There’s a lot of bullshit advice on building a profile out there, and a lot of guys have extremely delusional views on what actually works. 

A lot of guys that make these mistakes will also complain vocally about “dating apps being dead”. I can tell you with 100% confidence that dating apps are still one of the easiest ways to consistently go out on dates and get laid. 

Sure, they might not be at their peak, but if you live in a decent-sized city and build a nice profile, learn some text game, you’ll have no problem building a roster just from dating apps. 

Here’s a quick warning: This post is not gonna give you some cookie-cutter, happy-camp positivity advice. This is just gonna be some real shit that works, if you get in your feels about how unfair it is, I can’t help you. 

1 - Get yourself right

It AMAZES me, that there are men on this subreddit and other corners of the internet that will endlessly complain about how unfair online dating is, while not putting any real effort into bettering themselves.

If you aren’t consistently hitting the gym, taking care of your hair/beard, figuring out your style and wearing clothes/accessories that look good, taking care of your hygiene and stuff like teeth and skin, you have 0 right to complain. 

Is it fair? No. Does it feel good all the time? No. Is it going to make you a better, more confident and attractive man? Yes. 

Do you really expect that a girl who spends hours in the gym each week to get a nice ass and slim body, who spends hundreds of dollars per month on her nails, hair, skin, who has spent years perfecting her makeup routines and other shit, will want to date a guy who doesn’t put in any effort into his looks? 

At the end of the day, you have 2 choices.

  1. Complain endlessly about how unfair the world is and how cooked you are, never putting in effort to improving yourself.
  2. Accept that the world is unfair, but you won’t be around for that long so you might as well give it everything you’ve got. 

If you get “the ick” at the idea of making yourself look better/improving yourself, that’s fine. But don’t complain when girls want nothing to do with you…

You don’t have to look like a greek god, living a healthy life and taking care of yourself will get you to a point where you can definitely date some bad bitches (with good enough game ofc…)

Of course, saying this will bring out the blackpillers who think that if you haven’t won the genetic lottery it’s over. Those people usually don’t go outside much.

2 - Play to your strengths

Essentially, figure out the most attractive things about you and emphasize them. Then, downplay the unattractive stuff. What this means in practice:

  • If you’re tall, put your height in your bio, have photos where you’re with other people that are shorter than you, look tall in every photo. 
  • If you’re short, don’t put your height in your profile, DO NOT have photos where you’re with your 6’3 friend that’s towering over you. 
  • If you have a good face, have some selfies and photos from closer angles that show off your features, jawline etc. 
  • If your face is a bit cooked, have more full-body shots that show your physique and style, where your face is further away from the camera. 
  • If you have cool hobbies or do cool shit, have photos that show that off. Photos in exotic/cool places will always get results. The reality is that most girls are pretty boring, they want guys who can take them on exciting adventures. 
  • If you have a good/ripped physique, show it off. Don’t do it in a try-hard way like flexing in your bathroom mirror, but in a casual way, like a photo of you shirtless at the beach or at a pool. 
  • If you have a dog/cat, have a photo of them with you. Pet photos are always effective. You can honestly use them even if you don’t have a dog, just borrow your friends..

The more positives you have, the more you can get away with. This is why people will often see 10/10 handsome and jacked guys get matches with basic profiles and conclude that stuff like good photos or optimized profiles don’t matter. 

This isn’t true, for the rest of us that are closer to average, the quality of your profile will make or break how many matches you get. 

Personally, I have an alright face, I’m tall and I know I dress well. But, my physique is shit (I’m very skinny) and I honestly don’t do that much cool stuff, which means that for my profile, I mostly have photos that show off my face, height and style.

Inversely, I don’t have any photos that show the negatives, such as shirtless photos or photos where I’m with people even taller than me. But, for a short jacked guy, he’d have the opposite profile. 

Online dating, at it’s core, is just marketing. You are the product, figure out the best angle to sell yourself from.

3 - Stop making retarded, common mistakes

A major portion of the success in online dating doesn’t come from what you do, it comes from what you don’t do. 

Here’s a quick list of the most common mistakes that fuck up guy’s profiles (very scientifically collected from me reviewing a ton of profiles from guys here on Reddit)

The biggest mistakes that will fuck you up:

-Weird facial expressions or body language. Just one photo where you look like shit, is enough for a girl to swipe left. One shit photo will set off alarm bells in her head, that make her think the good photos might just be really old/edited. 

Axe away ALL photos where you have closed off body language or where your face looks weird. This is one of the most important things that almost everyone fucks up. If you can’t analyze how you look objectively, ask a female friend for honest feedback. 

Btw: You should look at least 10-20% better in all photos than you do IRL. It’s not catfishing, the fact is your own perception of how you look is probably pretty skewed, so may as well stay on the safe side. 

I can confidently say I look at least 15% better in my photos, yet I’ve NEVER had a girl say anything other than “wow you look better in real life!”. This is because once you actually see someone IRL, a lot of the small imperfections you obsess about in photos start to fade away. 

-Tryhard photos. Some years ago a big thing with online dating advice was professional photos. Good quality photos are fine, but if it’s obvious you dressed up just to take some Tinder photos, you’re not getting swiped on. 

Every photo should have a casual, laid-back vibe. You were doing some cool shit and someone just happened to take a photo of you. If you look super good in some posed, professionally taken shot, at most include one photo like that. But you better look fucking amazing. 

One or two selfies are also fine, but they can’t be shitty or weird selfies. No dirty mirrors or bathrooms. 

-Shitty outfits and style. Call me gay all you want but the way you dress is a major indication of your personality. If you’re wearing shitty, unstylish clothes in your photos, you won’t get swiped on. I once did a profile review for a guy in his mid-20’s that unironically wore a blue spongebob shirt in multiple dating app photos… While I definitely respect the confidence, that shit will not get you matches. 

Girls need to at least know that if they go on a date with you, they won’t have to be ashamed of you because you’re wearing a retarded outfit.

-Tryhard / weird bios and prompts. I generally advocate that unless you’re dating to marry and above 30 years old, your bio should be 1-2 lines. My bio for the past year has literally been: “hmu if you know how to resurrect houseplants 🌱” and I’ve done just fine. The bio is drastically overrated in getting matches. 

These are honestly 95% of the mistakes I see in guy’s profiles. If you’re at least somewhat attractive but aren’t getting good matches, I can almost guarantee that you’re making one of these. Put the ego aside and objectively evaluate your profile based on the previous criteria, I can guarantee that it is not as good as it could be. 

Also, avoid the low hanging fruit, such as: Blurry/shit-quality photos, photos in your dirty ahh bathroom, photos with women (especially ugly women), massive group pics, creepy/overly sexual pics or pics where you’re getting absolutely mogged by someone else. 

4 - Bonus

A couple quick things before we finish. NEVER. EVER turbo swipe right on every girl. The way the algorithm on dating apps works, will ensure that if you swipe right on every girl you see, your profile is going to get absolutely buried. 

As a general rule, AT MOST swipe right on 1 out of 5 girls. That’s it. This way, you’ll improve your match-rate, and the app will boost your profile, leading to more likes and matches. 

A secret, new feature on Tinder that no-one talks about, is that your interactions with matches also matter. The faster you message new matches, the more your profile will be shown. This is because Tinder wants to reward users for actually using the app, instead of collecting matches like trophies. 

So, make sure you message new matches within 24-48 hours of matching. You can also use this feature strategically. Usually on Wednesday I send out a ton of messages to all my matches from the past week, leading to my profile being boosted, leading to an influx of new likes before the weekend, so I always have fresh, hot & ready matches to practice my world-class text-game on. 

Conclusion

I could give you some bullshit “new technique” or strategy for how to get a ton of matches, maybe even tell you that as long as you pay for my coaching I’ll reveal that secret to you…? 

But the truth is, the secret to success with online dating is you. It’s how attractive you and your profile is. If you’re unattractive, no secret technique or photo-format can hide that away. But, attractiveness is not an unmovable quality. You can do things to improve it. 

If you’re currently not getting any matches, that should be a great thing for you! It means that eventually, you’ll get so sick and tired of opening incognito mode every night, that you’ll get a burst of motivation to actually start hitting the gym, dressing well and overall improving your attractiveness. Which, you guessed it, will lead to more matches & dates. 

The good news is that most guys on dating apps suck shit at building a good profile, so you don’t actually have to be a supermodel to stand out. 

For a lot of women, if your profile shows that you’ve got your life together, you’re confident and know how to present yourself, it’ll be enough. Sure, you won’t get the 10/10 supermodels, but they’re overrated anyways…

Hopefully you found some value in this post, till next time fellas