In life, often times it seems like what should be really simple, often times turns out to be really hard. The same is true for online dating. You should be able to just post a profile on online dating sites, email the women you find attractive, and have them email you back excited to meet you.

That's what I thought when I first got into online dating back in 2004. Since then I have emailed thousands upon thousands of women and I have beat my head on the keyboard repeatedly due to a lack of responses from women.

I used to get frustrated and quit the dating sites since they were working. Eventually, I just made it my mission to find out what worked with online dating and what didn't work. Here are what I consider to be the top three mistakes men make with online dating.

Bad Profile Photo:

Women may say that they don't care about looks, but that is exactly how they are judging you online. When they do a search what do you think makes them click on your profile and read it. 95% of it is your profile and 5% of it might be your headline, if it's funny enough.

The best photos are ones with you smiling in them. Also, if you have a picture of you doing something goofy in it then that is even better. Women love to laugh, the more you make them laugh and experience good feelings when they communicate with you the more likely they are to meet up with you. Take down all of the serious, macho looking pics and opt for the ones showing off your pearly whites.

Boring Unoriginal Emails/Profiles:

Do you know how much email women get on dating sites? They get a lot. It's not uncommon for a woman to get 10-20 emails a day from men. Recently, I was talking to a woman I met from Plenty of Fish. I thought it would be fun for her to read me the emails other guys sent her, you know do a little "competitive analysis". The short time she was online she received 5 emails from men. Of course her "online" status caused men to email her, but you should start seeing the pattern: women are swamped with emails online.

With that being said telling her your age, height, weight, what you do for a living is not going to make you stand out. It's going to make you sound exactly like the other 90% of guys email her. Again your profile should be funny, humorous, and entertaining. The email you send her should also be funny and entertaining. Bonus points if you are able to tie in something from your profile to your email. The bottom line is the more you make a woman laugh the better off you are.

Giving Up Too Soon:

Like I said earlier I have been on and off dating sites since 2004. Usually when you terminate your membership, the dating website asks you why you left. In this particular case I was terminating my Match subscription. One of the questions they asked was how many emails did you send. The available responses to choose from were 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 15, more than 20 or something similar to that. There is no doubt in my mind that there are men out there who send out only 1 email. When they don't get a response they say online dating doesn't work and they quit.

You should not be concerned with whether an individual woman emails you back. The more important thing to look for is "Are any women emailing you back?" If you aren't getting any responses, don't take it personally just change something up. Change your profile picture, reward your profile, change what you write in the email. Do anything except give up. Eventually, you will get the hang of it and start getting emails back and meet women for dates. Give yourself a chance to be successful. You deserve it.