Atkins, Cambridge, Watercress soup – women will try anything to lost weight. 'Diet' comes high on the list of women's most used vocabulary and has become a profitable industry.

The impressive initial weight loss that comes with these diets however has a shockingly high rate of return when the short-lived diets are abandoned.

It's hardly surprising when you consider that a person needing 2000 calories a day living on less than a 1000 calories will be hungry – which will make them more likely to binge on unhealthy foods - and lacking in energy – which will make them less likely to perform any meaningful exercise.

The result is a sluggish metabolism and a body which has learnt to live on under 1000 calories – by storing fat. When you eventually re-introduce foods - because you can't live on cabbage soup forever - you'll put on weight much faster than someone who's been living on 2000 calories quite comfortably.

For weight loss that may initially be slower but will be easier and ultimately more successful we've asked leading nutritionists to give us some tips and they all said one thing: Try the simple technique of cutting back. What may seem like small insignificant changes do add up and will leave you with enough energy to exercise and burn off those extra calories.

If you're a tea drinker who likes two spoons of sugar try cutting down to 1.5 then 1 and then you may even stop altogether. (Most people find they never go back up with the taste becoming too sweet.) What's a couple of teaspoons of sugar? Well, think about it this way. If you drink two cups of tea per day and you're cutting out the sugar you're decreasing your sugar intake by around 120 spoons of sugar a month. A significant amount that and you won't even notice.

Replacing butter and margarine with a low fat spread can also be a significant change. If you eat two slices of bread per day the butter adds on 75 calories and a whopping 8g of fat. These are things you can do without and will hardly notice but will make a change to the way you live for good.