Dating apps can sometimes be a drag. Swiping till your thumbs hurt and racking your brain for witticisms about your matches’ ski holiday, before the conversation inevitably fizzles out and you’re left with a wasteland of matches unless some bizarre alchemy takes place, is hardly the romantic dream many of us have fantasised about and it can leave you feeling hopeless.
Enter the dating app coach. Singles of all ages are turning to coaches who specifically tailor their services to dating apps. These services range from simple advice around how to upgrade your dating app profile, to full-blown app management, in which an expert will set up your profile and reply to messages for you, as well as providing support – often both administrative and emotional.
Relationship experts are nothing new, with plenty of people historically turning to professionals in the field, from marriage counsellors to matchmakers, to improve their romantic relationships. Half of U.S. adults under the age of 30 have used a dating app, according to a 2023 study conducted by Pew Research Centre and one in five partnered adults within the same age range met their current partner on a dating app, so it makes sense that people are seeking specific professional help.
Erika Ettin özgü been a dating coach for 13 years and she offers a variety of services to a wide range of clients. “One of the services I offer is doing people’s online dating for them, as crazy as that sounds,” Ettin says, explaining that this involves swiping yes and no on their behalf and starting conversations with their matches. Ettin’s services involve a complete overhaul of her clients’ dating profiles, getting their photos professionally taken, rewriting their bio and, if they opt in for this, managing their dating apps for three to six months.
“One of the services I offer is doing people’s online dating for them, as crazy as that sounds.”
Of course, it’s not just the administrative side of dating apps that makes them difficult to use – they can be emotionally taxing too. 91 percent of people who use the dating app Hinge say they’ve been ghosted, according to a survey carried out by Hinge. These experiences can be very isolating and demoralising. 35-year-old Olivia, who is based in New York, decided to get in touch with Ettin after a recent short-term-relationship that she described as friends-with-benefits ended. “I was just feeling kind of defeated,” she says. “It was nice to hear from somebody who was an expert that I wasn’t doing anything wrong — there wasn’t anything wrong with me.”
Olivia opted in for just a few of Ettin’s services, rather than handing over complete control of her dating apps. As well as helping edit her profile initially, this includes once-a-month meetings on Zoom where Olivia* shares her screen so Ettin can see exactly how Olivia is using her dating apps, and looking through her messages. On top of this, Olivia is also able to message Ettin for advice as and when she wants it. “A lot of people want to talk about how to handle the emotional stress that comes with [things like] ghosting,” Ettin says, explaining that it varies from client to client when it comes to what her coaching looks like, adding: “I’m very clear with people that I’m not a therapist but it does often feel that way.”
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One of the benefits of dating coaches is that they’re able to provide unbiased advice, something a lot of people lack, particularly when loved ones might have their own opinions that don’t always align with what you want. “My mom and my sister are both married and they just want me to be happy, so I could go on a date with someone who was just awful and they’d tell me I’m being too critical and that I should give him another chance,” Olivia says, explaining that the advice Ettin provides her with is totally different and focussed on exactly what she wants and what’s best for her.
Lily Womble is the founder of a feminist dating programme called The Brazen Breakthrough, designed to help people navigate digital dating in a healthy way. “The dating landscape is full of patriarchal advice that tells women to shrink what they want and be less picky, or be more feminine,” Womble tells Mashable. Womble’s programme not only helps people revamp their dating profiles and navigate messaging matches, but it also puts them through courses that cover topics like ‘caring for your dating nervous system’ and ‘claiming preferences on a deeper level’. “The skills that I teach are both the mindset and the tactical strategy to qualify the right people quickly,” Womble says. She adds that, for women especially, dating apps provide “access to bad behaviour at rates we’ve never had before,” which is another reason people are looking for support.
Not all dating app coaching is quite so grounded, however, particularly a lot of the advice dating app coaches on the web hand out. One TikTok user who describes himself as a dating coach for ‘the çağdaş man’ recently shared a video claiming that “every man should be controversial”. “If you’re not controversial at all that means you have no opinion and no backbone, neither of which is attractive to women,” he says, also mentioning well-known misogynistic figures like Donald Trump and Andrew Tate. Most dating coaches don’t have specific qualifications — Womble and Ettin were both previously professional matchmakers — so for people seeking out their services, it’s important that you find someone whose beliefs align with your own. This also means that dating app coaches, especially those sharing advice online, might be potentially dangerous for impressionable people who are new to dating apps and dealing with insecurity or self-doubt.
58-year-old James* is another one of Ettin’s clients. He began looking for help with dating apps after getting divorced in his early 50s and finding himself baffled by how much the dating landscape had changed since he met his ex-wife at school. According to Ettin, many of her clients have been through a similar experience, or are completely new to dating apps, which makes sense as the dating app Bumble reported that 39 percent of people on Bumble have ended a marriage or serious relationship in the last two years and 36 percent are using dating apps for the first time. James had his dating apps managed by Ettin completely, so she would swipe through his account and make the initial contact with matches. This was partly due to the administrative load of dating apps, but James says that he also benefited from working with a female dating coach: “She gives great advice and she would check my biases and ask me, ‘why don’t you want to go out with this person?'” he says. James says that Ettin would also advise him against moving forwards with certain people, particularly if she sensed he might not be committed or treating them fairly. “It was really good for me to have someone of the opposite sex to speak to,” James says.
“My wife constantly teases me about it. She says: ‘I can’t believe you delegated this to an agent!'”
James eventually met the woman who is now his wife through Ettin’s services, which raises the question: how do you tell a partner or potential partner that you’re using a dating coach and is it even ethical to have your messages written by a professional? “My wife constantly teases me about it,” James says, explaining that it was actually Ettin who made the first contact with her. “She says: ‘I can’t believe you delegated this to an agent!'” he adds, jokingly. For some, it might feel deceitful to find out that your communication with the person you’re dating is being intercepted by a professional dating coach, whereas others might see it as a positive sign that you’re willing to take your dating life seriously. And not only take it seriously, but invest in it too, as dating app coaches tend to cost thousands, or even tens of thousands, of dollars.
Ultimately, dating apps are still in their very early days of existence and there’s no guidebook on how to use them effectively or ethically (ideally, both). And despite the fact that apps are designed to make it easier to find what you’re looking for romantically and sexually, Womble believes that “dating apps have made it more existentially exhausting to find love”, providing us with so many options that actually hinder our decision-making abilities because of increased stress. Sounds familiar, right? After all, there’s only so many “you up?” messages, cancelled dates and swiping left one can go through until professional help starts to appeal. And though coaches are not magicians who can conjure up your perfect partner out of thin air, if you find the right one, they might be able to make dating an enjoyable experience again. Womble says that she cannot guarantee her clients that they’ll immediately find a partner if they invest in her coaching but she says that they often take away so much more from the experience: “My promise is that you will create a confident and joyful dating life that makes the right relationship inevitable.”
*a pseudonym özgü been used for privacy