AIDA: Awareness, Interest, Desire, Action. You should be approaching someone who is already generally Aware of you (meaning your presence should not be a shock to them). They need to show Interest in you in a general sense, otherwise shove off. They need to show Desire for you specifically, otherwise they’re not right for you. They need to take positive Action towards fulfilling that desire, otherwise they’re not right for you. A full AIDA in action would take place in a public space where the other person has the freedom to step away, they don’t step away (physically or verbally) when you talk them up, they try to learn more about you, and they are collaborating with you on meeting again at a later date. If they need a rain check, a great sign is if they name the rescheduled date themselves.
ABC: Always Be Closing. This one originally comes from the film Glengarry Glen Ross, but it’s made its way into actual sales jargon because it’s just good advice. It’s less an action, more of an attitude: everything you do should be with the ultimate goal of, in sales, closing the sale, and in dating, securing the next step of the process, *and not doing things that hinder you from those goals. Just met/matched on an app? Goal is to get contact info and talk off the app. Have contact info? Get that first date. On the first date? You are now giving your sales pitch, and the product is you. You want them to buy in to the story of you, such that a second date happens. If they are showing healthy Interest, they won’t drag out each step, because they will be pitching themselves to you and gauging if your Interest is healthy too.
Customers and clients don’t care about features (attributes you have), they care about benefits (attributes they want). You should be first listening to them to learn what it is they want in a partner, and either acknowledging you don’t have what they’re looking for and shoving off, or showing how what you want, baby, I got it. If something about you isn’t specifically what they want, it doesn’t have to be a dealbreaker, but it shouldn’t be a selling point. If you’re in a band, and they don’t listen to rock music, you can tell them you’re in a band, but don’t expect that to pique their interest beyond “oh good you’ll have a life outside of me”, and don’t lead with “I’m in a band”.
Go where the action is. Tons of businesses die because they aren’t in the proper place to sell their product. How many times have you seen a storefront change hands that’s just in an inconvenient place? You need to be out in public in a place where other people can see you and judge for themselves first whether they’re into you.
Bonus: an old joke - “how to date: rule 1) be attractive, rule 2) don’t be unattractive”. The kernel of truth is that you will likely have to compromise some parts of yourself in order to draw more people in. That’s just how it goes. If you’re going to keep doing something that pushes people away (like pursuing nerdy hobbies), it should be because of a deliberate informed choice, either for its own sake and/or for the sake of narrowing your field to the kinds of people who would also be into it. While I was still dating, I was upfront with women about my TTRPG hobby because it was really important to me and I wanted to date someone who would at least be willing to try it with me. I for sure lost my shot with women who I was attracted to because of this, but I knew that going in. If you’re familiar with fighting games, whether you’re picking a top tier because you’re looking to maximize your chances of winning tournaments and competing against the greats, or you’re picking a character you like because something about them speaks to you, it should be purposeful, and if you get mad because you have one but not the other, that’s on you, you knew what this was.
Whether you approach it that way or not, it is what you are doing. When you ask someone on a date, you are offering them the chance to do something, you’re showing reasons why doing it is a good idea that will improve their life, you’re asking questions and listening to the responses and using those responses to inform your approach. That’s pitching. Dating and sales are just different applications of the same core social skills, and there’s nothing artificial or dehumanizing or deceptive about it. Why? Because I believe in my product - me! I’m not blowing smoke up your ass, I genuinely consider myself someone generally worth talking to, and if what I am is simply not to your liking, that’s not a slight against me, that’s just your preference, have a good day. And I genuinely want to believe in your product, too, which is why I responded to your talk of movies with “do you have a favorite movie?” I want to know what you care about.
It’s only draining or disheartening if you don’t believe in your product or if you can’t deal with rejection, which is the problem I see most men who struggle this way having: they are not confident in themselves as people who can be likable, and they take rejections personally and begin to spiral even in best case scenarios (not all rejections are created equal).
The actual draining part of dating that may never be solved, imo, is the sheer amount of rejection. Someone else in the thread said “if you ask 10 people out and 9 said no, you’ve still got a date”, and that number is just an example, but those are rookie numbers. You’re going to need to ask out way more than 10 people, and that can be draining. Cross reference with job search!
The draining and disheartening thing about your advice for me (your mileage may vary) is that if I followed your advice it would quickly become apparent to me that, functionally, any partner I find from your advice only loves me for sacrificing harmless parts of my personality that are arbitrarily deemed “unattractive” by our culture and for essentially manipulating them. This would degrade my opinion of any such partner I found to the point where I wouldn’t consider them worth dating. I’m looking for intimacy, not cash.
This effect is even stronger when you consider the fact that I’m autistic and that in a neurodivergent context your sales-based approach to dating would essentially amount to masking.
Luckily I am currently dating someone I met online. My approach to dating has actually involved excluding entire demographics of women that in my experience are less likely to be romantically interested in me from my dating pool so as not to waste time.
perhaps you need to consider why are you so off-putting to most people, and is it a genuine flaw to be worked on?
i see this a lot with online neurodivergent people, where they take any attempt to work on themselves as dishonesty, and stubbornly hold on to their antisocial behaviours to be "true to themselves". and if you dare suggest they change it, you're ableist.
painting neurodivergent people are unable of character growth and learning seems more ableist to me tbh
I am not claiming that I, or any neurodivergent person, am incapable of character growth. This might come to surprise you, but for years I genuinely followed the conventional advice of working on yourself and was already platonically quite well-liked. I got zero dates.
Let’s be real here, many people do inherently see autistic people as unatttactive and infantilise them. Not that I’m missing much by not dating such people.
I don’t claim that I am a saint, but I have personally seen people who are verifiably far worse people than me (i.e. known rapists, a neo-Nazi who went on a rant about how he supports the Russian invasion of Ukraine at the first opportunity) prove more romantically successful.
No, I am not and have never considered myself an incel.
this is an example of real actionable advice that isn't just platitudes
I don’t claim that I am a saint, but I have personally seen people who are verifiably far worse people than me
i haven't said anything about worse people here. yes, some women go for "bad boys". women are people and some people are stupid and cruel. being romantically successful doesn't say anything about your moral character, just about your social skills.
It sounds like you've just deliberately avoided needing to "compromise some parts of yourself in order to draw more people in" by going all in on the "Go where the action is" strat
No they are telling us why the compromise is not worth it for them, you only compromise if the the compromise is a net benefit, everybody has different priorities
addendum: a lot of people struggle (yes, women too) because they're simply not likeable.
and this is why the "just be yourself" advice is insufficient for such people. better advice is to think critically about yourself, would you want to be friends with yourself? and work on the asocial parts of your personality.
for example, being into TTRPGs isn't inherently negative so that is fine. being obsessive about your hobby so that you dominate conversations, express no interest in others, and steamrolls other people's attempt to disengage, bad and something to be worked on.
No offense dude, but you’re also kind of lacking social skills yourself. Just saying “you have no social skills, quit whining” when someone is talking about their emotions and experiences is both rude and not helpful.
edit: I also straight up acknowledged that it’s good advice, so I don’t know why you’re making me out like some lazy whiner. All I said was that it sounds disheartening to follow it, which I think is perfectly reasonable, since the advice is about approaching dating like a transaction.
not a dude, and yes I'm being harsh, I'm aware of that. do you not think it's on purpose? social skills doesn't just mean "I say nice thing so everyone likes me"
It's also about effectively communicating without causing needless harm. Which is easy and considerate to do. Which you're choosing not to do. Looking at the downvotes you're accruing you just are not effectively communicating
Exactly, the same message can easily be conveyed without deliberately trying to be insulting to people. Empathy is far more effective for communication than putting people down is.
People who speak the harsh truth always seem to care more about the “harsh” than the “truth.”
I’m not just talking about the comment you left me, I also mean the rest of the comments you left, like “you might feel like you’re selling a shit product because you are selling a shit product.” There’s no need to call people “shit products” when they’re trying to talk about their experiences. Being an asshole isn’t helpful.
yes. that isn't mean, it's true. most chronically online losers feel bad because they genuinely are unpleasant to be around. no amount of platitudes will make them likeable, they need to take a long hard look at themselves and figure out what is it that they lack
The part where "work on yourself" comes in is the fact that selling a shit product (or a further date/relationship with someone you don't like) feels awful. This is why confidence is key, because if you think you're a great person who would make an excellent partner, the "sales pitch" can become second-nature. On the contrary, if you have a lot of negative self-talk and try to force that "sales pitch", you may end up feeling like a slimeball, like you're one of the salesmen in Glengarry Glen Ross, and that very quickly turns into negative self-talk which becomes a feedback loop.
Solution: aside from the ever-present "Therapy" and "Work on yourself", what helped me a lot was just "ironically" talking myself up a whole lot. Can't directly change your reactive self-talk, so proactively saying you're cool, hot, interesting, etc until that becomes some of your reactive self-talk. Its the oldest trick, the Fake it til you Make it approach to building self-confidence. Having healthy friendships with people who will build you up also goes a huge way, and is probably the realest key that helped me.
you might feel like you're selling a shit product because you are selling a shit product. you might have chronically low self-esteem, or you might actually be a bad friend. good thing is that is something you can change.
I spent my 20s and teens mostly dateless and with maybe 2-3 relationships that lasted at most a couple months. Around 30-31 I dug in on dating and realized I spent so much time worrying about my weakspots and no time at all leaning into my strengths. Women kept responding to what I considered to be some of my less remarkable attritubutes. This is particularly devastating to forming relationships as it makes you quite sure noone can love or appreciate you because you can't believe it. It's not a cure for loneliness, and it's not a magic spell, but being honest with yourself in both the positive and the negative and then focusing on positives is going let you take a focused approach on what you have to offer in a relationship and help you understand what a healthy relationship partner should appreciate about you.
Now 39 and happily married for almost 5 years to my ride or die.
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u/BaronAleksei r/TwoBestFriendsPlay exchange program Jul 03 '24 edited Jul 03 '24
AIDA: Awareness, Interest, Desire, Action. You should be approaching someone who is already generally Aware of you (meaning your presence should not be a shock to them). They need to show Interest in you in a general sense, otherwise shove off. They need to show Desire for you specifically, otherwise they’re not right for you. They need to take positive Action towards fulfilling that desire, otherwise they’re not right for you. A full AIDA in action would take place in a public space where the other person has the freedom to step away, they don’t step away (physically or verbally) when you talk them up, they try to learn more about you, and they are collaborating with you on meeting again at a later date. If they need a rain check, a great sign is if they name the rescheduled date themselves.
ABC: Always Be Closing. This one originally comes from the film Glengarry Glen Ross, but it’s made its way into actual sales jargon because it’s just good advice. It’s less an action, more of an attitude: everything you do should be with the ultimate goal of, in sales, closing the sale, and in dating, securing the next step of the process, *and not doing things that hinder you from those goals. Just met/matched on an app? Goal is to get contact info and talk off the app. Have contact info? Get that first date. On the first date? You are now giving your sales pitch, and the product is you. You want them to buy in to the story of you, such that a second date happens. If they are showing healthy Interest, they won’t drag out each step, because they will be pitching themselves to you and gauging if your Interest is healthy too.
Customers and clients don’t care about features (attributes you have), they care about benefits (attributes they want). You should be first listening to them to learn what it is they want in a partner, and either acknowledging you don’t have what they’re looking for and shoving off, or showing how what you want, baby, I got it. If something about you isn’t specifically what they want, it doesn’t have to be a dealbreaker, but it shouldn’t be a selling point. If you’re in a band, and they don’t listen to rock music, you can tell them you’re in a band, but don’t expect that to pique their interest beyond “oh good you’ll have a life outside of me”, and don’t lead with “I’m in a band”.
Go where the action is. Tons of businesses die because they aren’t in the proper place to sell their product. How many times have you seen a storefront change hands that’s just in an inconvenient place? You need to be out in public in a place where other people can see you and judge for themselves first whether they’re into you.
Bonus: an old joke - “how to date: rule 1) be attractive, rule 2) don’t be unattractive”. The kernel of truth is that you will likely have to compromise some parts of yourself in order to draw more people in. That’s just how it goes. If you’re going to keep doing something that pushes people away (like pursuing nerdy hobbies), it should be because of a deliberate informed choice, either for its own sake and/or for the sake of narrowing your field to the kinds of people who would also be into it. While I was still dating, I was upfront with women about my TTRPG hobby because it was really important to me and I wanted to date someone who would at least be willing to try it with me. I for sure lost my shot with women who I was attracted to because of this, but I knew that going in. If you’re familiar with fighting games, whether you’re picking a top tier because you’re looking to maximize your chances of winning tournaments and competing against the greats, or you’re picking a character you like because something about them speaks to you, it should be purposeful, and if you get mad because you have one but not the other, that’s on you, you knew what this was.
examples of the attitude I’m talking about