As Maine Goes: Internet Dating in My Home State
featuring my home state of Maine: Webdate.com says that Maine has the most new and total numbers of their webdating members, per capita of Maine’s population. “Nearly 9 of every 1,000 Maine residents is a member of Webdate.com, and increase of 2.2 per thousand over the past 6 months.”
Webdate.com also says that it is doing well in other rural areas, with an average growth rate of over 34% in places like Wyoming, South Dakota, and Utah. Webdate says it just past the 3.5 million mark on membership. Well, even at .9%, that’s a healthy number (I happen to know that Maine’s population just passed a million in the last 10 or 20 years, so that would mean that .9% translates into around 10,000 people), so I went on over to Webdate.com to take a look.
One reason seems clear right off the bat: Webdate.com’s site just screams “Free, free, free!” Maine folks tend to be poor, and are always looking for a bargain. “What’s the catch?” I wondered. Dating sites need to make money somehow. So I looked a little deeper, and did a search of men between 40 and 60, using the zip code of Bangor, where I lived for a few years. Twenty-one PAGES plus of guys came up, twenty-five to a page! Of course, towards the end, they were pretty far away, in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Quebec, but hey, I’ve got a car and a license .... No, wait a minute, I’m a married lady. Back to business…
So I clicked on a picture so I could read something about these guys, and got a registration form , couldn’t go any further until I signed up. Still lots of reassurance that a credit card was not necessary, it was free. I didn’t sign up, but my guess is that at some point you have to pay, maybe to contact someone. That’s how the sites usually get their money, and hey, they deserved to make a buck from the service they are providing. Does anybody out there know for sure what the deal is with Webdate?
One negative: The pictures of guys on the site were dreadful. Part was the guys’ fault: Take some time with your photos, guys! Think about digging into your pocket and get a professional shot. (I like -->LookBetterOnline.com -->, and my client have had great results.) These guys make all the mistakes that I talk about all the time: hats, sunglasses, too far away to tell anything, distracting background. One guy even was holding up a fish! Fellas: Most women do not see a big fish as attractive.
The other problem was likely the site: Most of the photos looked heavily distorted. Maybe some were webcam shots (also not a good choice), but the pictures were so uniformly distorted that I figured it was probably the website.
So “Yea!” to Maine for getting out there and online! And the rest of you, let me know about your experience with Webdate.com. This site might be a good one if you live outside major urban areas.
From Your Romance Coach, Kathryn Lord
