By Nancy Plummer, Columnist, The Times
“Nancy, I’ve heard of a few dating coaches lately, and I’m wondering how one could actually help me. I’ve tried online dating off and on for years, and honestly, I don’t believe there’s a good guy out there. The men I met were controlling, told me where and when we’d meet, didn’t look like their pictures, and kept canceling. I’m happy with my life, but if the right man came along, of course I’d love to meet someone. What could a dating coach really do for me?”
- Jackie , 61, West Chester
Jackie, I love this question, and I want every woman and every man reading this who has been burned by online dating to lean in close, because what you’re describing is exactly why people hire a dating coach.
Here is the most important thing I can say to you. It is not you. You are not the problem. Your process is the problem.
There really are good men out there. There really are good women out there. They are professional, kind, emotionally available, and looking for a serious, committed relationship. They are not all hiding. They are not all lying about their height or posting photos from 2009. They are not all controlling. The good ones absolutely exist, and many of them are right here in our community wondering the same thing you are. The problem is that the modern process of finding them has become complicated, time-consuming, and emotionally exhausting, and most of us were never taught how to navigate it.
The numbers tell the story clearly. According to Stanford University’s ongoing “How Couples Meet and Stay Together” study, more than half of all couples in the United States now meet online, while only about 15 percent meet through friends. The Knot’s 2025 Real Weddings Study found that roughly 27 percent of couples who married in 2025 met on a dating app. A 2025 AARP survey reported that nearly half of single adults age 50 and older had used a dating site within the past three years, and 48 percent of older online daters say they are looking specifically for a serious relationship. And here is the part that surprises people most. Research consistently shows that marriages that began online report slightly higher satisfaction and slightly lower divorce rates than those that started offline.
Read that again. Higher satisfaction. Lower divorce rates.
So, when you say you don’t believe there’s a good guy out there, Jackie, I understand exactly why you feel that way after the experiences you described. But the data, and my last decade of coaching hundreds of clients, tell a very different story. The good ones are out there. You just have not been given the tools to find them, recognize them, or filter the rest out efficiently.
Here is what a dating coach actually does. We help you write a profile that attracts the kind of partner you actually want, not the wrong men over and over. We teach you how to read photos and bios so you spot inconsistencies before you ever agree to meet. We coach you through a fifteen-minute phone call that vets a man so thoroughly you never again drive across two counties to meet a stranger who looks nothing like his pictures. We help you set the time, place, and pace of every meeting on your terms, in a setting that feels safe and easy for you. We teach you to spot controlling, manipulative, or disrespectful behavior in the first three exchanges, not the third date. And when the cancellations and the ghosting come, because in this process they sometimes will, we keep you steady, confident, and moving forward, instead of closing the laptop for another six months.
For singles 50 and older especially, we make dating safe, empowered, and fun again. Yes, fun. Remember fun?
Jackie, you already have the most important thing going for you. You love your life. You are not desperate, you are not settling, and you are not chasing anyone. That is the strongest possible position to date from. When you date, you naturally want to become the best you (U), Upbeat, Unstoppable, and Unafraid. With the right coach beside you, that is exactly who you get to be while you find him.
The right man is out there. Let’s go find him together.
Nancy Rugart Plummer, M.Ed., is the founder of All About Connecting, a dating coaching and matchmaking practice serving professional singles on Philadelphia’s Main Line and beyond. Learn more at allaboutconnecting.org.
