First Date Goals and Etiquette to Help You Find Summer Love

Gloria MacDonald, the owner of Perfect Partners: The Personal Relationship Executive Search Firm gives you some advice on getting through that pivotal first date.

It is important that you have simple goals and expectations for a first date, particularly for women. Set a goal not to approach the date thinking, “This might be the one, this might be the man of my dreams”, instead think, “Okay, my goal is to find out three things about this person.” That allows you to approach the date from a more objective place. I highly recommend that one of the three things is to make sure you come away from that meeting knowing the color of the person’s eyes. That way, you are sure to be making eye-contact with them. Another piece of information might be to find out something interesting and unique about the person you are meeting, maybe some hobby or activity that they love or what they do for a living. And a third idea is to find out something personal about them in terms of maybe where they were born or where they grew up or if they have any children.

Don’t try to learn their entire life story, just try to let the conversation flow. I recommend trying to be interested in the person you are dating rather than trying really hard to be interesting.

If you are genuinely interested in the other person then they are going to respond and committing to doing that will set you up for a successful first date experience.

There is some etiquette you need to be aware of with the first date and a lot of it is on the guy’s shoulders. One of the things that I recommend is that, as a guy, you try to be there first. Try to make sure you are at the coffee shop or wherever you are meeting ahead of your date. Do not go ahead and order your drink or your coffee before the woman arrives. In my experience, the woman really wants you to wait until she gets there and then you order together. If you really want to impress the woman by all means pay for her coffee or drink. If this sounds like something from the dark ages, it is, women are subconsciously looking for a man who can provide for them and so, one of the ways that you can show, in a very small way, that you can do just that is by spending the money to buy the coffee or the drink.

Often if the man doesn’t buy the coffee or the drink the woman thinks, “He is cheap” and she believes that that’s the way the man is going to be in everything for the rest of their life. So, particularly if you find this woman at all attractive and you want to impress her, you absolutely should buy that first drink. It is just a tiny little thing but it goes a long way in impressing most women.

A couple of other tips about dating etiquette for both men and women:
• Turn your cell phones off. There is nothing more rude than having someone constantly talking on a cell phone the very first time you meet them. The person you are meeting should deserve your undivided attention.
• Make eye contact. It’s really important throughout the course of the conversation that you can make eye-contact with them to make them feel that you are truly interested.
• Rather than sitting across the table from each other, sit at a 45 degree angle to one another.
• If you arrived before the other person sit facing the door, NOT with your back to it. This will help you be able to keep an eye out for the person your meeting and it will help them potentially recognize you.
• Be prepared. Prior to meeting think of some interesting questions to ask the other person and some potential topics to talk about.
• It may seem obvious, but do NOT talk about your ex. I still am shocked by the number of people that do talk about their ex on their first meeting.
• Strive for a balance in the conversation. Ask some questions and share some information about yourself. Do not turn the meeting into an interview.
• Letting the other person down: even if the person you just met is not the man or woman of your dreams, thank them for the meeting, find something genuinely positive to say, for example, “it sounds like you really have an interesting career”, or “all of the travel you’ve done is fascinating”, or “I respect your commitment to your children”. Follow the positive statement with something along the lines of , “I enjoyed meeting you. I don’t feel that we have enough in common for a relationship and I wish you all the best in your search”, or “It was really interesting chatting with you, but I just didn’t feel that special connection. Good luck on your continued search.” Above all, be kind, positive and honest.

If you set these goals and try to respect these etiquette rules you put yourself in a much better place to get the most out of a first date and really increase your chances of getting asked out on a second.