my style, but a necessary stance online) is that when you have a female profile, you tend to get a lot of e-mails from people who clearly have absolutely nothing in common with you, and wouldn't be at all interested in you if you met. Why is this? I can only guess that some men online seem to use a bird-shot strategy: 'I'll e-mail every female within a 10-mile radius, regardless of age, interests, education, or any other measure of compatibility, and hope for a reply.' So the ones with "I AM LOOKING FOR A PRETTY WOMAN TO GO OUT WIHT" tend to go unanaswered or recieve a 'no thanks' response, if the guy seems to be nice but just not the right guy.

I am certain you're not this type of guy, so to increase your reply rate, here is one tip I can give. The emails I do answer, universally, have given a cogent reason why this person wrote to me. They'll mention a common interest they saw in my profile and expand on what they know about that topic, or say something about what parts of your personality appealed to them. They're straightforward, friendly, and refreshing, and give some indication of why we might want to talk to each other.

But I still wouldn't take it too hard. A certain number of online dating people are probably just not serious about it / too busy to bother / already married or dating someone else/ skittish/ whatever.

My 2 tokens.

When I was internet dating, I'd hear back from about 15-20%, and end up getting together with about 20% of the ones who replied to me. I ended up dating about 20% of the ones I got together with. I married about 20% of the ones I dated. (For a total of one.)

for those not doing the math, agropyron married one of 5 repeatedly dated suitors among 25 potential suitors she met with after weeding them from a pool of 125 potential suitors who contacted her through an online dating service.

Except that I'm a guy, and I contacted them.

And realistically, those numbers do look a little low. I think the initial response rate was probably more like 10%, with the rest of the numbers looking correct.

I haven't been e-dating very long but, ever since I put up my infamous Sexy Inebriated Movie Star photo, I'm getting a lot more attention. I have a date Saturday (she contacted me). Up until now, my reponse rate seems to be about the same - 20% or so.

The problem here is in the numbers. I understand men outnumber women 2:1 on these sites. That right there makes things tough. Moreover, when deciding who to send e-mails to, I typically eliminate 80-90% of the canditates, based on whether or not they seem like they'd be people I'd want to talk to (Ok, attractiveness is also a factor). That generally leaves about 20-30 women within 15 miles of my zip. I get a reply from about five. 1 of every five I meet ends up warranting a second date. In four years, I've ended up dating one.

I don't consciously track response rates. However, in scanning the sent folder, lately it's roughly 30% response rate, and then meeting 30% of the respondants IRL.

I spontaneously craft an individual message each time, I don't respond to anything with more than one typo, I always send a smiling photo, and darn it Miko, I wish you lived in northern California.

If you're a woman and post a reasonably sexy photo, you will have people coming out of the woodworks to contact you. One tip/trick someone told me is to write down exactly what you want and are looking for as well as say something like, "Include [THIS WORD OR PHRASE] in the subject header and I'm more likely to reply." I took that one step further and asked people to come up with something creative having to do with being a non-smoker and got some really neat responses.

Of the close to 200 or 300 emails I got, I only met two of them in person, and one of them was a prick. The other one was cool, but eventually went back to his ex.

I have a profile up on a couple places, but never contacted anyone. What can I say, I'm chicken. ; )

Well, I've only done it on hotornot. 8 rather attractive young lasses agreed to be my 'double matches,' only two responded to my notes and then nothing. I'm rusty, I guess.

Well, I'm about to give y'all my profile & say have at it: make me attractive. I recognize that this may well be impossible, since I put it up on actforlove out of boredom & desperation on I think Saturday or Sunday and so far I have gotten precisely 0 emails, winks, or contacts of any sort.

are you saying you'd like us to photoshop you?

Are you saying that we should fly out and take you on a date?

Both. Also, you should rewrite my profile.

I can give you jonmc's head, but I don't think it will help any with the fellas...

Heh, maybe I could be Salome with jonmc's head on a platter. That ought to draw in the guys.

Only those with beheading fetishes...

I'm almost always answered when I email someone. But I'm totally opposite what Miko describes. For example, last month I did match.com (got a couple months left on it) and I've emailed exactly one person.

Part of the reason I'm so selective is because it seems like 80% of the women my age want a man "who will treat [her] like a lady". They also like moonlit walks on the beach and eschew capitalization, punctuation, and conventional spelling.

One interesting thing about my match.com experience, though, that shouldn't surprise me but it still does (a little) is that well over half of my "matches" are women who live in Santa Fe, not Albuquerque. But Albuquerque is four or five times bigger than Santa Fe.

I'm a little surprised that I have a higher response rate than most of the men report here. But I'm sure it's because I'm ultra-selective and I usually put a lot of thought and effort into the very few emails I send.

I usually get a few women who email me, not counting Russian women who "have like your profile and wish for correspondence". But I find that the majority of the women that email me are very obviously not my type.

But then there's so very few women my type. I think most of them are on MetaChat.

My response rate is 42 Probits.
The probit unit is y = 5 + Z(p) , where p = the prevalence of response at each dose level and Z(p) = the corresponding value of the standard cumulative normal distribution.

I tried the online dating thing once. I emailed three people: The first one didn't make it past the first meeting (we had nothing in common). The second one became my friend until she went all psycho stalker on me. I've been dating the third one for four years.

kmellis, I lived a long damned time in Kerky and I have one thing to say: you're surprised that you find more matches in Santa Fe than Albuquerque? Don't you think the two cities are, well, significantly different enough that the populations can be said to be, well, almost entirely different?

(figures you probably like Albuquerque, doesn't want to say too many bad things)

I know they're different. I've lived in both cities. But in some of the respects that they are different (past-life therapy, magic crystals) I prefer Albuquerque. But mostly it's just because of the great difference in population—I figured that absolute numbers would lessen the skew. Which of course it must, but I expected more parity.

Maybe some things I chose in my profile and such tilted to the artistic types. Several of my matches are artists of one kind or another. So there'd be a huge skew toward Santa Fe on that basis. But the one woman I emailed, and who I met, is an artist here in Albuquerque.

I appreciate that you refrained from dissing Albuquerque. I'm quite well aware of Albuquerque's many faults, but I like it anyway. Maybe I have no choice: I was born here. But, as someone who's also lived in Santa Fe, and loves Santa Fe, I find the Albuquerque vs. Santa Fe thing really annoying. Besides which, so many of the snobbish Santa Feans are white people from California who, besides avoiding Albuquerque, also have never been west of Cerrillos.

I'm the kind of person who likes east Central. :)

Do restraining orders count as responses? Uh, hypothetically of course.

I can only think of one person who *didn't* respond and I still lose sleep over how I could have worded my letter differently. ;)

For those still using Match.com or Yahoo's personal, you may want to read this.

Flattering photos and witty emails will get you greater than 10% if you work on it. You've gotta treat it like applying for a job. It's not a matter of being qualified. It's a matter of beating everyone else out. It takes some hustle. It's important to:

1) mention something that shows you read the person's profile/ad/whatever
2) be brief, fairly light and positive, at least to start
3) ask a question at closing, something that will spur the person to hit "reply" and start typing right away
4) sign your real first name

This is advice for men. Ladies have a different game to play, though I think sometimes the two are very similar if you're really making an honest and discriminating search for someone special.

In defense of guys and the birdshot approach, and this is going way back to Village Voice personals, I wrote a canned response and called it in blindly to every female listed.

One, whose ad read "pit bull babe needs a walk," (that I would never have answered but for the blanket approach) turned out to be a sweet pretty nice girl who owned a very well behaved pit bull and whose friends had placed the ad as a joke.

We had a good time together, there would have been no other way I would have found that ad, and she was all disgusted by the S & M responses she got.

I know that's a different context, but just goes to show.

scarabic, how are things with your ga-ga girl from a few weeks back??

Bunny eye for the Goth laundry?

My personal hangup (for not actively trying the internet dating thing) is that, while I don't *think* that I'm (particularly) ugly, I just don't photo very well.

Would getting "professional" photography after a "makeover" or something come across as shallow/assholish/creepy?

porpoise, I avoid emailing anyone who has those pro-looking photos; they seem a bit desperate to me. I'm talking about the ones that look like they were taken at the "glamour" store at the mall and have people posing.

No. I think a lot of people do that.

Hi I saw you're profile and thought u r a good guy. I like to fix car's and am a st8 acting guy. I'm 87, in shape and have all my parts!!!1one Write back big boy if you want to meat ur dream man.

My experience with internet dating was an ad on craigslist that I posted, drunk, that was extremely up front about my many flaws. I ended up carrying on correspondence with four out of the six women who responded, met them, made out with one, and finally decided that either internet dating is broken for me, or I'm too broken for internet dating. I mean, they were all nice and not terribly crazy, something I can't say about nearly any other woman I've gone on a date with that I met offline, but I didn't really click with any of them. Soooo, a life of bachelorhood and quiet bitterness await.

I'm glad it works for some people, though.

Both. Also, you should rewrite my profile.

I'll rewrite your profile!

I'd be wary of professional photos. There's a thin line between "flattering" and "fake-looking" photos. You want a photo that a) accurately reflects the way you look, and b) hopefully captures something about you other than just your physical appearance. A pro photo almost always fails on both counts.

A mall/studio portrait typically presents a flattering, well-lit photo that has nevertheless twisted you into a pose/expression/outfit that others would never actually see aside from the shooting session, which is bad. (People have built-in BS detectors when it comes to things like "fake smiles".) On the other hand, your typical deer-in-headlights point-and-shoot indoor flash photo typically light the face in a completely artificial way (unless you're dating miners wearing helmet lights) and therefore doesn't actually look anything like your normal self, which is why people almost always hate the way they look in them. Ideally, you just want a decent photo of yourself when you're relaxed and doing something that you enjoy. A late-afternoon fill flash photo outdoors when you're out doing something fun with friends on a weekend would probably do the trick nicely.

By the way, I find people's dating profiles endlessly fascinating, so please share! If you ever see me at a meetup and would like a DaShiv photo for a profile somewhere, flag me down and let me know so that I'll snap a few extra frames of you that night. But then, you'll have to show me your profile... muahaha!

By the way, I find people's dating profiles endlessly fascinating, so please share!

Here's the one I have on match.com now.

By the way, I find people's dating profiles endlessly fascinating, so please share!

Some of my old Nerve ad (headline is Dating me is the new black):

***

I:

* am the bastard son of Sam Peckinpah and Lauren Bacall. At least internally.
* make a mean omlette, write a kickass love letter, own a wicked cd collection, have patience to spare, and know all the lyrics to 'My Funny Valentine'.
* know the difference that can be made by an extra mile and an extra inch.
* am funny, confident, and employed.
* cry at sappy movies so you don't have to.
* make the best pumpkin pie you've ever had. Bet yer life on it.
* will make you famous.

She (you?):

* is comfortable with her own body and has a keen interest in her own life.
* prefers Polaroids to 35mm and has at least one poem memorized.
* expects good manners and punctuality.
* likes a dark sense of humour.
* knows which words she consistently spells wrong and has given up ever trying to get them right.
* can flirt with the best of them.
* can either kick my ass physically, emotionally, or intellectually, but not all three.
* wears good shoes.
* is sexy vulnerable.
* likes to be written about.
* is confident, mature (except maybe when it comes to sense of humour), and intelligent.


***

I'm attached now, but should I become unattached, I'll repost it with probably no changes. Seems to work.

kmellis, your link is to this thread.

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm talking about, DaShiv.

cmonkey - keep in mind that these women might have been NOT right for YOU rather than the other way around (you 're are right for far more people/women than you may realize - forget these floozies).

cmonkey - keep in mind that these women might have been NOT right for YOU rather than the other way around (you 're are right for far more people/women than you may realize - forget these floozies).

I know, and I don't worry about it. It just taught me that, being introverted and lazy, I can't just get comfortable with someone over the internet, and hope it translates well face to face, since chances are it won't. Much better to meet someone in person first, and then get to know them a little better over the internet. Which is what I meant by internet dating being broken for me.

It's a crazy, crazy world. And dobbs' ad is great.

kmellis, your link is to this thread.

Whoops. Here's the right link. I don't know why it's not showing a photo. Is it showing a photo in my profile for anyone else?

Is it showing a photo in my profile for anyone else?

The photo's there when I view it.

cmonkey, I feel the same exact way. The last time I tried internet dating I ended up going out for lunch with four guys - all of whom were perfectly nice, none of whom did I care if I ever saw again. And two of them were kind of hard to shake and left me feeling guilty, as in, "What's wrong with me that I feel no chemistry for these really sweet, nice guys?" so I swore off it. Now I'm trying it again - I don't even really know why. Desperation, probably.

Apparently it's working out for Dimitri the Lover (TM)

I have spent the last couple of weeks perusing your board after being informed by a lover of mine, of a Dimitri-related tirade ensuing on March 21st. These posts were a result of a recipient of my on-line advances informing the community of her good fortune.

The resultant thread provided me with some much needed comic relief, having just gotten out of a long-term relationship. To answer the main question lingering in everyone's mind ... yes, my profile is working for me big time. Off line I have no trouble meeting women for sex, but felt that it was far more efficent, being a busy entrepeneur, to post my "shopping list" for a long-term girlfriend/future wife on line.

However, what I want to focus on now are complaints posted by women who have been unsatisfied with the men they are meeting from on line dating sites. For example, one young lady complained that she went on dates with 4 men consecutively ... and that they were all "nice guys" but there was "no chemistry".

Conversely, I am being flooded with smiles and responses to my Lavalife profiles in all three sections under the nickname "dimitrithelover" and after going out on dozens of dates, and making love to several women subsequently, my phone is ringing off the hook. Why? I am handsome, but I am sure there are handsomer guys on Lavalife. What is the allure?

I'll tell you what it is: I am a REAL MAN ... not a "macho man" ... check out my url link for details. I speak my mind, tell women STRAIGHT UP-FRONT what I am all about. I do not cheat or lie. I am not a "player". I do not purport to condone the techniques of the "pick up" community, which amount to seducing and destroying women. I am highly sexual, but in a "female worship" rather than a misogynistic way.

The reason why these "nice guys" are not cutting it for you is that due to social castration by feminist society, they have lost their animalistic edge. They are too timid and weak. They allow women to step all over them. They lie to obtain sex. They are afraid to lay their cards out on the table because they are desperate to get laid. I DO NOT LIE EVER. I confidently stand my ground whilst being polite, respectful, and sensitive to a woman's needs. If more men allowed their true selves to come through, women would be much more sexually satisfied.

"Chemistry" is pure phermones. If you don't believe it, try to meet a guy like me for a coffee and compare him to the "nice guys" with hidden agendas. I guarantee that it will be an eye opener.

Have a pleasant day.

Dimitri The Lover