Topless Robot

Statistically proven online dating advice from OkCupid

Posted at 7:03 AM Sep 15, 2009

By Andrea Grimes

While, as a rule, I hate online dating with a passion, I really will say that OkCupid has been fun and a half. It hasn't worked for me personally, but I'll be damned if friends of mine haven't gotten some great dates out of the thing. Mostly, I trust the site, which with its quizzes and silly percentage-matching system, manages not to give off the creepy vibe o'desperation emanating constantly from Match and eHarmony.

So when OkCupid tells daters not to include poor grammar and spelling in initial messages, I'd consider listening. The bizarrely under-designed OkC blog has broken down exactly what's successful in a first-time message. And, wouldn't you know it, some of these tips even match up with some online dating advice I doled out late last year--like the aforementioned not-sounding-like-a-13-year-old:

Netspeak, bad grammar, and bad spelling are huge turn-offs. Our negative correlation list is a fool's lexicon: ur, u, wat, wont, and so on. These all make a terrible first impression. In fact, if you count hit (and we do!) the worst 6 words you can use in a first message are all stupid slang.

Thumbnail image for netspeak-chart.jpg
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Some of the advice may seem counterintuitive. Especially if you have never intuited or are generally a creep. For example, don't use the words "sexy, beautiful, hot, cutie," because "when they're used as pick-up lines, before you've even met in person, they inevitably feel...ew." I'd also add that online, calling someone "gorgeous" is about as hard as calling a LOLcat funny. Get specific with it.

The biggest surprise? Confidence is a no-go for guys:


Awkward, sorry, apologize, kinda, and probably all made male messages more successful, yet none of them except sorry affects female messages. As we mentioned before, pretty, no doubt because of its adverbial meaning of "to a fair degree; moderately" also helps male messages. A lot of real-world dating advice tells men to be more confident, but apparently hemming and hawing a little works well online.
Also, it helps if you're an atheist. SRSLY. Read all the tips here.

Comments

John A said:

Rather wonderfully, including the word "zombie" garnered a 40+% reply rate, while mentioning "god" drops you to about 30%.

With "sexy" at about 17%, I can't help but wonder what hit rate "sexy zombie god" would bring back.

Posted 09/15/2009 at 07:40:10 AM
Kiala said:

@John A The fact that you just said "sexy zombie god" in a blog comment made me find you attractive. So I'd say science is on your side.

Posted 09/15/2009 at 08:51:39 AM
evgelen said:

Amazing article, thank you a lot for your hard work.

Posted 04/03/2011 at 06:34:19 PM
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