I think that the answering machine traps a lot of guys because they’re not really sure what they should be doing. It’s a tough thing to deal with when you’re calling up expecting to talk to a person and you get the machine.

Here’s the rule, you’re only allowed to leave one message and that’s it. After that, you’re done. A lot of guys will call up, get the machine, leave a message, but feel this need to call back a few hours later and end up leaving another message.

Imagine being the female. You have some guy you just gave your phone number to leaving a ton of messages on your machine. Not cool.

Here’s what you should do. First call – no message, [space of a day ] second call – no message, [space of a few hours] third call – message.

And that’s it. If she doesn’t call you back, she doesn’t want to talk to you. Throw the number in the garbage and move on.