Is My Personality the Reason I Am Not Getting Matches?

Almost certainly not. A match is decided in about a second, on your photos, before she has seen anything of your personality. If nobody is matching with you, the cause sits in what she can see at that speed. Personality does matter, but it matters one step later: in the words you write and in how your conversations go once someone does like you.

She opens the app, sees your face, and swipes or taps. That is nearly all of it. She has no sense of whether you are funny, kind or dull, and she cannot yet tell.

a dating coach says that a man who gets matches without a strong written page is usually matching on his photos alone. His point is that the photos get her attention and carry most of the first decision. So when the matches are missing, the first thing to examine is what the picture shows, not the man behind it.

This is good news. A personality is hard to change in a week. A lead photo is not.

Three places, and all of them come after the first look.

The first is your written lines. a dating coach's view is that the picture gets her attention, but she judges your personality from your language. If you wrote nothing, or wrote something flat, she has nothing to like beyond your face.

The second is your first message. A plain "hey" shows her nobody in particular. A line that notices one thing on her page shows a man paying attention.

The third is the conversation itself, and then the date. This is where a dull or sour personality really costs you, and it costs you in the form of chats that die and dates that do not repeat, not in a lack of matches.

Look at your numbers over two weeks of steady, selective use. Count the women you liked, the matches you got and the matches who answered your first message.

Few matches, but those who match usually reply and some agree to meet: the picture is the weak point. Plenty of matches, but they go quiet after your opener or fade a few messages in: the words are the weak point, and this is where personality can be involved.

Many men have the second problem and call it the first. They are matching fine, the chats stall, and they decide they are boring or unlikeable. Usually the opener asked her to do all the work, and a better first line changes the result.

Write one concrete line about something you really do, such as a trip, a hobby you are bad at, or a place you go on Saturdays. A specific detail gives her something to answer, which is what a personality looks like on a page.

Cut the lines that every man writes, like loves to travel and good sense of humor. They read the same as a blank box. Show her your humor with one actual joke or a funny honest sentence, and skip the claim.

a dating coach's advice on low-value signals is to avoid anything that makes you sound unsuccessful or needy with women. A page that apologizes, complains about the apps or lists what you are not looking for does that work against you.

Make the first photo a clear shot of you alone, in daylight, with your face large enough to read on a small screen. Remove group shots, sunglasses and distant mountain pictures from the front of the set.

Then give each of the next photos a different job: your full height, you with friends, you doing something real. Change one thing at a time and give each change a week, so you know what moved the numbers.

Most men who ask this question have decided that something is wrong with who they are. The evidence rarely supports that.

What the apps see at the matching stage is a handful of images and a few lines, and both can be changed this week. Treat the matches as feedback on the page, not on your worth, and work through the fixes in order. If you are not sure whether your photos or your words are the weak spot, a coach can read both with you and tell you which to fix first.