How do you read an out-of-sign conjunction in synastry?

I'm trying to understand how people weigh sign boundaries when two planets are very close in synastry. Here are two made-up examples:

• Person A's Venus at 9° Taurus, Person B's Mars at 11° Taurus.
• Person A's Venus at 29° Aries, Person B's Mars at 1° Taurus.

Both pairs are 2° apart, but only the first is in the same sign. If you use degree-based aspects, would you keep the conjunction label in the second example and change the interpretation? Or does your approach require a shared sign?

I'm not asking which pair is a better match—I'm curious about the reasoning behind the different approaches.