Creating an Internet Dating Profile
So you’ve given up on meeting someone in a bar, you really don’t want to date a work colleague, and despite joining clubs/doing night classes, you still haven’t met anyone you would want to have a serious relationship with. Forget all that old fashioned nonsense about meeting people via the above routes - Internet Dating is here, and the days of us singletons enrolling in book clubs/Italian cookery classes to meet someone are over! There are tons of dating sites out there, and once you’ve decided which one to join, the hard bit begins - the writing of the dreaded profile… This article discusses the dos and don’ts of writing an Internet Dating profile, a task which should be easy but often is the one thing putting us off online dating.
One of the first things you need to decide when writing a profile is - are you willing to attach a photograph of yourself? All of the sites say you will get a lot more interest in your profile if you include a photograph, but on the other hand, a lot of us don’t want to run the risk that our work colleagues/family will stumble upon our profile. The simple fact is you don’t need to include a photograph to find success in Internet Dating. However, you will get a lot less interest and you must accept the fact that usually only people without photographs themselves will reply to your messages. So, bite the bullet and attach a photo to your profile. If someone from work stumbles across your profile just say you’ve been online dating for years and go out with someone different every week. That’ll soon shut them up.
The next thing you need to decide is how do you want to present yourself to potential dates? You want to appear keen to meet someone with similar relationship desires, but you don’t want to overdo it so that you appear desperate. Desperation is not an attractive quality, and should be avoided at all costs from your profile. You also want to appear interesting and intelligent, without coming across as pretentious. The best way to do this is to use self deprecating humour. Everyone is interested in a funny person, and your self-deprecation will make you seem like the least pretentious person on the site.
Another thing you need to do is to write about your hobbies. Write about too many and potential partners will think you won’t have time for them. Too few and you will be perceived as boring. If you have no interesting hobbies, just make one up. Buy a cheap guitar, and an instruction book. Now you are learning the guitar!! And you didn’t even have to lie… Also, watching TV doesn’t count as a hobby, so try to avoid including it.
By now you will realise that writing a dating profile is easy peasy. Include a photograph for maximum interest, but this isn’t an essential requirement. Try and use some humour that pokes a bit of fun at yourself – self deprecation is an attractive quality in both sexes. If all else fails and you are really stuck – have a look at the other profiles on the site for ideas. Sometimes seeing someone else’s badly written profile can do wonders for the creative spark…
