Joint Date Planning Before You Ask Her Out

Usually when we talk about how to ask a girl out, I tell you to keep it as simple as possible:

1. Ask her out
2. Then take her contact info

The reason is because in general I think the simpler your processes are, while still being effective, they easier they are to learn, the easier they are to remember, and the easier they are to stick to when there's a lot of other stuff going on.

However, what if you're a more intermediate guy, or advanced?

What if you want another way to reduce flakes and up the odds girls show up on dates with you?

Enter joint date planning, a surefire method to slash your flakes and up your date turnout.

Best of all, it's not something you need to fumble your thumbs with doing over messages -- you'll do it right there in person with the girl when you meet her, before you ever leave her side.

 

Couples that Plan Together, Date Together

How do you mix future projection with commitment consistency, while putting together a date a woman is legitimately excited to come out on?

Simple: you plan it together with her, jointly, before setting it in stone.

For instance, say you meet a girl on the train. You've followed best practice and made sure you know how much time she has; she gets off in two short stops. It's time to set the date and exchange contact information.

She already told you earlier she loves exploring antique shops. You figure that could make for a solid date that sticks to the five Cs. So you decide to plan a quick date together:

You: Hey, I'll tell you what. We ought to go antique browsing together. There's a neat little shop over on 7th. Two stories. All kinds of stuff there. Ever been to it?

Her: [smiling] No, I never have.

You: Cool, let's go there, maybe on... when are you free this week?

Her: I could do tomorrow. Or Friday. I'm free after 3.

You: All right, I've got a thing tomorrow so let's do Friday. So, Friday, let's meet at that antique shop, it's at 7th and Bayberry. Then we'll get a bite after. Meet up at 4?

Her: Okay!

You: Awesome. Let me grab your contact details.

This is a tactic I call the joint date plan.

It allows you to get a woman to envision the date before she even goes out on it with you (future projection).

It gets buy-in from her in advance of the date, which makes her more likely to show up on the date later (commitment consistency).

It gets you and her planning together something that she's likely to enjoy, which makes her more likely to show up to the date.

As the cherry on top, it makes taking her number even more natural than with the usual 'small ask' technique (and she's so bought-in the number will almost always be real).

It's a fantastic tactic to up your odds.

 

It's Important to Paint a Little Picture

Because you future project, you want to remember to paint something of a picture for her.

In the example above, we didn't just say, "We should go antique browsing sometime. When are you free? We'll do that then grab a meal."

We said, "We should go antique browsing. There's a neat little shop on 7th. It has two stories. It's full of all kinds of stuff."

This gets her painting a picture in her mind: of this two-story building over on 7th, filled with the kinds of knickknacks and treasures she loves combing through in a place like this.

When she thinks about her upcoming date with you, that same picture you helped her envision flashes through her mind.

This is a crucial part of the method. It's the biggest part of what makes it 'stick'.

If you've tried joint date planning before taking girls' numbers in the past before, and had it not work that well or that much better than your usual schtick, lack of solid future projection is one of the likeliest culprits why.

There's another likely culprit, which is that you didn't really make the date plan all that joint.

For instance, if she likes antiques, but she doesn't like watersports, and you tell her, "You know what we ought to do? We ought to go wakeboarding in the bay sometime. You get in your suit and you hop on the wakeboard and you're just out there, water splashing in your face; it makes you feel completely alive."

Well, that painted a picture, but it's not something she wants to do, so she's either going to reject it or give you a tepid response she's liable to flake on later.

Thus, our two most important areas where this tactic can fail if not done properly:

1. Failure to properly future project. You don't paint a vivid picture in her mind

2. Failure to choose a date idea she'll like. You pick something she's cool to, rather than something she's hot for

Get both of those right, instead of wrong, and this technique can go very smooth.

 

Finding Something Date-Worthy to Do

You might ask, "But Chase: when I talk to girls they rarely come up with things I can use as date ideas. How do you find this stuff out?"

The answer is, "By asking a couple of the right questions."

The right questions are:

• "What do you do for fun?"
• "What's the quirkiest thing you do for fun?"
• "Where do you like to get away to that most people don't know about?"
• "If you have a day off, what's the best way to spend it?"

Open-ended questions like these will get her to open up to you about things she likes to do. The second, third, and fourth questions really drill in and get her talking about things she really likes, that she may or may not share with most people.

Almost every girl has something she likes to do that she can share with you.

After that, it's just 'knowing your town' -- do you know your town well enough that you can propose something that fits into her date preferences?

If you don't, and you're not pressed for time, do a quick lookup on your phone.

Like so:

You: Where do you like to get away to that most people don't know about?

Her: Hmm! Well, I like to go to live music shows. I don't even tell my friends usually; usually I just go myself.

You: Oh yeah? What kind of music?

Her: Any kind! If it's live, I love it.

You: Well, I'll tell you what. We ought to go to a live music show. I'm not sure when there is one, let me check on my phone.

Her: Okay. I'll check too.

[both checking]

You: Seems there's one on Thursday at the Tune Factory.

Her: Yeah, I see that. How about Friday at Barry's? They have jazz.

You: Friday at Barry's is perfect. We'll hit up Barry's, grab a table, order something to sip on, and soak in the jazz streaming off the stage. Should we grab a bite beforehand? Looks like they don't start till 8.

Her: Okay!

You: Cool. Let's plan to meet downtown at 6. We can meet right near Barry's; we'll grab something close. Here, put yourself in my phone. [hand her phone]

So, you can say, it's a bit more involved than the usual invitation out.

However, by using joint date planning, you've gotten her very involved in planning out this mutual date with you. You've picked a thing she likes to do, that also makes for a good date; she has a clear picture of it in her head; and because she's committed to this detailed plan with you, it makes her a lot more likely to follow through with it later.

 

Small Tip: Add More Than One Activity

If you'll notice in my examples we are always adding more than one thing to do.

It's not just "We'll go antique shopping. Here's the picture of it" or "We'll go to the jazz show. Let me paint that picture."

We also throw in grabbing a bite (before, for the jazz show; or after, for the antiques).

It doesn't have to be a bite; it could be a drink, or something else you'd like to do.

The reason you add another activity is to make it more 'real'.

When you paint the picture, it almost puts her into a sort of dream-state as you describe it. If you then end after that, and grab her contact info, it feels like the whole thing was 'a dream'.

By attaching another activity, which you don't describe to the same degree of vividness, you pull something else off:

• There's the initial vividly painted activity, which she wants to go on

• There's another, more normal activity, loosely defined so she can imagine it how she likes

It's always good to leave a little open to the imagination when possible.

If you describe everything, it feels like the date is rigidly planned out and there's less room for the unexpected to occur.

If you fail to describe anything, though, the date feels amorphous, unformed; poorly defined.

So, by describing one thing in vivid detail, and another thing only fleetingly, you give her something to latch her teeth onto, and something else she's free to imagine however she likes.

These two elements work together in the joint date plan to improve how she feels about the date and raise the odds she shows up to it.

 

Conclusion: Make It Mutual

It's not just your date plan.

It's her plan, that she planned with you, together.

It's a joint date plan.

By making it joint, you raise her investment in the date.

You make it more likely you pick something she's genuinely interested to do.

You afford yourself the chance to paint a vivid picture in her mind she sees herself doing, and make it so concrete that she's a lot more likely to show up to it later (because she'll want to flake less, and will feel less okay about flaking even if she thinks maybe she'd like to).

For the beginner who's just starting out, again my suggestion is "Keep it simple."

Tell her you ought to grab a bite or a drink sometime, and when she says yes, grab her contact. Plan the rest of the date out over messages.

If you're intermediate on up, however, and you want a way to solidify the dates you ask women out on before you take their contacts, use joint date planning.

It's a simple way to slice the odds she flakes, and raise the odds she shows up, eager and happy to be there.

Chase Amante