How do I not appear too wishy-washy in a personal ad?

vinsanity0

Active member
I've decided to get back on OKC. As I am formulating my ad, I realize I seem a little unsure of what I want. The problem is I am open to anything, literally. For me, that is what poly is all about. It's the ability to have relationships on many different levels.

Yes, I am interested in committed relationships, but I want to avoid the appearance that I'll only date people who I think will go somewhere. At the same time, I don't want to appear as though I'm really just strictly casual. I fear keeping it so general just makes me look desperate in a way.

So what's a good way to word it so it shows I'm open to both committed relationships and more casual ones? Or an I getting to far inside my own head here.
 
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So what's a good way to word it so it shows I'm open to both committed relationships and more casual ones? Or an I getting to far inside my own head here.

Um, uh, doesn't it let you check more than one box under "looking for"?
 
I've decided to get back on OKC. As I am formulating my ad, I realize I seem a little unsure of what I want. The problem is I am open to anything, literally. For me, that is what poly is all about. It's the ability to have relationships on many different levels.

Yes, I am interested in committed relationships, but I want to avoid the appearance that I'll only date people who I think will go somewhere. At the same time, I don't want to appear as though I'm really just strictly casual. I fear keeping it so general just makes me look desperate in a way.

So what's a good way to word it so it shows I'm open to both committed relationships and more casual ones? Or an I getting to far inside my own head here.

Step 1:

Sincerely reflect on the possibility of including the verbatim message which you have just typed out (above) in your 'profile'.

Step 2:

If having decided that's really, really stupid, isolate the most stupid part and alter that … but leave the rest. Consider posting that.

Step 3:

Consider a highly edited, carefully crafted version of the above message.

Step 4:

If after giving all of this serious consideration and reflection with no beneficial results, tell me to go to heck. :p
 
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Hi vinsanity,

I suppose you could say something like, "I'm easy as far as what kind of relationships I'm looking for, casual or serious is fine." Inject a little humor in there, in general though keep it brief and light. I know, I'm probably being too general to be helpful. :rolleyes: I'm not a good guy to ask, I had terrible luck with OKC. :p Still maybe what I've said is useful for food for thought.

Regards,
Kevin T.
 
So what's a good way to word it so it shows I'm open to both committed relationships and more casual ones? Or an I getting to far inside my own head here.
I think you are getting to far inside your own head. Could just put this how you wrote it:

"I'm open to both committed relationships and more casual ones."

Or flip it.

"I'm up for casual dating as well as exploring more committed relationships."

Or similar.

Then move on to describing what kind of dates you like/companionship you can offer. Are you a good travel companion? Fishing? Sports? Games? What is it you like to do and would like to share doing with a dating partner?

It's just a profile. Try something on for a while. It's not like you can't go back later to update it/change it/freshen it up later on. Go for it! :)

Galagirl
 
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The OK Cupid profile pages are more about who you than than about who you're looking for. Focus on conveying your personality and interests and let those checked boxes speak to how serious you're willing to get in a relationship. Mentioning that you're poly is all you have to do in writing, you don't need to go into length regarding how and why. You don't need to justify or explain, you just need to indicate that you're open to both serious and casual non-mono relationships, which is what the boxes are for. Women want to know who you are. They want to get a feel for you. The best profiles convey fun loving confidence with a dash of humility. Every guy talks about the activities he is into and really, that doesn't give a sense of what you're like to spend time with. If you want to stand out, talk about your ideas, toss in a little humor and write about something specific. Every older guy wants a travel companion. YAWN! Who are you?

Photos are important. I'm sure you know this already, but here are my tips for photos.

All photos need to be in focus.
Include a full body shot that indicates your body type.
No sunglasses.
No shirtless bathroom selfies (They work on men but are a huge turnoff to most women. TMI, too soon)
No bathroom selfies at all.
No selfies taken from below the chin.
Smile. It's astounding how many men do not smile in their photos, presumably to appear masculine. Men who do not smile do not look rugged and appealing to women, they look scary. SMILE!
 
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Or an I getting to far inside my own head here.
I did some looking, and women have a 40% chance of getting a response if they write a man on OK Cupid. For men, it is only 25%. Because of the patriarchy and male privilege, I guess.

But that's based on averages and the ratios are way higher for pretty 18 year olds than anything else on OK Cupid.

Nevertheless I'm impressed its that good. I've not been on one so I don't know, but if you just make a lot of contacts you are going to get people writing back.
 
I'm not sure where you got that statistic, but I don't think it's accurate. I have dating profiles on OKCupid and PlentyofFish (and some others). I have messaged men on both sites numerous times and almost always get NO response. The 40% chance is way too high IMO. To be honest, I get why the men's side is only at 25% because I get a lot of messages that consist of "hey." :rolleyes: If that's your A-game, it's not gonna get you a response. LOL Just my two cents worth....

I did some looking, and women have a 40% chance of getting a response if they write a man on OK Cupid. For men, it is only 25%. Because of the patriarchy and male privilege, I guess.

But that's based on averages and the ratios are way higher for pretty 18 year olds than anything else on OK Cupid.

Nevertheless I'm impressed its that good. I've not been on one so I don't know, but if you just make a lot of contacts you are going to get people writing back.
 
I'm not sure where you got that statistic, but I don't think it's accurate. I have dating profiles on OKCupid and PlentyofFish (and some others). I have messaged men on both sites numerous times and almost always get NO response. The 40% chance is way too high IMO. To be honest, I get why the men's side is only at 25% because I get a lot of messages that consist of "hey." :rolleyes: If that's your A-game, it's not gonna get you a response. LOL Just my two cents worth....

Happy to cite that. I saw it being cited in later pieces, but this was the original:

https://blog.ted.com/7-things-we-learned-about-online-dating-from-the-co-founder-of-okcupid/

That came from a co-founder of OK Cupid so it's pretty authoritative and again, it is an average. The date is 2013 so a person can say it is dated, but it also comports with information gleaned from other sites too: women receive far better response rates than men.

We also know that for women, the maximum responses are to pretty 18 year olds. I was not making that up. The average is composed of women who receive zero answers no matter how many letters they write along with centerfold quality young women who get drowned in responses.

Most women are in the middle, and if we were to look more closely at some "deal breakers" for most of the population: polyamory is definitely a strike against you.

Being up front about that might cost you a lot of responses. But on the other hand it is going to eliminate the issue of concealing something important until you already have them roped in emotionally.

I don't have a dog in this fight, I am just a number cruncher by trade, published many papers in obscure academic journals in statistics.

Working with the average first, you can select a target number of responses like ten, it's a round number. 10/.4 = 25. An average woman would expect to write 25 letters to get 10 responses.

There is a famous statistical problem I heard from one of the top statisticians in academia, his name was Alan Hogg. I had the honor of taking a class from him, the most exciting class of my graduate work. But he called it "The Secretary Problem".

The problem for the statistician is that he will have a number of secretaries over his career, and he is concerned with maximizing the probability of choosing the best match. He is a geek and has never dated a woman but now he is a PhD professor and he's got them fawning after him. All he sees is secretaries because he just works and goes home.

How many secretaries, or rather what proportion of them should he let go by before offering marriage? And the answer is 1/e. The letter e means the natural logarithm, it's roughly 2.7. Not quite 3.

So it's roughly one-third. You let one-third of them go by and get a feel for what they're like. Now you can assess what a good one is vs. a bad one. You marry the next one that fits your experience as a good one.

It has much wider application of course.
 
vinsanity0, I hope you'll update this thread once you figure out how to word your preferences in your OkCupid profile. I'd be curious to hear what did or didn't work for you.
 
vinsanity0, I hope you'll update this thread once you figure out how to word your preferences in your OkCupid profile. I'd be curious to hear what did or didn't work for you.

I took FallenAngelina's advice and left it out. As ref said, there are boxes to check for that. I did put in one line about being poly and one line mentioning my BDSM preference. The rest was just a little about me.
 
I don't know, I prefer to say what I'm looking for when I have a profile. I'd rather have a stupidly long and wordy one and get fewer replies but better ones when I do.
Why not just say something like you're open to each relationship finding its own level, whatever it may be?
 
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