Getting Started In Online Dating

Over the last couple of years there has been a steadily increasing awareness of Online Dating. Match.com have advertised for a fair while on UK TV during prime time and Singles/Speed Dating Events have been around for a while.

Most of the advice out there for Online Daters is written by Americans for Americans and again with the explosion of You Tube and other sites tutorials, advice and suchlike is in no short supply.

Very little of this stuff is helpful beyond the real basics of forming relationships.

Someone beyond their mid 20's is by and large going to have at least some significant experience of forming relationships and approaching members of the opposite (or same) sex.

Online dating from lets say a UK perspective is more problematic. We have the paid sites like Match.com and eHarmony ( they wont take my money I'm too difficult to match based on their questionnaires..) which in my experience have a very limited membership and are bloody expensive for what you get, and a bunch of sites that say they are FREE, but are not (offering only limited functionality for Free - none of which would enable you to date someone for FREE) and PlentyofFish, which is genuinely 100% free.

Volume of people, active forums and the free nature of Plentyoffish make it an ideal place to start (and possibly stay) but once you have created a profile, you need to start approaching people. Managing this process is difficult UNLESS you really don't care if you are attempting to "date" many people at once and may leave a lot of people feeling used or badly treated by you. This of course could easily rebound on you as communities have a habit of self policing.

So far my specific advice would be

1. Create a good Profile with a picture of you that represents you now (not how you were 5 years ago or your more attractive younger sibling etc) Write if for who you "think" you want to attract not as a shield against interest from ex wife types, stalkers, etc. Keep it light hearted, be humble but sell your good points.

Stick a post in the review my profile section of the forum and ask people to suggest improvements (you don't have to follow their advice and you'll get input from people in USA, UK Canada Australia - most unlikely from anyone anywhere near where you live so don't be shy)

NO time for fannying about in online dating - giggling like a 12 year old schoolboy at the thought that someone you know "might" see your picture on a dating site is pointless - chances are they wont - if they did they would be there too - and more importantly would you be embarrassed being seen at your local supermarket or pub ?

2. Decide what you realistically are looking for. Sure you might like the idea of boning that 23 year old guy from Guildford (or at least the person hes posted a picture of on his "Profile") but if you are not remotely likely to be traveling 350 miles twice a week to see him and have 4 kids, no career etc - you are probably not being realistic.) What age ranges could you see yourself dating and would be broadly "comfortable" for you. Again lets not delude ourselves that 35 year olds dating 18 year olds is "normal" not 23 years wanting kids dating 50 year olds.

This should give you a broad but realistic age range, upto distance from where you live and a sketchy outline of the person in terms of I suppose education, family situation, smoker or not etc.

3. run a search for your braodest criteria. On plentyof fish thsis will be a distance from your location of say 50 miles and an age range. Apparently your age divided by 2 plus 7 is the american model of what is normally acceptible as the youngest you should date (so in my case 40 / 2 = 20 20 +7 = 27 years). You can alter this but in many respects it isnt a bad rough guide in most cases.

The research should return you a long list. Go through it - try to read most of what people have written and (unless they are a complete not if you were the last male/female on the planet ) favorite any that are long list possibles.

Some will find out you favourited them but there is no set meaning for adding as a favorite - it does however help you "manage" your long list.

4. you should have an idea of who looks like a reasonable prospect for you - real favorites based on what they say in their Profile, their picture etc.

5. Now sit back and wait a day to get your profile feedback. Perhaps have a look round the forums.

If you have some extra time on your hands..

Do a search, Whilst signed out of your Plentyoffish account as though you were you were look ing for you i.e if you are a male looking for women 27-45 ages in 35 mile radius of Bath, run a search for a Man 27-45 years 35 miles from Bath, This gives you a feel for the "competition" since that is what you are competing with broadly. Some people will create a fake profile or user specifically for this purpose.


We will go into more detail of the next stages in a later article