@CeliaC I would disagree. I don't think someone should have to go digging in a profile to find out their general rate. I think the rate shown at the top of the profile is intended to be the base rate. The pro may offer discounts for different things, but it should never be higher than the price indicated at the top. Especially if you want to remain in the good graces of potential clients. I don't think it would come across well at all if you had a lower rate up there, and then higher rates in your description ;-)
Yeah, but it's usually the other way around, and if you filter by that, then people are gonna miss out on those lower rates.
That's one of the cons to higher rates O:-) Economically, if you're starting out, you charge lower rates. This is to be more attractive to customers looking for a deal until you are able to get more established clients and get more karma. Both karma (average stars and number of reviews) and hourly rate should be visible on the search screen. Clients have the right to be able to easily see what your relative rates are and your reviews status without having to click on absolutely every single profile. Well, some might argue "rights" lol, but it still makes sense, virtually all databases of services or products online show the relative price and reviews prominently on the search screen. Even if our rates were indicated as $, $$, or $$$, etc as restaurants are sometimes shown as. And this also really helps people starting out as it allows their lower rates to effectively be highlighted. Once you have more reviews and higher rates, this would still be beneficial to you, as it would highlight your review status as being higher than other pros, even if your rates are higher. Anyway, it should all correlate...
@GameStriker4481 Ditto. @CeliaC Oh yes, prices may vary with abandon given the client and the pro cuddler. Even so, some people still like to see the hourly rate so that they have an opening idea.
I don't care for the restrictions as to how many people you can message. Sometimes timing is important and if you are restricted you have no chance of delivering an important message, striking while the iron is hot. I'm from the Tucson area and many of the so called "cuddlers" have old accounts that have not been used in quite some time. For all of the "benefits" that cuddling purports to offer, there are very few, and in my case, no people who are interested in participating. One of two of my dogs is a cuddle pup. He comforts me and apparently is more astute than most humans are about the practice. I always wanted to cuddle with a female whom I am unacquainted with just because I think the connection would be unique and rewarding, but using your site I may never know. Nobody here really seems too motivated about cuddling and by the number of people with accounts "dead in the water" it appears there are more lurkers than cuddlers. Just saying.
@ubergigglefritz Good point about the reporting. I've now added "Non-platonic" as an option.
@Mark Hey Mark, I've noticed that there have been profile popping up with nothing in their "About Me" section and it seems kind of sketchy. Is there any way that there can be a minimum word count for that section upon joining?
I get the logic but those types of decisions also have to be balanced with the impact to sign-up conversion rates. So there's no plans to do that for now but it's possible in the future those priorities could change.
@Mark - You'd need a way to prevent someone just putting 'blah blah blah' in there. Some suggestions as to what to include might be helpful. Also, some members may not want to reveal too much about themselves for the same reasons others don't want to include photos of themselves.
I feel it is best to not make sharing info about yourself mandatory. If it bothers a member, they don't have to message them. Also a lot of people start blank or photoless or both then add once they have checked the place out some and feel comfortable. Cant blame a new person for being cautious about having their personal info or pic on a site that is new to them until they feel safe about it.
Update
Search filters 'Last Online' and 'Cuddle Place' are now back and fixed.
Thank you for this! It gives me a much more accurate representation of how active this site is. Especially when it comes to pros that are available.
@Mark, I noticed earlier today that my profile 'cuddle place' options have changed by itself without me making any changes. I've always indicated all 3 options available: host, guest, public. But earlier today, I've noticed that it shows I host only. Both 'guest' and 'public', both got deleted & the system is not letting me add those 2 options, guest & public back into my profile. Could this be the after result of the new search filters? Has anyone else have this issue? Mark, can you look up & see if you can fix this so I can be able to add the guest & public options together with my current host option in my profile? Thanks!
@CaringSoul That bug is fixed now. Thank you for letting me know.
To any Pros who have edited their profile within the last couple of days, please check this part of your profile.
@Mark the features continue to improve... well done! I'm revisiting a previous suggestion: perhaps those searching for pro cuddlers should be able to filter based on the listed price and/or whether a price is listed. What's your thought?
Thank you. I can imagine a filter like that being added in the longer term as the site grows. It's not something that I'm giving much thought to at the moment though.
Please show the state along with the city in every view that currently displays the city under the person's picture. Like the visitors page, though I know there are others...
@Mark, thank you! Great job!
@ubergigglefritz - members outside the USA may not have a 'State'. There are no states in the UK for example. The site needs to be properly internationalized. It looks like members outside the USA are being forced to put their country as a 2-character abbreviation. A member from Poland is described as being from PL and Australia from AU.
@UKGuy in that case it would be the country. Regardless of whether in the United States or another country, seeing more than the city would be helpful in gauging where someone is located without going to their actual profile. It should show "city, state/country". I have the same issue when someone lives in another country, but their city exists near me also, lol. There are lots of city names repeated different places, but there is only one country of Australia, and only one state or country of Virginia.
Being able to filter by “last online” is an enormous improvement!
I don’t know about filtering by rate. There isn’t a standard structure. Some have just an hourly rate. Some charge HUGE travel prices. Some discount 2 hours, some have an overnight or weekend rate. A few even give a discount if you pay up front for multiple visits. I was thinking if I ever turn pro I’d offer a season pass. ( ok, that last one was an attempt at humor...or was it?)
Thank you for adding the new filters. To me, “last online” and “cuddle place” (ability to host) were the two most necessary additions to the search/filtering function. Thank you again!
@ubergigglefritz Agree regarding location display. That was a design decision at the time but I think seeing a lot of ellipsis on mobile (portrait) is a worthwhile sacrifice here. So that's now changed for Visitors, Favorites and Friends pages.
@Mark Yay :-D But doesn't it take a simple lookup to display the shorthand version of the state? Maryland -> MD. I did that all the time in my spreadsheets and databases to flip back and forth to whichever I wished to display.
Oh, the other place I was forgetting was in a message with someone. It displays the person's city under their profile name, and it should display state. Just always a better idea I think :-)
That's done too now.
Perfect. Yay. Thanks :-D
CREEP HURDLES. I’m on another site, neither cuddling or dating, but it has a problem similar one I hear expressed on Cuddle Comfort. The females, especially those who are new to the site get way too many messages from males, and many of them unwelcome as they run from presumptuous to inappropriate, sometimes even vulgar. This other site allows each member to check a few boxes to limit who may send messages. For example: Accept messages only from: Users who have a photo on their profile Users who have written a description of at least 50 words (or 200 keystrokes or whatever) in their profile Users who fall within the age range stated in MY profile Males Females
You get the idea. This doesn’t eliminate all the creeps, or prevent some of us from fudging on our age or other feature, but it does lower the sheer volume of messages, and sorts out some creeps. Each user decides which filters to check off, giving them more control.
That's really interesting. I'll note this down as a consideration for the future.