I've spent $1,357 on dating apps. I've deleted them at least three, maybe four different times in the last year. I even wrote a book telling people to delete dating apps. And yet I'm thinking I'm going to go back to dating apps anyway, because I don't think I was ever playing the game properly on them. I did get some decent dates on the apps, but in my experience I mostly wasted my time and my money because of the profile I had. The pictures I had were not good enough to get the women I was interested in through the door, and therefore I mostly wasted all the money I put into dating apps.
Why I'm going back after deleting them
It seems to me that dating apps are best used as part of a well-rounded dating strategy. I have matchmaking that sets me up with a date or two every month. I have friends in person who can help me out and connect me with other people to go out with. I'm out there approaching women and talking in person, getting phone numbers and getting dates that way. I go to speed dating and mixer events, and I got two dates last weekend going to speed dating and mixer events. I'm thinking that if I have dating apps as one part of a well-rounded dating strategy, they could produce some additional leads.
But there's an even more disturbing part of using dating apps for me: I'm a content creator, and dating apps are almost guaranteed to provide me with content. That means anything that happens on a dating app, whether drama, ghosting, or success, I can make a video about it. That puts me in an unusual situation. There are lots of people I would tell, don't bother with dating apps, because they're probably not going to work for you. And at the same time, I know people who've had great success with dating apps, including me. I met my ex-wife on Match.com 15 and a half years ago. So I know they can work, and I know lots of people have met on apps. I'm also back on Facebook now, so I can try Facebook Dating for the first time as well.
Where I went wrong
Where I've noticed I went wrong is depending too much on one specific app. What I'm noticing is that of the women I've talked to in person, some of them are on lots of different apps, while others are only on Bumble, or only on Facebook Dating, or only on Tinder or Hinge. Therefore, if you're trying to use just one or two of the apps, you may be missing the right woman.
And yes, in my opinion dating apps are often stacked in favor of the women, but often only in favor of certain women on the apps, just like it is for men. What I've noticed is that dating apps are actually a very easy way for a guy like me, who looks good and has a nice life, to get dates. If I present myself properly, I should be able to get plenty of dates on dating apps. Even presenting myself poorly, I still got at least one good-looking woman to go out on a date with me within a few hours of matching with me on Hinge this year, and I got several other women I wasn't as enthusiastic about to go out with me as well. That was while doing so many different things wrong on the profile.
At this point I'm so curious: if I do dating apps "right," will they work for me? And can I even use dating apps non-addictively? In the past, I put way too much time into liking and swiping on dating apps. I'm wondering whether it's possible for me to just sit on a dating app and maybe just boost my profile. If I can boost my profile, or test boosting, instead of sitting there liking and swiping, then with my profile optimized I might not even have to waste time liking and swiping at all. I'm wondering whether dating apps can produce some dates that I'm really excited about without so much time and effort, if I go nuts optimizing my profile.
Doing the profile right
That means getting pictures taken in clothes that make me look attractive, in an environment that is very nice, somewhere in St. Pete like the Vinoy downtown. I get a really nice shirt, I go out there, and I take a picture, not a professional one, just a picture, at the right time of day. Then maybe I put up a little video of me speaking in front of an audience somewhere, and I don't mention things like marriage on my profile. It's amazing how important the top picture is. The last picture I had done by a professional photographer absolutely bombed on my Hinge profile. I did videos on my Hinge profile that absolutely bombed too. It's like there's no in between: either you have an average profile and barely get any matches, or you get to the point where there's a whole bunch of matches. I swear I've gotten so close with the dating apps. If I can just optimize a little further and play the game a little better, I'm going to break into that point where I get a whole bunch of matches.
I know that because in person, I do really well. In person, I can easily get phone numbers from attractive women and get dates with them, some of the most beautiful women you would see on dating apps. The problem with dating apps, though, is that in the past they've also sabotaged my confidence in person. Using dating apps left me feeling rejected so often that I'd then feel down talking to women in person. But here's the thing: I'm not in a position where I naturally meet a whole lot of women, especially now that I've stopped going to yoga, though I do go to speed dating events and things like that. I work at home by myself. And I am very good at doing things on the internet. You'd think I could win this game of dating apps at some point, and then it would make for interesting content.
This is something I've been thinking about for weeks now, because in the past, when I just impulsively jumped on dating apps, I basically did the same thing I did before, and they didn't work. But now I wonder: did I not give them enough time to work? Several of the women I know who met men on dating apps were the ones who found the men. And I know some men who had been single quite a while and were just sitting on these dating apps for a long time when the right woman came along and found them. It seems women often don't last as long on dating apps. A woman will pop on, go out with a few guys, and then she'll be off the app. Meanwhile, there's a lot of inventory of guys who often sit on the dating apps for quite a while.
I'm a bit of a niche guy also. I don't drink, I don't smoke or do any drugs or use marijuana, and I want kids. That means there's a very certain type of woman who's likely to be interested in me. I need to optimize my job title as well, because apparently YouTuber or author are crap job titles that almost no woman is interested in. Meanwhile, I know from others that if you put an impressive job title on there, that one little thing makes a difference: if they get past the first picture, the job title is the second big thing. Yes, dating apps are unfortunately extremely superficial in my experience, but I'm prepared to win on dating apps. I look good, I can take pictures that look good, and I don't have a fixed job title. I can come up with about anything I want. I could put CEO, or chief marketing officer, or video producer, or investor. One guy told me I should put venture capitalist as my job title because I invest in crypto. So there's a lot of flexibility in what I could do on a dating profile, and part of me just wants to see if I can win the game.
Then I want to be able to teach winning the game, because my last Hinge profile made it obvious why it bombed. I've also talked to enough women in person, and seen enough of what guys are saying about dating online, to know that if a woman's really interested, you generally should be able to have a phone number and be planning a date within two or three messages. I know from doing that myself that the women who were very interested in me usually went on a date with me within 24 to 48 hours of matching on the dating apps. And yes, at least one of those was a woman I found very attractive, and that was with a poorly done dating profile, without considering what would be really attractive and seductive to women, without taking very careful inventory of everything I was saying and how it impacts female psychology, and without looking at what's working for other guys on their profiles.
Being on every app instead of one or two
So if you're wondering about dating apps, then yes, they suck, but they can be fun also. To me, the journey at this point is that I love not having dating apps on my phone so I can focus on content, but I also love that I can just match with someone and have a date that night on a dating app. I'm just so curious as to what is going to work best for me, and if I don't try all the different means, I feel like I'm not making the proper effort. At this point, I can't rule out dating apps and say for sure that they definitely won't work, because they already did work once. Maybe I need to be on Hinge, Bumble, Tinder, Match.com, Facebook Dating, and maybe one or two more. Most of the time I've done dating apps, I only relied on Hinge and/or Bumble, and that was a mistake, because often it's the people who just joined and are new who are going to come find you, and that's where you get a date set up immediately. I know one very attractive woman who was only on Bumble. She joined straight on the app and found a guy to date right away. This guy had been single and just sitting on Bumble for a long time, and he just happened to be exactly what she was looking for.
The long-term strategy
From a business standpoint, if I look at my business, I try to put myself in a position to be found everywhere. I'm out here on YouTube on six different channels. I have long videos and I have short videos. I'm on Facebook now. I'm on Instagram, I'm on TikTok, I'm on LinkedIn, and I'm on X. All these platforms get more people to jerrybanfield.com, and within a month of setting up all those additional platforms, my income has hit an all-time high: my business at jerrybanfield.com has brought in about $4,000 in the last week or so, which is fantastic.
Thus, with dating apps, I really want to be able to show a long-term strategy: get your profile set up awesome, and then don't use dating apps addictively. Just sit there, put in maybe a little bit of effort every day on all the different apps, and maybe one day, on one app, the right woman will come across my profile, and from there a date will happen that turns into something. I'll be documenting every step of this in my Dating playlist.
If I'm going out with women from dating apps, I'm going to speed dating, I've got matchmaking, friends are connecting me, and I'm meeting women in person, then I also have the certainty that I'm putting in the effort. I'm working on myself, I'm delivering value to the world, I'm making money, I'm parenting my kids, I've got a house, I've got a car. At some point, something's going to work. I just have to keep showing up.
So I'm interested to know: do you think I should go back on dating apps? The only way I'll see your answer is if you join my chat, join my Skool community, schedule a call with me, or drop a tip with your message.
Bottom line, I also want to be able to lead by example. I'm kind of testing all of this for content, so whenever I do end up in a relationship I'm really excited about, I can say: here's all the stuff I tried, and here's what actually worked for me.