Writing the Introduction Message (part 1)

Writing the Introduction Message

While choosing pictures and writing a profile are very important parts of successful online dating, I think the most stressful part is writing the first message. You’ve come across a profile and picture of someone you find interesting and now you would like to get to know them better. This first message is the truly hard part, what do you say to them? For some online dating services, the message may be the first impression of you. On OkCupid, messages are usually read before the reader clicks to the profile. On eharmony, the profile is what is sent first, so it’s important to understand the service you’re using.

If you still haven’t read it, go to OkCupid’s blog. This one in particular is about what kind of first messages were the most likely to elicit a reply. They have tips such as, what kind of greetings work better than others, don’t tell a girl that she’s pretty, hot, or sexy, stuff like that. My advice here will be a combination of what that blog post says plus my own experiences with messages b/c I don’t want to entirely duplicate what they already said.


First point (and honestly this should be common sense): Don’t be gross. Telling a girl that she’s like the hottest thing ever and you want to be on top of her is not a good way to get her attention. Remember in elementary school when they said there were good ways to get attention and bad ways? This is a very bad way. It is however probably a really good way to get on a lot of people’s blocked lists. I’m not sure if this kind of message any has any success rate, but I’m assuming that guys like this send out thousands of these spam-like messages over the internet hoping that they’ll find someone sleazy or desperate enough to reply. I do not recommend this method b/c sleazy people just make me hate people more.

Don’t write what is obviously a form letter. I know it’s a lot of work to think of something interesting to say to each individual person--you have to carefully read their profile (I do advise this otherwise you miss out in important facts like, “Hey, I’m dating someone else already”) and then think of something interesting to say. But you know, you have to spend the time b/c form letters (at least really obvious form letters) really really suck and in my opinion, if you can’t spend five minutes thinking of something new to say, how much effort are you going to put into the relationship?

Here’s an example of a real message that I received:

hello my name is XXX (not a porn, I’m just blocking out his name. :P). I am a chef and work for a couple of catering companys. I love to cook and bake.. I enjoy eating very good food.. I love to snowboard and being out doors.. Would love to know more about you.. ? hope to hear back from you..

Ok, kids, what’s wrong with this letter? A bunch of stuff. First of all, it’s obviously a form letter and if it’s not, it sucks enough and is generic enough to be a form letter and still falls under the same category of “not going to work”. Second, he could say, Hi/Hello/Hola/Yo (your name here) or other greeting. At least cut and paste my username into your first message so I know you read that much of my profile. Third, this guy should capitalize this message even if I don’t do it (it makes me charming…quiet from the peanut gallery!) but it seems like he put no effort into this letter. Couldn’t even bother to hit the shift key occasionally. I just looked at my Facebook profile and I capitalize here. I capitalize on my OkCupid and eHarmony pages. You know why? B/c it’s important to look more put together. (So if I don’t capitalize in my emails to you, then you’re not important…I kid, I kid!). It’s like dressing up for job interviews, you want to put your best foot out there. Even if you don’t normally capitalize, save that for later when you know each other better and can be a little more informal. Also, spellcheck! Spellcheck is your friend. And in my case, my friends are my friends and they catch my errors. :P Lastly, try to add in something personal. Not personal like your cat died last week or that you have a mysterious rash but personal like, “Hey do you like teaching?” if they’re a teacher or “What did you think of the most recent episode of Heroes?” if they watch Heroes. Don’t bring random things up if they don’t say it in their profile, again, it will seem like you aren’t paying attention.

Dude, I have to break this one up into three parts b/c it's really really long... sorry! But I'll have it post each morning for the next couple of days!