What’s the very first thing you look at when you look at someone on an online dating site? If we’re all being honest, it’s the pictures. Is that a bad thing? Of course, not! It’s one of the most exciting parts of looking for a new match. What is bad is if the only thing that you look at with a new online match is their profile pictures.

What are we talking about? Basically, if ALL you are looking at is a match’s pictures and ignoring their profile information, you’re doing yourself a disservice. Dating this way is no different than going to a meat market and ignoring the story behind the different cuts. You’ll end up with meat that doesn’t taste as good as you’d like because you can’t figure everything out just from a quick glance.

What I’d like to talk about today is the importance of going a little deeper in your search for love and why it’s going to benefit you more than you might think.

You Wish Other Singles Would Do the Same

Let’s be honest. We don’t want other singles to identify us only by how we look. We want them to be attracted to us physically, but we also want them to be attracted to who we are as people. We want them to know our likes, our dislikes, what we’re good at, and what our passions are. If they’re just looking at our pictures and making their judgment that way, it’s not great for the process.

If we want other people to be doing this, then we should be doing it ourselves. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t look at someone’s pictures to see if you’re attracted to them. Heck, when I was single and dating online, the pictures were always the first thing that I looked at. But, they certainly were not the only thing that I looked at.

If we’re going to hope and expect other singles to look at us as more than just a pretty face, we should give them the courtesy of doing the same.

You’ll Get Better Matches

Here’s the big selling point about why you need to make sure you are looking a little deeper. You’re going to end up with matches that are much more in line with what you’re looking for. You’ll be able to see what deal breakers might be present, what drives the person you’re interested in, and most importantly if there is even a chance that the two of you might be compatible.

What do better matches mean? It means two things. First, you’re going to have a much better chance of finding that special someone you are looking for. If all of your matches are closer to what you’re looking for from the get-go, by sheer numbers you’re going to have a better chance. Two, it’s going to save you a lot of time and money. If you’re stuck going out on a lot of dates with people that it will never work out with, you’re wasting a lot of time, money, and effort on things that aren’t going to go anywhere.

Your Potential Match Will Know If You Looked Deeper

The last reason that it’s important to look past the pictures when you’re searching for a match is it gives you a better shot of landing a date with that special guy or gal you are interested in. When you read into someone’s profile, it gives you the ability to send much more creative and relevant messages. These messages that don’t look like cookie cutter messages (a huge mistake) are going to get more responses and get your matches more excited to talk to you.

For example, if you’re looking to message a new girl that you’re interested in and you don’t read her profile at all, how creative can you be with your first message? Not that creative. You’re stuck with the standard “Hey, what’s up?” that is boring, overplayed, and does not get much of a response. But, let’s say you read her profile and you see that she loves dogs and volunteers at an animal shelter. Now you can send her a message that says, “Hey! I saw that you love animals and volunteer at the animal shelter. That’s so cool! How long have you been doing that for?”

Which message do you think she is more likely to respond to?

The Final Word

It’s not like I am recommending that you read a 300 page novel on every one of the singles you are interested in. All I am saying is that you should take a few minutes and at least glance through their profile. Online dating is a process that the more work you put into it, the better results you are going to get out of it. Take the extra time and help yourself by getting to know your potential matches before you fire off that first message.