I’m sure I’m not the first person to tell you that women experience attraction differently to men. If you expect her to build attraction the same way you do, and on the same timeline - you’ll often fumble creating the spark with her.
For over 15 years, I’ve worked as a dating coach helping men (and sometimes women) meet and attract one another in the real world. All my dating advice is “battle-tested”. Let me help you understand:
- Whyif you look for a clear sign that she wants you to make a move—you’ll be waiting a long time.
- Her attraction timeline: I’ll give you a blow by blow on what’s a realistic timeframe for her to feel 'into' you (unless you’re Liam Hemsworth).
- What you can do to build attraction, instead of torpedoing it.
Rule #1: Neutral is different to “no” when it comes to attraction
Here’s a scenario I see all the time. You notice her, maybe as she walks onto your first date if you met on an app, or from across the room if you met in real life. You immediately know “wow I’m attracted to her” and straight away your mind jumps into “how do I impress her?” mode. Then you look at how she’s responding to you. She doesn’t seem excited, she seems… neutral. You read this as, “she’s taken one look at me, and isn’t attracted to me.” Your confidence drops, you interact cautiously with her, and by the end of the date she just isn’t feeling it.
This is the definition of a “self fulfilling prophecy”, you don’t think she’ll be into you, so you act tepidly, so she isn’t into you.
What you need to understand is that unless you get a head-start most of the time women start in neutral, even if your attraction is already at full throttle. She is immediately excited to meet you if:
- She’s seen you speak at a conference and is seriously impressed with your on-stage presence.
- She knows you as someone who has status, whether that’s as an influencer, or a premier league footballer.
- She’s met you at a function that’s extremely hard to get into, and you immediately appear influential.
Does this mean you should give up on dating if you’re not a 6’3” millionaire, with 100,000 followers on Instagram? Of course not! However, it does mean that looking for automatic interest from her is unrealistic. Studies have shown that whilst during speed dating women opted for men who were around the same level of attractiveness as them, in marriage women cared much less about physical appearance.
So first impressions do count, but not as much as you think. When you first meet a woman I need you to start seeing initial neutrality not as a sign of, “she doesn’t like me, forget it,” but as a sign of, “she needs more information about me before she can feel excited by me.”
The bad news is she may not want to tear your clothes off when she first sees you. The good news is that when she gets to know you, she can find you more and more attractive. So don’t get spooked by her initial neutrality, see this as a request for more information.
Rule #2: Connection Before Attraction
So what have we figured out so far? You are a light switch of attraction: she’s either your type, or she’s not. Her attraction is more like a dial, you have to show her who you are, for her interest for you to build.
This is why to a woman if you show a lot of interest in going on a date with her, before you really know each other, this will feel jarring. Most of the time you’ll get a flat “no” or no response at all if:
- Your first message to a woman on a dating app asks her out, “Hi great profile! How about we grab drinks sometime?”
- You’ve spoken to her for all of 60 seconds and ask for her phone number. (If she gives it to you, she will ghost.)
- You’ve seen a woman “around” (that barista at your favourite coffee shop, a woman in your class) and you show her you really like her.
Here’s what women are okay with. They understand (even expect) that if you’re physically attracted to them you will approach them, whether that’s in person or online. They think, “if he’s attracted to me, and he’s confident enough, he’ll make a move.” What they won’t understand is when that initial “hello” is immediately followed by, “we should get drinks sometime.”
She doesn’t want to feel like her being good looking is enough of a reason for you to want to spend time with her. She doesn’t want to feel like you’ve chosen her yet. Why? Put simply, there's a lot of attractive women in the world, so if you’d go out with her based on looks alone, then you must have no options, or low standards. Asking her out without building a connection first is one of the easiest ways you can trash her attraction.
Instead you need to show that you’re filtering her, just as much as she’s filtering you. Filtering comes very naturally for women, they’re always figuring out who they should give their time to. For men, this sometimes feels alien. You might even worry that you’re not attractive enough to be picky. However, being picky creates more attraction.
Your action step here is to think of what you need from her, beyond her looks, to be into her. Do you like smart, geeky, feminine, or confident women best? Once you’ve figured out at least 1 thing you’re looking for in her, use this as a talking point in your conversation.
“Quick question, what do you think of…”
“So, I’m curious, are you into…”
If you click great, it’s your springboard to saying:
“High five, I was hoping you were a [that kind of] person. Let me get your number?”
And if you don’t have a click, it’s still a great way to build attraction:
“Ooph! I can’t believe you’re not into [that]... you haven’t lived!”
This isn’t about having things in common, it’s about showing her that you have higher standards than just “she’s cute” to want a date with her.
Rule #3: Be Authentic, Not Agreeable
So we know her attraction has to build, and that she’ll be much more attracted to a man who takes his time working out how much he likes her too. Finally you can also help to stoke attraction with her, by allowing her to know more about you.
If you’re just some guy who’s approached her in a bar, or sent her a message from your dating app profile (which is like taking a steamroller to your personality) she’ll feel “meh” about you.
If she learns that you’re well educated, hard working, funny, confident, etc, her attraction to you will grow. You become way more multidimensional. So in a conversation it’s very important to share two things:
Practical information
Let her know whereabouts you’re based, what you do, why you’re there. This helps her to build context around you and get enough fundamental information down to build trust. This might sound something like:
“It’s funny that I saw you, I actually live over in the west of the city, but my friend convinced me to come to this bar. I work in finance so I needed the time to unwind after work.”
Emotional information
This is where you share your personality and values so she’s able to relate to you. Most men approach a conversation with her as “how do I say the right thing to make her like me?” and in doing so come across overly agreeable. Simply by being totally authentic about what you do/ don’t like, you’ll come across more confidently. This could be telling her:
- What do you care about?
- What excites you?
- What frustrates you?
- What are you building in your life?
It could also be listening to her and figuring out:
- In what ways are you similar?
- How are you different?
By having independent opinions from her you show her, “I don’t need this to work, I’m just exploring.” This is super attractive, so much so that if you do it right she may start to work to hint to you why you could be a good match.
Women do not want a man who bends over backwards to impress them, they want a man who knows that he is impressive and who invites her to grow in his presence. This might sound like:
“That’s interesting, but I think about it in an entirely different way.”
“It sounds like I’m going to need to open your eyes to how interesting [that] is.”
“I like where that’s going... but have you thought about doing [that]? I think that could work for you.”
“Don’t be modest, take the compliment.”
None of these statements are rude, abrasive, or designed to squash her self esteem. However, all of these statements show that you know and value who you are. They subtly lead her and prompt her to grow. This is SUPER attractive.
So when it comes to attraction, for women it’s not usually a case of yes/ no. She also doesn’t take one look at you and think “I’m not into him.” Instead she starts off neutral, and as she gets to know you, her interest grows. The frustrating thing is, so many men never give her the chance to get to know them. They either crumple early on, because they don’t get a clear signal. Or play their dates too cautiously, constantly trying to think of, “what would she like me to do?” rather than, “how can I express myself?” Change this and you can stand apart from most of the guys she meets, you can grow attraction with her, and do it without ever changing who you fundamentally are.
If you want structured support applying this in your own dating life, you can work with Hayley as a professional dating coach.
