TheBlackoutBlog's Top 5 Tips for Success on Scruff

By now, you must know Scruff, but for those of you living under a rock, it’s a mobile app that lets you interact with men in your area and around the world. Many describe it as the Grindr for hairy guys (thought both apps have unique features); however, Bohoken noticed on his recent trip to Europe that it tends to attract more of a general non-mainstream-guy audience. There are over a million guys on Scruff worldwide, and many of them aren’t on other apps.

Wait, you don’t have Scruff on your phone?! Unacceptable. Go download it now. No, I’ll wait. It’s cool. 

Now that you’re Scruff-enabled, here are my top 5 tips for getting the most out of your Scruff experience.

1. Check your Woofs.

When someone Woofs at you, it’s a passive greeting. Sure, they could send you a message, but sometimes a Woof conveys a greeting better than words. So when you’re on the home screen, click on the icon in the upper right-hand corner that looks like a group of people. This will take you to a list of guys who totally dig your woof appeal.

2. See who viewed your profile.

That’s right! You can see a list of everyone who has looked at your profile. For free! I sometimes go to this list to initiate conversations because I’ve already caught these guys’ eyes. Okay, some may have clicked my profile and thought “thumbfail” (when a guy’s thumbnail is hot but his full-size picture fails to deliver), but some may have been into me but thought I wouldn’t be into them.

Pro tip: I’ve found that I get a spike in viewers, woofs and messages when I fully close and re-launch the app. 

3. Use the “Would you meet” feature.

Each profile has a button that lets you select whether or not you would meet a guy. If you’re both into each other, it tells you so. If not, it does nothing.

4. Use the Global view.

When you log on in the same area repeatedly, you get what I call geographic fatigue: you don’t get as many new messages or viewers because these people see you all day every day. But the Global view connects you to guys around the world who are online at that moment. I’m not sure how it picks what guys show up on your phone, but you definitely show up on others’ Global view. Obviously, you’re not going to connect for a quickie coffee with a guy 1000 miles away. But, and I hate to break it to you, most of the time, you’re not going to meet up with the guy 0.5 miles away either. So explore!

5. Check out the events.

The events page has listings of gay events going on around the globe. You can RSVP and see who else is planning to attend. And now, you have an ice breaker to start a convo! Bam!

Bonus Tip: Enjoy profile freedom.

This is a huge feature that makes Scruff extra awesome! There’s no policing profile pics for underwear waistbands like Grindr does. You can also have your website and Facebook profile linked from your profile. Additionally, there are multiple text fields in each profile (“What I do”, “What I’m looking for”, “Activities and Interests”) so you can share as much or as little detail as you like in your profile.

Scruff is easily one of the most used apps on my phone (only The Economist and my Renaissance art discussion group locator get more use), so I’m obviously having a great time with it. Hopefully these tips will enhance your Scruff hunting.

Click here to check out my Top 11 Tips for Online Dating and Hookups.

Click here to check out 5 Ways to Get More Messages on Grindr.