Good set of questions to send to get responses


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eman1 is offline eman1 Post #1  June 4,2011, 8:45am
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When I first started initiating communication with my matches by sending 5 questions (been here 2 months) I was choosing to send only those questions that related to or were relevant to LTR/marriage. Of those matches that bothered to respond or were able to, closed me. Now I switched gears and decided to go more "neutral" sending questions relating to casual dating and daily activities - and getting responses... anybody had similiar experience? I didn't think initial questions mattered much, something just to get the ball rolling. If anybody had real good success with any particular set of questions I would like to know.

I'm a male in early 40's by the way.

(Thanks for the reply to my earlier post about GC, now I get it)
 
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BuzWeaver is offline BuzWeaver Post #2  June 4,2011, 9:25am
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There are some questions that can doom you if you answered them as directly as you'd want to. I can appreciate EH's questions to illicit levels of conversation, creativity and imagination, but at the same time some of the questions are the "does this dress make me look fat" variety that no matter how honestly you answer, you're likely to fail.

Two of the questions that will nearly guarantee a close for me are "If you had three wishes" and "If you could write a movie about your life what would it be and who would portray you."

I fancy myself a bit of a word smith and sidewalk comic, but no mater how creatively I approach these two questions, among a few others, the outcome for a positive result is slim.

My realist side wants to answer the wish question by saying "Well, if had three wishes I wouldn't be on EH would I"? You DO NOT want to use that as an answer.

One that recently spooked off a potential match was the one where it ask you about doing whatever activity without penalty or cost amount. I answered "Vegas"? I never heard back from her.

Perhaps these questions are designed to protect people from potential matches that aren't on their frequency and they damn sure work at eliminating any potential to getting to open conversation if they aren't tuned in or dialed into you.

What works, neutral, neutral, boring neutral. I'll throw in some humor for effect, to at least bring some level of levity to the process. Maybe some people are really squeamish and cautious during this process, but if you're concerned just go neutral. Its sad and hurts me in all kinds of ways (frustration), but if you want to make it to open communication you're going to have to go vanilla.
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mitchell175 is offline mitchell175 Post #3  June 4,2011, 9:51am
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BuzWeaver wrote :
Two of the questions that will nearly guarantee a close for me are "If you had three wishes" and "If you could write a movie about your life what would it be and who would portray you."

I fancy myself a bit of a word smith and sidewalk comic, but no mater how creatively I approach these two questions, among a few others, the outcome for a positive result is slim.
"Does this dress make me look fat?" - Funny! And true.

I have gotten those 2 questions frequently from my (male) matches, and they stumped me at first, but then I decided to take a whimsical approach with them, and never got a close for them.

I think the OP is referring to the first 5 Step 1 questions, not the open format "essay" questions in Step 3. I do not remember what the "LTR questions" are for Step 1, but I most always used the same 5 questions. I thought I could get a good idea of how my match thought with those questions. But, I would not use the questions about "Body type", or "Describe your parents relationship" or "How did most of your relationships end".

I am not sure what the OP means about "questions that related to or were relevant to LTR/marriage." ? But, a lot of those questions are highly loaded questions and can send communication to a screeching halt. Step 1 is way too early to ask someone how all of their romantic relationships ended. Would you ask that as the first question to some person you met at a party? Or, even on a first date? I use that as my guide for Step 1 questions, coupled with what I think I can learn about how my match thinks (Like the "what's your sense of adventure?" question).
 
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Gr8Guyn2008 is offline Gr8Guyn2008 Post #4  June 4,2011, 12:03pm
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Don't know which set of questions you are asking about but some general guidelines to consider in the Guided Communication process.

1) You are asking questions of a stranger. You should choose questions that would be appropriate to ask a stranger.

2) You should ask questions that you would like to know about. Surely there are more than 5 things that you would like to know about a possible date.

3) The fastest thing that I found to get me closed was to put anything in my MHCS other than the most benign. This means staying away from the ones on sex, religion and politics. See #1 above.

4) I would recommend writing your own answers to the First Questions and writing your own Second Questions. Very few people do this so you are at least setting yourself apart from the masses.
 
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lunabeach is offline lunabeach Post #5  June 4,2011, 12:19pm
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Buz, answer them honestly - if someone is asking you a question and you find it ridiculous, give them a ridiculous answer. If they have a shred of humor or self reflection, they won't close you out. If they're looking for a "right" answer and will only accept that...well, good luck to 'em.

There are questions that are inappropriate/impossible and you're doing someone a favor by pointing it out (with humor and tact). They may be too numb nuts to figure it out, but that's someone I don't want to date anyway.

OP, I recommend asking lifestyle type questions - what do you do? what are some of you favorite places? what do you like about where you live? would you want to live somewhere else? what would your last meal be? etc

Keep it light and on topics that will tell you a little about them, but won't make them struggle or uneasy about answering.
 
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upstategirl is offline upstategirl Post #6  June 4,2011, 12:49pm
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Gr8Guyn2008;1353481
1) You are asking questions of a stranger. You should choose questions that would be appropriate to ask a stranger.

3) The fastest thing that I found to get me closed was to put anything in my MHCS other than the most benign. This means staying away from the ones on sex, religion and politics. See #1 above.

4) I would recommend writing your own answers to the First Questions and writing your own Second Questions. Very few people do this so you are at least setting yourself apart from the masses.[/quote]

Good advice to go by. Writing in your own answers to the first set of questions is a much better option than using the listed answers and also sets you apart. With the second set of questions, I always wrote my own and especially liked it when I would recieve questions that were written by my match rather than the alternative of the list of questions provided by eharmony.
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nick222 is offline nick222 Post #7  June 5,2011, 10:17am
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BuzWeaver wrote :
Two of the questions that will nearly guarantee a close for me are "If you had three wishes" and "If you could write a movie about your life what would it be and who would portray you."
Ugh, I hated those! They weren't quite "guaranteed close" with me, but I definitely had to be very interested in the person to answer them. If their goal was to weed out anyone who was on the fence about them, I guess it worked.

The only thing I hated even more was when people would say, "Tell me 10 random things about yourself." Uh, no. Buh-bye.
 
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BuzWeaver is offline BuzWeaver Post #8  June 5,2011, 3:56pm
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nick222 wrote :
Ugh, I hated those! They weren't quite "guaranteed close" with me, but I definitely had to be very interested in the person to answer them. If their goal was to weed out anyone who was on the fence about them, I guess it worked.

The only thing I hated even more was when people would say, "Tell me 10 random things about yourself." Uh, no. Buh-bye.
10 random things? So 9 wouldn't be enough and 11 would have been too much?
 
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BuzWeaver is offline BuzWeaver Post #9  June 5,2011, 3:58pm
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lunabeach wrote :
Buz, answer them honestly - if someone is asking you a question and you find it ridiculous, give them a ridiculous answer. If they have a shred of humor or self reflection, they won't close you out. If they're looking for a "right" answer and will only accept that...well, good luck to 'em.

There are questions that are inappropriate/impossible and you're doing someone a favor by pointing it out (with humor and tact). They may be too numb nuts to figure it out, but that's someone I don't want to date anyway.

OP, I recommend asking lifestyle type questions - what do you do? what are some of you favorite places? what do you like about where you live? would you want to live somewhere else? what would your last meal be? etc

Keep it light and on topics that will tell you a little about them, but won't make them struggle or uneasy about answering.
In reference to those questions specifically I found them irritating and I'd often respond with some sarcastic and or cynical remark. Naturally they would close if they perceived me as a malcontent.
 
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nick222 is offline nick222 Post #10  June 5,2011, 5:28pm
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BuzWeaver wrote :
10 random things? So 9 wouldn't be enough and 11 would have been too much?
Evidently. I was getting that one pretty often for awhile, believe it or not. Sometimes they would say 5. At any rate, it was way more than I was going to put into one freaking question response.
 
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