It is just so tempting isn’t it, 100% free online dating sites cost nothing and you can meet millions of people … but are they and can you?
Most inexperienced online daters will begin with free online dating sites but it won’t take long before they begin to see the drawbacks and either give up with online dating or turn to paid dating sites.
If you are considering online dating then read my free or paid online dating article to help you decide what’s best for you.
Here are the top 5 reasons I believe you should think twice before using free online dating sites, particulalry if you are looking for a real relationship:
1. Conmen and Scam Artists
We’ve all read about those stupid people that get conned out of thousands by African conmen posing as the love of their life …. but are they stupid? Love or the prospect of love can do strange things to you, people that are ordinarily very sensible have been conned by these people time and time again. Free sites are where they are most active because they don’t have to worry about providing personal information or payment and the site isn’t interested in who signs up for membership.
2. Online Players
Do you know how to spot an online dating player? These are not people that aspire to be serial daters adding the notches to their bedposts, they are hunters that look for vulnerable prey on dating websites. They join many dating sites to widen their chances of finding people to play their game with. Free sites are perfect for them because they are full of inexperienced online daters, often newly out of a relationship and vulnerable to their form of “romancing”. In order to maintain their clean ‘reputation’ they stick to large free sites where word will not get passed around so easily.
3. In Life You Get What You Pay For
Free dating sites want advertising revenue, they want clicks. Every time you click an advert on their site they get paid, the more members they have the more people click adverts and the more companies are willing to pay to advertise on their website. Just try telling the owners that someone has been sending you offensive emails and see how long it takes them to respond to you, let alone take any action against the offender. As far as services and support go, if you pay nothing then guess what you get in return?
4. Seriously Looking?
Free sites are great if you are young and just looking for some fun, they are full of people that just want to chat (including lots of married people looking to spice up their life with some internet time) or date casually. People that are seriously looking for a relationship take their time to choose sites and will usually opt for paid sites, not just join free sites to keep their options as open as possible.
5. What Does Free Mean?
It must be 100% free, it is plastered all over the front page of the website, they have those red sale type stickers with Free to join all over the place. How many people actually read the smallprint … go on admit you don’t do you! That is what they count on, you google free dating and most of the sites you will find will be free to join, so you click to the site and see pictures of people you would love to meet and before you know it you have signed up. You start getting messages but as soon as you press the reply button you get that “you must be a premium/paid/full member to reply” message. There are some genuinely free sites out there but for those see 1-3 above.
So you are ready to date again and want to get out and meet as many people as possible to widen your options. Stop and think, do you really want to spend 6 months chatting to someone at the other side of the world with no hope of ever practically meeting?
I would suggest spending time finding a niche dating site that caters for your interests and whose service is only provided to your country. Why? Because if it’s only for your country the site will take steps to keep out the scammers and conmen from other continents.
Finding a niche site (eg countryside, horse riding, golfing, dancing, music, etc) means you will meet like minded people who share your interests.
All good paid dating sites offer either a free trial period or “free to look” membership, that way you can see how many people are in your area and if their profiles interest you before you pay for membership.
February 9th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Hehe.. May I should really quit my actually Dating Site!
March 22nd, 2009 at 8:18 pm
A great thing about free sites for married players is that they don’t have to explain the charges on their credit cards to their wives. One less thing to worry about for them.
March 25th, 2009 at 1:20 am
So true Alison, hence the reason they are full of married players. Of course for people looking for one night stands they don’t really care if the person is married. Strange world we now live in.
May 12th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Online dating is evolving and merging with social networking. We have seen efforts by Facebook in this direction. Availability of APIs is also encouraging dating sites to integrate with social networks.
Datopia.com is an effort in this direction.
May 12th, 2009 at 8:16 pm
Hi
Can you tell us what Datopia is doing to combat the 5 issues about free online dating raised in the post?
October 27th, 2009 at 10:24 am
I am married now to the most beautiful person who is also my soul mate.
It took me many years to finally find the right one and we married in our forties.
Unfortunately this meant that it was difficult for us to have children. Fortunately we are lucky to have one gorgeous little girl who is now almost 3 years old so we count ourselves very fortunate.
If I was young again and had to start over I would choose online dating to meet the perfect partner. It’s so simple now days to choose from thousands of women and even easier to find out if they would be a likely match even before you meet them or start communicating.
I had originally planned to marry in my late 20′s and I’m sure that if the internet were available back then I would have had a much better chance at finding that one special person a lot earlier and would have a house full of kids… But no regrets. We are very happy!
John @ How-To-Get-Girls.net´s last blog ..How To Seduce A Girl Using Hypnotic Seduction