The 6 Biggest Mistakes You’re Still Making On Dating Apps

Guys: What Not To Do On Your Tinder and Bumble Profiles

Dating apps are a highly contested way to meet people; ask a handful of your friends and they will all give you their different opinions on what the app iss good for, if anything. But those opinions tend to vary depending on people’s overall outlook on dating, and of course whether they’re good at any kind of dating at all.

Personally I can assure you that when done right dating apps are an excellent way to meet people.

As a woman more than capable of getting a date, I too used to doubt the effectiveness of dating apps and thought maybe they were a tad bit desperate. How could there be anyone on there who was actually my type? But eventually I figured I should open my mind a bit. What happened of course, was as soon as I saw it simply as a way to meet more people and not anything more complicated than that…I immediately met the hottest, most amazing guy I’ve ever dated. True story.

That being said, the majority of things I saw on there turned into screenshots and exchanges of “wtf lol” with my best friend. Here are some all too common mistakes you might still be making.

Pretending Like it’s a Joke

We get it, you’re a little embarrassed to be on Bumble so you’re trying to deflect that embarrassment by pretending like you don’t care at all. Because if you treat it like a joke, then there’s no investment, and you can’t get hurt! But we know that’s what your doing and it just makes you look insecure. It’s actually a little insulting because you’re implying that we should all be embarrassed to be there as well. We aren’t. Rejection happens in the real world too, just relax. 

Using Bad Photos

Seriously. It is so extremely easy to get a decent photo of yourself these days, so when you post up with out of focus pictures it makes it look like you’re hiding something. When you post photos of hard copy photos we assume that they’re old photos…so it makes it look like you’re hiding something. If you have five photos from a single car selfie shoot, it makes it look like you have no friends or life…and that you’re probably hiding something. Same thing goes if all of your photos are oddly posed the exact same way. That’s great that you know your good angle, but you do know that if you trick someone into a date that they will then be able to see your real face? You’re more likely to get passed up for not having reasonable photos than for being what you might consider “not attractive” or something. Let us decide, don’t try to decide for us. 

Another thing that happens a lot is that people put action shots from far away that are cool enough (although standard), but we can’t see you. I can tell by your profile that you surf, do handstands on rocks, and can accurately aim a gun at the shooting range. But boy I can’t see your face! Believe it or not most women are not like “ah he really carved that wave real nice I should date him even though I don’t know if he’s 18 or 34 in that photo.” We like men with hobbies, but like, mix it up so we can see you and your interests. Also, feel free to skip the photos of popular TV characters that don’t have you in them at all, because we have Netflix we’re covered on reruns.

Writing the Exact Same Bio as Everyone Else

I don’t know where everyone is getting their information about what should be included in a bio but they seem to be getting it from the same place. Half the guys on Tinder must have the same eager to help platonic girlfriend/read the same dating advice blog. There’s no way that so many people are so uniformly unoriginal. A lot of guys list their height which is great from my perspective, because I’m one of those women who care about such things. (Sorry.) But don’t worry about me, we’re talking about you. The height thing is a good piece of information for a lot of people, but somehow 80 percent of guys on dating apps list their height in the same joke format: “6’2” in heels.” Seriously it’s an epidemic. And many of the very tall guys who don’t feel the need to make a joke about their height reference it and the first date by saying “Don’t worry you can wear your heels.” None of this is like horrible, but seriously when a girl swipes through 30 people with the same photos and same bios it’s not super inspiring.

Having No Bio at All

That’s right, you have to figure out how to find a middle ground between having a generic bio and none at all. No bio at all on a dating app is just bizarre, you look like a bot or something. There must be something that you’re willing to share with the lucky ladies browsing your profile, even if it isn’t your height. Even writing that you love pizza (like everyone else) is better than not having a bio at all. You don’t have to expose your salary but maybe what industry you work in? What area of town you live in? How about your Instagram handle? Guys, please put your social media in there. We will find you anyway and you might as well just be open about it and save us the time. I fancy myself a regular P.I. when I need to cyber stalk someone and I hardly know how to work my own Google Docs, so imagine what the truly tech savvy are getting done. When guys make it hard to locate them and find out who they are it goes back to that concept where it looks like you’re hiding something. If we are going to be turned off by a real assortment of photos beyond the four you put in your profile, then we might not be into you in person anyway. And we’re not just talking looks here, social media can give a very telling view of someone’s lifestyle and whether they’re active, interesting, have their life together, or are super annoying!

Showing Off Excessively

Okay so it’s true that a lot of women are drawn to men for their means and not just for their looks or clever bios, but show off too excessively on your dating profile and it just looks like you don’t have anything else to offer. Don’t downplay your real strengths material goods aren’t everything. Throwing up the deuces in front of your car and popping champagne on private jets doesn’t really explain much besides that you think you have money. (Or that you have rich friends or travel with your rich boss for work.) See we don’t really know. Sure those photos might attract you a certain type of woman, but if you’re being honest with yourself is that really the kind of girl you want to attract? If so do your thing, but if not maybe try to appeal to the rest of the girls as well who aren’t just swiping right trying to find a sugar daddy. (There are special websites for those heart warming matches anyway.)

Being Too Eager

There are maybe one billion dating app profiles that say “no pen pals,” aka “I don’t want to chat forever damn I want to meet you.” But no one is on Tinder for the pen pals you guys, if someone is chatting with you for longer than you like, it’s probably because they’re still trying to decide whether they’re actually interested at all, or they’re already dating someone so they’re only partially paying attention to you. In my personal opinion trying to rush someone offline into a date doesn’t really work. If I’m 100 percent interested right off the bat I will accept a date, but if I’m not and someone asks me out before I even know a single thing about them it’s not going to happen. It’s not because I’m trying to annoy you, it’s because I need a moment to stalk your social media and find out if you’re actually in a relationship, don’t resemble your photos, or are just really not who you come off as. 

If you don’t have time for a conversation before acting extremely eager (or joke proposing, which is common), I assume something is off balance. Confident guys who see a woman as an equal match aren’t freaking out about locking her down, they just move one step at a time. They’re also not trying to pretend like they’re someone other than who they are, and they certainly aren’t embarrassed to be there.

Anything to add ladies? Now’s your chance to help some struggling guys get it together. Put it in the comments.