Dating Direct UK and other online dating sites:

Dating Direct UK Dating Direct is the UK's leading online dating service with over 115,000 members. Joining dating direct is free, you can add your profile and photo for free and use the online dating search engine to locate your ideal date in your own area! By becoming a Premier member of dating direct you can then contact as many other members as you wish using the Dating Direct anonymous web-based email system. Click here to visit the datingdirect web site Bompi UK Dating bompi is a new UK online dating community and is free to join. Besides adding your profile and photo for free you can also use the search facilities and contact as many other members as you like to find your ideal partner. By becoming a full member of bompi you are still able to contact and communicate with all the other members after your free trial. Remember that you are 100% anonymous on bompi. Highly recommended. Click here to visit Bompi Dating. Planet Personals - a UK dating site to meet people, date and make new friends online. No More Frogs - offers "dating without pondlife" using their online psychometric personality profiling. Singles 121 Personals Singles 121 UK is an online dating and singles lifestyle site with the unique feature of 'instant messaging'. Awarded a 5 star rating by Webuser magazine who said "a Funky and modern site for singles looking to find love (or have fun looking) on the net." "This colourful and dynamic site describes itself as online dating agency which stands apart from other more traditional singles sites. In fact, Singles121 is fun and modern in design and approach. Simply register your details (it takes about 15 minutes), then search the database for your dream date, it is very good at what it sets out to achieve. The company vets each member carefully and deals with only professional men and women aged 18 plus". Click here to visit Singles 121. Dating Agency The UK's "favourite and fastest growing" online dating agency web site, an attractive and well designed site which is easy to use and has a decent sized database of current members. Register for free lifetime guest membership and you can search the personal ads; add your profile; add a photo; receive messages and reply to messages and use the online help service as much as you need. When you upgrade your membership from guest membership to club membership, you can do everything guest members can, plus you get these great features: unlimited messages - as a club member you can send as many messages as you like to other members, including guest members. top of the search results - you get more "club membership points", so you can easily keep your profile right at the top of the search results. advanced searching - search on every single criteria, including: sex, age, height, body type, number of children - plus you can search up to five geographical areas at the same time. keyword searching - no more searching through profiles trying to find somebody interested in cycling (if that's what you're into), simply do a keyword search. name searching - if you know a member's name you can find them in no time with this handy facility. saved searches - recall an advanced search with one click. Save as many searches as you like. horoscope matching - when you find someone you fancy, the one and only Russell Grant will tell what's in the stars for the two of you. weekly horoscopes and monthly horoscopes - get your forecast for the week or month ahead from Russell Grant. free featured profile (optional) - if you have a photo online they will feature it for a week on the home page and welcome page - dramatically increasing your "hit-rate" (this is optional - you don't have to have your photo featured). unlimited help - as always, you can send in as many help requests as you need. Click here to visit Dating Agency. International Personal Ad Sites For more recommended personal ads and dating sites, try: Personal Adds a directory which recommends a number of international personals sites. Most of the sites recommended include many UK personal ads. Would like to meet A "how-to" guide, aimed at both sexes, to giving yourself a dating makeover and gaining essential relationship skills. Written by the three "Would Like to Meet" experts from the popular BBC TV series, who combine to offer practical tips on improving your chances of meeting your perfect partner. To buy this book online at amazon UK click here. Online Dating Advice First off - a couple of tips: place your ad in the right category (this may sound obvious but it can be easy to make a mistake!). Online personal ads usually fall into four main categories - women seeking men; men seeking women; men seeking men and women seeking women. That much is easy enough, but check for sub categories such as 'long term relationship' or 'casual encounters' to avoid any misunderstandings. Some internet dating sites also have a category or tick box for those seeking pen pals or to 'e-mail and chat (online) only'. Being clear about what you expect means that you won't waste your time or others. Second tip is to include a photo - make sure it's a nice one, fairly recent and not one of somebody else!! Head and shoulder type photos often work well, some sites allow more than one photo so you can include a portrait and also a 'life' photo of you taking part in a sport or hobby you enjoy or whatever. If you don't have a digital camera, use a scanner - some dating agency sites will also let you mail in a photo and they will scan it for you. Oh and don't submit a 'naughty' photo unless it's that type of site - it will just be rejected! (And yes, there are sites just for "adult personals"). Writing your own personals ad Next, some top tips on writing your own personal ads, from One and Only Personal Ads. Show don't tell. For example, it is much more effective to use humor in your ad rather than just saying "I have a sense of humour". Show that you are an educated and intelligent person through interesting word choice, clear ad structure, and colorful and creative descriptions. Creativity counts. A personal ad can take many forms. A poem, perhaps. One amazing ad consisted entirely of titles -- one right after another -- of popular films, carefully chosen and arranged to describe the ad placer. Show them what YOU would want to know. Make a list of the most important things that you would like to know about a person before responding to a singles ad. Chances are, others would like to know the same about you. If you work, in what field? Have you ever been married before? Do you have children? Are you looking to make some new friends, or do you want find one special person to settle down with for a lifetime? Keep in mind that common goals are often more important in a relationship than individual interests. Age isn't everything, but... It is where a lot of people start. Be sure to include your age in the ad; if you do not want to give your exact age, narrow the range: "early twenties" or "mid forties" for example. If you are fifty but feel thirty, say so! If you are looking for someone outside your age range, give a range for the person you seek as well. Keep in mind that some people will be suspicious of a range that seems too wide -- such as "twenty to sixty", and this may limit responses. Likewise, a range too narrow (one to two years) also seems odd. Even those who fall in the narrow range might be hesitant to respond. Stating your age, and avoiding ranges altogether, is generally the best approach. Describe yourself first. Be careful to avoid creating an ad that is simply a mile-long list of characteristics you seek in another, without saying much about yourself. It is better to let the person reading the ad decide if they might be a match. This does not mean that you should say nothing about what you seek, just don't overdo it. You do not want to be too picky. Details, details. How many times have you read a personal ad that states: "I enjoy movies, music, and going out."? This sentence describes millions of people! The idea is to make yourself stand out from the rest! Instead, name a recent movie that you enjoyed. List some of your favorite music styles, song titles, or artists. If you enjoy going out to Italian restaurants, or line-dancing at a country bar on Saturday nights, say so! Ironically, it is the very details that are often overlooked as being insignificant or boring which in fact add the color and depth necessary for a personal ad to be truly effective. Honesty is the best policy. Above all, be honest when describing yourself. No matter who you are, or what kind of person you are seeking, you have a better chance of finding that person -- and with less disappointment along the way -- if you are honest from the beginning. The next step... Now that you have got the basics right, hopefully you got lots of replies to your personal ads (or to your direct replies to ads) and after establishing a relationship online, you are ready to meet somebody 'for real'. Safety first - choose somewhere public to meet (a coffee shop, restaurant, cafe or pub is good) and a good idea is to arrange a set amount of time, say an hour over coffee or lunch. That way, if things don't turn out as well as you hoped, you know you can leave after the hour is up without any embarrassment. If you are getting on like a house on fire - great - you can simply extend the date or arrange a second meeting. For some great advice on what to wear and creating a good first impression, take a look at the dating tips on the bbc web site, which also has some excellent information on flirting and body language. Finally - hopefully you found this guide useful - if you have any personal experience of the Online Dating sites listed (good or bad!) let us know. If you know of a good personal ad site which is not listed, tell us about that too. We recommend signing up for more than one online dating site (after all it's free) to find the one which suits you best and gives the best results. An easy way to do this is to type your profile or personal ad into a text file or word document and then just copy and paste the text into the profile form on each site. The love of your life could be out there - you just need to give them a few signposts to help them find you. Good luck!