Dating Tips for Men: 30 Tips From Over 100 Men We've Coached
The best dating tips for men come down to one idea: make it easy for her to see who you are, then lead. Most men who struggle aren't unattractive or boring. Their profile looks like a hundred others, they're on apps where the women they want aren't looking, and on the date they wait politely for something to happen. Fix those three things and dating gets a lot easier.
Below are 30 dating tips for men, grouped the way our team works with clients: your profile, who sees you, your texting, your dates, and your head. They come from Naturally Magnetic Men (NMM), a dating coaching programme for professional Brown and Asian men in the West, founded by Ravi Sandhu, with coaches Rags and Coach D. My team has coached over 100 Brown and Asian men, and the tips work for any man who's competent everywhere else in life and stuck here.
The 5 dating tips for men that matter most
If you only read one section, read this one.
- Pick one type of man and look like him in every photo. She decides in a few seconds. A clear six beats a confusing nine.
- Be seen by the right women. The same man can be invisible on one app or in one city and in demand in the next.
- Text to set up the date, not to entertain her. Three or four good messages, then a plan.
- Lead the date. Pick the place, set the pace, move venues, ask for the next date.
- Get honest feedback after every date. You can't fix what you can't see.
The rest of this guide expands on each one.
A quick word on where these come from
At 30 I had never been on a date. Even my first match online took six months of new photos. When I finally got dates, I had about 50 in a row in London that went nowhere, ending with the same text: "Sorry, Ravi, you're a nice guy." I've been on about 300 dates since I started, and these tips are what I wish someone had told me at the beginning.
One small moment changed a lot for me. I'd asked a woman from my class for coffee, and she said no. In my words from my own story video: "I celebrated with a coffee and though she said no, I felt for the first time a sense of victory. A sense of I actually tried." I realised, as I put it then, "that rejection didn't kill me."
Dating tips for men: your profile
She isn't reading your profile line by line. She's reading you. In the first few seconds she's quietly asking four questions: is he safe or unsafe, is he high or low value, does he have options, and does he know who he is? Most men's profiles answer the first question and stop there.
6. Lead with a clear photo of you alone. No sunglasses, no group, no dog stealing the shot. She should know which one is you before she reads a word.
7. Show one type of man, consistently. We call this an archetype: the creative, the athlete, the professional with an edge, the adventurer. If photo one says one thing and photo three says another, she gets confused and swipes past.
8. Show a life she'd be stepping into. Real places, real activities, people around you. A profile of headshots and landmarks says "nothing much happens here."
9. Cut the CV. Your job title is fine. A list of achievements reads as trying to win her over. One specific detail from your weekend does more.
10. Write prompts she can reply to. An opinion, a light challenge or a specific story gives her an easy opening. "I love travelling and food" gives her nothing. There are 100 examples in our guide to the best Hinge prompts for guys, and full bios in dating profile examples for men.
11. Get your photos taken properly. For most men, this is the biggest single change. See what each dating profile photo must do.
12. Don't let AI write it for you. It can help you spot that you're coming across wrongly, but a profile that isn't you leads to dates that don't work, because the man she meets isn't the man she read.
13. Get a second pair of eyes. You can't see your own profile the way she does. Our free profile review shows you what she sees in the first few seconds, and our Hinge profile review guide lists the 12 things we check.
Dating tips for men: who sees you
Where you're seen matters as much as how you look. This is the part most dating advice skips.
14. Pick the app for the women you want, not the one your friends use. Different apps and cities attract different women. Our app-by-app guides: Tinder tips, Bumble tips, and what to check if you're not getting matches on Hinge.
15. Judge by your numbers, not your mood. Count matches, conversations, numbers and dates for two weeks. If matches are low, it's the profile or the app. If conversations die, it's your messages. If dates don't turn into second dates, it's the date.
16. Know that your city changes the game. Frank, a 6'5" Brown man who has spent years in the self-improvement scene, put it simply on camera with us: "I see how I'm received differently, massively differently" in different countries and cities. If you've just moved, read dating in a new city.
17. Don't only rely on the apps. Social circles, hobbies with mixed groups, and talking to people in daily life all widen who sees you. The men who do best usually have more than one source of dates.
18. If the apps aren't working at all, find where it's breaking. We wrote a step-by-step check for when dating apps aren't working for men.
Dating tips for men: texting
19. Get to the date quickly. A few good messages, then a specific plan. Long chats with no date tend to fade.
20. Suggest a day, a time and a place in one message. "Are you free sometime?" puts the work on her. "Drinks at [place] on Thursday at 7?" is easy to say yes to.
21. Match her energy, not her speed. You don't need to reply instantly or play games with timing. Reply when you're free, keep it light, and don't send three messages in a row.
22. Text after the date with something specific. A short line about a moment you shared beats "had a great time." Our guide has 6 example texts for after a first date.
Dating tips for men: on the date
This is where most professional men lose. Not because they're dull, but because they're polite and passive. In my own story I described an early date like this: "She could see I was so beta, such a nice guy that she kind of had to take the lead, right?" That's the date most men are having without realising it.
23. Pick a simple plan you can lead. A bar with seats at the counter, a walk with a coffee, a small gallery. Our list of first date ideas ranks 40 of them by how easy they make it to lead.
24. Dress like the man in your photos. She came to meet him. See what to wear on a first date for each kind of venue.
25. Talk, don't interview. Ask fewer, better questions, share your own opinions, and tease a little. We've put 50 questions to ask on a first date in one place, sorted so the conversation builds.
26. Keep it short and change venue. 60 to 90 minutes, and if it's going well, move to a second spot nearby. A change of place makes a first date feel like more than coffee.
27. Calm your nerves before, not during. Nerves are normal. A short walk, slow breathing and arriving a few minutes early help. More in how to be confident on a date.
28. Ask for the second date before you leave. Don't wait for a text exchange to decide it. If you're not getting second dates, read why first dates go nowhere and our second date tips.
Dating tips for men: your head
29. Hold your standards. Early on I tolerated things I shouldn't have. One woman, in my words, would "come to dates be like 3 4 hours late. … I was weak." Other men helped me understand that my vibe was bad. A man who knows who he is doesn't wait three hours.
30. Ignore the trends and keep the basics. Every month there's a new theory about dating on social media. My view is the same every time: "men should not take these things too seriously, and instead follow timeless principles. Become the best person you can be, and you'll attract the right fit for you."
And one bonus tip that underpins all 30: get feedback from someone who can see what you can't. One of our clients, an Indian engineer of 30, wrote to me: "Without someone you can trust accurately telling you what you need to work on and improve, you are left to your own devices to interpret your (lack of) results." That's exactly where most men get stuck.
If you're a Brown or Asian man reading this
Every tip above works for any man. But if you're a Brown or Asian man dating in the West, the stakes on the first few seconds are higher. Before she's read a word, the stereotype has already offered her a picture: the polite, hard-working guy who'd make a safe date and a good friend. A plain profile and a polite, passive date confirm that picture. A clear type of man in your photos and a date you lead break it. That's the moment she looks twice.
None of this is about your face, and it isn't about women being bad people. It's social conditioning: what everyone grew up watching, and how a lot of us were raised. You can't change the conditioning, but you control most of what feeds the first read.
That's why we built the Double-Take Effect: the system our team uses so she stops seeing a generic Brown or Asian guy and looks twice, built across three parts: your profile, who sees you, and your dates. Rags, who has rebuilt profiles for more than 50 minority men, rebuilds your profile. Coach D coaches every date.
One of our clients, a South Asian senior professional in his 30s in New York, had never been on a date before he joined us. His new profile went live, and that first week brought 35 matches, 16 conversations, 7 numbers and 4 dates booked. You can read more stories like his on our client results page.
If you want a team on this with you, read what a dating coach for Asian men or a dating coach for Indian men actually does, or take the 2-minute Fit Check to see where you're losing: your profile, who sees you or your dates.
For the bigger picture, read Asian male dating stereotypes, do women like Indian men?, dating as a Brown man in the West and what the research says. If you're Indian, we also wrote 12 lessons in dating advice for Indian men.
The 8 most common dating mistakes men make
- Photos that show five different men, or none clearly.
- Being on the wrong app for the women you want.
- Chatting for weeks without asking her out.
- Asking "what do you want to do?" instead of suggesting a plan.
- Long, expensive dinners that feel like a job interview.
- Being agreeable all night, with no opinions and no teasing.
- Waiting for her to text first after the date.
- Guessing what went wrong instead of getting feedback.
Every guide on this site, by part
Your profile: Best Hinge prompts for guys · Dating profile examples for men · Dating profile photos · Hinge profile review · Hinge profile tips for Indian men · Tinder tips · Bumble tips · Not getting matches on Hinge? · Should you use your real name on dating apps?
Who sees you: Dating apps not working for men · Dating in a new city · Dating as a minority man · Asian male dating stereotypes
Your dates: First date ideas · Questions to ask on a first date · What to wear on a first date · How to be confident on a date · What to text after a first date · Second date tips · Why first dates go nowhere
Your situation: Dating at 30 with no experience · Arranged marriage vs love marriage · Dating advice for Indian men · Dating as a Brown man in the West · Do women like Indian men? · What the research says
Getting help: Dating coach for men · Is a dating coach worth it? · Dating coach for Indian men · Dating coach for Asian men · Dating coach in London · Dating coach in NYC
