Perfectmatch.com Review

Perfectmatch.com is a unique matching service for singles that are looking for a relationship or marriage.  There has been media highlights from Dancing with the Stars, Dr. Phil Show, Live with Regis & Kelly and NBC’s Science of Love Special. It has also been on the big screen in major motion pictures like Must Love Dogs, Superman Returns and Failure to Launch.  It is based on 30 years of research of scientific research and will result in more qualified matches.

The concept used by this relationship site is called the Duet Compatibility System, which was designed by Dr. Pepper Schwartz.  Dr. Schwartz is a Professor of Sociology and she has a M.A. and Ph.D. in Sociology from the Yale University.   The Duet Compatibility System was designed to uncover genuine compatibility between the members of the relationship-oriented adult.

When you sign up at Perfectmatch.com, you will need to go through an interviewing process where you first set up your profile details about who you are, where you live, etc, then it will take you through several sections of questions where you answer True or False.  These will be geared towards your background and values, deal breakers, and then the Duet Test.  These questions will determine your values, what’s important to you in a partner and so on. It is very different from any of the online dating sites.  Perfectmatch.com is geared towards you in relationship, not you as a casual dater. Once you are done you can see your test results.

Once you have gone through the setup of your profile, you will receive suggestions for compatible matches for you.  They will send you several potentials, not thousands to browse through. With some of the other relationship sites, you cannot have the flexibility to search and pick other members based on criteria that you are looking for.  With Perfectmatch.com, you do have the option to search and select based on personality type, keyword or other custom selections you pick.

The subscription fee for Perfectmatch.com is very reasonable and they often run a promotion or special for new members as well.  The fee for this site is one of the best values out there online, including the casual dating sites. The downside to how they have the sign up is that you cannot even get into the member area without becoming a paid subscriber, not even to browse around a bit. The upside to this is you will only have the serious people on the site and you will be able to communicate with any of them if you both choose so because everyone is a paid member.

Perfectmatch.com has a few unique features in this type of industry that will probably make this one a superior to some of the others.  One of the features they offer is a match Guarantee. If a specific number of matches are not sent to you, depending on the membership length, they will extend your membership at no extra cost to you, until you have received the number of matches they have guaranteed.  Considering that it is already a good value, this makes Perfectmatch.com even more appealing.

The site is easy to navigate around. In the home screen, you can see a summary of all the activity on the left side, including your Profile Management section, Communication Tools, your Match section, Search tools, and your Account Management. Across the top, you will find the Perfect Matches, Information section on Dr. Schwartz and why this system works, a Search section and Notifications, which is like your inbox.

Once you are sent your Perfect Matches, which will be sent to you for your review, you can either send them an “icebreaker” or a message if you feel they may be someone you would like to know more about. Or if you don’t feel that the match meets what you are looking for, you can deactivate the profile by sending it to an inactive section.  If you change your mind, you can go to the inactive section at a later date.

This site does not have instant messaging which eliminates the casual dating scene, but the downside is that if you have really connected with someone, sometimes it is easier to communicate with an IM system rather than via email.  Considering all the other pros of Perfectmatch.com however, this one feature that it is missing can probably be overlooked.

In conclusion, Perfectmatch.com is one of the best relationship online sites out there. In spite of the few features that this site does not have, it is well worth the money you pay for a subscription.  We would give this one a big thumbs up if you are looking for marriage or a relationship.

Date.com Review

At Date.com their goal is to help you find someone special – whether you are looking for marriage, a serious relationship, casual or friends.  This is the same site as matchmaker.com, just under a different name.  The slogan is “You may be One Click Away from the Love of your Life.”  This is a fun and easy way to meet others that may be looking for the same thing you are.

Signing up for a profile on Date.com is free. It is really easy to get your profile up by simply answering several of the questions in a dropdown format and then there are a few questions where you can write a paragraph or two in description.   Then upload your primary picture and three secondary photos. Once they are approved, they will display in your profile.

Getting around the site is really easy. The home page has four featured members pictures and then on the right a summary of how many messages you have, how many Instant Messages (IM) you have, new members this week, new members near you, who’s on IM, People you’ve viewed, People who’ve viewed you, Gifts you’ve received and Gifts you’ve sent.  Across the top of the header are tabs for Who’s Online, Search option, Messages Page, Favorites List, Chat, Advise and Your Account.

The downside of the featured members on the home page is that they are not always from your local area. I am not sure how the system chooses who gets featured here.  You can go to the search option to find profiles using the quick search by entering the age range you would want, the location and whether you want only profiles with pictures or both with or without pictures. If you prefer, you can do an advanced search where you can enter the relationship type, body type, horoscope, hair color, smoker or non smoker, drinking lifestyle and so on.  If you want, you can be quite specific about what you are looking for.

The look of the profile as displayed when you click on it is again a simple, yet very appealing way to see the pictures and the information about the potential match.  You see the primary photo, age, location, type of relationship the person is seeking, distance they are willing to travel, distance from you, and the last activity.  Then below this heading section, you will see all the details about them – height, weight, body type, ethnicity, and so on and as you scroll down the page, you will see the essay they have written.  The layout is easy to follow and read.

Unlike some of the other online dating sites, you can see all of the profile of the potential match and if you are interested, you can flirt for free until you upgrade. If you want to contact someone by using email or instant messaging, you will need to get a paid membership.  Even if someone has contacted you by email, you will need to be a member in order to reply. You can only use the chat rooms if you are a member as well. You can also make use of the dating advise and get answers to your relationship questions. Also, if you are a paid subscriber, you can post more photos onto your profile.

There is a lot of great information under the Advice section, especially if you are new to online dating. There are tips for men and women, success stories, and featured articles that are always interesting. Not all of the sites have such a great area for reading.

Date.com is a popular site and has many good features, but it doesn’t appear to have quite the volume of profiles as some of the others out there.  Having said that, there are still plenty to browse through no matter what area you live.

The membership fees are reasonable and you can sign up for 1 month, 3 months, 6 months or 1 year.  You get a discount for the longer you sign up for.  The year subscription is your best value at quite a discounted rate.

This is a simple and straightforward site to use and although the client base may not be as large as some, it is still pretty good for finding potential matches. The customer service however is not the quickest in responding and if you want to cancel your membership after you have found someone, it is a bit of a hassle to figure out exactly how to do that.

In conclusion, Date.com has some really good features and the site is very simple to use, but as far as customer service and so on, you may not get topnotch quality. The member fee is low and it is still a good value for your money to have a profile on this site.

Review of eHarmony.com

The basis of eharmony.com is to match people based on detailed relationship algorithms. It is based on the concept that there are 29 dimensions of compatibility and by cross analyzing these dimensions, the system will match you with highly compatible people. Some of these dimensions include those that deal in the area of emotional health, personality, character and family values. It is a unique concept and has great results because of it.

Unlike most of the dating sites out there, you cannot just browse through the whole lot of profiles and pick out the several profiles that catch your eye to start communication with.  When you sign up, you will go through a long tedious personality profile. Although it is a bit of along process, that is part of the point of finding the compatible matches for you, so you don’t want to skip out on this process.  As with most of the online dating sites, once you have completed the profile portion, you can upload your pictures.

Once you are set to go, you will need to sign up in order to communicate with other people who have also signed up. Although it is free to sign up, you are very limited with what you can do as a free member.  The clientele of eharmony.com are usually looking for long-term committed relationships, marriage or romance and usually don’t mind that they have to be a paid member in order to take advantage of what the site has to offer.  This eliminates the free browsers that may not be very serious about finding a relationship. The long in depth personality test will also eliminate anyone who is not serious because it will take about an hour or so to set up and it will require some digging into who you really are to complete this survey.

The other feature that makes eharmony so different from many of the other sites is that once you have completed the personality test and are set up, you are presented with only the profiles of members that the system has picked for you that it thinks would be highly compatible to you according to your personality test. You will receive new matches on a regular basis.

If there is a match that you would like to communicate further with, you can go at your own speed or you can use the guided communication option which is basically a step by step process to help you and your potential match get to know each other better before open communication or meeting. This consists of asking each other to complete multiple choice questions that you can select and they do the same back to you. Then you submit your Must Have’s and Must Have Not’s list.  This is a good time to express if there is something you know for sure that you require in a relationship. You wont be wasting anyone’s time by going through this process. Once you both have done this part of the process, they you submit some open-ended questions for the other person to answer. Once this is done, then you can start the open communication with each other.  At any time if there is something that really doesn’t match with who you are or what you want, you are free to close communication with this match for any reason at any ttime.

All of this makes eHarmony.com one of the most unique and best online dating sites for those that are looking for a serious relationship.  It is a slower process than some, but worth the wait. The subscription fee for eHarmony.com is a bit higher than some of the other ones out there. You get a discounted rate if you purchase 3 months, 6 months or a year at a time.  The downside of how the fee structure is in comparison to some of the others is that you both have to be paid members in order to communicate, some of the other sites as long as one of the two people has a paid subscription, you can communication back and forth.   There is sometimes a promotion they offer a 7 day or a 3 day free trial period.  The one thing to note with this free trial is that after those certain amount of days are over, they will start charging you for your first month (unless they have changed that since this writing). If you don’t want to continue after your trial, you would have to contact them to let them know.

In conclusion, if you want to “fall in love for all the right reasons” (eHarmony’s slogan), then this is a great site for you even though the subscription is slightly higher than some of the others.  They have put a lot of research and thought into how this operates and it has proven to be successful. You may need to be a bit more patient than with some of the others, but it is worth the money and the wait.

Chemistry.com Review

Chemistry.com was created as a different type of online dating site. It is meant to bring together independent-thinking, diverse, confident singles that are serious about finding a meaningful relationship. Chemistry.com uses a proprietary test of personality to predict which two people are most likely to experience a connection of chemistry together.

The research for this test was done by a biological anthropologist Dr. Helen Fisher.  She studied love and attraction for more than 30 years and has developed this interactive test of personalities to provide inside into your personality type. This approach makes this dating site very unique and the ideal place to find the relationship that is right for each specific individual, whether you are looking for a partnership or long-term commitment, marriage or romance.

This is one of the fastest growing relationship sites online because of its unique concept and matchmaking techniques.  There is a large client base so there are many options for finding the right person for you.  This site also keeps your personal info and dating intentions private so that your information is not out there on the web for the whole world to see.

How it works:

With the personality test that you took when you signed up in mind, you will be sent your first five matches. You can review their profiles and either say Yes, No or maybe.  If you say no, these profiles will be put in the archives and they wont show up again. If you say maybe, this profile will sit in limbo until you decide a yes or no.  If you say yes, a note to them indicating your interest will be sent to the prospective match.   You can sign up and have these five sent to you for free.  You cannot communicate further with them until you buy a subscription though.  Also, if you would like more matches sent to you, you need to purchase the subscription.  You can buy a one month, 3 month or 6 month plan.  The 3 or 6 months are at discounted rate which can save you quite a bit of money if you think you may be on there more than a month.

When you start out, you will need to be patient and go through the personality test to set up your profile. It is a bit time consuming, but it is fun and doesn’t feel tedious at all. It ensures that the software will be matching you as accurately as possible according to your personality, likes, dislikes, ideals and so on.  It is really important to be as honest and open as possible.  Uploading the pictures is next.  The screen for uploading is simple and they approve them pretty quickly. Also, the screen where the pictures are shown is a nice size rather than the thumbnail size of some of the other sites where you can hardly see it. You can have one primary photo and up to 25 secondary pictures.

There is a feature called First Meeting on the site as well which is an optional way to help you set up your first meeting with someone you are interested in.  This is a great feature for those that are new to online dating or people that may be a bit more on the shy side and just need some help knowing what to do next. This helps you and your match to get to know each other better to see if meeting in person is what you want to do. It is still up to you how quickly you would want to meet up.
The site is easy to navigate around and simple to keep everyone straight as you are going through the process of receiving and rating the potential matches. Basically, there is your home screen which gives you a summary of New Matches, People Interested in You, You’ve Been Noticed By, and your Active Matches. If you want to, you can review your archived profiles as well.

Overall, in review of what this site has to offer, even though is costs a bit more than some of the other online dating sites, the value of what you get is worth the money when you consider all the advantages of meeting people that your personality is truly compatible with. (Remember to cancel your subscription if you meet someone as your credit card will continue to be charged until you cancel your account.) If you are serious about looking for romance, marriage or a long-term committed relationship, this would be one at the top of our list for recommendations.

Singlesnet.com Review

Singlesnet.com is known for its quick account setup.  If you are looking for one of the easiest and quickest way to get signed up, then this is the online dating site for you. It is a very simple site to navigate and to use.  It does come with its pros and cons though.

You can sign up for free on a free trial service. You can purchase the subscription at any time or upgrade your account.  When you sign up, you are asked a few questions for your profile, for example, your eating habits, your exercise schedule, sports interest, educational background, occupation and a few other basics. Enough to get a profile going, but not enough to really give a potential partner a good idea about who you are. You can go back later and add or amend the information if you want. Then, of course, as with any online dating site, they recommend that you upload a few pictures. If you are serious about using the site, it is a good idea to upload a few pictures. The response rate is much higher for those with at least one picture. There are a few restrictions on what type of pictures you are allowed, but that is the same with most sites.

Once you are set up, you can start browsing around. Unless you have a subscription, you cannot send emails, but you can still flirt by sending a wink. The search option gives you three different ways of searching: you can view your matches, view the matches the database has found for you, or search by username. The downside to this Searching option is that it will only search by location or region, and not by age, so you will get results that may be way above or below your age range of preference.  The upside, is how the search results appear on the page.  There are 14 thumbnail type of picture (if the member has one uploaded) with their username, age, location, height and very brief description (if they wrote one). You can easily browse through the page and if someone catches your eye, click on the link and it will open up their profile. It doesn’t take very long to browse through quite a few profiles.

When you upgrade to be able to send emails, you will get full access to other features but your profile will also receive a higher priority than the other trial members in the searches. You can then correspond with others via email and so on.

The common feedback for this site seems to be that you get quick responses to your profile too. Whether you are a paid member or not, you will tend to get more flirts and emails quicker than many of the other sites. However, in order to actually talk back and forth you will need to become a paid member.

The downside is that although the site appears to be simple and should be easy to find the results you want, the search options are not near as advanced as some of the other online dating sites.  And the profiles are so vague that if you have certain criteria that you would like in your match, it would take quite the process to find certain things out.  For example, if you would like to be with someone that also wants children, there is no spot in the profile that indicates whether they want or have children so you would have to ask each person if that is something that you would want in someone.   Because of the limited information, it could be used just as a wide open place to meet new people and leave it at that as far as your expectations go. You may need to screen a bit more closely however before you actually meet up with someone.

Overall, in review of Singlesnet.com, there are some advantages because of the amount of people on the site and how the search results appear on one page.  However, the overall ease of use and customer satisfaction does not appear to be very good. We believe that this site is not one of the highly recommended ones for the best results and for your value.  We would recommend you try out the trial period before you sign up to see if you like it.

Review of Match.com

Match.com has been around since 1995 and services 40 countries and territories.  Because it has been around so long, there is a large member base. Over the years, there have been several changes for the better which makes this site a great option for finding the match for the relationship you are looking for.

To get starting, setting up your profile is simply answering several questions and write descriptions about who you are and what you are looking for.  Remember, the more complete your profile, the more responses you will get. Uploading pictures, up to 20 of them, is easy and you can have one primary photo and the rest would be backup photos. Unlike some of the other sites, your secondary photos can be viewed by anyone looking at your profile.

You can sign up for free but you cannot contact any of your potential matches without purchasing a subscription to the site. You can show interest by winking for free to your potential matches though. The nice this about this site is that you can actually search around and see profiles before you even sign up.  The subscription is reasonable and worth the value.  You can purchase the 1 month, 3 month, or 6 months.  If you buy the 3 or 6 month package you get a discounted rate. There is also a 6month package that you can purchase that also allows others to contact you for free.  It is just a few dollars more that the regular 6 month package, but for those who do not have a membership yet, it allows them to email you back even if they are not a member.

The way layout of the site is very easy to navigate and search to find the criteria in which you are looking for your match.  A feature that is unique to Match.com is that you can search for someone by keyword.  They call it matchword in the Search section of the site. Simply type in the word of interest that you are looking for and it will give you a list of people with the same interest. For example, if you are big into skydiving and you want to share that activity with your someone special, simply type in skydiving in the matchword search box and it will bring up all the matches that also enjoy skydiving.

Generally most people will search by age, location first.  You can narrow down your search by doing a custom search and specifying criteria like height, body type, relationship type, horoscope sign, appearance, interests, lifestyle, occupation, income, whether you have kids or want kids, political views, religion and so on.  If you would like to downsize the search, you can very easily do that on this site.

The other feature that match.com has is a well organized and simple results page when you are searching. Each result will have a photo (if it is supplied by the potential match), their username, their location, the headline and a little paragraph about them.  This is far better than some of the other online sites where you need to actually go into the profile to see their age and so on.  The way match.com has it set up, you can browse easily through the page of results without clicking on anything.  If you want to know more information about a particular profile, then you click on it and the whole profile is opened up to you.  Or if you want to just view the photos for the time being, you can change the view mode to photo gallery mode, which will only bring up the primary picture and their header.

Right from this screen you can also wink at them if you are interested, email (provided you are a paid member) or save them to your favorites section.  Also, there is a page called My Match.  From here, you can see a list of your newest matches (according to what you have indicated you are looking for in your profile section). This area also shows you if you have any new mail or new winks, who has viewed your profile and your favorites. It also shows you stats like how many singles are online right now and so on. This page is a simple way to navigate to the next place you want to go.

A new feature to match.com is the daily 5.  This is a random selection of 5 profiles based again on what you say you are looking for in someone.  These will be sent to you everyday for your review. You can go through them and say No, Yes or Maybe to your level of interest in this person.

Another unique feature to Match.com is that once you have sent an email to a member, it will show you a list of other members who have similar profiles to the one you just emailed. It is a nice feature as you may not have found the other similar member otherwise.

Overall, in review of Match.com, it is a great option for online dating and finding potential matches. There are a couple of things that they website could manage differently, but overall, it would get a positive thumbs up. Their aim is to service as a medium for matching single men and single women to flirt, meet, date and fall in love and many do find just that on this site.

Matchmaker.com Review

Matchmaker.com is for a more mature clientele, focusing on generally age 30+ singles looking for love and their perfect soul mate. This site is aimed for people wanting to find long-term, serious relationships and those who are more marriage minded.

Included in the site is a section for expert dating advice, a chat area, client success stories and more. They have thousands of members internationally, but you can search by only the local profiles if you like.  This is a great website for busy and successful people who don’t have the time to be out there getting to know lots of people in their day to day lives.

You can join at first as a Basic member to browse around, but to send emails you will need to become a Gold member.  The membership is based on a monthly fee or you can buy a 3 month, 6 month or yearly subscription at a discounted rate. Their price point is very reasonable and provides good value.

To set up a profile, you can simply sign up and answer the questions in the profile. Some will be in the format of a dropdown menu and others will be a freeform description section. Some of the answers could give you an opportunity to impress them with your intellect or to keep it short and direct. Be honest and genuine in your answers. It is important to answer as many of them as possible so that when someone is searching through, they can get a better idea of whether you could meet their criteria.  If you leave too many of them blank, sometimes people will just pass over them.  Then it is important to upload your recent pictures, usually one close up and a few extras to show more of you or a picture of you doing an activity you enjoy.

Once you have signed up, you can search for your match by age and then location.  If you want to narrow the search, you can go to the advanced search section and identify which body type, hair color, religion, income, education that is your preference.  There are 35 or so characteristics that can be searched on. Although this site is basic, it is simple to use and navigate around.  There is an instant messaging option if you see a profile that you like and that person is online.

Once you have searched for potential matches, if you see someone you are interested in getting to know, you can send them a smile to show your interest. You could also add them to your favourites list. The recipient can see who has added them as favourites as well. You can revisit your favourite list anytime.  This is a good way to keep them all organized as you get familiar with the site.  The other option of course is to start correspondence by sending an email.  This is the best way to get a response from the person you are interested in.

Matchmaker is really user friendly and the layout of the site is really simple to navigate around so you can get your profile up and running and start searching very quickly.  The only downside to the profile process is that it takes a while to get your photo approved. Once it gets the thumbs up, you will receive up to ten times more visitors than without a picture.  On the homepage, you will be able to see the statistical information of your profile, like the number of times it has been looked at.

Matchmaker.com is known for the members who are serious about finding a healthy, happy relationship. They aim their marketing at professional, educated adult men and women and have a high subscription rate so your chances of finding many prospects are good. In review of Matchmaker.com, we feel that it is a good site to have your profile on if you are over age 30.  To enjoy the full benefits you will need to become a paying subscriber and have the unlimited access to the profiles and pictures.

Lavalife Review

Lavalife Review

Lavalife is an international dating site for men and women. It offers three different communities – Dating, Relationships or Intimate. In this way, members are encouraged to socialize in the section for like-minded singles based on their individual desires and needs. How to attract the right match for you becomes easier with sites that have several ways to enter the criteria you are looking for.

Review of how it works: Lavalife used to operate with a credit system. You would purchase a certain amount of credits and then, depending whether you wanted to use them for send an email to a new contact or use the instant messenger service, would determine how many credits taken off your account. Now, if you sign up, lavalife has switched to a pay per month or get a discounted rate and pay for a few months at a time for the new users. The new members do not have the option for the credit system anymore. The nice thing about the credit system is that if you didn’t use it because you were away or busy, you weren’t being charged. However the down side is that if you wanted to send quite a few emails (only the first email to a new contact used your credits), you could quickly use up your credits and therefore a simple monthly fee would work better.

Lavalife is very well known and has a large member base in most areas. You can search for you match by lots of different criteria as well. Depending on whether you are in the Dating, Relationship or Intimate section will determine the criteria. In all three sections, you can search by location or age and then narrow it down from there.

Many of the online dating sites will have an instant messaging feature of some sort. Each of them operate a bit differently. The nice thing about the way lavalife has the Instant Messaging (IM) feature set up is that it doesn’t pop up, but rather the IM window sits at the top of the screen. This way if you are browsing or emailing someone, you can continue with what you are doing rather than dealing with an annoying pop-up screen. The downside to the way this feature is set up is that you don’t have an option to turn it off if you prefer not to instant message with anyone. It can be a bit time consuming and some people don’t enjoy it.

One way to show your interest to pick up women is to send them a “smile”. The recipient will then review your profile and may send a smile or email back if interested. Another feature on lavalife is the Viewed Me feature. You can see the profile of the people that have viewed your profile. Another feature that not many of the other online dating sites have is the Backstage Pass. This is an area where you can load pictures that you may not want everyone to see (could include ones with your family, or friends or ones that are a bit more seductive). You have the choice of who receives access to these pictures.

After you have signed up, you are ready to search and send messages to potential matches. Each time you log in later, there is a summary screen in the corner of the home page which lets you know if there are any new IM’s, Mail, Smiles, Viewed Me, or Backstage Passes. This is all the activity since your last visit.

While you are on the site, your profile is visible for everyone. Within each of the three sections, you can search within each section by New, Online, Local, With Gallery, With Video, Custom, My Saved Searches, by Interest, by Nickname.

The New section is for members that have signed up within the last 24 hours, 3 days or up to within the last week. When you click on the Online section, you can see who is online now in that particular section. If you want to know how to attract women that enjoy instant messaging, you would go to this section to see who it online and being a conversation with them through IM. Those that want to pick up women or men will use the IM to save time rather than sending emails back and forth. The Local feature will give you all the profiles in your local area but you cannot define by age in this category. The With Gallery part will list the profiles that have a photo gallery as with the With Video section simply lists the profiles that have a video attached.

You can do a customized search to downsize the amount of profiles to go through. There are different criteria in each of the different sections. Just use the drop down menu to enter your minimum requirement. If you have no preference in that area, just leave it blank. Once you are happy with a specific criteria for a search, you can save your search for next time. Name it and go back to it next time you want to search with that specific criteria again. You can also search by Interest if that is something that is important to you or if you know the nickname of someone you had previously chatted with, simply enter the nickname in this section rather than having to search for it. You will need to know the exact spelling of the nickname though.

In an overall review, the layout and service of lavalife is good. There are a few features that could be refined in order to make navigating around the site a bit easier. For example, when you are in a specific section and go see who is Local or Online, it would be nice to specify an age range within this area or some other criteria on how to attract a narrowed set of results in this section. Also, if you are not a IM user, it would be beneficial to be able to turn it off whenever you choose. Other than that, this is a good place to have your profile as it has many members and a diverse selection.

How do I know if She’s THE ONE

So you have found the woman that you have really connected with and everything is going so smoothly, you are thinking “Maybe she’s THE ONE.”  Possibly she is thinking the same about you as well. What are some of the things you want to consider?  Are you both wanting marriage and family, or do you want it to last the way it is forever?  This can sometimes be the deciding factor of whether to move forward with someone or not.

Commitment:  This is very important.  This can feel like a pretty heavy line. In fact, the next step may be marriage.  Most people cannot stay at the same dating bliss stage for a long period of time. Most women especially want it to move – this will be forward or backwards.  Chances if you have made it to this stage with her, she would welcome a commitment. She will let you know that she wouldn’t want to be with anyone else and that you make her happy.

Marriage: Should you decide that you want her to be your wife once you have been at the committed stage for a while, by now you probably know your woman good enough to know whether that is in her dreams as well.  Again, usually it is women who want to get married and possibly have a family sooner than most men. No one likes to be pressured into making this kind of a big decision, but if you have been together with someone for quite a few years and she wants marriage and you don’t, it may be a sign that you are not aiming for the same direction.

Here are a few points to ponder:

1.    If __(insert potential mate’s name here)__ asked me to marry him/her tomorrow, would I say Yes without ANY hesitation?  If there is any doubt, don’t.  Not right now anyways. Maybe there are a few things that need to be worked out before you can answer with no hesitation “Yes”.  Maybe the things that make you doubt saying yes are big enough to indicate this is not the right person.

2.    Would I be good with _____________ raising my children to be just like him/her?  If you say yes, you obviously respect and admire this person.  If you have any doubts, chances are this is not the person you want to have around long term or raise a family with.

3.    Am I willing to accept the qualities in ____________ that I do not like right now and understanding ____________ will always be this way?   Again, if you are willing to accept the quirky parts of __________ realizing this won’t change, then move ahead. If you want __________ to change those parts and you cannot accept them, then that is something you will need to look at.

4.    Ask yourself if you can give ____________ what he/she needs? Be honest with yourself.  By now, you should know what this person’s needs are.  Can you meet them?

5.    Ask what __________________ wants out of life and compare it with your own aspirations.  If these are totally different, it may be a bit difficult to realize a life together.  There is always room for compromise, but make sure to have this conversation before a marriage commitment.

6.    Do my family and friends think that we are a great match for each other?  (This may or may not be a good guide because not everyone sees things the same. However, if most of the people that know you best are telling you to be careful or giving you warning bells, step back and listen.  Observe and check it out for yourself.)

7.    Do you tell anything to ______________?  No-one likes to feel judged or have a fear of being judged, especially someone that you plan to spend your life with.  If you haven’t shared with __________, it might be time to do that before you decide if ___________ is the one for you. Two people cannot become close if there is non-judgment sharing between you two.

8.    When you are with ___________________, do you feel good about life, about who you are and where you’re going and does _________________ enhance my life?  (A good indicator of how you really feel about ______________)

9.    When we run into a situation where we disagree, I am happy how ___________________ and I work it out?  (A way to determine the level of communication this person has and problem solving skills)

10.    Besides the sex and the attraction, do I want to spend everyday waking up to _________________?

Some of these may seem basic and simple, but if you answer them honestly and objectively, you will probably have the answer as to whether she is the one for you or not. If you are not sure, put it aside for the time being and come back and do this questionnaire down the road and see what answers you come up with.  If you answer them all Yes chances are you have a good thing going on.

Keeping Things Going

If you are enjoying getting to know the woman you have been dating and you want things to go further, here are a few things you will need to know:
1.    She needs to know that you care and that she is important to you.  Ask her where she is at and how things are fore her…. AND Freak Listen man!    Asking the questions will benefit in several ways – she will feel like you care about her and secondly, if you ask her where she is at and where she sees you two going, it will give the two of you the opportunity to see if you are both on the same page.  Women love to talk about how they feel and the more you ask and talk to her, the closer she will feel to you.  This makes you look like a considerate and compassionate man and she will respond accordingly.  To her it is the thought that will count. Ask her about her day and what is going on for her shows her that you are interested and that she is important. She will want more of it, more of you.
2.    To continue the point above, most women want to be your lover and a friend (to a certain degree). Not too many women will carry on a longer relationship if they are Just your lover or Just your friend. They need the combo deal. Sharing some interests or activities outside the bedroom can help the friendship grow, or even being involved in cooking dinners together or watching a movie or whatever interest you can do together helps the friendship side of the relationship grow.
3.     Flattering DOES go a long way.  Your woman loves to hear compliments that let her know you are still attracted to her. Tell her if you enjoy a certain piece of lingerie she is wearing or it could be as simple as complimenting her how she looks today as she is rushing out the door to work.  The more you make her feel like she is hot, the hotter she will be with you.
4.    If you have been seeing each other for a while and you feel like you want it to go further, if you haven’t already had this conversation around exclusivity, it is one that you should be having now.  Two people can have different views around monogamy and exclusivity and it should be one to be talked about to see if both want the same around this. If you met through an online dating service, the other thing that could be discussed at this time is if it feels right for both of you to take your profiles offline and just focus on getting to know each other.  It is important to determine this together as if one person is still out there dating others or keeping their options open online, it can be hurtful or confusing to the other person, depending how far you have come with the relationship.  If she is someone that you think is worth getting to know further, respect how she feels about this and if it doesn’t coincide with how you are thinking, it may be that you both do not view your relationship at the same place or it may be a red flag that you don’t value the same thing in a relationship.
5.     One need most women have in common is the need to feel safe and secure with you, to feel taken care of. I am not referring to not being scared of you (ie physically being harmed) and I am not referring to you taking care of our every need all the time as if we know nothing or can’t do anything for ourselves.  I am referring to that inner safeness, an emotionally safe place for us to be ourselves and yes sometimes getting that reassurance from you (our hero) that everything is going to be okay. We really like to feel like if our world fell apart tomorrow, we could come to you and you would hold us and ask what you can do to help or fix it if you can. We don’t need everything fixed, but we do need to feel like you would take care of us if it came to the crunch of being hurt, harmed or in danger. We want to look at you like our hero. Even if you don’t have all that answers, just by letting us be who we are and share who we are goes a long ways to getting us to be close to you.
If you follow these five points above, you are sure to keep it going for as long you want to. She will be responsive to you. You can form a strong emotional connection with her and take it even further. Women fall head over heels for this kind of stuff!

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