We the recipients of your messages know you are probably messaging multiple people at one time but if you’re going to do it, do it right. We don’t want to feel like we’re one in a giant crowd that you’ve aimed your shotgun at. We want to feel like you’re genuinely interested in us as an individual.
Here’s an example of a better actual form letter:
Hi X!
So we finally made it through the preliminary questions. There are a thousand things I'd love to know about you but because this is our first email, I'll try to keep it from turning into the Inquisition. Still, there are a couple of questions I like to ask:
1. Do you like to sing in the car?
2. Do you ever lay out under the stars?
Hope to hear from you soon!
- Y
PS: you can also reach me at Z
I think this one is better b/c it’s not as obvious it’s a form letter, and the user knows the service that he’s on. Eharmony generally forces you through a series of steps before you can freely send messages back and forth. It assumes that you’ve already read their profile and answered specific questions getting to this stage and so a question that is not, “What do you typically do on weekends?” question could be seen as imaginative and a welcome change from the often meat-market mentality of dating websites.
Ok, here’s another example of a not great first message:
i was browsing to see who i can fall in love with and move away and then i came to ur profile. i am a capricorn i love hot wings and i have been skateboarding since i was 8 years old (i think). now that i have ur attention. please tell me about yourself
If the guy had read my OkCupid profile, which he obviously didn’t, he would have read that I’m already in a relationship plus my profile reads that I’m only looking for friends and networking (which is kind of a lie b/c I don’t need more friends and it’s hard to network with people who aren’t librarians, since I don’t sell anything at my job). So, again, read their profile. Capitalize. Use complete sentences or at least make your sentences sound decent. Don’t use textspeech (ur?!). And yes, you got my attention but in the bad way and now you will be mocked forever on the internet. Finally, “move away”? You’re going to fall in love and move away from me b/c long distance relationships are more romantic?! Dude, you make no sense. :P
Another real life example:
Subject: wanted to say hello
hello.
well i guess I said it. Success.
Hey, be honest. Did you go into library science because of Giles? or was it to have time for reading support material for your next 3.5 ed (or 4th ed) character?
are you a brown coat?
hope you are having a good day”
This guy obviously read my profile (or at least part of it) and is probably a really nice guy. But the impression I get is he’s so hesitant that I wouldn’t even want to be friends with him. It seems like he has no self esteem. (Maybe b/c girls never write him back, but technically I did write him back, but just nothing aside to say that, “yes I am a browncoat.”) Aside from things I said about the importance of proper punctuation, grammar blah blah, this is an example of shooting yourself in the foot. He’s obviously interested but this would have been a much better email if he had also talked about his interest in Buffy or D&D or Firefly, what he likes about those things, or his experiences with gaming, or really anything other than just throwing a bunch of questions at me. As he was writing this, I’m sure he was thinking stuff like, “I’m showing interest in HER, and I’m being witty, this is great,” but in text it comes across very flat.
(Text and how it flattens tone is part of the reason why I love !! and and other emotes. I know it’s supposed to be not cool but I think that it’s one the ways that I show that I’m enthusiastic and interested in a conversation. My brother made fun of me b/c I once read over an email I was sending and the only change I made was to add a smiley at the end. He said, “You thought a happy face would perfect your email?” and I said, “yup.” I’m not saying use exclamation points and LOLs and :P all over your emails but to me, it helps me hear your voice better. Oh, also, don’t type in all caps ever. It looks like yelling and no one likes to get yelled at.)
Continued tomorrow!
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