How to get responses on Fetlife

Maybe if I title a post with the exact search string I saw in my stats, people will read it 🙂 A lot of this advice is going to sound familiar if you’ve already read my post how to make friends on fetlife for the hard of thinking, but in the spirit of the holidays this post is going to be a bit gentler of a guide to getting responses to your fetlife (or collarspace or okcupid or whatever social network or personals site you choose to message people on) messages. Merry Christmas, I’m going to teach you how to get responses to your messages!

Disclaimer: this guide is aimed at submissive men who are interested in dominant women. Some of it might be helpful if you’re not a straight submissive guy, and I hope it will, but at least some of it is going to be irrelevant.

My very first tip is going to be a little bit frustrating, but seriously, it will save you misery in the long run. That tip is to wait! Do not message people in late December or early January, they are busy, you will not get good results. In general, don’t expect quick replies around major holidays – I wouldn’t message someone in the US around the time of their thanksgiving either. People aren’t being jerks by not replying or replying very slowly, it’s just that stuff is more likely to fall through the cracks when they’re already very busy and if you want good results, you’ve got to set people up for success.

Speaking of which, it’s a lot easier to get a response if you give the person you’ve messaged something to work with. Granted I overthink things like it’s my job, but even with people who can just dash off a message without editing it repeatedly it’s only going to help if you make it easy for them to figure out what to say in reply. Mention something you have in common, ask them a question about something in their profile (but NOT about their kinks/fetishes) or something in their writings or something on their blog/website if they have one or something they said in a group you’re both members of. Questions are easy to answer and common interests make it easy to reply with stuff like “Oh you’re a fan of ___ too? Did you see/hear/play their latest movie/album/game?”

I do have to stress that you should NOT ask any questions about a person’s kinks in the first message. You can literally never go wrong by treating someone like a person first. There will be lots of time later to talk about kinks if you even turn out to like each other, and if you don’t end up liking each other than there’s really no point talking about kinks. Yes, you could make the argument that if a certain kink is an absolute must have for you and you’re not interested in a relationship that doesn’t involve that kink then you should bring it up right away so as not to waste time on a woman who won’t make your dick happy, but you would only make that argument if you were a jackass who deserves to stay lonely so don’t do it. If you only want to get to know someone if she’s willing to make your dick happy, you don’t actually want to get to know her. Bonus tip: being interested in a particular kink in general tells you absolutely nothing about her willingness to do that thing with you.

Another note about asking someone a question: you are going to have to read their profile or something else they’ve written to figure out what to ask about. Of course, you should have done that anyway because you’re not just messaging people at random, right? You know, that deserves its own paragraph at least.

The single biggest thing you can do get responses to your messages on any social network or dating site is to choose people who might possibly want to hear from you! Do not message people at random, that’s a waste of everyone’s time. Do not message people because their pictures made you feel funny in your pants, that’s a waste of everyone’s time. Do not message people because they’re a woman who lives within a hundred miles of you, that’s a waste of everyone’s time.

Do message people because you’ve read their profile/blog/writings/posts and comments in discussions/anything else they’ve written and the two of you actually have something in common and they seem to be open to hearing from strangers and are interested in people of your gender (if you’re messaging them because you want to play and/or date). Particularly in the case of fetlife, many people have profiles just to keep up with friends or participate in groups and are very clear about that. If you read their profile first, you will not embarrass yourself and waste everyone’s time by bothering someone who doesn’t want to hear from you. There are people who have things in common with you and are interested in people like you, the best thing you can do for your reply rate is to message them, not people you have nothing in common with.

Something I see a lot of questions about is how to address someone in the first message. This is another reason you want to read their profile carefully – if someone really likes being called Domina, for example, she might say so on her profile. If there aren’t any clues like that (which is not at all unusual, don’t feel like a failure because you couldn’t find a clue that wasn’t there), just use her screen name. No reasonable human being is going to be mad that you called them what they chose to call themselves.

And finally, context! Don’t forget about context! By that I mean, I and probably lots of other dominant women look at messages from people in the context of their profile. If you send me a great message but your pictures are a weird little shrine to your dick (or god forbid, your avatar is a dickpic), your odds of getting a response just tanked. Same if your profile and/or pictures are all about what you want done to you or your fetish list is twice as long as your profile. When I’m deciding whether or not to reply to a message, I think about whether I’m likely to get treated like a person or like a malfunctioning vending machine. If your profile makes me think that you’re likely to treat me like a malfunctioning vending machine (you know that stupid shit some guys do where they tell you what they want, then you try to start a conversation, then they tell you what they want again as if you’re a vending machine that just didn’t register that they pressed B5 already?) if I don’t immediately hand out the kink you want, you’re not getting a reply.

This is another one of those “choose people who might possibly want to hear from you!” things. Look at the profile of the person you want to message and compare how much time you spend talking about your kinks on your profile versus how much time she does. If your ratios of directly kinky stuff versus who you are as a person and what you want in a relationship are completely different, that’s a clue you might not be compatible.

Finally, on the subject of compatibility: messaging someone and getting a reply or not means nothing about your worth as a person. At worst all it means is that you’re not compatible with them, and it might only mean that they were busy or on vacation or got sick or even just lost track of time (er, not that I would ever do such a thing :). I know rejection sucks, nobody is saying it doesn’t, but it’s not about whether you’re fundamentally unloveable.

Think of it this way, if you go out to an Italian restaurant and don’t like it because you’d rather have Thai, that doesn’t mean you hate the chef or think they’re a terrible person who should never cook again, it just means you like Thai food better. If you send a respectful message to someone you have things in common with and don’t get a reply, all it means is that you offered them Italian when they were in the mood for Thai.

Readers, do you have any more tips for sending messages that actually get replies?

“why every women should try femdom”

Somebody found my blog by searching for “why every women should try femdom” and if they weren’t disappointed already, they sure will be now 🙂

Every woman should most certainly not try femdom. If you’re already curious or at least undecided one way or the other, sure, by all means give it a shot. But if you already know that’s not for you, then you should in no way feel obligated to waste your time doing something you know you won’t like.

Sure, in general I think trying stuff is a good way to find new stuff you really enjoy, but that absolutely does not mean people should try stuff they know they aren’t into. Trying shit out is for stuff you don’t know if you’ll like, stuff you’re willing to try because your partner really likes it, stuff you just never thought about doing and don’t have a strong opinion about one way or the other. It’s not for stuff that actively turns you off.

If anyone out there is getting hassled to try stuff they don’t fucking want to, you officially have my permission to not do it. If your partner won’t knock it the fuck off, send them here and I’ll straighten them out. I’m just so goddamn tired of hearing about women being pressured to fulfill every last one of their male partners’ fantasies as if they’re nothing more than malfunctioning sex toys. Everyone – women in particular, but this applies to everyone – you don’t have to do anything kinky if you don’t fucking want to.

You don’t have to do it to prove you’re open-minded.

You don’t have to do it to prove you’re good, giving, and game.

You don’t have to do it to prove you’re not a prude.

You don’t have to do it to prove you’re not boring.

You don’t have to do it because your partner thinks you owe him.

YOU DON’T FUCKING HAVE TO.

No, every woman should NOT try femdom. Women should try what they’re personally interested in and comfortable trying. Saying every woman should try femdom is saying “I don’t care what she enjoys, I just want her to make my dick happy.”

Kink in public: keep it to yourself, asshole

Honestly, just go read this excellent tumblr post, I really don’t have that much to add.

If you absorb nothing else from that post, take this one thing: those people going about their day in public DID NOT CONSENT TO BEING PART OF YOUR SCENE.

I’m not saying that you can’t ever do anything the tiniest bit kinky if you’re not behind multiple locked doors, just that you need to not be a complete fucking asshole about it. It’s not doing something kinky outside of your house that’s the problem, it’s involving non-consenting people in your scene like a gross fucking creeper.

It’s really not the point of this post, but there are plenty of ways to subtly enjoy your kink in public without anyone else ever knowing about it. Think about it for a couple of seconds or google it if you need to. Here’s a hint: code words are really handy.

If you’re not willing to put any thought at all into doing kinky stuff quietly in a way no one else would notice, then can you please just fucking admit that you’re only doing stuff in public to freak out non-consenting vanilla people who are just trying to get through their days? To be clear, you’d still be an asshole if you did admit you just like freaking out the vanillas but at least you’d be an honest asshole.

And don’t start with the “oh noes ur kinkshaming!” bullshit. Kink involves consenting adults only. If you involve people without their consent, you’re just an asshole. Stop pretending you’re special and you’re tooOooOOOoo kinky to keep it to yourself, we all know the truth. Knock that shit off you tacky little brat.

While I’m at it, putting kinky picture online is fine, but for shits sake don’t tag them in a way that means people having a shitty day and looking for a little distraction can’t safely browse, say, the kitten tag (scroll through the results long enough and it’ll just make you sad). If there’s kink or nudity in your picture, tag it properly it’s not that fucking hard what the fuck is wrong with people. Non-kinky people exist and shouldn’t have kink shoved in their faces when they’re looking for cute pictures of kittens. And even kinky people like me sometimes just want to see cute pictures of kittens too, what is so fucking terrible about that?

One final point: don’t be a white person with dreadlocks. Just don’t.