Should I switch from online to in-person pickup?

So, now that I've reached my low-40s in notch-count, I can take a step back and see whether or not online dating is getting me what I want.

I'm curious. Lots of folks here criticize me and others for dating "average looking" women online, rather than picking up "8s and above" in person. I'm wondering if I should change my tactic since I'm no longer pressed to get my "40 by 40" merit badge.

So, let's compare. Since the beginning of 2013 I've banged 5 new chicks with an average attractiveness of around 6. Plus I have two girlfriends (one I recently broke up with but will probably get back together with) who are 6s as well.

For those who only bang 8s and above and only meet them in person, I'm curious as to how many 8-10s you guys have banged since 1/1/2013. And how many LTRs you currently have going with 8-10s. And if you haven't banged any new ones since the beginning of the year for whatever reason, can you tell me how many you banged, and how many LTRs you had in 2012.

I'd like to move up to 8s and above, and admittedly there are pretty much zero 8s and above online. But I'm also used to being surrounded by women and getting easy p*ssy with no more cash outlay than first-date drinks (maybe $30-40). I don't spend money on online dating sites so literally the only money I spend is when I'm out with a chick. And after the first couple of dates (if it goes that long), I let her know that I expect her to pay half the time.

Can in-person PU deliver this?

Basically I'd like to hear some in-person PU success stories, especially from those who dislike online PU. Inspire me to change my ways!

Zarky said:

Can in-person PU deliver this?

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You tell us, you been trolling game sites for what 5+? years now. Surely you've seen the odd LR here and there.

What's your angle here anyway, fishing for a Oh yes Snarky POF whales are definately the way to go, online dating RULES!! You were right all along.

Zarky said:

Basically I'd like to hear some in-person PU success stories, especially from those who dislike online PU. Inspire me to change my ways!

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A nice dress perhaps and a return to the kitchen?

Paradox that doesn't answer my question.

I'll wait for guys to give me some good stories that will inspire me to quit online dating and go for in-person pickup.

I don't need a new chick each week, if I could reasonably get a new 8 every 3 months I'd be happy with that. I just need to know that guys here are doing it and that it's possible before I waste time trying.

So, to all the guys who are banging four or more 8-10s every YEAR -- doesn't have to be more than that -- tell me how it's going, what you're doing, where you're doing it, how much you're spending, etc. Give me the deets and inspire me. I'd like to change venues but not if it's going to be a major step down.

Without online dating, men are forced to cold approach because that is there only path to intimacy with a complete stranger.

If you assumed every girl you approach in real life were single, it would be easy to, right? Cold approaching is very different, you both aren't at the convenience behind the screen. You are uncomfortable, she is uncomfortable. You have to lead the social interaction and project high value in 5 minutes. Getting the number doing a cold approach feels much more thrilling and rewarding.

Women post up their best pictures online so you never know until they show up. An 8 online can be a 6 in real life. Assuming this scenario when you meet up with her for a date, you are more prone to accept that difference. You currently have a girl on a date, as before you had nothing. Of course, that's assuming Hungry Hungry Helen doesn't show up. Face to face approach virtually eliminates that.

You are content and that's all that matters to you, Zarky.

Well, I'll give a chime in here though I may not be the best responder.. I get 2-3 numbers, fairly easily, a week, but I've only been doing this for 3 months. My close rate is abysmal right now.

However, on that regard, I started dating a girl that's a solid 8.5, maybe a 9 if she throws on make-up, a little over a month ago. I've had girls that have shown some interest, and I'm pretty sure I could have closed had I not made other mistakes or been better in some regard. Or heck, just to be older than 21 and have some money, and to gain 20 more pounds of muscle, would take my close rate up.

I've typically closed in either coffee shops or bars, so far. I've started making approaches on my college campus, and of those they've been fairly good overall. Helps that instead of gaming girls older than I, I'm gaming younger, but it's also annoying as oftentimes they can't always get drinks.

I think I've gotten 15-20 (maybe more, I've deleted a few that I got annoyed at) numbers over the past 2 months, which is really when I got my approaches going, and out of those, 5-6 showed some more legitimate interest, and it's narrowed down to 2-3 that are potential lays, one of those guaranteed. To be fair, though, I've put a significant investment of time into this, too, and I have a college campus to work over.

I'd be able to give a better report in another 3 months or so..

As to what I do;
1) Coffee shops, university library. The latter is a gold mine in particular (for me). Just sit down near a girl, make a comment about something, ask her what she's working on, be friendly, talk to her. You can quickly gauge interest depending on how into the conversation she is and body language, which I missed in a lot of my first number closes (I'd get the number but she wasn't really that interested). You can also walk over and talk to them, if gutsy. It's an indirect speech with a fairly direct approach. Invite her/her friends to join you at your table (if you have a friend with you).
2) Bar scenes. Lots of girls, but more competition, more money going out in expenses. It's a more concentrated way to get numbers as you can bar-hop, talk to more girls in a time span, etc etc. Just hop over and ask them how they're doing, how their night is going.

Once I get a number, I usually just open (a day or two later) with a "Hey [some pet name], how's your weekend/how are you/how was [some activity]? -[name]". Keep it light and humorous and if they respond well, suggest grabbing a drink on some night. I've tried waiting longer and typically I find the responses are less likely the longer I wait. Talk to them while they remember you well and remember the good time they had talking to you.

My last suggestion; give it a try while still working online dating. Combo it, if you're worried on time, do it in a place that you can get work done at the same time. Spamming messages to girls? Do it in a coffee shop, while meeting other women. Every venue is hit or miss, though, you can have days at a place that are fantastic and then a week straight where it just sucks.

BeginningDJ said:

If you assumed every girl you approach in real life were single, it would be easy to, right? Cold approaching is very different, you both aren't at the convenience behind the screen. You are uncomfortable, she is uncomfortable. You have to lead the social interaction and project high value in 5 minutes. Getting the number doing a cold approach feels much more thrilling and rewarding.

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I go into every approach assuming the girl is single until she says otherwise, or her actions give evidence to the contrary. It's really the only operating assumption you can have. She'll express her relationship status if you push and then you move to another girl (or if no expression is made, assume she's single). I think 50% of the girls I talk to end up being taken; the other 50% don't appear to be at all. RSD notes that it's usually an 80/20 rate, 80% of the girl/guy pairs you see are not together, which is different than the concept of whether a girl has a boyfriend or not, but more additional reason to open all types of sets.

^^^^ Thank you that was what I was looking for.

Can you tell me what your statistics are so far? Like money spent, number of lays, etc? You've given me stats about your phone number closes but what percentage of those have gone further? How many flakes, etc?

The reason I'm asking these questions is not to have some sort of p*ssing contest online but to determine whether the stats justify a switch for me.

I assume you're only approaching chicks who are at least 7s, right?

Obviously I'm twice your age so things are going to be a little different for me, but I can at least get an idea of the success in-person PU guys are having.

There. Checked my numbers so I'm not just throwing guesses out. Even checked my bank statements, heh.

All 7's+, maybe a couple 6.5's in there. 0 lays. This starts from mid-December, which puts me at 2 full months of time. 95% of the activity is from Jan 4/5th and onwards.

I'll skim it down.. my 2 months of learning game resulted in:
Approaches (anything over a 2-3 minute convo): ~100+
Numbers: 18
Medium to High Interest: ~6
Potential Lays: 3
Guaranteed Lays: 1
Total Lays: 0
Total Dates: 6
Flakes: 1
Money Spent at Bars: ~$180
Money Spent (Other): ~$250
Money spent purely on pick-up (from the above numbers): ~$150
Money spent on dates: ~$100
Girls I passed on: ~15+ (hard to remember these..)
Girls I screwed up with: ~3-4

This is a bit of a mind**** as I swear it felt like way longer than 2 months (barely a month of hitting bars..). To be fair I got a lay 2 months ago, too, but it was a house party, not a cold approach. As I said though, abysmal close rate. I've been learning my approaches first and foremost and now I'm starting to learn transitions from approach to dates, along with a better handle on which girls are potential lays.

When I hit the bars, I spend between $5 to $25, unless it's a specific date, in which case I may spend as much as $40. During the week, I spend no more than $10 a day at coffee shops/lunch/etc and that's usually while getting work done, too. At the bars, I alternate; I'll drink beer/coke, or jack and coke/regular coke. I never get drunk, and I've gone out a few times stone sober.

Flakes - only one, back in december. The girls have either shown for the date (or shown in the case of it not being a date, but a group thing), let me know way in advance (if it's a couple days in advance, I don't call it a flake), or just gave me the 'I'm busy' line when I initially asked.

It's hard to give accurate statistics, as I really feel I'm learning all this, and I know my statistics aren't representative of what is possible. But if I went through the same stats I'm at now I'd have at least an 8 every 3 months, as I've gotten 1 guaranteed 8.5 in my 2 months of work (it's goin' down w/ her - she's requested that we just 'stay in' for v-day date, with some take-out - I already made it pretty far with her on the last time in her apartment).

I passed on a lot of girls who were digging me, but just weren't up to my standards for looks. Heck, I brought a girl home while trashed and ended up leaving her on the couch while sleeping in the bed. Woke up and she was gone, kind of felt bad for her, but she wasn't all that hot.

My personal situation; I live with my parents, 13 people in my house, so my place is a no-go in all circumstances. I've been driving a minivan around. I'm young for the bar scene. I'm not rich, being a college student. It's also cold.. when the weather picks up, there's some great areas nearby for meeting women.

I haven't pushed myself during the past week, I've missed a good 10 approaches lately. But, it's busy; I've got two dates right now, thursday/saturday, and a potential meet-up on Friday. I work 3 other nights of the week and do homework on the 7th, so I haven't cared to meet any more regardless. But, if these don't pan out, I see dozens of hot college girls every day that want to party. I'm also considering dating more seriously with my thursday date, so I've been flirting without trying to close (had 3-4 interactions like that in the past two days). The saturday date is a girl wanting to party and get laid, so I'm pretty sure that'll pan out, probably first-date lay, so if it goes as expected I'll finish my first 3 months with at least 2 good lays, more unless I date the other girl.

Man, I'm a verbose guy; so I apologize for the wall of text here. But, one more thing; Paul Janka notes that his ratio is 11% of the numbers he gets, he closes, on average. So getting 3 numbers a week means you'll close a new girl every 3-4 weeks, on average. His ratio remained consistent and matched numbers from other guys. Except he collects 5-10 numbers a day, so he swims in a harem, but anyways..

I really appreciate all that info. Getting laid at your age is no easy task, because most girls that age have little sexual experience and need a whole lot more wheedling. Not like 35 year olds who've been there done that and are either interested or not.

Although on the other hand you have a big pool of prospects on a college campus.

Hmm.. still not sure how in-person would work for a guy pushing 40. Day game on the street? Clubs are too expensive. Bars? Meh. Coffee shops? Bleh.

Just not really sure how to make in-person PU work for me at this time. Mind's working on it though

Zarky said:

^^^^ Thank you that was what I was looking for.

Can you tell me what your statistics are so far? Like money spent, number of lays, etc? You've given me stats about your phone number closes but what percentage of those have gone further? How many flakes, etc?

The reason I'm asking these questions is not to have some sort of p*ssing contest online but to determine whether the stats justify a switch for me.

I assume you're only approaching chicks who are at least 7s, right?

Obviously I'm twice your age so things are going to be a little different for me, but I can at least get an idea of the success in-person PU guys are having.

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Im not trying to be a dyck, although it may come off that way, but have you not been living in the real world for 38 years or have you been living some virtual reality? Youre asking these questions as if talking to chicks online and talking to chicks in real life are mutually exclusive. As if talking to a girl in the real world is some "big plunge" you're thinking of undertaking. Why ask for all these statistics and stories? Why not just wake up tomorrow morning, walk outside and start talking to chicks like a normal person going through a normal routine day and see where it takes you

If you are not getting girls in real life, using online dating is like trying to put a band-aid over a gunshot wound. There are still major issues there.

Interestingly, girls on sites like POF also seem to have major issues, probably for the same reasons. If a girl cannot easily attract more than enough men in real life, there is something very wrong.

Darth said:

If you are not getting girls in real life, using online dating is like trying to put a band-aid over a gunshot wound. There are still major issues there.

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Id say its like putting training wheels on a bike when youre trying to learn. You gotta crawl before you walk, and for some people online dating is a helpful learning tool


Rejection gives most guys learning game their most setbacks. Think about all the ways it makes approaching and rejection easy to deal with...

1) You already know ALL the chicks are single and looking

2) You're not getting rejected to your face

3) Online chicks are of less quality than chicks who dont use online dating, thus lowering the pedestal most "beginners" put ALL chicks on

4) When you do get rejected, you should have other message threads going and/or are working on starting several others, lowering the devastating impact AFCs feel when being rejected because you have several other chicks fresh on your mind now



If you go into online dating with an understanding of what it is and who the girls are that use online dating, it can only be beneficial to a bedginner

We should be encouraging this dude to dip his feet doing in-person approaches...

Zarky said:

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Anything can work with practice I've found.. if you are stuck for time, I've pulled several of those numbers within a 2 minute interaction, and got a date out of one of those times, too (though I screwed it up by being totally awkward on the phone, that was when I tried my first call instead of text). And the two minute interaction can very simply be at a Target, shopping around, waitresses, the mall, anything. Streets if you have them.

I think the main benefit I've gotten out of this is that, when I see a girl that is my type of girl, that seems like she might be cool, I go and talk to her. Sure, I may get blown out, but, I may not, either. Doesn't matter, if I do, I try again on the next girl that catches my eye. I don't hesitate (as much), wonder if she has a boyfriend, wonder if she's too good for me, wonder if our personalities would clash, I just go talk to her and see how it goes.

Pays off with my mood, too. I'm more confident and get what I want done. In other words; give it a shot. Talk to someone that catches your eye, keep it simple.

If you want some reading, Roosh's Day Bang is good (more suitable for your age bracket, too, it's so-so for the high school/college freshmen), Paul Janka's Attraction Formula and Jeremy Soul's Daytime Dating are both pretty decent. The former being indirect pick-up, the latter two being more direct quick pick-up.

As mentioned from others.. I'd also suggest working both mediums. Do a phase into in-person pick-up. Work both, see which you prefer after several months of trying the in-person routines. Thanks for the props, too, I've found the bar scene is definitely difficult for a 21 y/o when most women are 24-32 or so (opposite side of town from the uni - in the downtown, corporate area).. College girls aren't so hard though if you get into decent parties.

Good ideas, I'll give 'em some thought, thanks for the posts.