301- What About Your Online Profile Drives a Man to Contact You – Part II
In my previous post I told you how I scanned through 45 profile photos and only noticed those that contained smiling faces. Now I want to tell you what happened after I clicked on a photo to see more.
Remember, the reason what I’m telling you here is valuable is because my actions reflect the average man (well, maybe a little above average!) out there, who you might be interested in dating.
I clicked on a photo of a woman with a really nice smile and pretty face and came to her profile page. Different dating sites have different layouts but the basic idea is the same: your profile page has photos, your username and basic stats, and your answers to questions or essays.
The ONLY thing I noticed on her profile page were her photos. That’s really all I cared about initially. I didn’t look at her age, height, religion. I certainly didn’t even think about scrolling down to see if she wrote anything witty or enticing. My sole mission was to see her full-sized photos. “See” is really the wrong word. I analyzed each of her photos as if I was a CSI team member on a high profile murder case. I scrutinized every part of her body (at least those parts I could see) for any clues regarding weight, skin tone, body type, and aging. As soon as I found enough negative evidence (based on my personal standards and expectations) I left the page without bothering to even look at any of the words on the page.
Some of you are in shock, disgusted, enraged by my actions. How can I be so superficial? There’s so much more to a person than her appearance in a photo, right? Here’s the deal. My mission here is to give you an exclusive glimpse into the mind of the single man, and that’s what I’ll do at all costs. You can ignore this information or use it to your advantage. It’s your choice.
Men decide to contact or pass over a woman’s online profile based primarily on her photos. Only if they’re attracted to the images they see will they bother to read what she’s written. Many men will make contact without ever reading a single word. If they like what they see, they’ll pursue.
Getting back to my own experience, many of the photos I saw had major flaws which turned me off and made me move on to the next profile. Here are a few:
1. The subject of the photo was so far away from the camera, I could really make out how she looked. That told me that she’s either trying to hide something about her appearance or she’s just really clueless. Either of those reasons was a no go for me. Next.
2. There were two women in the photo and I couldn’t tell which one I’d be contacting. In one case the other woman in the photo (I could tell based on other photos) was actually prettier than the profile subject. Why should I go out with her when I can try to go out with her better looking friend? In any case, I don’t have time to start figuring out who the real date is. I’ve got dozens of profiles to analyze. So I’ll just give up and move on. Make sure your profile photo is of you, and you alone (take a look at the feature photo of this post to see what I mean).
3. Blurry photo. Bad lighting. Hard to see anything. Too much trouble. Next!
One more thing. I’ve read articles and pitches by online dating experts who claim to be able to vastly improve your chances of online dating success by creating usernames guaranteed to attract men. In my humble male opinion, this is nonsense. Men couldn’t care less about your username, so don’t waste your money. Men care about your photos, period. After you start dating all the other stuff will become important, but for the initial online attraction and contact, it’s all about your photos. If you’ve got some money to invest, you should apply it to getting great photos and enhancing your physical appearance.
There’s one more thing I’d like to discuss about your online profile photos, but I’ll save that for next time.
PS — No, I didn’t contact anyone on the dating site!