Romantic Planet
RomanticPlanet.com offers a quirky appearance. It reminds me of store-bought greeting cards that try to pass themselves off as homemade and hand drawn — a folksy gesture sold to the artistically challenged. Its simple design bordering on “too cute for kittens” could mislead you to think that the site is equally simplistic.
In actuality, it’s full service all the way, just like any other major online personals site. I appreciate when still waters run deep and that despite not being bombarded by advertising and quick links, I can discover a website that has as much to offer as louder, more aggressive competitors.
“RomanticPlanet.com is a surprisingly down-to-earth example of what an online dating site should be.”
Romantic Planet has six pages of info to fill out for your free profile, but you can skip a fair amount of the questions. However, it cautions that its patent-pending compatibility system, Match Mind, will be most effective if details are as complete as possible. They claim that their proprietary matchmaking software took three years to develop and beats out one rival’s famously advertised duo-two-way matching system.
Free searches are extensive with loads of detailed criteria to select, as well as narrowing the locality down to within five miles. There’s isn’t a live chat room, but there is instant messaging, which even includes a video option. Emails are sent to your offsite email account, but the real email addresses are always masked in communications between members to protect their privacy.
Before starting to message someone, first you need to send a prewritten introduction epostcard or greeting. Once the other person says that he or she is interested in talking more, his or her profile is moved into network of connections. At least one of you will need to be premium RomanticPlanet member though for open communication to be possible.
If you want to be able to send personalized communication to a member that interests you, you do need to upgrade to a paid membership. I find it refreshingly honest of the site to have made it clear that to initiate customized messages requires only one of the two members to become a paid subscriber.
Beyond the one-on-one stuff, there is a community section meant to bring together members to discuss all kinds of topics, as well as online dating, too. For example, there are sections devoted for men only to discuss diverse topics with other guys, as well as the same sort of private board just for women. Some members give online dating tips, even specific to RomanticPlanet.com.
Overall, by requiring that the introduction step be completed before allowing open-ended communication between two members ensures more quality connections are made and less time is wasting on disinterested prospects. RomanticPlanet.com is a surprisingly down-to-earth example of what an online dating site should be.