When you go job searching your resume is the top tool you use to land a job. And just like a resume portrays your attractiveness to potential employers, your online dating profile displays your attractiveness to potential suitors.
The profile is there to characterize your personality, experiences, desires, and expectations in the context of a seeker of companionship and love. Sure, pictures are the primary gatekeeper but once that’s triggered your profile is the deal clincher.
And good profile can even outweigh a picture that’s not up to Hollywood paparazzi snuff. The unvarnished truth is you can’t control how you look nearly as much as you control how you present yourself and how you come across to others.
So here goes:
1.- Don’t forget that you’re writing for both an audience and to one person.
Your profile should have some elements of mass appeal to attract readers. This can often be accomplished with a good headline which consists of intrigue, curiosity meshed with specifics.
If you’re stuck with writers block and imagination constipation, a good way to get started is to look at other profiles for inspiration. Pay attention to the styles that appeal to you. Are they funny, or revealing, or persuasive? By the same token, you’ll find those you don’t like, since they probably sound obnoxious or desperate or depressing. As you do so, think about the kind of person you would most likely respond to.
And always be yourself so you won’t regret it later as you twist and turn trying to fit an artificial persona.
Additionally, try not write your profile so it’s either too short or too long. This means that, like a woman’s skirt, it should be just “long enough”. Say what you have to say and say no more – don’t ramble on and manufacture words. Brainstorm things and then whittle it down to the essentials.
2.- Be detailed but concise. Avoid adjectives and specify with proper nouns and action verbs.
A good rule of thumb is to write like you talk. Pretend you’re having a conversation but cut out the “uhmms” and “ahhhs”. Always bear in mind that you’ll come across better if you’re not writing in a formal manner like one does on a job resume or professional correspondence.
And be specific in your writing. A good idea is to let the adjoining multiple-choice sections take care of all the adjectives describing you. That’s the place to mark down how you’re smart, funny, interesting, exciting and other subjective eye-in-the-beholder descriptive words.
It’s good to set scenes and be specific when talking about your experiences. Use nouns of places you’ve been or about interest you have – tell a tale about a bistro in Paris, not a trip to Europe. Talk about your water polo fame, not that you’re good at sports.
Use action verbs, too. You didn’t just visit, you “traveled” to exotic Bali to “explore” and “luxuriate and bask”. Then set a scene – in its “sun-drenched, soft sands” with a local drink that “lifted you” into a “state of unwary bliss”. Expressive writing will gain you a lot more readership and thus more interest and more results.
And never resort to a plain series of words like in a list – it can come across as lazy and isn’t at all descriptive.
3- Always remain fun and cheerful.
Don’t ever be a downer as it will surely doom your chances. This is especially important if your present situation or mood inhibits you form writing a friendly profile. The fact of the matter is, our current circumstances affect how we come across to others. If you just experienced a nasty break up or a similarly negative event, it will effect your attitude and your writing and thus poison the content of your profile.
Also, refrain form pouring your heart and soul into your profile. Honesty is good but diarrhea of the mouth and baring of your emotional center is not. In other words, save your problems and your issues for your shrink. Your profile should not serve as therapy. If this seems the case, you may need to wait a little while as you may not be ready yet to successfully create new friends and relationships.
Never resort to clichéd cop-out phrases like “my friends put me up to this”, I’m just here looking, or “I’m not sure what to think about this”. They’re generically over-used and make you look the same.
A great idea is to have a friend read your profile before you post it. You’ve been very close to it as the writer, so let someone a bit more detached and objective have a look a it.
4- Don’t be a show boat or act arrogantly.
There’s a difference between being confident and being cocky. Raising yourself by putting others down serves the opposite effect. It makes you appear to have low –esteem issues. The solution is to just not go there at all. Mind your own business and tend to your own positive character traits.
And if you come off as arrogant and snobby, that’s the kind of person you’ll have writing back in response – someone superficial and with questionable motives. Do you want a trophy wife or a sugar daddy or do you want to meet someone who shares similar interests and has an engaging personality.
5- Always be honest and truthful.
This is the biggest complaint among online companionship seekers. Woman are besieged by married men who don’t tell the “full” story until after they meet or they convince themselves since they’re a 5’-10” in flats, they can boast a more studly 6’-0”. Or when guys meet up with women who “have a few extra pounds” but the words fat and over-weight lend themselves to more accuracy or they’re picture was form 10 years ago and they “kind of” resemble it today.
Just know this – a liar now, a liar later. The best policy, since there are no character witnesses and you can’t police unethical practices, is to do your best to avoid them. One tactic that helps there is to not have a scarcity mentality online. Be deliberative, don’t jump at every Dick and Jane that you see or comes your way.
The only exception might be to fudge your age in the choice section to avoid being filtered out by a round number like 40 or 50. Of course, you must tell your truthful age in your profile and it shouldn’t stray to far from the limit.
6-Always proofread your work and TEST IT.
Simply knowing the difference between their and there can go a long way towards meeting Mr. or Mrs. Write….Right? Correct.
By testing, it’s meant that if you’re not getting a response, then try another approach. Change your headline, or relate some more experiences or interests. Look for implicitly negative vibes you may have overlooked. Insert some more paragraph breaks. Experiment. It’s only your love life, after all.
There you have six core principles and a handful of tips and tricks to write a better profile. Now, go hunt’em down all you online Casanovas.
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