I read a review of all the major dating sites you mentioned where the reviewer tried all the paid versions and came to the conclusion that OK Cupid's paid one was the only one that felt remotely worth it, but it was written before they changed to the new, stupider message system. From what I can tell, the only time paying would help anyone would be right when they start the account, because that's when your profile gets the most free promotion, and no one has left swiped you yet, plus right swipes on a lot of these apps expire, and by the time they do, your account is no longer receiving the promotion a new profile gets, so the account is basically useless, as is any paid version.
Real life dating gets difficult after college, because you no longer have the exposure to so many women that you get at a college, and there are fewer appropriate times and scenes to interact with them in. Even harder if you work in a setting with few women, harder still if you don't frequent the bar scene or go to church, as those are the three major social environments of adult life in most western cultures. Sometimes you just gotta find your own social scene, like joining a club or something. You can find stuff like that on the internet too, on sites like Meet Up. I've done stuff like that to find tabletop gaming groups, but you could find whatever you're interested in. Once you find your people, you have your dating pool, but also you'll have friendship and companionship of the platonic variety, which is also nice. Other times you gotta make your own social interactions, just get out there, talk to the cute cashier at the coffee shop, whatever. That's a good skill to have anyway, because even if you find your scene, nothing will happen if you don't make a move to get to know someone. Like lets say you went to a cosplay convention. Super social sort of event where plenty of gamers and nerds will be for the express purpose of communing over their common interests. Great opportunity to make new friends, maybe even more, but not if you stand there in silence like an idiot and watch the cute girls in costumes walk by. I mean you also gotta know how not to come off as a creep, you'll have to be prepared for rejection, you'll need time to build up experience if you want to do it well, and most likely it'll take time and effort before any significant intimacy happens (even of the emotional variety), but thems the breaks, and you gotta start somewhere.
