New to match/online dating

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-01-2007
New to match/online dating
7
Mon, 01-01-2007 - 6:23am

Hi everyone,
I was sick of my single situation and decided to DO something about it this year. I just joined match.com. I some questions:

Are there things you wish you'd known when you first started online dating?
Is eharmony worth the money?
How many pictures/what type of pictures should I include?

I'm very nervous about this

Thanks!

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-06-2006
Mon, 01-01-2007 - 10:15am

Hi and welcome,

Pictures are very important. Most men will not read your profile; they will go by your picture(s) and maybe your header. I think you need a good head shot, a full-length picture and at least one more picture. Pick pictures in which you look good. (When I started on Match last year, I didn't have good pictures, and I got very little interest from guys. When I got better pictures, interest quadrupled.) The head shot is the most important one because it is what will show on searches.

I did e-harmony for three months and Match for five months. I got more dates out of Match. I did not find e-harmony worth the money, but it may have been because of my age and what I am looking for (a man in my age-bracket who is my intellectual and professional equal who is not unwilling to date a woman my age who is also a little overweight). I am now doing Yahoo Personals which seems about the same as Match for getting me dates.

Others here are more experienced than I, but I think we will all agree that different services work differently depending on the person, the location and sometimes just luck.

I hope you have good luck.

Elsa

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-27-2004
Mon, 01-01-2007 - 12:03pm

Renee, the big thing I wish I would have learned earlier about online dating is you need to meet the person quickly. Don't waste time emailing and talking on the phone. You build a false image of the person and when you do meet them, you aren't thinking straight. I got involved with a guy and had a 1.5 year relationship with him and he was a total jerk. But I had gotten to know him online for 3 months before I moved to his state. It was totally a stupid move. I didn't want to see all the red flags. I wanted him to be what I thought he was, and heck, he sure wasn't.

eHarmony has not proven to be worth the money for me. I've been on there off and on for a total of 2 years and have only met 2 guys, neither were right for me at all. I have no idea how they pick the people they hook you up with, but intelligence doesn't seem to be one of their 28 matching criteria. You can go months without a match and then they send you someone you know you wouldn't have anything in common with. Plus they appear to keep matching you with people once you stop your subscription. I think that's their way of luring you back, but I suspect I've been matched up with people who don't belong anymore, so you never hear from them. So I'd skip it. Do Yahoo or Match.

Good luck!! It works, I have friends who've married their online matches. Just keep a tough hide and don't let the rejection get to you. We can't click with everyone.

Chick

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-01-2007
Mon, 01-01-2007 - 12:52pm

Thanks everyone.
I need to post a full body picture. I'm looking for a good one that actually looks like me. It's hard because a lot of my pictures have someone else in them and they look pretty bad when cropped out :)

ok.....

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-13-2006
Mon, 01-01-2007 - 1:21pm
I agree. I wish I learned to meet the person earlier then wasting time on IM for weeks, even months. One time I started communicating with someone from out of town for over a month. He was really into me, and I thought he was very attractive from the pictures. Finally, he flew in to meet me - Aggghh!!!! And he was a liar as well!
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-01-2007
Mon, 01-01-2007 - 8:14pm

Hi!

Congratulations on your decision to put yourself out there. I too am new to online dating after lots of contemplation and discussion with friends. It is definitely a unique format that takes some getting used to but once you get the hang of it, its actually a great way to meet people more in depth than you would if you were just bumping into someone at a social occasion.

I am using Match and have heard pluses and minuses about it. The one thing I wish existed was a message board or blog of some kind to warn women about the jerks that are out there on each online dating site! For all those who are doing it...wouldn't it be great if we could be warned in advance to spare us unnecessary grief, not to mention that it would be a great method for protecting ourselves and each other! I just had a month long experience with a total CREEP who was VERY GOOD on paper but an emotional wreck. He came on to me super strong in the first two weeks, calling me two and three times a day, emailing, text messaging. I really thought he was going to be someone special although there were warning signs, he is a complete narcissist, totally into himself;he loves to joke and sometimes took it too far to the point of hurting my feelings; he never listened to anything I had to say...would rather talk about himself than try to find out anything about me; is totally into physical appearances...eg. wanted to know how big my breasts were basically right away. Even so I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt and there were things I really liked about him. He lives in DC and has been asking me to fly down to meet him so I called him on his behavior and he did a complete 180 and turned into a complete creep rather than half a creep-stopped calling, basically stopped all mode of communication, you know the drill ladies.

So, my best advice is go with your gut. If a guy is interested he will pursue you, call you, do all the work. Let him. Also, when a person shows you who they are, believe them.

All the best to you!

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-15-2004
Tue, 01-02-2007 - 12:41am

Well, photos tend to get you LOTS more attention. I think 4 -5 is a good number. Full body & close ups. Be precise in your write up about what you are like, what you like to do, & what you are looking for. I find that weeds out a lot.


I like Match. But than again, its really the only one I have done.

Photobucket

iVillage Member
Registered: 06-30-2006
Tue, 01-02-2007 - 4:57pm

I believe OLD should be FUN. If you don’t MAKE it FUN, you will become frustrated and disappointed. Just read this message board and you will hear about the guys that lie about most everything, especially their age, weight, height, even who they really are. They will start the process appearing to me so wonderful and then they will ghost or turn into some real creep.

When I started OLD a year ago I expected to find the “love of my life”…what can I say, I had been married for 23 years and separated/divorced for 3 years…I was totally ignorant about dating! You have to have a tough skin to take the rejection that comes with OLD and I got a few bruises this past year. I am now realistic and have NO expectations, other than to meet some guys that can become friends, and maybe, maybe, maybe…have the potential for a LTR. I keep a journal of all my face-to-face meetings and dates and get a good laugh when I feel frustrated and want to give up. OLD is still the best way for me to meet men, I would have never met or had this many dates if I relied on IRL meetings.

Read this board and pay careful attention to the cautions about keeping your personal information private. Don’t give out your real name, a phone that can be traced to your home, your address, your employer, etc….Always meet in public! Don’t engage in long email/phone conversations that go one for weeks, a BIG mistake. You never really know a person until you meet them face-to-face. They can be wonderful writers, sound gorgeous on the phone, give you lots of attention and then BAM, you meet the guy and he is a real dud! Keep the email/phone talk short and then insist on meeting the guy, this will help eliminate building up a lot of false expectations. Don’t let your imagination make a guy into your dream date, another BIG mistake.

The suggestions about the pics are good. You need to have some attractive pics if you want good response. If you don’t have any, get a friend with a digital camera to take many pics and post the best ones. Your headline should relate to you as a person and have some character in your profile. Read other women’s profiles in your age range and don’t do what they are doing. You will see that the majority of the profiles are boring, they all same the same thing. Make your profile unique.

Match has been the most successful site for me this past year. I’ve tried eHarmony for 9 months, it was a bust. Only met one guy and all he wanted was FWB. Yahoo Personals has resulted in some meetings but I think Match has more men that are better educated and more what I’m looking for. You just need to try one/or both and see which one works best for you.