My SO started out as an online friend, and I became attracted to his personality before I knew what he looked out. Luckily we both ended up being attracted to each other physically as well, but I wonder if we would have worked out if that hadn't been the case, even though we shared such an intimate mental and emotional connection.
My brother also met a girl online, and while I love my brother. . . I gotta say she is way out of his league in terms of physical attractiveness. But they seem really happy, so I guess for some people looks just don't matter as much. (And she's definitely not a gold-digger because he lives with my parents and works at McDonalds, lol.)