One of the side effects of writing a book about dating, is that every now and then I get a message from one of my (female) friends needing advice.
Take Margo for instance (not her real name).
Margo uses Hinge. One of the newer swipe left or right dating apps that looks surprisingly similar to Bumble or Tinder.
Margo has no problem at all ‘matching’ with guys, but after some initial messaging, her face-to-face ‘dates’ are nearly always disappointing – they’re not nearly as attractive as they appeared on the app, and the chemistry is non-existent – leaving Margo with the unpleasant task of “letting them down gently” the following day.
Except that every now and then, the guys get in there first.
This makes Margo feel like there must be something wrong with her – specifically, her personality. That maybe her enthusiasm for books, animals and geeky facts is off putting in some way?
But that’s NOT what’s happening. At all.
The problem isn’t Margo, or her personality – the problem is the app, and how Margo is using it.
What’s happening to Margo is that she’s choosing her potential dates based on photos alone, and she’s matching with a lot of these guys because most guys pretty much swipe right on every single woman they’re presented with. Way to go fellas. Way to make a woman feel special.
So when Margo she eventually meets these swipe-right-on-everyone guys, she THEN discovers they actually have very little in common.
What needs to happen, is that Margo needs to be far more choosey at the swiping stage – and to do this, she needs to review whatever profile text is available. More than that, she should never make her swipe right or left decision based on a picture alone – regardless of how cute these guys might be, or whether they’re wearing a shirt or not – it’s simply not enough information.
Instead, if Margo were to discount all the profiles that have barely (if any) profile text, she would automatically eliminate the lazy, vain, shallow men. But more than that, she’d be left with a more eloquent, thoughtful, and frankly infinitely more interesting, pool of male suitors. Men who believe that they might have to make a little more effort than simply uploading a picture of themselves without a shirt on.
More than that, now that Margo is considering profiles that have some text, she can start scanning for mentions of dogs, books, geek stuff, humour… whilst at the same time keep an eye out for any ‘Red Flags’; text that is 100% about them, political beliefs counter to her own, text that is 100% about sex, bad grammar, a hatred of dogs or cats, obvious stupidity, racist or sexist comments… whatever.
Suddenly Margo’s chances of meeting someone with whom she might actually click, have risen ten fold.
For more tips like this, download How To Stop Waiting And START DATING. The definitive guide to twenty-first century dating – whatever your age – from me, Peter Jones, best selling author of How To Do Everything And Be Happy. Only £1.99 for your Kindle enabled smart phone, tablet or laptop. Tap here to download. Also available in paperback.
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