How to Raise Your Stakes |
The Written 'Profile'
There are several sorts of personal profile:
Newspaper ads where, to keep it cheap, the writer must convey as much as he/she can in very few words.
Agency profiles. Here you have much more space - though this will usually be limited to the size of fields their database will allow, so efficient use of words is still important.
Agency profiles subdivide into two kinds: free prose where you can write what you want, unprompted, and the questionnaire type (Singles Grapevine) where the member is prompted for answers, and you get the same sort of information about everyone.
With free prose you have an opportunity to state what you are looking for also.
The questionnaire-type is more likely to be a description of you only. The agency may well know what you're looking for, but it won't be published. You will have lists of members of the opposite sex, usually narrowed down according to age and area. It is for you to decide and choose for yourself whom to contact (Singles Grapevine).
One disadvantage of including 'what you're looking for' is that it can sometimes put off the very people you want to meet. For instance, a lady reading it may happen to be slim herself, which to her is not particularly relevant. If the man's profile says 'looking for a slim lady' is the most important thing to him, she might think 'if that's all he cares about he's not for me'!
The following are general points observed about profiles, from members' questionnaires. They will also apply to leaving one's details on voice mail.
Many of the very best matches will be between people with something unusual in common.
The potential number dates will of course be much fewer, but a more 'uncommon' mutual interest or experience could make a very strong bond. For example, they may both be into Buddhism, or both parties are dog breeders, or they are both vegan, or both nursed their ex-spouse through a similar terminal illness, or both are extremely tall/fat/short, or both spent their childhood in the same distant village etc. etc. etc.
I hope that the following lists may help you decide which of your attributes are worth emphasizing and which are best glossed over at the initial stage!
Nobody is perfect. Perfection could be very hard to live up to!
LYING
Lying is a no-no. Omission is another thing. When you have limited space to describe yourself this space must be used to your very best advantage. One of my most popular gentlemen members had a glass eye (and happened to be 6'2" tall, great fun and very handsome). His one eye was undoubtedly best left unmentioned.
It is unwise to omit anything extreme which is likely to be unpopular, though! If you're very short, fat, bald, smoke more than a couple a day, are at the older end of the age spectrum, it is best to make mention of the fact to save wasting everybody's time including your own.
CONSIDER THE WORDING
Consider the wording, though.
Age. If you're a man in your 60s try something like 'Sean Connery contemporary'. 'Young looking for my age' is too much of a cliche and ladies have learnt, through bitter experience, to be disbelieving, as have the men!
Ladies, try bracketing yourself with, say, the ever popular Felicity Kendall (though not if you're large) or Joan Collins! Men can become so cynical about ladies lying about their age (and vice versa), that those old hands at the Dating Game automatically put you into the next decade if you say you are a in your 40's or 50s rather than being specific.
Size. The same goes for weight. Be very careful with the wording. 'Cuddly' can sound obese. If you are obese, OK, your size must be mentioned. If just only a little on the plump side, don't mention it, but certainly don't lie and say you're slim! Likewise don't, naturally, approach someone for yourself who makes 'slim' a specific requirement if you are not slim.
Height. If you're a shortish man of about 5'6", for instance, you may be very fit. Describe yourself as fit or athletic build. You won't mention height yet. At the next (telephone or response letter) stage, if height is of paramount importance to the lady in question, she'll certainly ask you. There's no point lying - the meeting would be a disaster!
The lady would rightly feel deceived and annoyed - having taken trouble to look her best, driven to the meeting place and maybe even arranged a baby-sitter. Just as somebody would if the person they met had obviously badly deceived them about their age or size.
To deal with her question, "how tall are you?", you could well reply with a question back, "is height very important to you? How tall would you like me to be?" Then the 'boots on the other foot' - she's the one with answering to do! When she says six foot you can say you wouldn't want to waste your time, or hers. Face has been saved all round!
Smoking. This is a very important issue to non-smokers, and if you will be smoking on the first date, the other person must be given the option not to meet you.
Smoking - the unfortunate thing about this world is that good habits are so much easier to give up than bad ones' - Somerset Maughan
If the date looks 'workable', it's essential to propel yourself to the next stage in the Dating Game - which is where you may have to duck out anyway!
Photographs. Some agencies circulate photographs which in my mind turns the 'list' into a sort of catalogue. It also compromises confidentiality. However, in Singles Grapevine I gladly forward photos between members, and those members on the internet can exchange photographs that way, in confidentiality.
It might interest readers to know the views of surveyed members concerning including photographs with profiles - remembering that these answers came from people with experiences of several different types of agency.
- 90% of the people would like to see photos first given the chance (significantly a few said definitely not)
- 62% were happy to have their own photo included
- 29% said they did not want their own photo included - for fear of being recognized if the profile was shown around or left about
- 19% didn't mind one way or another
In my own research into Internet dating agencies I have to admit that a great many of the good profiles I read of gentlemen in my age group were spoilt by seeing photos! If I wasn't attracted to the photo I would never have contacted them - though in the flesh it's possible there could have been chemistry.
The moral seems to be - if you're going to use a photo, make it a good one.
It's all in the presentation. Go to a good photographer!
Some internet agencies who encourage people to display their photos usually say people with photos get far more response.
Unless you're really extremely attractive and photogenic, and how many people are, I wonder if they are right!
Click here for next Section - 'What People Actually Say' ...
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