Name: Theodore Underwood
Comment: I’m wondering if you can share some advice on how to get more responses from women on dating profiles. It seems that for every 10 messages I send, I get maybe 2 or 3 responses, and of those maybe 35% lead to a date. It’s really frustrating for guys, and we can’t even tell what we’re doing wrong. I tried out this service SpamHerClam.com that messages women for you to save time and rejection…aside from being a little crass, it’s the best thing I’ve found to work so far. Suggestions?
Age: 32
City: Fredericksburg
State: Virginia
Now, before everybody jumps into the comments it’s important to realize that this is an advertisement disguised as a letter.
I don’t believe in sponsored posts. In fact, when a crew of dating bloggers formed so that they could each schill a bunch of cheap, stupid scams and products I laughed knowing that it would destroy whatever modest credibility the bloggers had. Oh hai, internetz. Let me tell you how much I luuurve having this meal program delivered to my home for a week or about this mood ring for single ladiez that they can wear on the wedding finger and pretend to be engaged. I mean, I would never pay for this myself, of course. But I got paid to tell you how awesome it is, so here I am telling you to spend your money on this stinker. While maybe 2 or 3 of these bloggers were honest in their assessment of various services, most weren’t. You’d be surprised how willing someone is to promote a product just to get a little publicity or promotion. Or cash.
Let’s discuss SpamHerClam.com, shall we. Their tag line is…wait for it…”If you want some clam, you have to spam.” Stay classy, kids. Stay classy. The service provided by this site is to mass mail several women at once based on criteria you select.
You set the search criteria, eg: Girl, aged 18-28, thin/fit, in New York. We can use whatever your site allows as a search feature.
So, if my feeble woman brain is understanding this correctly, this site sends a bunch of messages to women based not on whether or not the customer finds them attractive, but just because they have a vagina. Is that right? Tell me again how this isn’t a disaster waiting to happen? Let’s picture the awkward conversations and possible drama that ensues when a bunch of women the client finds unattractive reply to these emails. Talk about frustrating. But hey, if the woman is getting frustrated, who cares? Vaginas don’t have feelings!
From their website:
Online Dating sites are designed to cater to women and frustrate men.
Boobs, amirite guys? Yes. It’s all a conspiracy! The womenz are eeevil. I’m not sure which is more reprehensible, that tag line or the black and white photo of the obviously under-aged model glammed up to look adult. Sadly, we all know that there are men out there who will rush to this site. Who is the target demographic for SpamHerClam? The “nice” guys. The whiny dudes. The, let’s just say it, less attractive men. Yes, let’s feed into the misconception that online dating is so! hard! for men. Bitch, please. Try being a woman over 35 on these sites. Then come crying to me about what a rough go of it you have. Online dating is hard for everybody. A person is lucky to send out 10 messages and get 2 to 3 responses. That’s higher than average.
Do women really respond to these messages? SHC’s answer:
Yes, they do, so long as it’s a good message. Sending an overly long, detailed, and personalized message actually comes off as desperate to most women.
Wrong! Wrong wrong wrong. People respond if you’re attractive. Or they respond just to get more attention. That doesn’t mean they are interested in you. What this service will do will get you more frustration. Not dates. Pay close attention to the verbage of sites like this. They aren’t promising more dates. Just more responses.I could send out 20 emails to guys on OKCupid that say, “Hey, I think you and I used to work together.” Guess how many guys will respond? Like, all of them. There. I just saved you money, bro. You’re welcome. At least you won’t be getting responses from women you don’t find attractive and have to deal with the possible landmines that come from conversations like that.
The problem isn’t how shallow people are, it’s the unreasonable expectations and self-perceptions that many people bring to online dating. When you identify and accept what you can feasibly attract, and you focus on the people who show interest in you rather than throwing a bunch of darts in the dark, you’ll have an easier time of it. Nobody owes you a response or an acknowledgement of the hard work and effort you put into an introductory email.
Despite what your brahs tell you, guys, not all women on these sites just want attention. The only people who make such claims are the ones who go for people way, way out of their league and get no response. They blame the opposite sex because that’s easier than saying admitting that they aren’t as attractive or youthful or interesting as they think.
Photo Credit – Spam Her Clam website
DISCLAIMER: I did not receive payment or any kind of reimbursement/discount of services for writing this post.
That spam website is nothing more than a commercialized version of specialized computer scripts (PHP? Perl? who knows) shared amongst some guys and used for Plenty of Fish (and possible others). What do these scripts do? When the script is run on a completed search list (age, location, etc), the script automatically clicks the “Meet Me” button for EVERY profile in the list. Hundreds upon hundreds of “meet me” messages can be sent out automatically. These scripts are shared behind the scenes on PUA forums. Leave it to the nerds to screw up online dating.
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Theodore Underwood
Really? Really??
It seems that for every 10 messages I send, I get maybe 2 or 3 responses, and of those maybe 35% lead to a date. It’s really frustrating for guys
That’s their definition of frustrating? I agree with Moxie. Assuming one is messaging to the more attractive women, a 20-30% response rate isn’t that bad. Though, I think once you get the hang of it and set your sights on the right audience, you can do better. When I’m using online, I typically get about a 40-50% response rate (though it varies by season) even if some are just “no thanks” (hey, it is a response). And maybe 30%of those result in a first meeting, with another third going any further. Keeping in mind that I’m a geezer, and it’s not bad.
I can see where this might work for the PUA types because, yes, their only interested in the vaj. But for regular guys sucked into trying this it could be disaster, especially if they let these dudes compose their message for them. They may actually get more responses, but there also going to get responses from women that they don’t want to date because they don’t find them attractive. So now what do they do? Ignore a message exchange that they supposedly initiated? These dudes also don’t say if they record search results and to whom messages are sent–though I suppose they must–otherwise they’d risk sending multiple messages from a guy to the same woman. Although come to think of it, the resulting shit-storm could be amusing…
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yes, 2 or 3 out of 10 is very good. Height and income are very powerful attractants online too. I’ve experimented around and adding 6 inches of height and changing from hidden income to 100,000 and up (on match) yielded immediate results. In New York you need 100,000+ to get much pull in my opinion. I would lie by an inch and consider putting the next higher income bracket if it’s believable. I don’t think its proper to put income on the profile, but lately I cant seem to get anybody without it. It’s look once, twice or more and disappear. Put up the income and the winks and emails start trickling in. The way I look at it, any decent girl can line up 3 weeks worth of dates, so don’t think of your date as your possible future wife, just look at it as dating practice for when you meet the right one in person. Make all your dumb mistakes with the serial daters and maybe the attitude that you don’t care will come across as more attractive anyway.
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So what happens when you then meet the woman and she is rightly pissed off to find that 6 foot actually means 5 ft 6 in?
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ha ha, I agree that would be ridiculous, I meant that was just a test, I only add 1 inch typically, read again. That is not a big deal. I read in another post Moxie said that half of the women in my age group lie about their age. And, I do post very recent photos because I have nothing to hide. I’ve found many women I have met have photos several years old.
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While I wouldn’t use it myself, I can see the appeal of a service like this. Someone once told me that “to win” at OKCupid, you should send out thirty personalized messages A DAY. That, quite frankly, sounds exhausting.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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I thought the hard part was after the first date. The online part was pretty smooth sailing as far as I’m concerned.
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It probably just send generic cut and paste messages. The kind of chicks who reply to those kind of messages will be thrilled to get a message and will reply to them, send camera phone picks of them making smexy faces in the bathroom.And the hopeless, semi-literate 5’6″ World of Warcraft champion who lives in his parents basement will be thrilled because a girl wrote him back. Good for him. Good for her. Losers deserve each other.
Its not going to make a difference to people who really have something to offer, on either end.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Dear ‘Mr. T. Underwood’, You’re about as hopelessly out of date as your typewriters. This?
“It seems that for every 10 messages I send, I get maybe 2 or 3 responses, and of those maybe 35% lead to a date.”
Is not the definition of a marketing ‘failure’, but a sterling level of success in almost any field you can imagine. That’s the problem here. Do the math. You don’t understand the ‘problem’ or your market much.
And anyone say past the age of 30 still keying in on ‘height’ and ‘income’, really deserve to be played by the players who know the score too. While wholly understandable, past a certain point you’ve got to grow up. No really. The number of ‘bankable’ or even likable over 6ft. athletic, healthy, securely high income earners with good benes & families are a vanishingly small population. But everyone’s chasing them, seemingly. So most of them are either married or have been. Now mix it up and start to explore the ‘short stuff’ with many fo the same characteristics? you expand your options dramatically. But most will prefer to save this advice until they’re over 40 I imagine, for continuity’s sake. Only after trying on all the other really bad options, and then going more rounds with same. That’s how persistent the prejudice is. Cheers, ‘VJ’
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The reason there is a market for something like this is what Moxie said in her response “I could send out 20 emails to guys on OKCupid that say, “Hey, I think you and I used to work together.” Guess how many guys will respond? Like, all of them.” She certainly could and would get that 100% level of response. At best a handful of men on OKCupid could say the same thing. Hence there is a market for something like SpamHerClam. A sad troubled market but a market none the less. No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American consumer.
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I’m torn about this. Part of me says-Damn! Why didn’t I think of this easy way to separate lazy horny guys from their $$$!
As Moxie has repeatedly and correctly stated, online dating is work. Dating is work. You will need to devote some time to decent pictures, profile, and messaging.
And here’s another newsflash, relationships are work, especially if they turn into marriage and children.
What I don’t get, if these guys just want sex, and are willing to pay for spam clam services, why don’t they just pay for a hooker? Or troll Craig’s List?
Is this somehow beneath them?
Hot debate. What do you think?
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“As Moxie has repeatedly and correctly stated, online dating is work. Dating is work. You will need to devote some time to decent pictures, profile, and messaging.”
And no one’s disputing that. The thing is, for some people, the amount of work is not proportional to the results they receive. It can be inordinately frustrating to put a lot of time, effort, and money into something and then feel like you have nothing to show for it.
Also, I think the existence of this service shows that Moxie’s statement of “Men are winning at online dating” is incorrect. After all, it’s not “Spam HIS Thing” (I can’t think of a good, catchy male analog, but you get my point).
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Another thing on this site that is atrocious… in order to submit a message on their Contact Us page, you have to choose the “hottest chick.” ….and y’know what, one of them is blogger at fat activist Lindy West. I’m sure the other two “not hot” girls are also real live people with actual feelings. Disgusting.
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i JUST sent her an email and a tweet.
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They are attention whores, trying to talk up their “service.” They probably picked that picture on purpose, so as to get attention. I would guess they are writing some advice manual to men on how to “get some clam” and they want to get themselves a rep. The service is probably just a fake thing, to get everyone outraged, so when the Ebook comes out, they have a rep already. Who would pay for someone to send cut and paste messages anyway? As for Lindy West, shes got to know that some guys would use her as an example of ugly. Its not going to be news to her. Anyone checked you tube yet to see if they have videos with the actual guys behind the website? Are they wearing World of Warcrft tee shirts?
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