This time consuming activity is often made worse by the
abundance of nearly identical profiles, full of online dating
clichés. Don't let your profile become one of those! Here are a few
of the most common clichés to avoid when writing your own profile.
If you want to find more just check out other women's profiles,
note the stuff that seems to repeat again and again in most of them
and simply leave those bits out of yours.
Online dating cliché #1: Reeling off a long list of
adjectives
There is little use in saying you're funny, caring, happy and
fun-loving as these things can mean different things to different
people. So many women start off their profile with such a list that
you'll find yourself skipping over these anyway. On the whole, it's
far better to show and not tell - talk about things you do or enjoy
that will tell your readers about who you are. For example, saying
you tend to go out every night and train at Thai kickboxing is
better than saying you're "active" and "sporty". You may indeed
want to stick many of these in the activities and hobbies section
rather than the bit where you talk about yourself as a person, and
that's fine. Online dating profiles don't actually have to be very
long.
Online dating cliché #2: Starting your profile with
talking about how you hate writing about yourself
Guess what? Everyone hates writing about themselves. What they
probably hate even more is reading about how everyone hates writing
about themselves.
Online dating cliché #3: "I like long walks on the
beach"
It seems like walking on the beach is the nation's favourite
pastime. Lord only knows what people do with their free time when a
beach is not available (which, for many of us is 99% of the time).
Unless your walks on the beach include walking on your hands,
taming lions or bringing about world peace, it's best to
concentrate on your other favourite activities in your dating
profile.
Online dating cliché #4: "I Enjoy going out to
restaurants / bars / films / with friends but also happy to stay in
with a DVD and a nice bottle of red"
Apart from walking on the beach, it seems this is what everyone
in the world and their dog seem to do. This could make you think
that anyone you'll meet on a dating site is the same as anyone
else, which is blatantly untrue. You could go out and catch a film
with one lady and be instantly bored while another could make for
the most exciting evening of your life. So instead of talking about
mundane activities everyone ends up doing (which are a given in any
relationship) try concentrating instead on the things that make you
stand out - your world view, your quirks, your unique selling
points.
Online dating cliché #5: Saying you're average/ usual /
normal
Average = boring. It's the default option for anyone who
can't think of anything good to say in her profile. Chances are,
people who write that they are average are actually quite
interesting in person, but most readers wouldn't stick around long
enough to find out. Remember that when you write a dating profile
you want to stand out from the crowd to make women reading your
profile stop and think you may be interesting to meet up with. So
leave out the stuff that makes you just like everyone else and
write about stuff that sets you apart. We are all different, so
even if you think you're the most standard person, there'll be
things that set you apart from the next dating profile. You just
have to spend a bit more time thinking about them.
Interested who's compatible with you?
