For many single people, online dating appears to offer a way to escape loneliness and social isolation. Sadly, the internet has also become a hunting ground for those wanting to prey on the weaknesses of others. At Searchmate, we’ve been finding out more about the phenomenon of ‘love-bombing’ and how online predators are faking love.
For thirty-four-year-old Poppy, internet dating appeared to offer a pro-active approach to meeting new people. Having been treated badly by a guy she’d ‘met by accident’, Poppy decided to approach finding love with a more determined approach. As a medical professional working anti-social hours, she felt the internet offered a way to meet a large volume of people, recreating her highly social school and university days.
In many ways, Poppy enjoyed the confidence boost of having so many guys express an interest in her online profile. However, she soon found a disparity between what she was hoping to find online, and what was on offer: “I want someone who is my best friend; someone who makes me laugh; someone I’m thrilled to be with. I want ‘easy and comfortable’ more than anything else. The men I’ve met online want fireworks and something indefinable that they never seem to be able to explain.”
Poppy found that few internet-daters were looking for serious commitment – “I find it interesting as to why men will go to all the effort of chasing a woman on line, and meeting up, but continually refuse to commit to a relationship. I haven’t yet met a guy on line who is willing to turn a fun situation into something permanent.’
The only man who appeared to be interested in pursuing a relationship left Poppy feeling more isolated than ever before. When Steve, an IT specialist in his 30s, began contacting her online, Poppy was already starting to lose faith in ever finding love. However, Steve seemed determined to win her over. When she went away on holiday, he was in constant contact…and when she returned he was waiting at the airport to drive her home. Steve’s grand gestures and frequent communication began to make Poppy feel special…and safe enough to begin to make shared plans.
Having finally won her trust by bombarding her with attention, Steve surprised Poppy by starting to complain about a lack of money and the pressure of his debts. Poppy now believes that Steve used a ‘love-bombing’ technique in order to gain control of a single, affluent woman. However, when it became clear that she wasn’t going to hand over cash, things changed quickly. After spending what Poppy describes as ‘a perfect time together’ during a four day mini-break, Steve vanished from Poppy’s life. She was devastated – “The whole situation made me feel stupid and insignificant. I felt lost without him: he’d infiltrated my whole life.”
Poppy has reached the conclusion that Steve was “the loneliest person I’ve ever met in my life: I never once heard him speak about family or friends with any real feeling.”
Poppy is now moving on with her life and sees working with a Personal Matchmaker as a refreshing, new option that she’d love to try. Like many women in their thirties and forties, Poppy feels she no longer has time to waste on internet predators who are faking love – “I know my age puts men off because they realise I’m probably ready for marriage and a family…and I am! I want to find love, and I can’t wait to have children.”
If you’d like to share an informal chat with Julie, our membership adviser, about finding a genuine, loving relationship, please call on 0800 644 4160.
9am – 9pm Every Day
Forget everything you’ve heard about the great romantic trysts of our French and Italian neighbours; the truth is, UK singles are willing to spend more on romance than most Europeans. While a French couple spends an average of £46.00 on an evening of love and merriment, and an Italian couple stretches to an average of £47.00, Brits are happy to spend an average of £129.00. According to new research compiled by the Centre for Economics & Business Research British singles spend more than double the amount their European counterparts would expect to part with in the name of love.
With singles taking an ever more proactive approach to finding a mate, gone are the days when people would sit at home hoping a new partner might miraculously appear. Safe and exclusive dating agencies like Searchmate offer UK daters an exciting, new way to meet people and enjoy a fantastic social life. As a result, dating contributes £5.89bn to the UK economy every year, and that figure is set to grow.
Within the food, drink and entertainment sector, the total date-related national spend in the UK last year was £2,800,000,000. Add to that an increase of £153 million over the last year in expenditure on eating-in during a date and you start to get the picture in terms of how seriously British singles have begun to take good old-fashioned courtship.
As recently as five years ago, many couples were still stumbling into relationships, bypassing the sweet and butter-fly inducing first dates that are now enjoying such a renaissance. Due to popular TV shows such as Channel 4’s First Dates people are realising the value of investing time and money in meeting a potential, new partner.
At Searchmate, our Personal Matchmakers love to hear the excitement in a client’s voice when a date has gone so well it almost feels like a fairy-tale. Our values are now being shared across the nation: genuine people, who are looking for authentic, loving relationships, are taking the time to get to know each other. We pride ourselves in being a traditional agency with a contemporary feel; very much in keeping with these exciting new attitudes to dating.
So whilst the CEBR’s figures are great news for the economy, they’re also great news for the quality of the relationships single people in the UK are ready to share.
If you would like to learn more about finding love with Searchmate, please call us for an informal chat on :
0333 253 2540
Lines open 9am – 9pm Every Day
No Valentine’s Card This Year?
No Valentine’s card this year? It certainly is disappointing if that hoped for card or gift didn’t materialise, especially if you started the year so positively believing that 2017 was going to be THE year for you in terms of love and meeting that special person. St Valentine’s Day is very much a barometer, 6 weeks into the new year, when you can check out those aspirations you have for love and romance coming into your life and assess how you are doing so far.
If you aren’t happy with the progress you are making to date, then perhaps you will feel it is the right time to become more proactive. Most of the 16 million singles in the UK are now quite comfortable about using a professional, third party company to find love and Searchmate is one of the most popular.
We have been around since 1998 and are one of the established Personal Matchmaking services in the country, we also truly cover the country, which is unusual in Personal Matchmaking. Searchmate caters for attractive, professional people from all walks of life, so a Personal Introductions or Dating Agency for nice people from the right sort of background, in other words one of the best and most successful dating brands in the UK.
We have one of the largest data bases in the country, almost all of whom are professionals or aspiring professionals, who have been personally interviewed, ID checked and vetted – to absolutely ensure that they are who they say they are. We also support the dating safety guidelines advocated by the Dating Agency Association.
Is that for you? Well we’d love to put you in an informed position so that you could decide yourself. If you’d like to know about Searchmate and how we work, then why not call Julie, our Senior Membership Adviser/Dating Expert, at our expense on 0800 644 4160 or complete out contact form by clicking here and we’ll call you back, usually within 24 working hours.
We hope to hear from you soon.
Our Dating Safety Campaign Launch
Searchmate Ltd is delighted to support the Dating Agency Association’s Dating Safely Campaign launch, it is especially appropriate with today being St Valentine’s Day, which has been associated with love and romance now for many centuries. Finding new partners should be fun and part of an exciting journey that you take within your life, it is however important to take steps to ensure you stay safe, both your personal safety but also safety from scammers and online dating fraudsters. Searchmate announces our Dating Safely Campaign launch and fully supports the efforts that the Dating Agency Association have taken to highlight safer dating. Here is their press release:
Industry Body for UK Dating Agencies Announces Launch of National Dating Safely Campaign
Campaign Set to Save Lives Will ‘Go Live’ on 13th February 2017.
13th February 2017 – The industry body for UK dating agencies, The Dating Agency Association, has announced that its national Dating Safely Campaign will go live on February 13th, 2017, providing free information to single people, and clear professional guidelines to dating agencies, in order to promote a cultural shift in the way we think about personal safety.
On the 15th January 2017, eighteen year old, Leonne Weeks – ‘a quiet girl, who wouldn’t hurt anybody’ – was found dead in an isolated pathway in Rotherham, South Yorks. Police are scouring social media for clues after friends said that Leanne had gone to meet a man from a dating site. A teenage boy has been charged with her murder.
While Leonne’s devastated family await answers, this young woman’s death is a stark reminder of how meeting strangers online has become commonplace within our society. Men and women of all ages are putting themselves at risk every day across the UK as a result of new and dangerous attitudes to dating.
In the tragic case of Usha Patel – a forty-four year old mother who was brutally murdered by a man she invited to her home – having connected via an online dating agency – Judge Rebecca Poulet QC said: “In my assessment, this case is a stark warning to anyone who plans to meet someone following limited internet contact. That meeting must take place in a public place until one person feels they know something of the other.”
Usha Patel’s five-year-old son discovered his mother’s body the morning after the vicious and bloody attack, having been left alone with her overnight. Judge Rebecca Poulet concluded – “She (Patel) was clearly anxious to meet a new partner, but she paid for this invitation with her life.”
The Dating Agency Association has set out clear guidelines for both single people, and dating agencies across the country, to ensure that the very human desire to find love no longer leaves single people vulnerable to exploitation and violence.
Dating Expert and Self-Help author, Trelawney Kerrigan, has worked closely with The Dating Agency Association, safety professionals, UK charities, and a diverse group of single people, to devise a set of simple guidelines aimed at saving lives. The Dating Safely Guidelines handbook can be downloaded free of charge via the Dating Agency Association website www.datingagencyassociation.org.uk
A hard copy of the handbook can also be requested via the website.
Trelawney Kerrigan said: “The frightening conclusion to my research is that the anonymity of dating apps and online sites has bought with it increasingly dangerous attitudes towards meeting complete strangers in isolated settings – blinded by the instant intimacy of online communication. Importantly this is not a behaviour limited to young people: men and women of all ages are trading the basic safeguarding of their lives for instant gratification.”
Tina Wallace, the Chief Executive of the Dating Agency Association, is thrilled that all Dating Agency Association member agencies must now commit to implementing clear policies and procedures that promote a safe and transparent environment on behalf of their clients. Tina Wallace said: “Our Dating Safely Guidelines handbook provides simple common sense advice to single people, ensuring that they consider their own well being and put personal safety first when seeking a relationship.
For those hoping to attract love in 2017, the simple practice of giving gratitude could boost your desirability to others by around 25 per cent. This fact was reported by one of the world’s most respected experts on gratitude, Robert Emmons, phD, in his book “Thanks! How The New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier” Let’s look at how you can find love in 2017 by giving great gratitude.
People who regularly give gratitude experience increased levels of positive emotions. They sleep better. Express more compassion and kindness. Feel more alive. We don’t need science to tell us that these are the kind of people others love to be around.
The key to giving good gratitude is remembering to be thankful for life’s small blessings. Momentous occasions are wonderful, but it’s by noticing the little details that we really bring change. Sharing a smile with a stranger. Sipping a Gingerbread latte on the way to work. Waking up to sunshine streaming through the blinds.
Keeping a Gratitude Journal:
By taking the simple measure of keeping a Gratitude Journal, it’s possible to significantly raise our levels of happiness and well being. Notice the small details of each day that made you smile. Note them down.
Making a Gratitude Jar:
Write special moments on tiny pieces of paper and fold them into a Gratitude Jar. Next New Year’s Eve, pour out the jar and look back on all of those lovely memories.
Write a Gratitude Letter:
Let the people you love know how much you mean to them. Write down the little things they do that make such a difference to your life. Use good old fashioned paper and ink. Create a timeless memory of your appreciation.
365 Thank You Notes:
In her blog Daring To Live Fully ,Marelisa Fabrega writes about a man named John Kralik. Kralik made a New Year’s resolution to write 365 thank you notes, one for each day of the year. He spent an entire year thanking the people in his life – from his daughter’s teacher, to his coffee barista. By the close of the year, Kralik felt that his life had been transformed.
You really can find love in 2017 by giving great gratitude!
We can help you find the perfect partner to share this fantastic new year with. Call us for an informal chat on 0800 6444160 to see how our Personal Matchmakers can help.
