lolo1234 Posted March 25, 2011 Posted March 25, 2011 Contact when dating online? I know this is the 21 st century but there's still alot of preferences that both men and women have when first approaching someone.
Kelemort Posted March 25, 2011 Posted March 25, 2011 Doesn't matter. Your best bet is just to go for it. I initiated conversation with everyone I've ever dated. Of the two serious boyfriends I've had, I asked one of them to be my boyfriend. I initiated first kisses with both of them. And I also have a friend who's way more interested than he should be...who initiates most of our hang-outs and tries to push the dating conversations. Although to be honest, it's nice sometimes to see a man with gumption who's willing to do the approaching. It's nice to be asked out, to be asked if you would like to be his girlfriend, etc. If I ever get married, I always figured in the past that I would do the asking - but at this point in my life, nah. If he wants to marry me that badly, he can ask. Go for it, dude. Talk to her.
EyesWideOpen Posted March 25, 2011 Posted March 25, 2011 I don't think it matters per say. But I think a guy who wants a girl to initiate contact is shorting himself. There's a largely disproportionate number of contacts between the sexes. Women get a ton more first contact messages. There's much less need for us to do the initiating to e-meet people.
MarlyStar Posted March 26, 2011 Posted March 26, 2011 I'm not an experienced online dater; I've been doing it 3 weeks. But I went in thinking I'm going to give it my best shot and I was there to meet people. There's two ways to contact with winks/pokes/whatever where you just say, hey I noticed you, notice me. And then you can email. I winked at anyone I thought was a possibility. All the profiles start sounding alike after a while. It's very hard to really get any idea from a profile. So if there was nothing exclusionary, I winked. About a quarter winked or emailed back. If they winked back, I said, I winked you winked, what next. I put it in their court to initiate the next step. I felt: I initiated step one (show of interest), you initiate step two (development). Most disappeared after that, but some would email, and I'd respond. It would only take a couple short emails to decide whether I wanted to take it to the third step (meet). I know the third step with talk on the phone or texting, but I'm too busy to text, and don't like talking on the phone to a disembodied voice of a stranger. So for me meeting is the next step. A couple wanted to talk on the phone, so I proposed meeting and it went nowhere. And two have agreed to meet. So of maybe 40 winks, I got two who agreed to a meeting. One I've met, and will meet again tonight. And one I think I'll be meeting on Monday. Small return. About 12 people I saw something in their profile that interested me; something unusual or that was pertinant to me, so I emailed. I only got one response that has turned into a potential meeting (maybe next Thurs, but I doubt the scheduling will work out). A couple emailed back, but then stopped emailing. Or I stopped responding. So for me initiating email contact was not very successful. And it's sort of counterintuitive; you'd think the personalized emails would be more sucessful, but in my experience as a woman, showing interest and then forcing the guy to take the initiative was more successful. As Carhill says, your mileage may vary.
musemaj11 Posted March 26, 2011 Posted March 26, 2011 People are different. Personally I have high distrust toward women. However I found that when a woman initiated first contact, my guard would suddenly lower as if my subconciousness was telling me that I could trust her since she was willing to go as far as reaching out first.
jkl6158 Posted March 27, 2011 Posted March 27, 2011 As a girl, it has turned out that the only guys I ended up going out with and wanting to see again were guys I messaged first. However, they all initiated asking to meet up for the first time. Of the few that initiated contact with me first and I agreed to go out with, my interest ended up being very low and I wasn't interested in seeing them again. Thing is, you know what you are looking for, and if you see it, you can't just wait around hoping they will message you because there is a good chance they won't, but a better chance that they will respond if you start up contact. I mean, what do you really have to lose?
zengirl Posted March 27, 2011 Posted March 27, 2011 I've always had better luck with the guys I messaged first (liking them better once we actually went out). I recommend either gender message people if they feel compelled. Don't wimp out and hope a guy will message you, if you see one you like.
kiss_andmakeup Posted March 27, 2011 Posted March 27, 2011 If you're a female, you really shouldn't have to initiate (simply because the statistics for online dating are so skewed in women's favour), but go for it if you want to. If you are a guy, you're probably going to have to initiate, women have too much attention coming towards them from other guys to come reach out and find you.
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