My first experiment with online dating will be whether or not a shirtless photo gets you more or less right swipes, or has a negligible effect
The parameters of the experiment will be as follows. I am 27 years old. Online dating apps cater to the audience that is primarily 18-50. Being that most 18-22 year olds still have social circles where they will date within (Ie the college they attend), I will up my age to 30 to get a larger range of women to have a larger range of women that Im shown to (Ie I will default to 25-35 without changing any settings on bumble). I can pass for someone between 24-30 with my photos, so 30 is a workable age.
I will create two bumble profiles. The profiles will be identical except for the shirtless photo, which will be replaced by 1 or 2 photos in the other profile. That photo will be a shirtless beach picture of myself.
Hypothesis: A shirtless photo will substantially increase the right swipe rate of the profile. This will only work if the user has visible abs, is muscular and is not taking an obvious mirror selfie. A gym photo, any physical activity, any outdoor activity etc would be a viable substitute to a beach image
The Experiment:
We will use two cities (NYC and San Fransisco) due to their large population densities (thus taking randomness of active users out of the equation) and large metropolitan sizes and will use 4 profiles in total. We will create the profile on a Tuesday night (June 8th 2021) and right swipe the maximum amount allowed per day for a non paying user. We will allow this to run for 1 week. Right swipes will be slightly subjective
3 Photos for the profile the shirtless profile
4 for the non shirtless
Photofeeler – All photos ranked between 6.7 and 7.7 on the attractiveness scale (one photo fell below 7, but felt it was important that both profiles had solid head shot)
Photo feeler rated pictures that scored within the 7-8 range only (being that is where the shirtless photo picture scored – 7.7)
Why Bumble? Its a middle of the road dating app, so this is where I expect middle of the road results in terms of raw numbers
https://www.statista.com/statistics/826778/most-popular-dating-apps-by-audience-size-usa/
Going off this chart, Id expect more matches from tinder (and badoo if youre in a country besides the US), roughly the same with POF, and less with apps like Coffee Meets Bagel and Hinge. Tinder also seems to have more women on the app promoting their IGs, onlyFans etc, or just straight up bots, which would potentially screw up the results
Why 7-8 is an important range for most men – This is attainable to almost every guy who works out and takes high quality photos. These are not even close to the highest quality photos I can take. Excluding the beach picture, they are all selfies or photos of me in a family members basement. Every guy can lift and take selfies. Most men are like me and could take higher quality pictures if they are not getting results that they want. If you arent getting results, figure out a way to get some
Data Gathering: 30 right swipes a day on women that I find attractive – will pay for premium service to allow everyone that swiped on me to be viewable (ie accurate data counting). First day – only swiped until meter was filled on bumble
I will pay for premium in order to “clear the queue” each time I go on. I will record the amount I “match with” and the amount I swipe left with. If IG or Tik Tok is listed, I will record their follower count.
Data will be gathered once a day either at night or during the morning
Default age range of 25-35 for a 30 year old profile
Profile creation – Tuesday, June 8th, 2021 5:45 pm
6:07 pm – just checking to see of both profiles are running
NYC – Has the shirtless photo – current right swipe count – 11
San Fran – Regular photos – current right swipe count – 8
Note – I used 2 random phone numbers that I got from an app… They dont seem to be effecting the experiment, but the coloration is different on each account. This leads me to believe that one of the numbers was previously used (the nyc one) which may throw off the statistics… we will see as the week continues
11:19 PM of tuesday
NYC 42 right swipes
of the 42… 21 were matches (50% rate)
SAN Fran 39
Of the 39… 14 were matches (35% rate)
Wed June 9th, 10:36 AM
7 more NYC right swipes (51 totals) 4 matches… total 25
San Fran – 8 right swipes (54 total) 4 matches… total 18
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