Agencies and paid websites - what is the benefit?

[Turboguy]

Just 'cuz your married doesn't mean you stop learning. 

Nothing wrong with that as long as you are learning and not yearning.

[Misha]

guys please write WHEN you met your wife - in what year

I met and married my wife in 2006.

[shakespear]

Nothing wrong with that as long as you are learning and not yearning.

Touche' Turbo.

Thankfully, my wife is pretty understanding about an occasional roving eye. 

One day a group of my wife's Russian friends and I were shopping in a local mall and I took a moment to glance over at a group of pretty young girls walking by.  One of her friends said, "Did you see your husband looking at those pretty young girls?", and my wife replied, "Of course, he's married not dead".

[kievstar]

I met my wife in 2008.  To me agencies take care of everything and never have met a bad agency if you make it clear what you expect and pay the amount to get the high service.  Agencies are a business and the girls who work in the agency are the key.  You do not need to make the owner of the agency happy.  You need to make the workers happy.  I will say I have met maybe 1 owner of an agency who was not a tool.  The foreign men running agencies are living a cheap fanasty.  Best to stay clear of their advice in today's world.  May have been good 3 to 5 years ago but now stay clear of them. Listen to the girls who work in the agency. Your writing the letters to them anyways. 

Someone asked me the % of men with marriages from women from agencies.  I know I have met more than 50 couples now in the USA (wife is good at meeting RW / AM) and all were agencies or hookers (different thread on this).  I have never met someone in person to marry a RW via free personals. 

[Jooky]

Over the years, I've perused several of the free sites out of curiosity.  Wanted to keep informed about the current trends in this endeavor.  Just 'cuz your married doesn't mean you stop learning.  

So, on what sites do you use and have profiles? Do you post your real info and photos? Do you write to women first, or do they write to you? How many women you talked to on the phone or met in person?

I'm real curious as to why you would have to wade through scammers, pro-daters and mental cases, while I encounter none.

[Jooky]

Someone asked me the % of men with marriages from women from agencies.  I know I have met more than 50 couples now in the USA (wife is good at meeting RW / AM) and all were agencies or hookers (different thread on this).  

Lumping agency girls and hookers together isn't much of a ringing endorsement for agencies. :-)

But, that doesn't really answer the question. You seem to have a lot of experience with agencies, so I'm wondering the success percentage. My guess is 1% or less of both men and women using agencies end up married. Does that sound about right?

I have never met someone in person to marry a RW via free personals.

There are far less men that seek a bride using free, normal personals, so it's no surprise if you don't know any couples that met this way.

[Misha]

I have never met someone in person to marry a RW via free personals. 

And I have never met you in person, so does this mean that you do not exist  Again, I met my wife using free Russian personals (singles.ru). There is nothing inherently wrong with using a free Russian dating site to meet women as it would be no worse than meeting a woman via eHarmony or match.com or plentyoffish.

[GregfromGa]

Knowing what I know now, If I were still in the game, I'd use a free personals instead of an agency. I've met more than just a couple of agency girls in Kiev. All were with other men of course. I'm just not that impressed. Maybe  8 or 9 years ago but with skype and such, a guy can do his own homework. And the girls make ask him to show his passport. If the guy doesnt own a passport then he aint coming to try your borsht.

[GQBlues]

And the girls make ask him to show his passport.

I'm curious, how does the IMBRA disclosure law apply to free sites?

[Gator]

Someone asked me the % of men with marriages from women from agencies.  I know I have met more than 50 couples now in the USA (wife is good at meeting RW / AM) and all were agencies or hookers (different thread on this).  I have never met someone in person to marry a RW via free personals. 

Did they say they were hookers?  Or is this something you discerned, or were they just unpolished provincial girls whose husbands liked them to dress trashy? 

I have met about 30 AM/RW couples in the Tampa area.  At least 40% of the RW were in one of these categories:

-  arrived here unmarried on student visa, tennis, and the like. 
-  met at work in Russia (one couple at Coca Cola).
-  met though religious organization.

[Gator]

I have never met someone in person to marry a RW via free personals. 

I was engaged twice.  One was on free personals, placed there by herself, not by an agency.  I probably should have stayed with her.

[Misha]

unpolished provincial girls

When exactly are you going to give the provincial girls thing a rest?  Muscovites can be just as "unpolished"

[Gator]

When exactly are you going to give the provincial girls thing a rest?  Muscovites can be just as "unpolished"

I speak from my experience, not hearsay.  In this case, I never met a Muscovite who dressed like a hooker.  I saw women in Moscow dressed like cheap hookers, yet I don't know if they were born in Moscow or just visiting. 

Some of the outfits worn by provincial girls were laughable, yet they seemed like genuinely sweet women.  To the credit of provincial girls, I will say that on average they treated me much sweeter than the three Moscow dyevs I dated.  However, the single sweetest RW I met was born and raised in Kiev.

BTW,   to be candid, I am not sure how hookers are dressed.  I recall one beauty coming out of the Baltschug Kimpinski dresssed to the nines, yet had a look that said expensive escort.  I have seen some trashy women on the streets and my wife whispered "prostitute" to me.


What does that prove?  Nothing to you, but something to me. YMMV.

BTW, are you not a little curious how Kievstar determined that all married RW he met were agency girls or hookers?  So don't pick on me please.

[Misha]

I speak from my experience, not hearsay.  In this case, I never met a Muscovite who dressed like a hooker. I saw women in Moscow dressed like cheap hookers, yet I don't know if they were born in Moscow or just visiting.

So, in other words, you assume that all women who are dressed like "cheap hookers" are women from the "provinces?" Did you ask these women where they were from? Where they were born? Of course not. You simply use random women you see on the streets and slot them into your stereotype  

Some of the outfits worn by provincial girls were laughable, yet they seemed like genuinely sweet women.

Sorry, Gator, but I have met many, many more "provincial" women than you ever will. Some dressed well, some dressed average, some dressed poorly. Had little to do with style, much more with money. If you don't earn much money, you can't go shopping in exclusive boutiques. Your crude generalization is extremely insulting. I would wager that my "provincial" wife dresses as well or better than your Muscovite.

To the credit of provincial girls, I will say that on average they treated me much sweeter than the three Moscow dyevs I dated.  However, the single sweetest RW I met was born and raised in Kiev.

So, why do you keep putting down "provincial" women? Again, I do not see the need to generalize and put down others. Muscovites have their fair share of low class women based on my experience.

[Misha]

I know I have met more than 50 couples now in the USA (wife is good at meeting RW / AM) and all were agencies or hookers (different thread on this). 

So, how exactly did you know they were hookers? Did they have a scarlet П branded on their foreheads? Did they list it on their CVs? Did they have "former hookers now married to Americans" potluck suppers? Sorry for the sarcasm, but I do hope that you understand that this comment could be seen as quite insulting to a number of men and their wives.

[SANDRO43]

I'm curious, how does the IMBRA disclosure law apply to free sites?

It does not, IINM. Quoting from RWD's E-book:

IMBRA provides that an IMB must acquire certain background information - through direct documentation or an attestation from its WM client - before disclosing for a fee an EW client’s personal contact information.

This distinction therefore excludes free-dating sites/operators from the category of IMBs, and therefore their obligation to comply with IMBRA regulations.

[Mike78]

Ok, let's go back on topic

Knowing what I know now, If I were still in the game, I'd use a free personals instead of an agency. I've met more than just a couple of agency girls in Kiev. All were with other men of course. I'm just not that impressed. Maybe  8 or 9 years ago but with skype and such, a guy can do his own homework. And the girls make ask him to show his passport. If the guy doesnt own a passport then he aint coming to try your borsht.

Yes, the free personals is the approach that I've chosen as well. My strategy is based on sending tons of initial, unpersonalized emails. Basically I browse the site's eligible girls (20-30 yrs old, no kids, speaks English) and if I deem the girl mail-worthy (based on about 5 seconds of looking at the profile), I run a macro that sends an email that doesn't really say anything besides listing my Skype, MSN and Yahoo addresses and a request to chat sometimes. This is really a quick process and takes perhaps those 5 seconds per girl. Then I just wait for them to send me the IM address or pop up in the chat by themselves. In those 2 weeks that I've been doing this on semi-regular basis I had sent probably several hundred emails and collected about 40-50 IM addresses and chatted with at least 20 different girls. My "game" isn't really developed beyond this at the moment (still very new), but I think I'll start weeding out my IM contacts a little, removing girls that cannot speak English on the phone and girls that I can just feel I'm not compatible with. So far, I feel, it has been a fairly successful endeavor and I am in contact with a small number of interesting girls that have a potential to perhaps be a little bit more than pen-pals.

Anyways, I'm still inclined to NOT use the paid websites since I haven't really heard any arguments which would persuade me to shell out quite a bit of money. Maybe if it was in the range of $20/month or so, but if the cheapest option for Elena's Models platinum membership is $259 for 3 months, that seems a bit too much. It's not that I can't afford it, it just seems like a really bad deal. So far the only interesting thing about these websites is the idea of having one as well, my own little goldmine. I don't advise you to join, all the girls will be purely fictional and the responses will be automatically generated

[Simoni]

Hi there, I'm new to this forum and to this whole thing.

My question - what exactly is the benefit of the paid websites and agency run websites? There are tons of free websites like FreePersonals.ru, Mamba network, etc. with thousands of members. Why would anybody in their right mind use one of the paid websites? The ones where you pay per letter, per contact, etc, seem especially devious. With all the scamming on the agencies' side (making arranged, photoshopped pictures, recruiting and paying attractive local girls that are not really that interested in marriage, outright fabricating of profiles and letters,..), why would anybody want to pay for service that is potentially worse than the free service?

What am I missing here?

Here's what you are missing:

An good agency, as a dating service, screens girls and gives the man a cleaner list of girls to contact.  My experience with free personals always ended bad, because I wasted time on girls that turned out not to be serious.

I met my wife through a dating agency in Dnepr. three years ago.  And to answer your comment that is in bold above, I was very much in my right mind and I'm very glad I used an agency 

[GregfromGa]

I remember Galina from Gateway2heart in Kharkov, as well as kharkovgirls.com..I knew both of the managers and I wouldve trusted either of those two had I been looking in that direction. The first girl I went to see saw my profile in some paper over there. I didnt even know it was in some paper. I had went to an agency in Tallinn just looking for a couple of girls who spoke English that might want to show me around Tallinn in turn for me buying them a steak. I received hundreds of emails and letters. God knows how many were scam and how many were sincere.  I think given the right people working at an agency, good things might happen if they know how serious those girls might be.

[Simoni]

Mike1978--  You post you are new to "this whole thing."

My advice to you is to be very broad in your search.  Yes, use the area based good agencies that men here have  been successful with.  Yes, use free personals.  Yes, Elena's Models, a broad based site that will not give you WMVM options, but will give you good girls for a WOVO sortie.

And Yes, do talk to men you know who are married to FSU women, and ask if they know someone they might introduce you to.

All of these ways have worked, and can work for you as well.

~Si

[Jooky]

My experience with free personals always ended bad, because I wasted time on girls that turned out not to be serious.

What free personals sites did you use? I ask because I think we should draw the distinction between free Russian dating sites and free sites like freepersonals.ru. They are very different, but I think when people here start talking about 'free personals' they are thinking of only one or the other.

[Simoni]

But, that doesn't really answer the question. You seem to have a lot of experience with agencies, so I'm wondering the success percentage. My guess is 1% or less of both men and women using agencies end up married. Does that sound about right?

It does not sound correct to me.

Here in this little city where I live, we have bumped into half a dozen AM/FSU woman couples.   All of them met via agencies.

When I was using agencies, naturally I met a lot of guys who were in and out of the agency office. I am still friends with a number of those men--they found what they were looking for in the agency profiles and are married today.  So I'd say the agency model works for the visiting man.  As it did for me.

But where it has a much lower percentage of success is for the women who sign up.  They outnumber the men who visit by a whole lot.  Yet, some do get lucky and find the right man for them.  Those success stories are why women use agencies.

[Simoni]

What free personals sites did you use? I ask because I think we should draw the distinction between free Russian dating sites and free sites like freepersonals.ru. They are very different, but I think when people here start talking about 'free personals' they are thinking of only one or the other.

I'm not going to debate this by saying don't use free personals.  I think men should.  I know one man who found his wife that way.  But I'm also going to say that agencies are a good option to; likewise, I know many men who met their other half using an agency.

Guys--it's not either/or.   All ways can work.

[Jooky]

I'm not going to debate this by saying don't use free personals.

It's not a debate. I'm just asking you to clarify what type of free site. People use the terms 'free personals' to describe different types of sites, and it's confusing (especially for the newbie) when people are using the same term to talk about different things.

I agree that any way can work. The main reason I can think of to use an agency is to meet a specific woman that catches your eye that you couldn't meet any other way, or just to expand your choices.

[Simoni]

What free personals sites did you use? I ask because I think we should draw the distinction between free Russian dating sites and free sites like freepersonals.ru. They are very different, but I think when people here start talking about 'free personals' they are thinking of only one or the other.

I have used both.  Had a friend in Keiv help me search Russian dating sites in Russian.  That did give me a few nights of bliss--but not with the girl I wanted to bring home to family :-)

In the end, the agency model worked better for me.  It gave me girls that were accountable to someone (the agency), and gave me a number of girls in one city.