How to get guaranteed replies - Good manners in detail - Part 1

Thanks to subjoe for raising the question.
You are looking for a partner to play, possibly a mistress or master potential for a longer (D/s) relationship. But, although you take care in looking at the profiles and other information given, you rarely get any reply. Here's my humble advice. Though it probably fit everybody, I invite you to think about it and be inspired.

When I was around the age of sixteen, I opened up to approach other people. It was so much fun to get into contact with new people that I nearly jumped onto them offering them my hand for a shake as soon as I spotted them in a given situation. Fortunately, my siblings told me that my behavior was way too bold and intrusive, so I had the chance to correct it. I broke good manners because I didn't know better.

On a visit to Switzerland, I recently learned a common tradition to greet any lone stranger on the street. It's uncommon in Germany, especially not in the cities. But, as always, there are exceptions, for example, if people are not alone, talking on the phone, not looking at you. Despite being an adult, I first had to learn all these things, the good manners. Entering a new country, culture, social situation or online community might require me and possibly you to learn and adapt to their different good manners.

Since I am satisfied with my rate of replies, here are some simple advice by my experience and thoughts:

1. Accept two inevitable truths

Smiling is magic, as well as the three basic magical words "Hello," "Please" and "Thanks." Try it out, they simply work but not as you might expect. If you smile at every single person in your view or greet them friendly, you may be surprised how often you get a smile, a nod or greeting in return. Alternatively, you may be disappointed that not everyone returns your single smile or greeting, and even the returned are rarely as bright or friendly as the ones you gave.

With private messages and other communication, it's quite similar. If you would always get a reply to any PM you send, you would have a 100% return rate. But any response you don't get drops that rate under 100%, while no case would raise it again. You cannot expect to get responses from two different people if you only messaged one of them, right? In conclusion, you have to find a way to get along with an imperfect return rate, something lower than 100%, maybe even less than 90%, 80% or 70%. Think about the other way around, of all the thousands of messages and calls you have gotten in your life in general, how many have you returned? Think twice. And then there's another issue: How long did your response take? Shortest, sure immediately. But in average? And what was the most delayed response? Now imagine that the person that got that late response didn't experience your average response time, but only this longest delay.

Again, don't expect you don't get a reply just because you didn't get any immediately or so far, even if you see that person online. There are so many issues that delay an answer in practice, for instance, sickness or vacation sometimes for up to three weeks. Or people got busy and distracted in real life. Often they are not even away that they didn't reply. Nobody is perfect!

And so aren't you. I don't know you, but just like me when I was around the age of sixteen, you are probably not in balance. Either you are too hesitant to contribute any comment or contact any people at all, or more likely, you are highly charged and overambitious. At least from my experience, I was and still can be quite horny and excited, especially when it comes to kink and the explored and unexplored kinds of play. Like kids on sugar or a dog in heat. That's not too bad if you notice it and redirect your energy where it is in best use.

2. Too much too early

In communication, you usually don't share every dirty secret of yourself with a stranger immediately. The other way around, you make yourself creepy. People fear such strangers and keep their distance, and then they reject or don't reply at all. For every level of intimacy of contact, information exchange and interaction there is a certain degree of trust required for mutual consent. Just a common sand trap to mention here: Don't address anybody with "Master", "Mistress" or alike until agreed to. I dropped that brick, too. It's kind of a stairway you try to go with another person. If you jump several steps at once, you might lose the contact with that person. Give your contact space and time and adapt to it. If you create a great distance to your contact by pushing forward too far or staying behind, you provoke your contact to keep the distance as well.

The very first act of communication is attention. It's also the first stage of love by the way. You notice somebody, look at him, show your mere existence. That said, whom would you trust more, a stranger in a gray, indistinguishable coat and his face covered by a gray mask, or somebody in colored, individual cloth openly showing the face and hands? Now here is the comparison: If you don't customize your avatar and your profile picture on getDare, you are the gray-cloaked with the mask. Just to be sure you are aware of this, only your profile shows your profile picture. For the forum, for messages and more, you show your avatar! These can be two different pictures, but you should upload an individual picture for both. Search for pictures and crop them to fit the requirements for uploads, or use a URL. This minor effort makes a huge difference. You can even change it later from time to time to get some more attention.

Now think twice about how you look. Have you filled out your profile? Have you given some useful information besides "age-sex-location"? Can I find something special about you that differs to many other people? How much of it? Have you listed your preferences, Likes, Dislikes, and Limits, or even more? Have you PM dares which show what you are willing to do as examples? Have you any other blog entries about topics I might be interested, or that share your thoughts, feelings, and experience on a level that might make you personally interesting and therefore attractive for other human beings? What about your signature? Did you care for good readable formats of your content and the comfort for the human eye? You don't need to customize all the colors and options for your profile, but using a bold, italic, underlined, smaller or bigger words, comfortable links, a colored word here and there, all these look good and therefore make you look like a better catch.

What will I find if I click the statistics of your profile, most recent posts, threads, comments? Will I find something indicating even more what you are interested in and what you contribute to the community, that you have a minimum of self-control despite your kinky arousal, or won't I find anything which tells me you are just a horny bitch who logs off as soon as you have an orgasm? Maybe you even put some picture into your album for others to see, no face required, but something personal. Maybe a shot of your toys, or your body in casual cloth?

Second, comes a greeting like a "Hello." It means "I am here. You are there. I notice you. I come in peace. I respect your private space. I won't harm you. I don't want to offend you. I'd like to get in contact with you. Do you consent?" These are implicit promises. As soon as you break it, you are already out and don't need to wonder why you don't get a reply. Get aware of that. That to be said, mutual consent means your contact can reject as well as you. It's their right as well as yours.

Third, what do you want? What is your relation to that contact you are trying to make? For which reason did you choose that contact? Sometimes it's apparent, like when on a small path in the hills, two wanderers cross each other. Yes, they are there for travel, and they want to pass, so they need to make way for each other. Most often the casual greeting and the situation imply that it's not for any other reasons like robbery or murder. But other times you don't know. When you receive a phone call, you can expect the caller to state name and intention after the greeting. If not it would be creepy, right?

You can easily make an honest compliment on any contribution of your contact. If it's only for that, you may even leave a frank but friendly comment on their blog entries or album pictures, add your opinion, raise a reasonable question, post in a thread concerning their post if it was that good. But don't you dare to spam. Nobody likes spammers. Also, remember lies travel short. Any lie is almost certain to be discovered sooner or later, and then all your effort is lost, because nobody remains a contact to liars.

Continue reading here.