The Art of Tinder Talk: Everything You Need to Know to Get the Date
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There are lots of things that are chronically misunderstood by men, but in today’s culture, how to talk to girls on a dating app like Tinder might be one of the worst.
Not only are you primarily interacting with strangers that you know close to nothing about, but there are so many of them to swipe on that taking any single one seriously and treating them like what they are – which is: a real-live human person – can feel not only daunting, but frankly, impossible.
What you’re left with is a group of frazzled online dating burnouts handing their phones off to their friends to be spared the exhaustion of the actual Tindering process.
But for every few dozen boring or bad Tinder conversations, there’s a really good one that makes the whole experience, well, kinda worth it. And if you know what you’re doing, you can be that one shining example that all the other guys are jealous of. Here’s how:
How to Start a Conversation on Tinder
The rules of online dating 
dictate that, as the man, it’s probably on you to make the first move and start the conversation. We’re sorry, but that’s just the way it is, and you’ll probably find out that most of your matches won’t message you if you don’t message them first. So how do you go about making a great first impression? We’ll get into the specifics later, but for now, here are some good general rules to follow:
- Tailor your opening message to her bio (including her pictures & interests)
- Be bubbly and upbeat
- Avoid generic opening messages, since she’ll see hundreds of these
- Don’t be crass, hypersexual or vulgar
- Steer the conversation towards going on an actual date
Remember that having the girl swipe right on you isn’t a victory; it’s just the first step. And the reality is, women get many more matches than men do, so it’s not even enough to help you stand out. Your opening message is your chance to make a great first impression, so you don’t want to flub that!
Tinder Conversation Dos & Don’ts
There’s no golden rule to being good at Tinder. Like everything else in life, some people are naturally better at it than others; working hard at it will typically mean you improve, and naturally attractive people have an unfair advantage no matter how bad they are at flirtatious banter. While the following dos and don’ts won’t work for every single person you match with, they are pretty good rules of thumb – no swiping pun intended.
Do: Use Specific Compliments
“Make your opening message a sincere, specific compliment about something from their profile that caught your attention,” suggests dating coach Connell Barrett. “Maybe you noticed their taste in movies. You could open with, ‘You’re a Wes Anderson fan? Nice! OK… ‘Rushmore’ or ‘The Royal Tenenbaums’?’ In just 12 words, you’ve scored lots of points by showing that you read their profile, by sharing a genuine compliment, and by asked an engaging question.”
Don’t: Send a Boring Opening Message
“With your opener, the greatest sin is being boring,” says Barrett. “Avoid starting with, ‘Hi,’ ‘How’s your day?,’ ‘What’s up?’ or any version of hello. In real life, approaching someone with a confident hello can work, but on Tinder, it makes you seem boring, and they might not reply. Starting with ‘Hey’ is the same as opening with, ‘Hey, would you please ghost me?”
