I’ve seen several “coaches” and bloggers in the online dating niche give the advice to test your profile pictures on picture rating sites like www.HotOrNot.com to find out which pictures are your best.

Testing is always a good idea because it will increase your results when done consistently and in the right way (see How to Get Women to Email You Back).

However, when you conduct tests you want to make sure the conditions for the test are as close to the real world as possible. Testing in “practice” or manufactured environments can give you very misleading results.

My Results On HotOrNot.com

A few years ago I tested my pictures on HorOrNot.com and had to laugh at the results. I was routinely rated in the range of 2 to 4 out of 10.

I by no means have model good looks, but I would have to resemble Sloth from The Goonies to be in the 2 range.

Back when I tried HotOrNot.com there was a function where you could see individual ratings for each number from one to 10. In other words, you could see how many people rated you a 9, 10, 1, 2, etc.

When I looked at the range for my various pictures I found a few votes in the 5 to 10 range, and a cluster of votes in the 1 to 2 range. Hmm…

I find it very unlikely there are scores of women rating guys 1’s and 2’s consistently. I’m just guessing here, but I think it’s much more likely those votes were coming from guys with fragile egos.

Skewed results like that don’t teach you anything. The reason I’m fairly certain the ratings on my pictures were bullshit was because of the feedback I got from real women on dating sites about my pictures.

I sometimes get comments like “Hey, handsome,” or “Great smile!” or “You’re welcome for the wink! You’re a very good looking guy” on dating sites. If I was really a 1 or 2 I would never get emails like that.

The point is if I were to rely solely on feedback from the picture rating sites I would likely be mislead as to which pictures are good and which are bad.

The Worst Thing About Picture Rating Sites

There is an even bigger problem with picture rating sites, which is you have no idea what kind of women are rating your pictures.

Now read closely, this is the important part.

If you’re conducting tests with the goal of increasing responses, you want to make damn sure you’re testing the right audience. In this case, that means conducting tests on the kind of women you’re interested in.

Testing on anyone other than your intended audience will skew your results.

The Easiest Way To Get True Ratings On Your Pictures

Rather than posting your pictures on sites where anyone from 10 year-olds to grandma’s to closet gay guys trolling male pictures can rate your pictures, test your pictures on the kind of women you’re actually interested in.

How do you do that?

The simplest way to get only women you’re interested in to tell you which pictures are your best is to…
ask them.

You can do this on dating sites (or Facebook) by emailing or IMing them and asking them something to the effect:

Subject: Can I ask a quick favor?

Message:

Hey,

I just got on here and I’m trying to decide on a few pictures that “show me off.” So the quick favor is: would you check out my pictures and tell me which two are best and which two I should take down? I’m not looking for a therapist here, just a quick female opinion.

You won’t offend me, so feel free to be completely honest.

Thanks, you rock!

Send that to 10 women of the caliber you’re interested in. Maybe just two out of those 10 women might email you back, but those two opinions will be worth more than the garbage results you get from picture rating sites.

Send it to a few more groups of women and you’ll find out very quickly which are you best pictures and which pictures suck.

The women you email can be from anywhere, that way you won’t waste any opportunities with women in the area where you live.

Pictures Aren’t Going To Get You Laid

Remember though, your pictures will get you only so far, unless of course you have model good looks. In that case feel free to email “duh” to women and you’ll still get numbers.

If that’s not the case, you’ll want to focus more of your time on writing emails that get you to the next step in the interaction with women. If your emails rock, you can have mediocre pictures and still get lots of numbers.

Of course, you want to give yourself every advantage, so definitely pick some pictures that present you in a good light.

Till next time,

Brandon Duran

It’s official, as of July 21, 2010, Yahoo Personals (Yahoo’s online dating site) is part of the Match.com community, and is branded as “Match.com on Yahoo!.”

Before the transition to the Match.com system, Yahoo Personals users were given the option to make a seamless switch to Match.com or discontinue their membership.

Users who chose to make the switch were able to easily transfer their profile and other information to the Match.com system. Those users now experience the Match.com system as any other Match.com member does.

How This Helps You Meet More Women

The most important thing about the partnership between Match.com and Yahoo Personals for you is that it means there are more women on Match.com.

There’s no need to worry about the additional guys that are now on Match.com due to the switch. As I’ve discussed before, the male competition on dating sites is a joke!

If you have been on the fence about plunking down your hundred bucks for a six-month subscription to Match.com, the partnership with Yahoo Personals is one more reason to do so now.

I have no affiliate relationship with Match.com, but I know that you want to meet more women on dating sites, and one way to do that is by standing in front of the ever increasing parade of women on Match.com.

Match.com is currently running a promotion where you buy six months and then get six months free if you don’t find somebody in the first six months. In other words, you’ll get a 12-month membership for the price of a six-month membership. (You’ll have to email at least five women each month and keep your profile visible the whole time to qualify for the free six months.)

This means it would cost you just over $8 a month for a year-long membership to Match.com. That’s a bargain considering how many attractive single women Match.com has wrangled up in one place for you.

Match.com has already put in the work to get the women there, now all you have to do is email them.

The Other Site That Helps You Meet More Women

I still recommend using Match.com in conjunction with the free dating site, Plenty of Fish.

You’ll likely find that you get slightly better results on one website than the other, but being a member of both sites increases the number of women you can meet.

To find out more about the differences between Match.com and Plenty of Fish see The Best Online Dating Sites.

Talk to you soon,

Brandon Duran

To some guys, getting good with women means being able to seduce any woman, any time, any place.

That is not realistic and only makes getting better with women harder, not easier.

A few years ago I found some guys on the internet that claimed to be very good with women. Some of these guys claimed to be so good with women that they could get any woman, any time, any place.

In fact, one of those guys claimed that you can’t consider yourself good with women until you successfully seduce 10 women out of 10 women you approach.

In other words, in that guy’s eyes, you’ve got to be able to successfully seduce any woman you ever approach.

Back then I was just trying to figure out how to approach and start conversations with women, so setting my goal with women as 10 for 10 seemed like a pretty tough hill to climb.

That made meeting and talking to women that much harder for me because I felt like I couldn’t mess up at all.

Now, years later, and much more successful with women and dating, I can guarantee you that none of the guys claiming to be able to successfully seduce every woman they go after actually can. Not a single one of them.

How do I know this?

Even A-List Celebrities Get Rejected

There have been well publicized stories of A-list celebrities that have dated some of the most beautiful women in the world getting rejected by other women. One such example was when Colin Farrell got rejected by Meghan Lowther.

Colin Farrell has dated many gorgeous women, so considering even he, an A-list celebrity (or close enough), gets turned down occasionally, how could you hold yourself to the unreasonable standard of getting every woman you talk to?

The point is even men most women drool over get rejected occasionally.

To hold yourself to a standard that you have to get every woman you approach is not only unrealistic, it could be holding you back from dating the women you’re most attracted to because you’ll be afraid of failing with them.

Rather than approaching those women and knowing you might not be successful, you instead move on to women you are more likely to succeed with, but who aren’t as attractive as the other women you’re afraid to fail with.

Rejection Can Devour A Man’s Courage

You’re probably well aware of and accept the fact that you won’t get every woman you talk to. However, when you get rejected it still stings and consumes your thoughts for the rest of day, week, or even longer.

That feeling can eat you up inside and consume your thoughts to the point you end up not approaching other women.

When you let rejection get under your skin or psyche, it not only ruins the opportunities that come your way while you’re beating yourself up, but it also makes you shy or hesitate the next time you talk to a woman.

You end up getting in a protective mode where you do everything you can to avoid getting rejected, which ultimately means you don’t take any risks with a woman, such as asking for her number.

When that happens the fear of rejection rules your mind rather than thoughts of having fun with a woman, playfully teasing her, and attracting her.

When fear of rejection becomes so bad it rules your mind, it can screw up a lot of opportunities you have with new women and also prevent you from getting to the next level with women you’re currently dating.

Moving Beyond Rejection

The take-home lesson is to be comfortable getting rejected from time to time because it will happen. If you never get rejected, you’re not talking to enough women or you’re not talking to hot women. Period.

If you haven’t dated very much you’ll probably get rejected more at first, but you can use those early rejections as guide posts that show you what not to do the next time.

Think of rejection as free coaching from hot women on the topic of what not to do with them.

As you get better with women you’ll experience less and less rejection. However, you still must accept that rejection will bare its face sooner or later, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

If you’ve been holding off on emailing the women you’re really attracted to on dating sites because you have a feeling you’ll instantly get blown out, email those women anyway. Take a chance and learn from the experience.

You’ll end up dating some fantastic women that most guys are afraid to talk to or email, and you’ll also learn not what to do as well. It’s a win-win situation.

Brandon Duran

I just read an email from a woman who apologized for taking a few days to get back to me. She had been really busy at work the previous week and hadn’t logged onto the dating site during that time.

When she finally logged on she found more than 40 new emails from guys!

What’s interesting is even though more than 40 other guys emailed her, she took the time to write me a long and thoughtful email. It was obvious to me she had read my entire profile and my other emails to her.

She probably emailed a few other guys back too, but most of those other 40 + guys’ emails got deleted after she skimmed them.

So how did I get this woman to respond when there were so many other guys that got ignored?

The answer is simple…

The Competition On Dating Sites Sucks!

Their emails suck, their mindsets suck, their profiles suck, they don’t know what to say once they get a woman on the phone, and if by chance they do get a woman out on a date, they blow it.

The competition sucks so badly because they see online dating as one big crap shoot where you either get lucky or you don’t.

They never realize there is a series of small steps for going from first emailing a woman to getting her phone number to meeting her in person, and that each step can be learned and mastered one at a time.

So rather than making their profile and emails as strong as they could be and using that system over and over, they send out random emails and pray for responses.

The easiest way to be successful on dating sites is to focus on each step one at a time. First you work on getting women to respond to your emails, then getting phone numbers, then getting dates, and so on.

By focusing on conversion during each of those steps one at a time, you greatly increase your chances of getting women to respond to your emails and ultimately meeting them in person.

However, the fact remains that there are still a lot of other guys online that women have to choose from. So how can you differentiate yourself from all the competition?

The Secret To Destroying Your Competition

Destroying your competition on dating sites boils down to one core principle: attract the woman and your competition will disappear.

It sounds obvious, but most guys forget that women get on dating sites to meet men they are attracted to. When a woman is attracted to you, she’ll make getting to know her easy and she’ll naturally ignore the competition.

The converse of the principle above is that if you can’t attract a woman, you’re not going to get anywhere with her. In other words, you’ll be one of the guys she ignores.

So how do you attract women on dating sites?

There are three primary ways to attract women on dating sites:

•    Make women laugh
•    Demonstrate confidence
•    Differentiate yourself from every other guy in an interesting way

Making a woman laugh is the easiest way to attract her online. It demonstrates that you’re fun and you don’t take yourself too seriously, as well as showing a woman that she would probably have a good time with you in person too.

Making women laugh also makes them comfortable. Don’t downplay that. There are scores of awkward guys on dating sites that make women cringe, not only with their emails, but on the phone or in person too.

Demonstrating confidence makes a woman feel safe, and shows her that you can handle any situation that may present itself. And really, what woman wants a meek man anyway?

Women are naturally wired to be attracted to confident guys. Men who are confident are comfortable in their own skin and tend to get what they want. That is very attractive to most women.

It’s very easy to confuse cockiness with confidence though, especially online. Cockiness is a turnoff to most women.

There is a simple trick to coming across as confident rather than cocky. Confident guys don’t try to impress other people, while the sole intention of cocky guys is to impress others or get a rise out of them.

Express yourself and your views comfortably without worrying about how a woman or others will judge you. When you do that in a tactful and charming way, you’ll come across as confident every time.

The last way to attract women online is to differentiate yourself from all of the other guys in an interesting way.

This comes down to expressing what’s important to you and what your life is about. The easiest way to do this is by talking about your passions.

Talking about your passions with energy excites other people and makes them feel alive, like there is so much more to experience and enjoy in life.

When you can make a woman feel alive, you’ve got her attention and the competition withers away because all they have to talk about is the same boring crap everyone else talks about.

You don’t have to do a bunch of extraordinary or exciting activities to come across as interesting. Simply express your life in an interesting way. If you don’t know how to do that, study your favorite authors and how they make everyday details come alive.

Remember to also clearly express what you’re looking for in a woman. It’s counter intuitive, but the clearer you are in your description of what you’re looking for, the more attractive it is to women.

Describing your type of women is attractive to all women, even when they’re not your type because it demonstrates that you know what you want and you expect to get it.

Most guys are willing to accept any woman that will say yes, so when you demonstrate that you have standards, you’ll instantly stick out in a good way.

I want to leave you with one last thought from a woman about the competition on dating sites.

Straight From A Woman’s Mouth

I was on a date with a woman the other night and one of the topics that came up was how many guys are on dating sites. She asked me what I thought about all of the competition I’m “up against.”

I laughed and asked said, “What competition?” I could tell by her body language she thought I was just being cocky, so I explained what I meant.

I told her I don’t have to worry about the competition because they blow it all by themselves the moment they open their mouths to women.

She started laughing and then said, “Fine, I guess you’re right.”

Don’t let the competition hold you back from getting what you want on dating sites. If you’re interested in a woman, email her.

When a woman reads your emails after reading a bunch of boring emails from other guys, she’ll know instantly that you get it, and she’ll make it easy for you to get to know her.

Follow the tips I gave you above and don’t worry about the competition because they’ll mess it up with women all by themselves without you ever having to “compete” with them.

The tons of clueless guys on dating sites actually help you to stand out that much more once you know what you’re doing. Imagine that, the competition online actually helps you meet more women.

Brandon Duran

Your email sequence on dating sites has two objectives: to break the ice with a woman and then get her phone number. Once you have a good email sequence, you’ll get numbers every time you send out emails.

Of course, not every woman will give you their number or even email you back, but a solid email sequence will allow you to get lots of phone numbers from attractive women.

What about women that ask you for your number?

If an attractive woman asks you for your number first obviously you’ll want to give it to her, but get her number too just in case she chickens out when it comes time to calling you.

In cases where you ask a woman for her number and she responds with some variation of “Why don’t you give me your number instead?” there is zero point in giving her your number.

Giving the woman your number ends the interaction with her right there. She will not call you and she will not give you her number, and she will usually stop answering your emails too.

Why then do women even ask for your number then if they aren’t going to call you?

Women ask for your number rather than giving you their number for a variety of reasons.

Sometimes you haven’t built up enough attraction with the woman; other times it could be that she was just being polite when responding to your emails but she’s not interested in you.

Or it could be a lot of other guys have asked her for her number too and she doesn’t want a bunch of random guys calling her.

Or maybe she’s trying to be cautious since there are so many wackos in the world.

Regardless of the reason why a woman asks for your number rather than giving you hers, it comes down to one simple conclusion – if she were really interested in you she would give you her number.

Women That Are Attracted To You Make Dating Easy

Women that are attracted and/or interested in you make it easy for you to get to the next step. If you ask a woman for her number she’ll give it to you. If you call her, she’ll answer. If you ask her out, she’ll accept.

Women who make getting to the next step difficult for you aren’t interested in you. There are some women that just make things difficult even if they like you, but that’s definitely not the kind of women most guys prefer.

So the simple answer is no. If a woman asks for your number rather than giving you hers when you ask, don’t give it to her. She’s not going to call and the interaction will end there if you do give her your number.

If you’re still interested in the woman you can try one last thing.

You can challenge her to make a decision one way or another – give you her number or hit the road.

That’s a very direct and possibly aggressive approach, but it saves you time in case you’re dealing with a woman who just wants to play games.

You can challenge a woman this way by sending her another email along the lines of, “If you were interested you would leave your number. Best wishes”

An email like this is simple and to the point. A woman will understand that she can give you her number or just move on.

This won’t work every time because, remember, a woman who didn’t give you her number the first time you asked probably wasn’t very interested to begin with.

However, I understand there are times when you’re still attracted to a woman and want to try one last time, even if there is only a small chance for success. You have nothing to lose at that point anyway with the woman, so go ahead and email her if you still want.

So there you have it. Now you know the only circumstances you should give your number to a woman. Remember though, playing games with women about getting their numbers should be the exception, not the rule.

If you find that you have to play games with women when you ask for their number, tweak your email sequence and profile.

If you’re having other problems when you ask women for their number, leave your situation below in the comments.

Brandon Duran

Getting good at meeting and dating women isn’t a one-step process. It’s a series of many small incremental improvements.

You’ll have a lot of victories and a lot of small defeats. Those victories and defeats will both point you in the right direction to keep you moving forward and improving your success with women.

Learning to get better with women this way is similar to a mindset called Kaizen.

At its core, Kaizen is simply a philosophy aimed at making continual progress by making many small improvements. Over time, the compound effect of those small improvements can result in a huge payoff.

You can apply Kaizen to every aspect of meeting women online.

(In a previous article I talked about split testing your emails to get more responses from women. Split testing is a form of Kaizen because it involves making small improvements to get better results.)

The thing I love most about Kaizen is by using it the only thing that can happen is you’ll get closer to your goals and even reach (and surpass) them. Kaizen nearly guarantees that you’ll get better results because you never stop improving yourself and what you do.

How To Use Kaizen To Meet More Women

Using Kaizen is very easy. When you reach a roadblock, you just have to do something different. You then track that information to figure out what works best, and then you do more of what gets you the most results.

That’s it. Here’s a quick breakdown of Kaizen:

Continue doing what’s working until you reach a road block, and then try something new to get passed it. Observe how the change you made affects your results. Continue doing more of what works and less or none of what doesn’t. Then continue doing this process over and over to get better results.

Of course, you don’t have to wait to apply Kaizen until you reach a roadblock. You can aim for better results even if you’re happy with your current results, and really that’s what Kaizen is about – constant improvement.

When you stop looking at meeting women online as one gigantic process that’s impossible to figure out, and you start looking at it as a series of small steps, you can really start making some serious progress.

Each of those small steps is an opportunity where you can improve, and when you do, those small improvements will result in you meeting and dating more women. And really, that’s the whole reason you’re on dating sites in the first place, right?

Use Kaizen on each of the small steps to continue making forward progress. It might take you a few weeks or months, but those small improvements will payoff and you’ll meet more women.

Brandon Duran

The goal of emailing women on dating sites it to get their phone numbers, which can then lead to meeting in the real world.

In this article you’ll learn what to do once you get a woman’s number, and how to transition from emailing to talking on the phone.

Why Women Don’t Answer Their Phones After Giving You Their Number

Many women will give you their phone number and then never pick up when you call.

A woman that doesn’t answer your calls or return your messages makes absolutely no sense. After all, if she’s not interested, why would she have given you her number in the first place?

The explanation comes down to attraction. If you can attract a woman, she will likely give you her phone number. However, attraction is a fleeting emotion.

A woman might be momentarily attracted to you, say from a funny email you sent her, and give you her number, but then a few days later when you call her she doesn’t answer because those feelings of attraction are gone.

So what do you do then? How do you get a woman to answer her phone when you call or return your messages?

Well, first we have to go back a little bit.

Attraction Starts Before You Call A Woman

If a woman was guilted into giving you her number or just being polite, of course she’s not going to answer when you call.

Make sure you’re getting women’s numbers because they are attracted to you, not because they are being polite. That is the first step to getting a woman to answer her phone when you call.

So let’s say you have attracted a woman and she has given you her number. What then?

Well, you can just call her, but the problem with that is only a small percentage of women will actually answer their phone.

One reason women don’t answer their phones is because they don’t recognize your number.

If a woman doesn’t answer her phone, you’ll have to leave a message. You’ll then have to wait for her to call you back, if she ever does.

Some guys have realized leaving messages on women’s voicemail doesn’t work very well, so they get smart and text her.

Setting up a date through text can be done and I have done it, however, doing that prevents you from attracting her over the phone, which can be very powerful.

Setting up dates through text also eliminates the chance you have to qualify a woman to make sure she’ll be fun once you meet up with her. It’s much better to find out if a woman is a dud on the phone before you take the time to meet up with her.

Going out with women who have nothing to say, who are boring, who are negative, or who you have no chemistry with is a waste of time. And you can’t find out any of that information through text, but you can over the phone.

I have disqualified a lot of women over the phone and thereby saved my time for other women. I’ve learned this by making the mistake of meeting up with women who were duds on the phone and then were duds in person too.

My rule of thumb is if you have no chemistry or don’t have fun with a woman on the phone, there is no point in meeting up with her in person. I’m sure there are exceptions, but this rule will save you a lot of wasted time with women who suck in person.

So now you know why talking to a woman on the phone is important, but how do you get her to pick up her phone?

How To Get A Woman To Program Your Number Into Her Phone

How do you get around the problem of a woman not recognizing your number?

You get her to program your number into her phone before you call her. This greatly increases the chances a woman will actually answer her phone when you call.

I’m going to give you a text in just moment that will persuade most women to program your number into their phone, but first there are a couple things to keep in mind.

You’ll want to call a woman on the same day you text her this message. And you want to have a few hours between the time you text her and then call her.

So if a woman gives her number in the evening or at night, you’ll probably want to wait until the next day to text her.

If a woman emails you her number early in the day you can text her and then call her that same night.

Here’s the text:

Hi. Just wanted to give you my number too. – Brandon

(Obviously you’ll want to leave your name instead of mine.)

Very simple, but very powerful.

This text does several things very effectively.

First, it makes it seem like she asked for your number and you were just being polite by giving it to her. This is powerful because it gives value to your number.

Second, there is a subtle suggestion that she should program her number into her phone. So rather than seeing a number she doesn’t recognize, she’ll see your name when you call.

Third, it prepares her for your call. She’ll assume the next thing you’re going to do is call her.

Most women will text back something like, “Thanks, how are you doing?” or “Hey! What are you up to?” I’ll usually text back something like, “Just working. I’ll call you tonight.”

I keep it brief when I text a woman back because I don’t want to have a conversation through text. It’s very easy to lose momentum when a woman doesn’t text back right away, and if you lose momentum she might not answer her phone.

After you send the text, wait a few hours and then call her. (I like to call between 8 and 9:30 pm.) Most women will now answer when you call.

Some women won’t text you back. That’s not a big deal. Just call her a few hours after you send the text anyway.

Try out this text and let me know how it goes.

Brandon Duran

Most women look great when they’re all done up, with all their makeup on, in a little black dress, tan skin, and in 3-inch heels.

That’s not how most women look most of the time though.

Fine. Most guys accept and understand that. What’s hard to stomach is how drastically different women can look when they’re at their best compared to what they look like on an average day.

Everyone hates a bait and switch.

Unfortunately there’s a lot of that happening on dating sites.

Many women post only pictures they look great in, forgetting they hardly ever look like that. That allows those women to get massive amounts of attention and ends up disappointing a lot of guys when they meet those women in person.

So how do you figure out what she really looks like?

Some guys recommend asking women for more pictures. The problem with that philosophy is she could send you more of her best pictures or simply choose not to send more pictures, at which point the interaction ends.

Asking a woman for more pictures simply doesn’t work very well.

There’s a much better option available.

Although most women will post pictures of themselves that look much better than they do on their average day, most women will also throw in a picture or two of them that show what they normally look like.

These are the pictures to judge a woman’s looks by. After all, what woman is going to post pictures that she looks bad or fat in if they don’t really look like that?

That’s right; no woman will post bad pictures of herself if that’s not what she really looks like.

Judge a woman’s looks based on her worst picture in her profile because that’s what she looks like on a daily basis at best. This will save you a lot of time and disappointment.

Don’t be fooled by the other 10 pictures where she looks smoking hot, because that’s what she looks like only when she dresses to the nines or what she looked like a few years ago when she was working out 7 days a week and starving herself prior to a vacation to Cancun.

Something else to watch out for is when a woman posts only one picture.

Really, what woman that is online today has only one picture of herself? Unless her profile on a dating site is brand-new, there is always something up when a woman has only one picture in her profile.

Save your time and avoid disappointment by simply skipping those profiles.

Use the two techniques in this article to look passed the trickery going on in many women’s profiles, and you’ll end up meeting more women that look like their profile pictures.

Brandon Duran

This past week I got some great questions from a reader named Droog.

Before we get into Droog’s questions, I want to show him some respect for trying out something new. He read about some new techniques on this blog and then tried them out immediately. That’s how to do it!

Trying new things that have been proven to work is the easiest way to jump to the next level in your game.

I pass along only techniques, mindsets and tactics that I have used over and over to meet new women. Everything I share with you has been proven to work, and it all still works today.

I’ve set up this blog to help you meet more women on dating sites. One of the best ways I can do that is by answering your questions and helping you get passed your current sticking points and hurdles.

If you’re stuck at a certain level with online dating, let me know about it and your questions might be featured on the blog.

Without further ado, let’s get to Droog’s questions.

Question:

Ok I just did my first split, if possible can I have some feedback?

The constant variables (PoF) were
Male looking for Female 18 – 30 Images only, up for anything
The message was the same for both
“Hey I am moving there soon and wanna meet some people, how you going?”

I sent 20 messages to Melbourne with the tag line – “Your Match of the Week”
Then I sent 20 messages to Sydney with the tag line – “Hey”

I messaged the first 20 I was able to in each and disregarded any other aspect of their profile to get a proper random sample.

I am testing tag lines and I am assuming the open rate and response rate will be way higher on “Your Match of the Week”. I am not using this on local girls because there isn’t enough to mass email for a test.

Could I do this better, is it more rigorous to send all 20 messages to girls in the same city or even to the same girl?

Also how long should I wait to get responses before taking what I got as my result?
Cheers again,
Droog

Answer:

You’ve got some good questions here.

I’m glad you included the information you used to search for women.

When you conduct split tests, you want to make sure you’re conducting them on your intended audience.

Your intended audience is the group of women you want to meet and date.

Different types of women respond to different things. Of course, there are some things that most women will respond positively to, but there are little differences for different groups of women.

I like to take as many variables out of the equation, and one of the easiest ways to do that is by only conducting split tests on the kind of women you want to meet and date.

If you’re really interested in meeting women that range in age from 18 to 30, that’s fine. Conduct splits on all of them. However, you’ll want to split those women into several groups.

The mindset women in the age range of 18 to 30 varies greatly.

Women in their early 20’s respond differently to the same stimuli than women in their late 20’s will.

I’m on the cusp of being 30, and I have noticed huge differences in the psychology of women in the age range of 20 to 30.

I’m generalizing here, but this is true more often than it’s not. Women in their early 20’s are much more worried about just having fun, “playing” with their friends, and they love being the center of attention. When you think of bratty women that play games, this is the age group that has most of them.

As women get a little bit older, they tend to stop being so selfish and self-centered. As they get closer to 30 and beyond, their priorities shift dramatically.

They seem to be much more open to finding a serious relationship and they tend to look more critically at each guy they date. Rather than dating just any random guy they meet, they tend to at least consider the long-term potential of a relationship with a guy before getting in too deep with him.

I can’t speak for women in their mid-thirties or older since I haven’t dated very many women in that age range, but I’m sure the psychology of those women differs from other groups as well.

Once again, these are just generalizations; however, I’ve seen these behavior patterns over and over.

Why are these behavior patterns important? Because women with different behavior patterns will respond differently to the same message or stimuli. This is true whether the groups are broken down by age, cultural differences, or whatever.

Women in different age groups will respond better to different things. Knowing that, you can focus your messages and profile specifically to the needs and wants of the women you’re most interested in to get more responses from them.

I realize you might have used the age you listed just to get a larger sample size rather than being interested in women throughout that whole age range.

However, I wanted to emphasize how to separate your split tests to cater to the needs of specific groups of women so you can get the most responses possible from each group.

Moving on.

You got the idea of split testing the subject lines right; everything else should be the same.

I can tell you right now that the subject line “hey” will easily get demolished by almost any other subject lines you test against it besides maybe “hi.” Those are two subject lines most guys use, and because of that, they have no impact and women easily dismiss them.

I like the second subject line (“Your Match of the Week”). I’m guessing that somebody has already tested it and it has done well.

In my previous article on split testing I mentioned emailing 20 women (10 for each variable of the split test you are testing) only to give you a starting point.

Sometimes it will take 20 emails or more to determine with any degree of confidence which version in a split test works better because of how close their response rates can be.

You could start by sending three to five emails of each version of the split test you’re running until you can confidently determine a winner.

That would be a lot less work initially. If you can’t tell which version gets more responses from that small of a sample size, you could then email more women until you determine a winner.

On to your last question. You asked how long to wait before tallying up the final numbers of a split test and determining a winner.

Three days is long enough for most tests. That gives you enough time to wait for women to respond and also gives you quick feedback.

For example, if you send out emails on Sunday, you could reliably tally your results on Wednesday night or Thursday morning.

Question:

I have been contacting women in other states to get a bigger sample size but I was adding an extra variable (their state). I think I will change my plan to contact six women a day, three with one split, three with another and then track the results.

Answer:

I understand your point about the extra variable you add when you email women from another state, but it doesn’t have as big of an effect as you might think.

What is more important in terms of the reliability of your results is the age range or other psychological differences I discussed above.

When I used to travel a lot for work I would conduct split tests on women throughout the U.S., and my results were very consistent.

I would keep my real city listed in my profile. Many women asked about that and it caused some problems when it came time to meet up with those women because they knew I would only be in town only for a few days.

However, the point of my split tests was to get their numbers, so if I got that far I was happy with my results because I could then send out those same emails to women when I got back from my trips.

You could also make profiles for each city so the women don’t even question it. Of course, you would then take your results from those split tests and apply them to women in your hometown.

Question:

I have been testing different pics on hot or not and have some decent ones and I got a friend who is pretty good at this stuff to write my profile so I am getting about a third of my emails responded to on plentyoffish.

My main problem is I have no idea where to take it from there. I tend to fluff a bit and the girl responds a few times then she fades. I need to start have a clearer idea of the purpose of each message.

What are your thoughts?

Cheers again mate,
Droog

Answer:

I tried testing my pictures on Hot or Not a few times but got pissed off because a bunch of dudes kept voting my pictures “1s” and skewing my results. Lol!

For the most part, I think most people know when they look good in a picture.

Put some pictures in your profile that you think look good and then work on the wording of your profile and your emails. Then when you get your emails and profile tweaked enough to start getting more responses, then you can test different pictures.

One way I like to test my pictures is by swapping the main profile picture.

I noticed a huge increase in winks and women emailing me first when I went to a close-up picture of my face where I had a huge smile on my face.

According to a survey done by OkCupid, that picture shouldn’t have done as well as some of the other types of pictures I had in my profile, but it did. I’m guessing this was just a very good picture of me. (This is the whole purpose of testing.)

I discussed the kind of pictures that work best on dating sites in another article – Are Your Profile Pictures Really That Important?

If you can’t guess which pictures you look best in, ask a few female friends or coworkers (preferably the type of women you’re attracted to) which pictures they like most. That will suffice until you get the other parts of your profile and emails together. Then you can test individual pictures.

If you’re getting a third of your emails responded to right now, that’s great news. Once you get better at getting those women’s numbers, you’ll end up meeting more women that you have time to date.

You mentioned that you end up losing a lot of those women though because you don’t know where to guide the interaction after they respond to your emails.

I had a lot of trouble with that too when I started.

Your question makes me realize I’m going to need to post an article with a blueprint of how to proceed once you get a response from a woman.

But let me give you a quick peek of that blueprint here right now.

Email a woman until she responds (up to three emails with no response). Once she responds, build some rapport by asking her a few questions. You could ask her about her favorite music, movies, or something she said in her profile.

When she answers your questions, she might have some of her own questions for you. Briefly answer her questions and briefly comment on her answers to your questions. Then tell her something to the effect that she sounds interesting and you’d like to learn more about her over a drink. Then ask for her number. (That should all be done in one email).

Try that out and I’ll put together a blueprint that explains these steps in more detail.

All right, great questions, Droog! And once again, props for taking action. Keep taking action and your results will keep improving.

If you are getting stuck somewhere when emailing women (or anywhere else), I want to hear about it. Let me know what your biggest hurdle is.

You can leave a comment below or click on the “Ask Brandon” tab at the top of this page.

See you in a few days,

Brandon Duran

Recently we talked about split testing to get more responses from women on dating sites. There is one more thing you need to do to get more responses from women – track your split tests.

I’m not going to geek out on you in this article. We’re going to go over just the essentials so you know the easiest way to track your split tests so you can quickly identify what gets the most responses.

Split testing seems simple enough – you test two emails (or profiles or whatever) against one another to determine which one gets more responses.

By doing that you’ll experience an immediate increase in responses from women, but the real value of split testing comes when you break down those results over a few weeks or months.

Compiling the information you get from your split tests allows you to spot trends in what is working and gives you clues about other things that might work too.

I’ve tried some crazy things that have worked very well, but I never would have given them a shot had I not tracked the results of my split tests.

When you combine split testing and tracking, you’ll quickly find the best emails, and once you do, you won’t have to write more emails until you get the bug to do so, or your emails stop working.

Let’s go a little deeper on how to track your split tests.

Just The Facts, Sir

In this article I refer only to tracking email split tests, but you can track other things too, like your profile wording, profile pictures, headlines in your profile, ways to ask for phone numbers, second emails, no response emails, text messages, etc.

Let’s start with a definition of “tracking.”

Tracking is simply another word for logging information. However, tracking goes one step further than logging by arranging the information in a specific order that allows you quickly make comparisons.

The easiest way I have found to track emails is by putting the information into a spreadsheet.

I use Microsoft™ Excel but if you don’t have this software you don’t need to buy it. You can get free spreadsheet software at openoffice.org that is comparable to Excel.

The purpose of using spreadsheet software is so you can easily log information into a few categories. Then, once you have tracked the information for a few weeks or months, you’ll be able to easily track trends.

There are a few categories you’ll want to create in your spreadsheet:

• Date of when you send the first email to a woman
• Screen name of the women you email
• Title of the emails you’re testing
• Any differences you’ve made to the emails
• The woman’s response (most important)

This might look like a lot of information, but it’s actually quite simple.

Let’s break down each of these categories.

Date of when you sent the first email to a woman – You’ll want to track the date you send first emails because it determines the flow of the rest of the emails.

If a woman doesn’t respond to an email, you’ll wait three days before sending her the next email in your sequence. Tracking the date prevents confusion over when to send the next email.

Logging the date will also allow you to identify certain parts of the week, month and year that work better at getting responses. For example, you’ll get a lot more responses around certain holidays. In a future article we’ll talk about the best day to send a woman the first email.

Screen name of the women you email – Logging women’s screen names allows you to quickly identify which women you have emailed and which emails you have sent to each woman.

This is also important because it’s very easy to mix up which women you have emailed once you have been on a dating site for a few months. Emailing a woman the same emails twice is tacky and a waste of your time.

Title of the emails you’re testing – Logging the titles of the emails you send is critical because it allows you to determine which emails are getting the most responses.

When you factor in that you can send each woman three to four different emails, and each email can have two versions, you can very quickly get lost in data if you don’t track the names of the emails.

This probably sounds much more intimidating than it actually is in practice. Stick with me and I’ll show you a screen shot that will greatly simplify this.

Differences you’ve made to emails – Even though you’ll be sending out template emails, many times you’ll make small changes to the emails. You’ll want to track these changes because some of them get higher responses than others.

You can implement those changes into your templates to get higher responses.

The woman’s response – This is the most important information you’ll log into your spreadsheet.

Observing how women respond to different emails is the most valuable information you’ll track because it gives you the emails that get the highest responses.

You can then send those emails over and over to new women. This is how you consistently meet women on dating sites and the whole purpose of split testing and tracking your emails.

Putting in a little work in this one place will allow you to meet many women later. You’ll have to conduct multiple split tests, but once you find some good emails, you’ll be able to meet women forever without having to come up with anymore emails.

If your emails stop working, you can repeat this process to create other emails that get high responses.

A Visual Example of Tracking

Here is an example of how I log my information into a spreadsheet using the categories I described above. (Click on the image to see a bigger and clearer version.)

This information is just an example, but it reflects how I really track my information.

To save space I used only four women, but when you log your information your spreadsheet should have more women.

I recommend sending each version of an email to 10 to 20 women when conducting split tests to accurately determine which email performs better. See my article about split testing for more information.

I tried to simulate how women actually respond in this spreadsheet. You’ll notice a few of the example women emailed back but didn’t give their numbers until two more emails.

That’s somewhat normal and demonstrates why you should continue emailing using all of your emails until you get a number. (I stop emailing a woman after I have sent her three emails without receiving a response from her.)

Don’t worry about the particular names of the emails, they are just examples; however, notice how I named specific emails to keep track of them.

In this example the only two emails being split tested are the first emails. The other emails (Haha! Mod 2; 2nd Email Template; and Adventure Mod 4) stay the same. This ensures you’re testing only one variable.

If you wanted to conduct split tests on the other emails, the only difference in your sequence would be those emails.

For example, if you wanted to split test the email “Haha! Mod 2” against another email, you would keep every other email you send women the same except “Haha! Mod 2” and the email you’re testing against it.

The Big Picture

I know this might seem very intimidating, but the take-home lesson is you want track the split tests you conduct so you can identify which emails get the most responses.

Without tracking the information from your split tests, it quickly gets way too confusing to determine which emails get the most responses because there is too much information.

Once you identify some good emails, you can simply copy and paste those emails to meet more women. It’s really as easy as that.

And it doesn’t take very long to find good emails.

Take the information I’ve given you in this article and start using it immediately.

You’re on dating sites because you want to meet more women, and this is how to do it.

I’m certain if I didn’t split test and track my emails, there is no way I would be able to meet all the women I do.

Split testing and tracking your emails is the “magic bullet” of online dating. Do it and you’ll meet more women. Period.

See you next week,

Brandon Duran