I have made my fair share of dating profiles. Both for myself, and for friends. I’ve seen hundreds of dating profiles in my day and there are very common mistakes I see people making. Most of the time they do it because they think it’s no big deal but in reality, they’re shooting themselves in the foot and then turn around and blame the dating site.
Bad Pictures
Guys please understand that the picture is by far the most important part of your dating profile. No matter how good everything else in the profile is if the picture sucks then the whole profile is garbage. Here are the most common mistakes I see with pictures.
- Bad pictures
- Poor lighting.
- Unflattering angles.
Composition is too bland or eccentric.- Too revealing or not revealing enough.
- Too many people, or too few.
- Poor selection of attire.
Esoteric Self Information
I’ll never understand why some people feel the need to be so bitter on their dating profiles. They write things that indicate that they hate the world and everyone in it but yet can’t figure out why they’re still single. Really?! No one likes a negative Nancy or a bitter Bob.
Life sucks sometimes get over it or at least don’t put in your dating profile that your life sucks.
Unrealistically High Standards
Unless you have a million dollars and a six pack or a million bucks and
Self Deprecating Low Standards
Having too low of standards and being a wet noodle is equally problematic. This is especially a problem for women and men who look abroad to date. They’ve been socialized to believe that they’re not worth very much and therefore allow people to take advantage of them just to claim being coupled.
If you do choose to look abroad to date understand that you have something they want–US citizenship and you don’t need to tolerate a partner that looks down on you or acts like she’s doing you a favor by being with you.
Being ‘Too Christian’
I know this sounds counter-intuitive but seriously some of the worst people I’ve ever met were people who wore their religion on their sleeve. Christianity is not a contest and there is no ‘winner’ of Christianity in the sense that the more you advertise your religion the move favor you will gain from God.
Jesus himself tells us this in Matthew 7:16 “know them by their fruits”. People will see you have Christ in your heart through your deeds not by wearing religion on your sleeve or the cross on your neck. You don’t need to saturate your dating profile with Bible verses and boast about your church committee assignments in order to have a good Christian dating profile.
But after writing those out, I realized that there is a more abstract way of viewing all mistakes.
Not Correctly Targeted
Facebook is one of the world’s most successful companies. Last year, the company boasted a 15.9 billion in profit. While NBC Universal had a net income of just 2.56 billion. What is it that facebook does that makes the company so much money? The answer: targeted marketing.
The company is genius at knowing what people are interested in and targeting specific ads to those interests. That’s why I’ll never see an ad for feminine hygiene products or flower delivery on my feed. Because of that advertisers love using their platform for their ads since they’re not wasting money on people who will never buy their products.
People are not thoughtful enough about the kind of person they are hoping to target with their profile.
So many times, I would catch myself and my friends fiddling with the thought, “will people like this?”
Who are people?
No, but seriously. Who are these people? Do you want your profile to appeal to the widest possible audience? Do you truly believe that any “catch” is a good one? Because if you do, please correct that immediately. Each of us
Related: How to Find a Christian Wife
Lack of Self Awareness
Really, the people who are the best at creating online dating profiles are those who have the highest internal and external self-awareness.
This is
So if you really want to improve your online dating profile, show your friends. I dare you. If you feel embarrassed at the thought of it, you probably have some editing to do.
An Example of a Good Dating profile
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