I refer them to my profile and ask what they liked about it besides the pic to see what happens.

I am pretty specific in what I want and do not want on there.

I get a lot of those "I like your profile" emails. When I ask them what they liked about it, they usually say everything, or that they liked the pictures.

I am not sure. I put preferences on my profile ad and got a response from a really sweet guy who was younger than I would have wanted to date. But turns out he's a really sweet guy and not that bad looking either.

I still have not dropped my settings for younger men (and I'm not talking 18-25 either) He's 29.
But I did send him a friend request and I chat with him outside of the site.

We have become good friends, such a nice feeling actually, to be appreciated.

But I do inquire if people respond to what they liked about my profile because sometimes that one or 2 compliments could change my profile settings to what I am looking for in a relationship :)

i couldn't agree more. i see profiles as similar to classified adds. some people have something to sell, others have something they want to buy. when i'm looking to buy a used car i don't look in the 'used cars wanted' section, instead i go to the 'used cars for sale' section. if i'm to click on the 'send message' thingy i'll do so because i see something that i like. i'm not about to click it because i meet a requirement or preference.

but hell, rarely do ladies reply to my messages and i can't think when the last time someone just messaged me out of the blue anyway so what do i know, huh?

I no longer have anything written on my profile because no one who wrote me ever read it anyway.

Yes, I pay attention to preferences. Although I don't send first emails anymore anyway. But, if I saw a preference for something like "no long distance", I would not bother pursuing it.

This thread wasn't about emailing someone because you meet a requirement of theirs. It was more about if you see something you like, do you ignore their preferences if you don't fit into them?

For example, I state what age range works best for me. However, I often receive messages from much older or much younger men trying to tell me that age is just a number, despite what I've written in my profile. For some reason, they seem to think they my preferences do not count for them.

I know that I could set a filter for age, but I enjoy chatting with all kinds of people from the forums, so I am not going to block certain ages from contacting me all together.

I thought about removing most of my profile for the very same reason. Those who actually look at my profile complain that it's too long and want me to just repeat what I've written anyway.

I put the no long distance part at the top and it's regularly ignored. Same with the age preference.

it's quite clear to me that the thread asks this question; "If someone has preferences listed in their profile, do you pay attention to them, or do you hope they just won't matter?"

i answered the question as best i could as reagards to the attention i pay to the preferences of others. as far as seeing something i like; IF and that's a big IF, i can get past the preferences i suppose i might send a message anyway. but i won't simply ignore the preference. i simply do not care to read what women want in a man. in a profile i want to read that a woman is what i want in a woman and no, i'm not at all sure what that is either. the point is that a profile must cause me to want to take the next step and reading what she expects is not likely to do that.

I agree that a profile has to catch my interest if I'm going to contact the person.

I have the same problem. People will write to me and want to argue with me about my stated preferences. They think, for whatever reason, that I should make them exceptions to my own rules. It just doesn't work that way.

I never thought it would come to this, because I used to believe that it was simply a matter of common courtesy to reply to anyone who wrote, but more and more I find myself not replying, simply because I don't see the point in getting into a long, drawn-out debate over something I've already decided on.

I still try to at least reply to those who write. But, some get mad when things don't go their way. And others take a response as meaning I'm interested, which of course is not always the case. So, I can definitely see why people don't respond every time.

This echoes my thoughts.
I guess I perceive, any blanket statements,
made about women, on a man's profile, to be
negative in nature.
My eyes glaze over.

I actually don't mind seeing what men want in women on profiles, as it gives me an idea of whether or not I fit into their preferences. If it's clear from the beginning that I don't, there's no need to pursue anything.

Now, if a profile is mostly negative, I'm not going to bother at all whether I fit their preferences or not.

They have drops for that.

i suppose it would serve me well, in an educational sense, to look at a few profiles of men my age. i have seen blanket statements about men on women's profiles which often seem to be gross overgeneralizations, something that will make me move on to the next profile in a heartbeat.

They have drops that remove the
crap in front of your eyes?????
I want some.

i usually look at the profile, but i won't make a decision about anything until i know them better... anyone can say anything on the pro, truth or not...

I generally pay attention to preferences on profiles but mainly in regards to the age range and whether they are looking for a non smokingand/or drinking prospective partner. Other than that, I tend to ignore everything else as I’m a member of the ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained’ brigade.

On the whole, I don’t think people read/pay attention to preferences stated on profiles. I don’t know whether there’s a general assumption that most people tend to be economical with the truth on their profiles. Or because there's an assumption that if contacted by someone who seems compatible, the recipient might be prepared to relax their preferences.