A lot of people often confuse eau de cologne with eau de toilette. Apart from the obvious last words that are supposed to say 'big difference', there's one major thing that sets them apart: their content. With eau de cologne, it has 3% perfume mixed in an alcohol-water base. For the eau de toilette, it is a 3-8% perfume mixed in an alcohol OR water base. See the difference now?

Now how can you tell if the bottle that you are holding is cologne or toilette without looking at its list of ingredients or label, for that matter? As the usual way of buying something meant to please the olfactory senses, smell it. Eau de cologne will smell light and airy compared to a eau de toilette, which will carry a heavier scent compared to the cologne but lighter to that of a perfume. This is because of the percentage of perfume mixed with the base. Remember, the eau de toilette carries 3-8% perfume while the eau de cologne carries only 3% perfume, and never goes beyond it.

Because of their light scent, they often give the person instant relaxation of the senses and of the whole body as well. This is one of the reasons why eau de colognes are one of the most popular gifts for any occasion. The other reason, of course, is that they are plentiful in the stores, reducing the time spent on looking for them.

If there's one big problem in giving eau de cologne to someone, it is this - you will have to take a lot of time in choosing the right one, or the one which you think the receiver will like. If you already know which cologne to buy, then you can always log on to the internet, search for the specific bottle and buy it.

If you do not have any ideas as to which cologne are you going to buy and give, you have no other choice but to head on to the mall or department store and try every bottle that you can find there. To do this, apply a tiny amount to a small area that's accessible to your nose (such as the back of the hand), let it sit there for a minute and then smell it. In this way, the cologne is given time to react to the skin's chemical constituents and thus give off a distinct aroma.

When choosing a bottle of eau de cologne for somebody, never forget the person's gender. There are times that cologne bottles do not come with the label "for him", or "men", or something like these two. In short, you have to rely on your sense of smell. Remember that colognes tend to smell alike, what usually results is either you can hardly tell which cologne is for which gender or you can never tell at all and end up saying that the cologne that you've chosen is unisex. To help you avoid committing this common mistake, take note that men's colognes are more concentrated than women's, hence smell as strong as the eau de toilette.