Dating Tips

Please share your tips or questions, use contact or feedback to send them in.

Posting a Personals Advert

Do
Photos
  • Include at least 1 photo of yourself, your ad will get more views and it will be more self selecting than plain text.
  • Include your face in the photo.
  • If your pic includes a friend, identify yourself in the text of the ad.
  • Less important but worth considering is background, eg studio, exotic holiday, messy bedroom all say different things about you.
Advert Title
  • Try to be descriptive, original and concise.
  • Clever, humorous and original are all good click bait.
The Advert
  • Describe yourself and what you are looking for.
  • Focus on your positive attributes.
  • Include your main interests or what’s important to you.
  • Be honest, it’s not a popularity contest, you want to find someone to like you for you are.
Website URL
  • Share your publicly accessible social networking or about you page.
  • Share you blog if it’s about you (not a product/service).

Do check your spam filters, and mark lovelounge mails as “not spam”.

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Don’t
Photos
  • Don’t use someone else’s photo, use your own.
  • Don’t post photos of kittens, sunsets or football club logos.
  • Don’t show your naked bits, save that surprise for later.
Advert Title
  • Don’t try and be original but posting theee lonnnnnngessssst tiiitleeeeee everrrrrrrr. You will be blacklisted.
  • Don’t SHOUT (by typing everything in upper-case).
The Advert
  • Don’t Cloak, ie try sell a product or service under the guise of a dating ad.
  • Don’t copy and paste the exact same ad you used on another site.
  • Don’t post one big paragraph, its unappealing/difficult to read.
  • Again, don’t SHOUT.
Website URL
  • Don’t spam, obviously. The ad will be deleted before it goes live and you will be blacklisted.
  • Don’t link to irrelevant sites. The idea is to link to additional information about you/your ad.

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Replying to a Personals Advert

Do
Replying to dating ads, do’s
  • Address the advertiser, whatever name they chose to use on their ad, shows you have read it.
  • Answer any questions the ad might ask. eg age, height, phone number.
  • If the advert asks for a photo include at least one recent photo.
  • Add humour if the advertiser rates that as a desirable attribute.
  • Follow the style of the advert, if long and detailed, do the same, if brief, keep the reply brief.

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Don’t
Replying to dating ads, don’ts
  • Don’t use a scatter gun approach and reply to every ad with a generic copy and paste message.
  • Don’t ignore key questions on the advert they were asked for a reason.
  • Don’t reply with photos of your naked bits unless specifically requested.
  • Don’t be rude or insulting, if you don’t agree with an ad, move on.
  • Don’t write an essay about all the bad luck you have had in past relationships, keep it upbeat and positive.
  • Don’t loose heart if you don’t hear back, could be a 100 reasons why they didn’t, don’t take it personally, keep trying or post your own ad.

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Meeting, staying safe on your first date

Do
Logistics
  • Arrange to meet at a public location you are familiar with at a time when there are a lot of people about.
  • Tell a friend where you are going and who you are meeting.
  • Get a friend to call 30-60 into date to see how you are doing, could also be a good reason to make a quick exit.
  • Preplan how you will get home, last trains, local cabs, cab numbers etc.
  • Make sure your mobile is fully charged.

Have fun and enjoy the opportunity to get to know a little more about someone new.

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Don’t
First date, don’ts
  • Don’t spend the whole evening talking about how great you are, sell yourself but listen too.
  • Don’t talk about how fantastic your ex was – or wasn’t for that matter.
  • Don’t get blind drunk.

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