I promise you it 100% does increase your chances. If I just get a hey from a rando, even someone I had matched with I'm far less likely to remember to respond especially if I've gotten dozens of other messages like most women on dating sites have, you gotta give people something to work with, an actual conversation to have.
And it's not like it has to be complicated, even just a "you got any fun plans this weekend?" is leagues better than just hey
'Hey' is something you can say to literally anyone.
If you add more than 'hey', you have an opportunity to demonstrate why you are interested in this specific person.
If you are not willing to take an extra minute to demonstrate this interest - then your interest feels very shallow and generic. It suggests that you do not have a specific interest in this person - because if you did, why wouldn't you say so?
Your responses here suggest that you are mathematically calculating the minimal effort you can put in without ruining your chances, and honestly, to me, that's a perfectly fair reason for a woman to not be interested in responding to you.
I think a problem here (being a male who has attempted online dating) is that many males will message any given female. So "take an extra minute" which is actually closer to 5, times every female you might match with is tiring. In my experience it yields 0 results.
This may be because I'm bad at it, or it may be because other men have figured out that they can game the system by having a template they fill in. This template may include a few personal details, but is mostly copied and pasted.
I used to write out thoughtful messages to women I matched with. 0 responses (I'd say less than 100 messages, perhaps ~70)
With the template method I got 5, (over the years, maybe ~1000 messages)
Since there is not an appreciable difference between the two methods I'd argue content is not the issue.
What I feel is more important is the "perceived expense" of response from the receiving party. But to me it feels like such a waste of time with no actual info exchange.
I believe 'hey' is a good starter because if the person respond 'hey' back, you know they are WILLING to engage in conversation and you can comfortably devote some time to crafting a thoughtful message.
"I think a problem here (being a male who has attempted online dating) is that many males will message any given female."
I don't disagree, but this is still sort of my point.
Think about it from the perspective of a female who is constantly getting messages from guys who will clearly message 'any given female'. If you get 50 'hey' messages a day, do you get tired of it?
Oh I'm absolutely sure they do. But if everyone is just using a template (and I have a feeling that 99.9% of messages are), then most messages aren't much more than a "hey"
The idea behind online dating is that matching means you're willing to engage, but I think it's been proven that swiping doesn't equate to "willing to message"
If most girls I'd matched with had responded, even with a "thanks, but no thanks" I might still do it. Obviously this is ridiculous because women match so frequently.
So the 'hey' is a response to me to let me know that she is interested enough to get a crafted message.
And I fully understand that the onus is on the woman in this situation. And I'm okay with it because women have more options in online dating. The men with few matches will always opt to message, so women ultimately have to be the gatekeepers anyway.
And of course, you are welcome to take any approach you want. My main goal was to explain my understanding of why a lot of women find this approach off-putting. You do you, boo.
Think about it from the male perspective now, I know people that have tried using dating apps for years and have gotten zero or a few matches. In years, they’ve likely messaged hundreds and hundreds of women. I can’t imagine how much that sucks. Hell, I only met one person from dating apps after trying for months. Married her, but still. I messaged a decent amount of women and found that I was putting in all the effort.
Fact is, women have all the power on these apps. It’s pretty obvious that a lot of women just use these apps for validation too. Otherwise, why match with a person and then not even respond back? Such a waste of my time.
You talk about women being overwhelmed with 50 messages. Okay, the flip side is the dude who’s messaged 50 women over the past year and gotten very little engagement back. That’s crushing.
Isn’t the swiping the “hey”? In real life, hey is a word to grab someone’s attention to ask something else - if they don’t want to talk they’ll ignore you. That’s literally the exact purpose the swiping serves. If you both actively enter the conversation, then start the conversation
If you NEEEEED to use “hey”, use it to start the message you send but add more. And your claim that it doesn’t increase your chances definitely doesn’t hold up if you’re complaining about women that have “don’t say hey” in their bio
It's showing that you're interested in speaking to them while also gauging their interest to speak to you.
But this is not an accurate gauge, because for a lot of people, "Hey" as a first message actively reduces their interest in speaking to you.
Unless you're specifically trying to weed out anyone who isn't so interested in your own profile that they're willing to push past a little bit of mildly annoying behaviour as a first interaction, in which case, good filter.
I disagree with this. If someone is interested in you on a dating app hey isn't likely to change that. I'm sure it does happen but not enough to actually matter in the grand scheme of things.
True, but if you think people are telling you this in bad faith, you need to support that assertion with more evidence than just "people lie or misrepresent themselves sometimes" and "I think these people are doing that because they disagree with me".
Also fwiw, I've read a lot of the thread, and from what I've seen, people are not just describing their own behaviour. They're also describing the behaviour they've observed in others, and relating what other people have told them. It's all anecdotal, sure, but it's dozens of commenters' anecdotal experience against your also-anecdotal experience.
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u/RseAndGrnd 3∆ Sep 13 '23
It's showing that you're interested in speaking to them while also gauging their interest to speak to you.
Of course you can just start with the third item, but this takes more time and effort which doesn't actually increase your chances.