The Shift from Online Dating into the Real World

Congratulations! Your profile and effortlessly witty conversation online has landed you an actual date in The Real World. Now what?

Sooner rather than later

Although you’ve met online, both of you are obviously looking to meet someone who you can have a relationship with offline.  This means that however perfect things seem to be going via the Internet, you do need to actually meet the person in real life as soon as possible if you want the relationship to go anywhere. Dragging out your back and forth messages is unrealistic and could give you false hopes about the person you’re talking with.

Planning the date

While dinner and a movie is a classic, there’s limited opportunity to chat to your date in the dark cinema and it’s not great if you realise half way through that you don’t like them as much as you’d thought. Instead go for something more creative that shows off who you are, or simply coffee or drinks, which gives you the chance to escape if you want to or extend the date if you’re getting on well! Maybe try a brunch date or one of our active date ideas. 

Just because you met online…

It doesn’t mean your usual manners should go out the window!

Even if you arrive and they look nothing like their pictures, or you don’t click AT ALL face to face, do bear in mind that this is still a person with feelings. Stay for one drink and make polite conversation before you bolt.

Practice makes perfect

The more dates you go on, the better you’ll become at establishing whether you might want to see more of someone based on your conversation over coffee. Not only that, but you’ll become a better date yourself too. You’ll be able to build a bank of go-to funny stories to tell and interesting, relevant questions to ask, while knowing to keep the super-personal info out of the conversation.

Follow up quickly

Keep it simple – if you like them let them know. People appreciate those who are upfront and there’s no point faffing with the ‘two day delay’.

 

Whether you stay within HelloYou to contact them or have exchanged personal contact details by this point, it doesn’t really matter. Just a message to say you had fun and you’d like to see them again will do the trick.

If you don’t hear back…

Unfortunately, not every date will be a winner. If you’ve followed up and your date doesn’t seem so keen, you’ve got to learn to let it go. This is another case of practice makes perfect, because although it’s always going to hurt a bit, the more this happens the thicker your skin will become. Don’t bug them for an explanation if they don’t give one, and once they’ve made up their mind they probably won’t change it. There are millions of other people dating online so try not to get hung up on that one who doesn’t want to be with you! You’re only wasting time that could be spent finding the one who does. Likewise, don’t keep someone else hanging if you’re not too keen on them yourself. Let them down kindly, and then move swiftly on! Try to remember to keep things light and breezy, and not get too caught up overall.