How to attract your match online

A tree to lean on and a puppy to cuddle — it’s the ideal formula for a winning dating profile. Phoebe Luckhurst explains how to attract your match online
Spontaneous? Using a dog to score is almost as cynical as using a pic of you and your niece to emphasise that you’re sensitive (Picture: Scope Beauty/Steven Chee/ACPSyndication)

Chaps, the course of true love never did run smooth, but hooking your arm around a tree could limit the bumps in the road. As could acquiring a canine chaperone, proclaiming your ambition loudly in company and positioning yourself in sun-dappled light.

You couldn’t invent these bewildering blueprints for romantic success — and I didn’t. In fact, it’s the curious alchemy that makes the perfect male dating profile. According to research conducted by Skout, the world’s largest mobile social networking app, the best male profiles use photos taken in the sunshine near a clump of trees — and throwing a pup into the foreground ups the ante. You are also advised to describe yourself as “spontaneous, ambitious, funny and adventurous”.

Unfortunately, British men didn’t get the memo — they’re languishing near the doldrums of the international dating scene, holding only five per cent of the top dating profile slots. Brit gals fare better: we’re second after the Italians, a popularity that is attributed to our “fun” personalities. Apparently, girls looking to game their profiles should use the words “athletic”, “partner”, “honest” and “adventurous” — and stick to a natural #selfie.

So far, so bland, surely? Lads: correct me if you’re currently notching your bedpost nightly on the strength of a selfie shot in the sun-soaked environs of a towering oak, but I don’t see why getting papped with some living timber connotes raw sexuality. I’d never select a partner based on their passion for nature, and anyone who describes themselves as “funny” usually isn’t.

The premeditation of saying you’re spontaneous rather collapses your argument; using a dog to score is almost as cynical as using a pic of you and your niece to emphasise that you’re sensitive. While you can’t argue with stats, I’d argue that the best London profiles look a bit different.

Other London singletons agree that this can’t be the apex. Journalist and commentator Milo Yiannopoulos has been on Tinder for six months, and as somewhat of an all-star — “I’ve never swiped right and not had a match,” he insists — is more than qualified to offer some advice on gaming your profile.

“You need to take people on a journey with your photos,” Yiannopoulos recommends. “Hot, approachable, fashionable — hot is a good trajectory.”

A survey by London-based dating website Doing Something agrees that users with three or more photos receive 70 per cent more activity (views, “sounds good” responses and messages) than users with just one.

“The best photos make you look conventionally sexy but mischievous,” Yiannopoulos says. “Sauciness is fine if you have the looks to carry it off, and use your most polished, pop-star photo as your main profile image. Grainy, candid shots don’t work with the app’s white border — get professional headshots done if you have to. Provided you look good and work out, there’s no such thing as too skimpy, particularly for women. If you’re gay, avoid looking effeminate: it’s the kiss of death.”

I don’t know about “pop star” and I’d prefer to leave skimpy for people who actually pass the test, rather than just anyone with a smartphone and a screenshot function, so I stuck to photos where I look happy, presuming that was better than channelling “athletic” (boring) or “partner” (passive and boring). Matches seem particularly taken with two of my photos: in both I’m wearing a hat and holding a drink. Sod the bikini pics — I’ve got boys salivating over a bobble hat. Profile gamed.

What about the words? “Keep your profile answers short,” advises Fiona Bateman, head of partnerships at Doing Something. “A dating profile is like a CV — those reading it will have read hundreds that day and chances are they all sound the same. On DS we ask non-clichéd questions, for example, ‘If you were a biscuit what biscuit would you be?’ A person’s answer to this can say much more about them than the traditional, ‘What are your interests?’ type questions.”

That still sounds a little lame to me —sort of like some kind of “wacky” personality test. Yiannopoulos has better advice. “Don’t try too hard with your bio,” he says. “Less is always more. If someone notices what you’ve written, you’ve screwed up. Always leave questions for later. You can’t control mutual friends but if you’re maintaining your Facebook like you should, culling the bores and uglies, you’ll be fine.”

He’s right — less is certainly more on Tinder (especially if, like many men in the north-east London area, your bio reads “Don’t tell my girlfriend I’m on here”) and there’s a whole corner of the internet that ridicules the choicer dating profile biogs and chat-up lines (see @ShitOKCupidMenSay, @RedditOKCupid, or just stick “online dating” into Buzzfeed). God love the poor people who end up going viral for all the wrong reasons.

Get your head in the game — all’s fair in love and war.

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