1.  Why did you create this blog and OkCupid profile?-I think being genuinely fed up with the kinds of messages I was receiving was my primary motivation for doing this. I would get so fed up at every copied and pasted message etc., that I would deactivate my profile. What's the good in that? Therefore, I came back on and decided I could maybe save some other girls the trouble, while helping people put their best foot forward. 

2.  Can you tell me how to fix my profile?
-Sure I can, I do it all the time.  But first, I need to see that you have read this page and made some changes.  After that, feel free to drop me a message and I will take a look.

3.  Are you single and looking, or just full of advice?
-At this time, my profile is simply there to assist.  

4.  How do I know if it's my messages or my profile that needs work?
-Send me a few of your best messages that you've sent.  If I can see your best work AND your profile, I'll be able to figure out where you need to focus your energy.

5.  Why is your OkCupid profile so long? No one is ever going to read it.
- It's long because everything on it is important.  This blog should make it easier for you to find what you are looking for, however, many people do sit down and give it all a read through.

6.  I've done everything you said, why am I still single?
- I can do the best that I can to help you. But, I will never be able to identify whether you are messaging the right kinds of people for you, or know what your chemistry is like on that first date.  Know that these things DO take time, and new people make profiles every day.  You never know when the right person is going to find online dating, so stay focused and patient. "Good things come to those who wait."

7.  What about sites other than OkCupid?
Many people who utilize OkCupid also use other free dating websites.  I have spent time on Plenty of fish and have found it to be less comprehensive than OkCupid.  POF has more people, so you are more likely to get messages. However, it also takes a lot less time to fill out a profile, and tends to attract less serious daters or people who are just seeing what's out there. You'll also get a lot of messages at the beginning, but they do slow down over time. I always say that OkCupid is far superior because of the match percentage feature. It was created by Harvard grads using mathematical algorithms to predict the people you are most compatible with. It's science, and it works.

This is geared toward females, but a lot of this advice works for guys too.  If you have any questions about whether something applies, leave a comment and I'll clarify.

I have decided to take a second to address why your use of language may be hurting you in the world of online dating.

1.  My first shout out is to those of you with wide and expansive vocabularies who probably write excellent research papers.  I personally can appreciate a strict and structured paragraph with verbage I need to verify with Webster.  However, most people don't. While still showing off your intellect, you also need to remember to be personable and friendly. You wouldn't approach someone acting uptight, so try to keep it a little more casual.
2. My second shout out is to those of you that don't care about your vocabulary.  In fact, you find reading this blog a pain in the ass and wish I would stop being so formal. My guess is that you write your messages like that too, and don't give a shit whether your spelling is right or wrong, or where you should put a comma.  Try taking some more time to make your messages look more like they belong in the English language.  Just because you don't think it's important, the woman of your dreams might. She might pass you up at the first message because she thinks you're too lazy to write her a good one.  If you want someone to take the time and effort to write you a quality message, you have to write one too.

In the technological world we live in, it has become well-accepted that we creep on each other.  Facebook has made it even easier to stalk people with features like checking in and the ability to tag others when we are out and about with them.  This is good for online dating, and today I would like to address what I call "acceptable creeping" when you are dealing with someone you have met online.

My first form of acceptable creeping comes in the form of creating an entirely new profile.  Don't run yet, hear me out.  This profile is going to be for those of you who are more modest, and don't want the world to know how you feel about personal issues or the details of what you have or haven't done in your sex life.  When I want to see someone else's answers on their match questions, but don't want to share my answer with the world, I defer to my second profile.  This is a profile with nothing on it, that I essentially use to answer questions I would never want associated with me.  I can satisfy my curiosity and find out what a match thinks, without sacrificing what I think.

My second form of acceptable creeping is actually not acceptable, but mandatory.  You absolutely must do this.  Before you meet anyone, do your homework.  Get their full name, and do a web search.  Things like newspaper articles about crimes committed can be of much help to you, and I would certainly like to know if my potential date was a suspect in a robbery.  You think I'm joking?  I've actually seen it happen.  Get the back story.  If the things someone is telling you don't make sense, question them.

My third form of acceptable creeping is to get someone's facebook profile.  Other than the obvious benefits, here are some others.  If you go back far enough, you can usually find some evidence of someone's past relationships.  If there is a facebook wall full of drama, is that something you really want to be involved with? You could find that your match likes to post every detail of their personal life in a facebook status. In fact, you could find they are already posting lyrics to love songs about you! (Run.)  Make as much use of this as you can, because we all know facebook is the window into most people's lives anymore.

My last form of acceptable creeping is one you are going to have to do with your match once/before things get serious.  I encourage you to creep into their sexual history.  Now, I DO NOT mean you should be messaging ex partners and asking them if they are into BDSM.  What I do mean, is that you can't trust a stranger you know nothing about.  To the realities:

• 80% of people who have a sexually transmitted disease experience no noticeable symptoms.
• 1 in 4 people have genital herpes, an INCURABLE STD, and up to 90 percent of people don't know they have it.  You can contract it without the other person having any visible signs of an outbreak, due to asymptomatic viral shedding.
• 1 in 4 college students has an STD.
• Each year approximately 19 million additional people are infected with an STD and over 50% of these are coming from teenagers and young adults, aged 15-24.

Have you received advice from OkTori or OkLarissa and want to share your success story?  Please email your story and/or picture of you and your date to oktoristutorials@gmail.com!

It's no secret that you can send out tons of messages to potential matches and not get any responses.  The most important thing to remember when this happens, is that it's not necessarily about you.  Sometimes we focus so much on saying that right thing, that we think the lack of response means we blew it ("Not again!?").  I think it's necessary to consider that there is a lot more to the process, and that you can't let it get you down.  Here are some scenarios to consider:

• The person you messaged was hitting it off with someone else.  It doesn't mean you didn't send a great message or have a really stellar profile.  Someone else just got there first.
• The person you messaged isn't serious about online dating or just made their profile to see what's out there.
• The person you messaged is overly picky, and therefore, probably not the right person for you anyway.
• You just don't fit their wants physically.  Again, you could have a great profile and message, but if you're just not what their looking for (whether it be body type, hair color, whatever), you're not going to get a message.  In which case, pardon me, screw them! 
• The person you messaged doesn't feel you are compatible.  Personal story:  I once got a message from a guy that I would normally talk to, but didn't message him when I found out his favorite hobby.  This particular hobby drove me crazy in a previous relationship, and I really couldn't imagine myself dealing with that again.  I passed him up. My loss? Maybe, but if I had to sit around watching grown men play Warhammer for hours ever again, I might lose my mind.