In the past, a few of my clients have found striking up a conversation more difficult than keeping a conversation going. I’ll often hear them say: ‘…I’m alright once I get talking!’ Perhaps this sounds familiar? Whilst visiting Sydney recently, I decided to address this by developing a template that’ll allow you to quickly and easily create a charming first impression with people, by using your powers of observation.

It’s straightforward and best of all, you can use this universal conversation starter in pretty much any setting or environment.

(NB. Simply walking up to people and introducing yourself can be a great approach too, but usually lacks any flair or sparkle. This approach is aims to create some magic with your conversation starter).

Part One: Smile And Get Their Attention

You need a genuine reason to talk to people, otherwise your conversation will probably come across forced and awkward. Consequently, the first part of the icebreaker gives you a great purpose for striking up a conversation by voicing your approval at another person’s current situation.

Here’s the phrase:

• “That’s what I like to see..!”

This line should simultaneously grab the other person’s attention and build their curiosity to what you are going to say next. Make sure you deliver it with a smile because this is the first thing people will notice as they turn to look at you.

Feel free to use these variations instead: “Well, that’s made my day…” & “Now, there’s a reason to brag…”

Part Two: List off 2-3 Positive Observations

So, you’ve grabbed their attention and built a sense of curiosity in a matter of seconds. Now you need to list off 2-3 positive observations about what they’re actually doing.

Make a point of including anything you notice about the environment they’re in too. For example, imagine several people are sitting outside a bar one evening; your observations, combined with your icebreaker from before, might be sound like this:

• “That’s what I like to see… Happy people sitting around, relaxing with drinks at sunset!” 
• “That’s what I like to see… Knee deep conversation, drinks topped up and the night is still young!” 
• “Now there’s a reason to brag… Outside with your friends, great weather and no need to be anywhere else!”

You can enhance your skill at listing observations by people watching, which will give you a feel for the buzz and rhythm of the community around you. This will also speed up your ability to make observations. Head to a public spot in your lunch breaks and get used to noticing what people are doing. Pay attention to how they move and the clothes they are wearing. Try and guess their story just from mere observation. All of this effort will help you shoot observations from the hip in rapid succession.

Part Three: Cap Off The Comment

You can then cap off your perfect opening line with the handy rhetorical question: “What more could you want?” This will turn your observations into a cheerful social compliment, which will then put you in a position to expand the conversation further if you want to. Happily, the rhetorical question is useful because people will often answer it for you, which continues the banter. Other variations of the ‘cap off’ line are: “Could you be anymore happy!” and “Does it get any better?” I’m sure you can come up with some great alternatives too.

When you put these three components together you should have a line that looks like this:

• “That’s what I like to see… Happy people sitting around, relaxing with drinks at sunset! What more could you want?”
• “Now there’s a reason to brag…Outside with your friends, great weather and no need to be anywhere else! Could you be anymore happy!” 

If you decide not to continue talking, your opening line will simply serves as a cheerful remark and you can continue on your way knowing you added to somebody else’s day.

Sometimes icebreakers don’t effortlessly segue into full blown conversation. When this happens you can have another stab at carrying the conversation further by asking an open ended question. A good one is: ‘So what’s the occasion?’ People are usually out and about for a reason. Their answer will give you a chance for further commentary, which will improve your success at having great conversation skills.

You’ll notice I messed up the order in the video and it still worked well because I was smiling: have fun! And improve on the world’s best conversation starter by inventing your own ones!

How Safe Is Your Life From Fear?

Have I ever wanted to do a bungee jump?

Oh, my God. No… no… no, no, no. No. No. No, I haven’t.

Well, once when I was younger I caught myself daring to imagine doing one after seeing it on televison. I quickly suppressed those thoughts and sat on them for years.

I mean, the prospect of leaping off a building in a ritual of quasi-suicide was terrifying. And as soon as I knew that fear owned me in that context, I may as well have mentally signed off that doing a horrible bungee jump was inevitable!

My personal belief is that if you don’t face your fear, your fear will own you, and nothing that you’re scared of could ever be worse than that.

Bottom line: If I can’t do something then I must give it a try.

Setting The Wheels Of Terror In Motion

Guiness states that the Macau Tower is currently the world’s highest bungee jump (764 feet). I figured if I was going to bungee I may as well set the bar high.

Cashing in on some good fortune (watch this video for a surefire strategy on how to be lucky) I hustled a free business ticket to Macau, China’s clammy answer to Las Vegas.

As the bus, crammed with Chinese, took me to the tower the thought of jumping off it an then plummeting to the ground at terminal velocity filled me with a predictavle unease; after all I had never done such a thing before and had no experience to draw upon on.

Bungee jumping suddenly looked dangerous.

Understanding What Fear Is And Why It Controls You

You cannot make sense of any experience in life unless you have a context to put it in.

For example, if I say “I’m a hypnotist” I have a lifetime of experiences that allows my mind to make sense of what the role is to me: helping people through the use of trance.

However, other people may interpret the notion of a hypnotist from a completely different perspective. They may see a hypnotist as mysterious agent with Svengali-like powers: they have different reference points that tell how them to make sense of that role.

Consequently, the referential experiences, or reference points, that you collect in life help you to make sense of reality by controlling how you interpret it.

Reference points can be acquired through primary experiences (living through the moment yourself); or by secondary experiences (learning about the moment through books, the media and other people).

Humans have a need to believe other people’s reference points because it allows us to make sense of the world as quickly as possible and, for the most part, serves us well.

For example, although I have never owned a shotgun, I know it’s a good idea not to point one at somebody in case it accidentally discharges. I have seen that reference point played out in films and books.

Consequently, you have to trust the source of your secondary reference points and question them often.

Likewise, if a cannibalistic zombie was attacking me then maybe firing the gun at them would be a good idea. Again, I have seen this played out in (some awesome) films and books.

Hence the context of your experiences in shaping our perception of the world. A hypnotist may be mobbed as a heretic in front of a group of Christian fundamentalists, or seen as a bringer of relief if they worked in a phobia clinic.

First hand reference points allow us to make sense of reality in the strongest possible way because they’re:

1.) Personal

2.) Emotionally charged

3.) Undeniable

Defeating The One Trigger That Causes Fear And Anxiety

I had no reference points for my bungee jump: I only had experience of jumping off tall trees and a crazy parachute jump, but never in the context I was about to encounter (a tall building, held by elastic with the ground in immediate sight).

Consequently, I was going into the unknown and scared.

When the future is unknown you will fear the unknown. If we can only imagine negative outcomes we will also trigger the feeling of fear. It’s part of the human condition.

Happily though, when you can predict the future positively, the feeling of fear disappears. Now, you don’t have to be a psychic to predict the future: you do it all the time by looking at your past reference experiences and make some assumptions.

For example, if all your reference points related to talking to strangers have been positive then you will use this experience to assume that the next stranger you talk to will also lead to a positive outcome: and that’s what you’ll probably hget.

On the day of the jump I arrived at the tower and called the elevator down. The feeling of ever present dread in my stomach grew as the elevator fired up the tower like a missile. This instantly caused the busy traffic below to shrink into dots.

Rather than let my mind create a new reference point, laden with negative emotion over the context of heights, I dealt with the moment by keeping my attention in the present moment.

How To Overcome Fear And Eliminate Anxiety

When you think about it, the feeling of fear can only really exist in the future, since right here, right now in the present moment you’re safe and well. It’s the thought that we can’t handle the fate we’re about to meet that cripples us.

Ironically, the reality is that we tend to surrender to whatever situation is presented to us we find we simply deal with it on a moment by moment basis.

Focus on turning off your internal chatter (you know, that voice in your head). It is remarkably effective at caUsing your focus to dwell on future events rather than simply enjoying the moment of time you are currently living through.

When I stopped talking to myself the feeling of fear before the jump began to disappear. I made no judgements to what was happening to me but rather chose to focus on the moment on a second-by-second basis.

This technique was very effective: I had to wait 20 minutes before the jump whilst workmen repaired the hoists! I watched this potentially unsettling events and made no judgement about them.

What Throwing Yourself Off 746 Feet Tower Feels Like…

Standing on the ledge and feeling the wind on my face I looked down at the city of Macau scrawling below. It was a scene that instantly welded itself into my mind.

The countdown came quicker than expected. “Here we go” said the bungee jump operator (perhaps for the fifteenth time that day) and I felt my entire body shudder.

This was it.

I leapt forward from the security of the tower into the cold embrace of nothingness.

As my body sensed me fall, primordial programming ensured I wailed and swung my arms in a pathetic attempt to grab something. My body also entered a state of shock for a split second.

As the fall continued I felt free from any physical connection to the world. Almost detached from reality. I was surprised by this and, laughing, hollered: “this ain’t so bad!”. As I fell, no thought of the bungee rope snapping or the ground racing towards me was a concern.

The moment I surrEnded myself to the feeling of fear and letting go for trying to control the situation I felt a feeling of absolute peace. There were no thoughts in my mind, just the experience of what is happening.

As the bungee cord finally slowed my descent there was no sense of relief; I just didn’t care. At that moment, my survival became less important than my enjoyment of the experience, On some level I realise i’m not pumped full of adrenaline in the way I’d expected, but happily calm.

The Importance Of Creating A Positive Reference Point

As soon as I leapt off the tower I decided I was going to enjoy myself. At the bottom of the jump I met and high-fived the guy who helped me out of my harnesses. From there, I caught the elevator back up the tower tp greet my friend with a big smile on my face. I made some other people riding the elevator laugh.

As soon as I saw my friend I met another jumper who had leapt before me. We shared our experience and hugged and were both beaming with awesome energy.

I now had a positive reference point associated with bungee jumping; and once they build a higher platform I’d love to jump again!

Five Strategies For Overcoming Fear:

1.) Taking action that leads to you stepping into your fear immediately causes you to grow as a person. If your life feels like  its stuck in a mental rut then one of the best things you can do is to challenge something that scares you.

2.) When you face fear you’ll create a reference point in your mind of how you handled yourself. The next time you’re in a similar situation your mind will draw upon this referential experience to guide your emotions. Make sure the referece point that you worked hard to obtain is connected with a feeling of positivity so it becomes a resource not a future hinderance.

Develop a consistent positive attitude by looking hard for the enjoyable high points you create from your actions. Check out this video for more easy ways to do this.

3.) All fear exists in the future. Keeping the focus of your mind in the present moment is an effective way to keep yourself in control when on the verge of fear. Do this by focusing on the sights, sounds and feelings of your surroundings so that they overwhelm your focus and effectively replace your inner voice. When this happens it can’t give you a running commentary of the situation you find yourself in.

4.) The moment that you face your fear, you move through a split second of uncertainty and into a point of self-understanding. You can think of this ‘anxiety gateway’ as a sure-fire way to personal growth. Stepping through this gateway is a euphoric feeling, although temporary… only to be replaced by a transformation in yourself that
is permenant.

5.) If you live in fear, you’ll spend a life quietly dying. When you face fear the only parts of you that’ll die from the experience are the parts that you no longer needed because you have outgrown them. In some respects, facing fear was like giving your self esteem a spring clean.

You’re not alone if the thought of speaking in public scares you. However, provided you have an interesting topic to talk about, most of the hard work is done! An ‘interesting topic’ qualifies as any information that you believe  the audience wants to hear about. Once you’ve got that covered, what really matters is your stage presence, which influences how effectively you can deliver this interesting information.

I’ve seen bad speakers attempt to hammer over hundreds of points an an hour, and witnessed great speakers sharing one point to an enthusiastic audience for twice as long. The difference between the mediocre and great  speakers is their stage presence. Stage presence is your ability to communicate your ideas with panache that keeps the audience engaged.

To give you a great shot at this, we’re going to focus on how you begin and finish your talk because these are the crucial moments that determine how your audience will receive you and how happy they’ll be at the end of your presentation.

Hook Your Audience Before You Say A Single Word

That wobbly moment where it’s your turn to talk has suddenly appeared from nowhere! As your tummy fills with butterflies, or excitement, follow this 3 point game plan that will ensure you make a great first impression with your audience and set them up to hang off your every word.

Step 1: Walk On Stage then PAUSE

When you walk on stage, smile and shake the emcee’s hand if he’s still in the spotlight. Doing so helps transition the flow of the proceedings without interrupting your audiences’s precious attention. If there is no emcee, smile at the audience as you take your place in front of everyone.

Rather than jump  immediately into your speech, take a moment to survey the room in silence and make eye contact with the audience. A few seconds is ideal. This simple gesture simultaneously  conveys that you have unstoppable confidence in your message; builds the audience’s trust in you; and adds a little dramatic tension in the room, that will vanish with a sparkle as soon as you hit the opening lines of your talk.

However, while this pause is powerful, keep your mind occupied on something. Having a gaunt look on your face won’t cut it. My magician pal Woody (more about him shortly) uses the silent pause to imagine that he is sending out an energy beam to hit all areas of the room. Crazy, but it must work for him because his show stopping performances repeatedly bring the house down,

Once, you’ve paused for a moment, it’s time to talk!

Step 2: Say WHAT You’re Going to Talk About

Quietly engaging your crowd as you walk on stage is great but it’s also crucial that you use this short window of time to then clearly state what your talk is going to be about.

This is simple enough: “Ladies and gentlemen, today, i’m going to be sharing assume awesome stage presence tips with you!” would be quite adequate.

Introducing the title of your speech builds curiosity in your audience and sends a cue to the crowd that you are about to launch into the content of your talk.

It also ensures that all the audience members fully understand what your topic is going to be about (there’s usually one person who turned up late or got dragged into the festivities by a friend!)

From my experience, the more specific the title of your talk the more curiosity it’ll build in your audience. For instance, calling your lecture: “How to Be Charismatic When Giving Presentations on Stage” works far better than calling it: “Stage Charisma“.

If you get stuck for a good title, try using ‘How to-‘ in the heading, it’s good way to sell the specific benefit of your talk immediately!

Step 3: Say WHY You’re Going to Talk About It

Outline the reason why you’re actually giving a talk and requesting your audience’s time. Most people forget this step (myself included; and you can see me do this in the first example in the video!).

If an audience is watching you it does not mean they want to be listening to you. There are always distractions competing for their attention, including the temperature of the room, their ever-present cellphones and their unspoken desire to use the bathroom as soon as they sit down!

No matter how familiar you think your audience will be to the topic you want to discuss, do not assume that the audience will automatically cotton on to the purpose of your speech.

For example, lecturing about your specialist subject of car engines to an audience of car mechanics may seem like a cake walk. However, some of those mechanics in the audience may switch their attention off because they assume you have nothing new to teach them when that really isn’t the case.

Outlining the significance of your talk by taking a moment to explain ‘why’ you’re excited about how the topic will benefit your audience will motivate them to actively listen.

Now start your speech!

Top Illusionist Reveals His Magic Formula For Crowd Control

An applause cue is a gesture that suggests to the audience that they should clap. Magicians use them after they’ve successfully performed a notable trick, and at the end of their shows to announce their time on stage has some to an end.

The applause cue is very simple: feet together, big smile and open your hands with your palms out… as if you were going to catch a huge beach ball thrown to you by the Brazilian volleyball team.

This action will trigger the audience to automatically show their appreciation. There might be a delay in your gesture and their response, so pause until you hear the applause. Next, take a few moments to drink it in. Not only does it feel great it also gives the audience a chance to thank you for your talk.

(Side note: If your audience doesn’t immediately clap, add a bow to make the gesture more significant. You can see me do this in the video!)

Incidentally, it was Woody the Magician who taught me this brilliant technique. Woody is a master of controlling the room and delighting his audience and you can read more about his adventures on his blog. Part of his success relies on him being able to gently direct his audience in a way that makes them happy.

An audience doesn’t necessarily know when your talk is over; they need to be told. As the boss of the room it is your job to guide them to this happy conclusion. The applause cue is a surefire way to walk off stage to a round of applause.

There are several variations of the applause cue (for example, the inverted applause cue) but the one demonstrated in this video works consistently well. That’s all for now…ta da!

“These aren’t the droids you’re looking for,” muttered Obi-Wan Kenobi, using a Jedi mind trick in Star Wars, “Move along” came the reply from the befuddled Storm Trooper. And with the wave of an Imperial hand, the legend of covert mind control was firmly cemented on screen forever more.

Is this level of influence truly obtainable? There certainly is scope.

And some people seem to be born supernaturally smooth talkers: whether you want to talk your way out of a speeding ticket, or talk your way into a somebody’s heart, making your speech more persuasive is an essential skill to learn. One effective way to garner the gift of the gab is to learn language patterns. These are stock phrases and retorts that can give you lightning fast retorts and the upper hand in a conversation.

The concept comes from NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming), an offshoot of of hypnosis, whereby excellence can be studied and modelled for personal use. The original source of modern language patterns was obtained in the 1970s from legendary hypnotherapist Milton Erickson, who used his own patterns to ensure that his clients followed his suggestions. Since then, new patterns have been studied and developed by various NLP practitioners.

Using short language patterns in your speech is an advanced technique that requires a little practice to master. The best way is to take one of the lines that you’ll learn in this video and use it in everyday conversation, to the point where it becomes natural. Be careful though: deliberately forcing a language pattern into a conversation too many times can make you sound robotic, so practice one pattern at a time, little and often, until becomes part of your spoken repertoire.

More Persuasive than a Jedi Knight: Introducing Rintu Basu

At a recent training event in London, I had the satisfaction of working alongside Master NLP Practitioner, best-selling author and conversational expert, Rintu Basu.

Based in Glasgow, Rintu has spent years developing the persuasion skills he teaches. Consequently, he is an in-demand corporate speaker and leading authority on NLP and Hypnosis in the UK; you only have to listen to Rintu speak to hear how smoothly he stacks numerous patterns together.

In this interview, Rintu kindly agreed to share several powerful techniques that you can put to immediate use right away. You’ll notice how we have fun repeating the patterns that he teaches many times: this is a great way to learn and something that can be explored with a training partner before you hit up the rest of the world.

Interview Transcript: How to Be a Smooth Talker

Below is a transcript of a short interview we filmed on the topic of using language patterns to become more persuasive:

Marcus: It gives me great pleasure today to welcome Rintu Basu, a best-selling author on the topic of persuasion and influence. Today, he’s going to share some great insights and tips to help you become more influential with the people you meet. So Rintu, how did you get started with all this?

Rintu: Persuasion skills, specifically?

Marcus: Yes.

Rintu: I’m an NLP guy.

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: And if you know NLP, there’s a lot of people who do stuff in that field.

Marcus: That’s ‘neuro-linguistic programming’?

Rintu: Yes.

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: It doesn’t really matter what it is [called] because it’s just the thing that I’m into.

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: And there’s lots of people who do it. And what I wanted to do was focus on that field and just focus on something within it that I could be really, really good at.

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: For me, persuasion was a natural thing. There’s lots [of information out there] about language patterns. For example, do you recognise the fact that language is just a filter? Sorry…

Marcus: That sentence was a language pattern wasn’t it?!

Rintu: Yes, it was!

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: So if you think about it this way, whenever you say anything, or whenever I say anything, you have to make pictures in your head about what it is that I’m saying for it to make sense.

Marcus: Yes, that makes sense.

Rintu: Which then basically means I can force anything that I want on you [by putting a picture in your mind], just by talking about it. Are you with me?

Marcus: Yes.

Rintu: So this whole language thing is just a filter.

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: And let me just direct your attention wherever I wanted to go, which is fabulous. And when I heard that, I said, “Oh, that’s brilliant”. That’s the [key learning] I got from NLP and that’s what I got very, very good at in terms of language. So I thought, well, if I need a niche to study then that’s a good one to look at.

Marcus: Okay. For you, what was your – how did you know when you were starting to really sort of get the skill and develop it? Were there any sort of ‘way points’ [or moments] where you thought: “Right! I’m a bit more persuasive than I used to be!”?

Rintu: [Laughs] Yeah! So here’s what actually happened to me. I was working as a teacher and I started getting into this NLP  stuff and I thought to myself: I’ve got 16 little minds in the room every day of the week that are just waiting to have their heads full of all sorts of interesting and exciting stuff. Why don’t I take five language patterns and write them out every evening so that the next day, I’m going to go in and, come hell or high water, I’m going to spout this stuff out and [get to practice my skills].

Marcus: Right. So let’s be clear there. A language pattern is a sentence that-

Rintu: [Cuts in] it forces you to look in a completely new direction. So for example, the pattern we were playing about with this weekend just gone was ‘the issue isn’t X, the issue is Y’. So the issue that we’re talking about it’s actually focusing on the pattern.

Marcus: Right.

Rintu: So it doesn’t matter what you say. I can move this conversation to where I want it to go.

Marcus: And you’re about to do that right now. Oh, god I better resist you [trying to redirect the conversation]!

Rintu: The interesting thing about resisting, it’s about continuing the conversation …

Marcus: Okay. So the issue isn’t about the conversation. It’s about where it’s going. So you’re saying that if we use [the language pattern] ‘the issue isn’t X, the issue is Y’, we can redirect any conversation.

Rintu: Yes. Let me be more blatant. The issue is not what you’re talking about, it’s actually about what I want to talk about; which is actually moving this discussion into what I was doing with my bunch of students. Now here’s what I was doing with this bunch of students: they would come up with a question on the topic that we were talking about and I would say: “that’s such a great question! But you know, the issue isn’t that question. It’s really about what I can give you as a definite answer to it!” And then what I would say is – well, whatever it was I actually wanted to say [to answer their question with]!

Marcus: [Turns to camera] So, we both met at a seminar and Rintu passed on this great tip to win any argument, which was in two steps:

1.) Find agreement with somebody.

2.) Use the language pattern: “the issue isn’t X, the issue is Y”.

Rintu: Yes.

Marcus: Now, I understand you also worked in the police for a while. Was that technique something that you used in that sort of situation?

Rintu: Absolutely. I mean this is what my desired outcome was originally: ‘how do I convince someone to put on a pair of handcuffs, climb into the back of the police van and then write me a testimonial about what a great experience that was.

Marcus: Yes. That would be pretty impressive.

Rintu: So that was what I was looking to do with hypnotic language patterns and all the rest of it and they’re always doing that. And you have to take this approach in perspective; it doesn’t work consistently all the time.

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: But what I would say to anyone is that if it works, one or two times more in your normal life would that make a difference? So, say for me as a police officer, if I was just to make one or two more arrests or stop one or two more crimes than any other police officer, would it make a big difference? And it certainly did.

Marcus: Hey! That was a language pattern you used just then!

Rintu: It certainly was! You’re getting it now!

Marcus: You cheeky rascal! Now, we saw another presenter this week called James Tripp. His version of your language pattern was “On one level, it’s X, on another level, it’s Y” so it might be another way of using the same pattern with different wording?

Rintu: Yes and the great thing about that is that I completely agree with him… and the issue isn’t the words that you use. It’s actually about what makes it most comfortable for you. So you can say ‘the issue isn’t this, the issue is that…or you could phrase it as: ‘on one level its this, on the other level it’s that’.

Marcus: [Turns to Camera] Rintu Basu is a nightmare to interview! But the issue isn’t that you’re a nightmare; on another level, you’re fantastic! So is there a technique that people watching can take out and try? Because you’ve got so much to share on influence and persuasion.

Rintu: Sure. In the next two to three minutes, here’s something you can use. You need to – well actually, when I say use, go ahead and practice and have fun with this. Let me tell you where it comes from first. It’s called an awareness pattern. In sales, salespeople call this a, ‘Yes Set‘. So, what it’s about is trying to get you to say ‘yes’ several times to things that you have to say yes to; and then when they do, I’ll slip in a question that they’ll say yes to.

Marcus: Hey you’re doing it now!

Rintu: I know! And then at the bottom of that [technique], you ask the one question that you’re not sure if they’re going to say yes to. But if they’ve said yes all the way down [to your questions], the chances are they’ll also say yes to the last one [as well].

Marcus: Okay. I’m liking this.

Rintu: Yes. So in a sales environment it would work along the lines of: “Okay, we’ve talked about the product. Yes, you’ve got the benefits [Yes] and that means you are ready to buy [Yes!]. So you’ve got two yes’s and then you go “buy it now!” and they say yes. And that’s kind of how [the technique] works for sales. A hypnotist does the same thing. They call it an awareness pattern. What hypnotists do is this. If they want to take you into trance they will say [points to chair]: “So you’re sat in this chair?”

Marcus: Yes.

Rintu: That’s verifiable.

Marcus: Oh yes.

Rintu: And you listen to the sound of my voice?

Marcus: Yes

Rintu: And that means you are ready to go into trance.

Marcus: Oh, Okay.

Rintu: So it’s just leading people to where you want them to go.

Marcus: Right.

Rintu: So I mean I’m quite happy doing this in conversations and it would be the same sort of thing. [For example] so we’re sat here talking and having fun and that means that you’re ready to take out your wallet and pay me loads of money.

Marcus: Okay. So that’s quite a big leap for me to suddenly take out my wallet and then pay you lots of money! [Turns to camera] This isn’t a free interview; I’ve had to pay Rintu to be here! So on one level, that’s quite good that….

Rintu: Hey! I’m just kidding!

Marcus: So would it be valuable then in [just getting them to] say a little yes, another little yes and then maybe a ‘small yes’ that they probably otherwise wouldn’t have said ‘yes,’ to?

Rintu: Yes. Okay. So the trick with this is you take small steps.

Marcus: Sure.

Rintu: So what I would rather do is let’s say the intention eventually is to get you to buy a course.

Marcus: Okay.

Rintu: So what I might start with doing is say something like: ‘Okay, we’re sat here chatting and that means you are ready to tell me about what kind of issues you have in your life.

Marcus: Yes.

Rintu: Okay. So now we’re talking about whatever issues you have in your life and that means that you’re comfortable in my company which then means that you are actually willing to work on how you might want to change things.

Marcus: Right, and there’s the bit [of your patter] where I’m receptive to that?

Rintu: Yeah, so now that you’re being receptive to change; and now that we’re talking about being receptive to change; that’s a great thing for us to be talking about. [Breaks conversation] And what you’re looking for here is a nodding head.

Marcus: Yes.

Rintu: What that means is that you’re ready to start talking about a coaching scenario.

Marcus: Yes.

Rintu: Can you see what I’m doing? I’m just taking little steps [to get you to respond in the affirmative].

Marcus: [Laughs] how do I answer that? [How can I answer the question?] ‘Can I see what you’re doing?’ without actually answering in the affirmative! And there’s a question very quickly. Do people have to say yes or can they just ‘feel’ yes?

Rintu: They just need to feel it.

Marcus: They need to feel it. So they can nod. They could be like in a quiet state of agreement.

Rintu: Right. Here’s the thing that I really want you to get with this. Okay? You will generally use lots of different things to get people to move, alright?

Marcus: Yes.

Rintu: So it’s not just about reapplying the same pattern but here’s the deal with this. When you get to do this naturally, you can see amazing shifts in people and the way [that you] get to do this naturally is just to practice doing it in a normal conversation because it gets to be fun. All you have to do is sit there and you probably want to go out there and do this deliberately with people is you just sit in a conversation and go in your own head: ‘I’m only allowed to say what I want to say after I’ve given them two truisms’. So if I would be to start with you, it would be, Okay, so we’re sat here…

Marcus: True!

Rintu: …We’re having a conversation…

Marcus:  True!

Rintu: …And what would you like to talk about next?

Marcus: Oh, Okay…erm… Monkeys!

Rintu: Monkeys. Cool. So, you just said the word “monkeys” (true), and we’re here on camera talking about monkeys (true). So can you give me another subject you’d like to talk about?

Marcus: Haa I always pick the monkeys! But Rintu, we’re out of time now, I’m afraid. How can people find out more about you?

Rintu: Easy. Its www.theNLPcompany.com

Marcus: I recommend you sign up to his newsletter. It’s full of liquid gold. Well it would be, if newsletters were actually liquid. They’re not. But… it is full of gold! I’ve learned a lot from you, Rintu. It has been an eye-opening experience. I also recommend that you go back and re-watch this interview several times. This guy is a master of language and he’s got lots of language patterns [that he's used] in the interview.

Rintu: Final thought. If you sign up on my website for my newsletter you’ll get a 20-page report with a bunch full of language patterns in it. Go and read that and then go and listen to this interview again (as there was a lot going on!).

Marcus: Perfect. Rintu Basu…high five!

Final Thoughts

Few people have a full grasp of persuasive language. However, most people have a few key phrases up their sleeves that they unwittingly use to influence those around them; whether that’s a shopper winning a discount on a new dress, or a kid charming his parent to stay up late… they probably don’t realise on a conscious level what they’re doing beyond their intention to prosper.

Potentially powerful language patterns like these are (probably) being used in conversations around you on a daily basis. Listen out for them: moments whenever somebody says something that persuades you, or a colleague, are gold dust.  The chances are that the influencer’s phrasing can be taken and adapted for your own use!

Here are two big secrets to striking up conversations with strangers.

The first is having a genuine reason to talk to them. After all, if you haven’t got a reason to stop and talk to somebody then its going to make the whole exchange rather awkward! This applies to any social environment you find yourself in, such as a bar, a library or even the street, as demonstrated in this video.

The second secret is being aware of how emotionally expressive you are when you speak. People are very good at picking up the emotional context of your words over their logical meaning. For example, you can greet somebody in a cheerful way with the seemingly negative phrase: “you look tired” -and they will respond positively based on the emotional energy in your delivery, rather than the actual content of your sentence.

A few days before Christmas 2011, I decided to try a fun experiment on the streets of Central London to find out how powerful these two simple elements are in relation to your ability to influence. The goal was simply to see how easily I could hand chocolates to passers-by on the street.

To make things interesting, I changed one small element in my approach each time:

Experiment 1:

“Take a chocolate”

First up, I provided absolutely no reason why I was handing out the chocolate. As I approached them I added no positive emotion behind my words, simply stating: “take a chocolate”. Sounding like a Soviet pision guard, I was unsurprised when almost everybody refused to comply with my festive wishes. From their perspective, I had no logical reason to be handing out chocolate to them in the first place (despite the telltale Santa hat!).

Experiment 2:

“Its Christmas…take a chocolate”

The second time round, I provided a reason why I was handing out the chocolate, by adding: “It’s Christmas!” to my opening line.

This idea comes from the work of social psychologists Langer, Chanowitz, and Blank, who found that they could easily cut the line of a busy Xerox machine when they added a reason for doing so. Even if the reason was senseless to the people in the queue: “May I cut ahead? It’s Thursday!”

Giving a reason for your behaviour makes people more compliant to your requests. However, with little emotional energy thrown in the mix, my approach still came across a little menacing, albeit much more successful than before: this time people took chocolates!

Experiment 3:

“Its chocolate…take a Christmas!?”

On the third attempt, I added some warms emotions to my request to take a chocolate. In other words, I walked up to each person with an upbeat vibe and a smile on my face. This ensured that the words coming out my mouth sounded more cheerful than in my previous attempts.

The result was significant: this time everybody took a chocolate, and more importantly, they were happy to do so!

Spurred on by my success, I wondered what would happen if I delivered my opening line in the wrong order! Hence, I changed my the phrase to: “It’s chocolate…take a Christmas!”. Pure gobbledegook! And you know what? It made no difference, people were still influenced to take a chocolate… and (probably) didn’t think I was mad!

Conclusion

Having a genuine reason to talk to people is important as it has a significant effect on how receptive they will be to you. However, your emotional expression makes an even bigger difference to how warmly you will be received in conversation; and ultimately, how influential you will be.

What is it about some people that makes everyone take notice when they walk into a room? The chances are that they radiate an aura of presence.

Presence is the ability to gain respectful attention and is the first step of making a great first impression. If you have ever felt that you are hiding your true self from the world, or have  wondered: “how do I get people to notice me?” then having presence is the answer to your frustrations.

In this video, you’ll learn how to make a strong personal impact on people and get all their eyes on you; so that you can command the attention of a room. The magical type of stage presence that skilled actors use to captivate an audience can just as readily be used to create magic off-stage too!

Charisma Coach USA: Introducing Jonny Dupré

On a recent trip to Mexico, I had the good fortune to meet a fellow expert in the field charisma, social dynamics and high impact communication skills: Jonny Dupré.

Jonny is a charisma coach based in San Diego and an absolute fount of knowledge when it comes to learning how to be charismatic. He and I immediately hit it off (after all, putting two charisma coaches together in the same room is like mixing cigarettes with C-4)! As we talked, we realised that we had a lot of original ideas to share about developing charisma and transforming your social skills.

I took the opportunity to quiz Jonny about one area close to his heart: the ability to create massive presence when you walk into a room.

Interview Transcript: Using Presence to Steal the Limelight

Below is a transcript of a short interview we filmed on the topic of creating presence and being the centre of attention:

Marcus: Welcome to the next episode of Your Charisma Coach. It’s finally here! Now it gives me great pleasure today to be interviewing an expert on presence, Jonny Dupré .

Jonny: Pleasure, Marcus.

Marcus: Pleasure is all mine. I had the absolute opportunity or pleasure to meet Jonny on a recent trip to Mexico. He has agreed to talk a little bit about what he does and what gives him the absolute, most massive presence I’ve ever seen of anybody. He walks into a room and people light up. Where to begin with this guy? I mean his voice projects everywhere. We don’t even need a microphone for this interview! His voice just booms out!

We went out to various clubs, to various parties. All eyes on this guy all the time. He has presence by the bucket load. Now I’ve been lucky to meet lots of people who are very successful in their respective fields of social communication. Jonny has the most presence of anyone I’ve ever met. So I thought picking his brains would be too good an opportunity to miss. Let’s find out what makes him amazing.

Jonny: Thanks, Marcus.

Marcus: Yes. Pleasure to meet you, Jonny. So what is presence?

Jonny: What is presence? For me literally is the ability to be so present in a situation. Not everybody else is present with you.

Marcus: Okay. So like present in your own self?

Jonny: Yes, and on the same point in time, it’s presenting of your self as a present individual within whatever situation that you’re in.

Marcus: Okay. Is that something you’ve always had or is that still – you had to develop and learn?

Jonny: Absolutely something I had to build. Absolutely something I had to build. As a kid, I went to a private school and so I didn’t really have a whole lot of opportunities to build social skills at a young age. I just really spent most of my time focusing on building intelligence.

Marcus: Okay…

Jonny: So when I had the opportunity to go into elementary school, a public school, all of a sudden, you know, you start meeting new people, new different groups, cliques. Popularity becomes more important. Social situations change and shift pretty quickly. So, I sort of ran smack face first into the ‘Mack Truck’  of needing presence.

Marcus: A lot of people, I’ve found when I’ve worked with them, have been in the situation (and I definitely I have too) where you’re in a bar maybe and you’re talking to like a couple of your friends and they’ll be like in the conversation [back and forth]: ‘chat-chat-chat-chat…’

Jonny: Yes.

Marcus: And you’re always playing sort of tennis. You’re at Wimbledon looking for the ball and you can’t get into the conversation and that’s – I mean that’s the perfect moment when having presence really helps. Is that something that you’ve had to deal with? And is there a technique we can use to smash into those social situations?

Jonny: Absolutely, absolutely. Of course. In most social situations, you’re going to be dealing with a lot of different factors especially a place like a night club or out in the – you know, Starbucks or something like that where there are people constantly being around us, the sounds in the room of the coffee being made and people yelling and some people talking on their phones and all the rest of that. For me, the biggest and most important thing that I have to learn to develop quickly was your voice. You absolutely have to present yourself through vocal tone the same way people perceive you.

Marcus: So your voice fills a room. You know, I think I talk loud but it’s like I think my voice sounds like a fly in the wind compared to you. So what do you do… or is there anything we can do to get that booming sound?

Jonny: Absolutely. There’s a lot you can do for specifically vocal tone and inflection. Number one, try speaking in a place that has a lot of sound around and just continuing to elevate your volume, literally just volume and you need to elevate it while not appearing to try harder.

Marcus: Right. What would a try-hard do?

Jonny: [Shouts and leans forward] Hey, Marcus! Come over here, man! It’s try-hard. You’re like screaming almost.

Marcus: Okay, Okay.

Jonny: As opposed to still projecting with volume even at this level while looking almost completely relaxed.

Marcus: So a bit more laid back?

Jonny: Yes, absolutely.

Marcus: So at breakfast this morning when I went, “Hey Jonny, how are you doing?” and you just walked past rand blanked me. That was why huh?

Jonny: Absolutely…. not!

Marcus: So is there any way you can test your projection in that way? I mean is there – do you have any little ideas, say go to a coffee shop maybe and try to get somebody’s attention from the back of the room. Would that work?

Jonny: Absolutely! And of course there’s the social situations we were talking about before. If you’re out in the night club, try increasing your distance from the group [you talk to]. So if the group has got three or four people in it, you’ll notice this sort of natural circle they’re creating or natural area they take up. I will take two steps back and see if I can still get them to perfectly and clear hear me.

Marcus: That’s a good little experiment to try.

Jonny: Yes.

Marcus: Yes. Okay fun times! All right. So how long does it take you to get proficient in presence? And what I mean by that is, you know, I think we all go through a learning curve to get a skill; and spend a few more months, maybe even years, refining that skill. But that initial curve [to improve presence], how long was that for you?

Jonny: That initial curve for me? Well, you know, it’s really interesting. I’ll take two seconds to talk about this right now.

Marcus: Okay.

Jonny: The difference between having someone there with you as a sort of sounding board [to practice with], takes this curve and [increases the speed you'll accelerate through it] by a monumental amount. So having your charisma coach being there with you gives you the opportunity to not only have the sounding board of the people that happen to be there (the bystanders in these situations). but also have somebody to practice with who knows and understands your intention so that they can actually help you.

[A coach is like] your sounding board who understands your intention for what you’re doing can help increase this monumentally. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t have somebody like that there to watch [what mistakes I was making]. So it was literally just ‘guess-and-check’ in approach. My process for improving my presence probably took much longer than it should have done.

Marcus: So you had like a methodical approach in the end for boosting your presence.

Jonny: Yes, I have a methodical approach to it. One thing at a time. I would just practice just one thing at a time so I would go into a club the entire night. I would spend that time focused just on [improving] my voice.

Marcus: So here’s a quick question then….

Jonny: Yes?

Marcus: Marlon Brando has a very introverted presence. Well, he did before he became a skeleton.

Jonny: [Laughs] Yes!

Marcus: Then you have someone like – in the UK, we have comedian called Russell Brand.

Jonny: Yes, I know Russell.

Marcus: Yeah, he’s doing quite well, he’s based in America now.

Jonny: Yes.

Marcus: But he has got a very extroverted presence.

Jonny: Yes.

Marcus: And you got these differences (ie. introverted and extroverted presence -types) So what controls that difference? How can someone have a quiet presence and not necessarily have to be the life and should of the party but still draw people on themselves; as opposed to somebody who [exudes much more energy].

Jonny: That is an interesting question. For me, it’s about energy. It’s about intensity.

Marcus: Emotional energy?

Jonny: Emotional energy specifically. So, if I’m in the club and I’m wanting to be quiet and reserved and more introverted, I’m going to be projecting the same voice tone through my eyes.

Marcus: Okay. Right.

Jonny: So it’s as if I’m still trying to impact the group without having to speak.

Marcus: So you form like a strong mental intention [which affects your body language and character]?

Jonny: Absolutely.

Marcus: Fantastic. Jonny, well we’re going to end it there… but not the friendship hopefully.

Jonny: Of course not, of course not.

Marcus: Yes, that’d be rubbish wouldn’t it!

Jonny: Okay. If we’re going to stay friends, you probably should take that [hands over roll of dollar bills].

Marcus: [Mock puzzlement ] This roll of money isn’t as thick as the one I gave you?

Jonny: [Laughs] Yes, I know. It’s weird how that happens.

Marcus: So, I know you’re in the process of developing your website at the moment.

Jonny: I am.

Marcus: And I’m hoping you’re going to come back to YourCharismaCoach.com and share a few more pearls of wisdom. So hopefully everyone watching can keep track of what you do because Jonny is going to be – you know, I think he’s still deciding exactly what he’s going to be doing but your knowledge on the social dynamics of creating social empowerment and building people’s social skills is, I mean, second to none. You’re absolutely fantastic.

Jonny: Thank you very much.

Marcus: So it’s an absolute pleasure. You can stay in touch with what Jonny is up to. I’ll add a link to the bottom of the text below this video shortly but in the meantime, many thanks, Jonny Dupré .

Jonny: Marcus, a pleasure.

Marcus: Thank you so much.

Jonny: Thank you.

Marcus: See you shortly in the next episode of your your charisma coach!

Final Thoughts

Improving your presence is key getting noticed in a great way, no matter if you’re on a stage (or in a coffee shop). It’s easy to feel that the best way to avoid criticism is to avoid being noticed at all. Unfortunately, this type of thinking has does even more harm in the longterm and often makes us feel invisible in social situations as we try and keep a low profile.

This interview will hopefully give you some ideas on how to maximise your moment in the limelight and enjoy that feeling of taking centre stage. All it comes down to how and here you direct your emotional energy and practising this aspect of your social skills was the key message embodied by Jonny. I’m certain that you haven’t seen or heard the last of him..!

Are You a Lucky Devil?

Some people seem more lucky than others: getting the breaks and wangling those amazing opportunities that allow them to prosper in life. Most rags-to-riches business people will tell you that their success came from a lot of hard work and a little bit of good luck.

Whilst hard work can be created with time and effort, luck seems a bit more elusive. In this video, I wanted to see how simple it would be to manufacture luck. After all, it seems to be a tipping point in most stories of success; and in my opinion, too crucial to chance to divine intervention.

Human Networks Are Powerful

Reaching out to people is a great way to harness your ever-developing social skills and transform your life by building genuine relationships with them. After all, it never ever hurts to know somebody who can pull the odd string or two to help you out; whether thats a business contact who can kick-start your career, or a colleague who’ll play matchmaker and refresh your dwindling dating life.

The Formula for Luck

The Roman philosopher Seneca strongly believed that: ‘Luck was what happened when preparation met with opportunity’. With this insight he highlighted two huge factors that fortunate people benefit from:

Step 1: Preparation

Who is that person sitting next to you in the hotel lobby? Or in front of you in the line for the toilet? When the random opportunity to meet a great person lands on your plate you’ll want to be sure you have the skills to take ACTION and speak to them. Some conversationalists are more skilled than others, so if you’re yet to master the gift of the gab you’ll probably just need a little practice to tighten up your skill set. Refine your conversation skills by talking to people everywhere. Start small and strike up conversations with people in shops: they’re usually very receptive.

Step 2: Opportunity

When you talk to people you’ll find that favourable circumstances present themselves to us more than you realise. For example, last week I was invited to a party. Feeling tired, I initially decided to pass on the opportunity. Remembering that more opportunity would be created if I went, I dragged myself to the venue and met my friends. The club was very loud and noisy (the type that make your head hurt) so I headed to a quiet area. Whilst there, I met a guy who also escaping from the noise. He turned out to be a movie director from Toronto! The secret to luck is siezing opportunity.

Say ‘YES’ More

In 2005, Danny Wallace wrote the book ‘Yes Man’, a diary that detailed his commitment to constantly welcome opportunity into his life. Wallace’s premise was simple: say ‘yes’ where once you would have said ‘no’. Making this decision positively transformed his life (to the point where Hollywood was impressed enough to put Jim Carrey in a movie about it!) Inspired, I decided to say YES more and document the result on video.

The First Yes…

I was contacted through my website by a student who asked me to give a business lecture at his university. I said Yes and agreed to the request. When the day came it took effort, hard work and a long night of planning to prepare for the talk.

The Second Yes…

After the lecture, several of the students invited me to the local bar for a drink. I was very tired as I had stayed awake the previous night planning my speech. I said Yes and agreed to the request. In doing so, I met and made many new friends and sunk a lot of beer.

The Third Yes…

A few months later, several of my friends at the university invited me to an event they were holding. They had arranged for Charles Dunstone, the co-founder of the UK telecommunications company Carphone Warehouse to give a speech. (According to Forbes, his net worth is about $1.6 Billion). I said Yes and agreed to the request. I turned up to the event and was lead to the front row of a huge auditorium. My friends promptly sat me next to the principal of the unviersity. Whils he was on stage I was able to ask Charles Dunstone a question I was curious about.

The Fourth Yes…

After Charles Dunstone left the stage, one of my friends asked me to join them for a drink again. I said Yes and agreed to the request. We chatted in the bar and enjoyed a beer. Woo should walk in but Charles Dunstone! I seized the opportunity and struck up a conversation with him: I was able to pick his billionaire brains about a few ideas and got to know him better. Most people would call that kind of networking opportunity good luck…really it was a product of saying yes.

Build a ‘Yes’ Chain!

Saying the odd yes here and there won’t do. That’s what everybody does. The power of yes truly reveals itself once you begin to build a chain of yeses. My story truly began in the middle of one such chain: it actually started back when somebody said I should build a website. If I hadn’t agreed to that suggestion then I would never have got the email that led to the opportunity to document the story you saw in the video!

Saying yes the first few times takes effort because you are relinquishing control. However, each Yes in the chain becomes easier. Agreeing to give a talk took time and effort. Joining a celebrity billionaire for a drink was a lot easier. A chain of agreements almost always leads to a profitable situation.

Conclusion

Say ‘Yes’ more… no matter how much that spoils your life. It’s only then you can fully appreciate the power of saying No…

You can make new friends anywhere… even if you’re by yourself in an unfamiliar place, like a new city. Chatting with people to make more friends is fun and a great way to build your social circle, so having the ability to approach a group and meet lots of new people is a powerful social skill to develop.

However, if you find the idea of chatting to groups of people by yourself a little daunting, then don’t worry -it’s quite natural to feel a little nervous: this is an advanced skill.

Approaching a group can feel like you’re walking into a lion’s den at times: as soon as you open your mouth you’re under pressure to make a great impression with the entire audience who are now looking at you… otherwise you risk coming across as an intrusion to their free time.

It’s for this reason that most people never even try to approach a group of strangers; only starting conversations with people who are also out by themselves. This really limits their options for connecting with people, making more friends easily and revamping their social life. This is behaviour that some people can do fairly well at a party, with a few drinks inside them. Doing it smoothy, whilst sober, in the daytime is a different prospect.

Understanding Group Dynamics Theory

Happily, I’m going to share some tips with you that’ll ensure those first few moments of approaching a group of strangers passes easily. That way, you can focus on making more friends, rather than collecting a sea of icy stares and cold shoulders.

For the most part, it’s easier to approach a group of people who are in a bar, pub or club. After all, the people in a venue like this huddled under the same roof for the same reason: to have fun!

Being chatty and meeting new people goes with the territory. Hence, if you squash enough people together into one space (indoors or outdoors), it’s almost certain that the groups will begin to mix and people will talk to one another… the group dynamics exist simply because everybody is standing so close together!

However, for this video, I wanted to practice talking to groups of people who were not squeezed close together as you would find in a typical social environment, such as on a popular beach. In other words, talking to groups who were busy amongst themselves and isolated from neighbouring communities of people.

(Hey, I like to make life difficult for myself!)

In my opinion, attempting to approach and befriend a group of people who are sitting on their own, in an empty park, is one of the more difficult scenarios you will encounter on your journey to improve your social skills.

After all, you don’t know why they are there, or whether they are receptive to a random person like you infiltrating their private gathering. Worse still, they can see you for a good while as you walk up to them, which affects your ability to operate smoothly!

Time for a Few Social Experiments

Following a few days of wet weather, the London park I visited was almost absent of people sitting on the rain-soaked grass. It was perfect training ground to test a few ideas out! In the video, we’ll look at how to approach and befriend a group of people. You’ll learn how to approach a group of girls; and how to apporached a mixed group of people.

Approach #1

I walked up to the group and hung around near them for a while. I was curious to see if this would help acquaint themselves with my presence. It didn’t. Nobody spoke to me so I asked a question to start the ball rolling. Two members of the group kindly answered my
question and I was left with nothing to do but leave.

Lesson Learned: Take responsibility for beginning the conversation and don’t use a question that can be answered with one word to start the conversation: after it has been answered you have nothing left to talk about and no reason for being near them (unless you fight for conversation, which would be awkward).

Approach #2

This time, I decided to take the initiative and start conversation by asking an open ended question to the group, about the badminton game a few of them were playing (just out of shot in the video). The idea was that this would hint that I might also be up for a game. The group answered my question but didn’t really expand on their reply, or get the subtle hint, so I was left in a situation where I had to leave… or linger around in an awkward fashion that the British do so well. I left!

Lesson Learned: Bring something of value to the group. Asking a question takes away their time from each other and is distracting, unless you can feed more conversation off of it. Walking up to a group with something interesting or fascinating in tow will make them more receptive to you.

Approach #3

This time I walked up to the group with a gimmick: a pop-up frisbee that I wanted to test out. Ever wondered how to approach a group of girls outdoors? Take a game with you! The promise of fun got one of the girls to join in the game and her friends enjoyed the source of amusement (and me looking moronic).

Consequently, this group were more engaged with me, but now I had a new hurdle. I didn’t take responsibility to sit down and join them! Instead, I waited to be asked, which we already know doesn’t work. Overall, a fun interaction but not one where I really got to connect with anybody new.

Lesson Learned: Ask for permission to join the group once you have engaged them on an emotional level: “Do you mind if I join you?” works well.

Approach #4

I approached the group and got their attention as early as possible. I asked if they were friendly (they were) and proceeded to ask them a straightforward question. We chatted light-heartedly and then I asked to join them. They agreed and I met some very cool people as a result!

Lesson Learned: Be cheerful and in a good mood. As soon as the group smile, ask to join them and proceed to sit down (NB. next time, I will remind myself of a cool event I can invite them out to at the end of our chat.)

So there you have it: a simple strategy for meeting and connecting with groups of people in public spaces!

Exclusive BONUS Video: A Simple Technique to Create a Massive Connection with People

Sometimes you can unexpectedly hit it off when talking to new people. You’ll know that awesome moment: it’s when you instantly feel like you’re talking to a friend and and the conversation blasts wide open.

It’s a great feeling when it happens but is there a tried-and-tested technique that will allow you to connect with people on a deep emotion level every time? I decided to make another exclusive video, revealing a technique I DISCOVERED that will help you ‘click’ with every person you meet!

You can only see the Bonus Video on my Facebook Page (to find it, scroll down the wall to October 2011). Keep up to date with more exclusive videos like this one by clicking “LIKE” on my Facebook page once you get there!

Life is no fun when you have no friends! Today we’re going to look at how to make more friends… from scratch.

I figured a typical bench in a park at lunchtime would be a good place to begin for this short tutorial, since this kind of setting is common wherever you are in the world: all you need is a seat and some sunshine!

Starting a Conversation

To strike up a new conversation smoothly, you’ll want to look for remarks that you can fire off without any rehearsal. Spontaneous observations that are delivered ‘off-the-cuff’allow you to express yourself in an authentic manner; but there is a knack to it.

I prefer to start conversations with remarks that make me laugh just as readily as the people I am talking to!

Here’s a good habit to get into: be aware of your surrounding envronment at all times. As you walk around let your attention drift upon things that quietly make you smile; whether that’s a dog chasing a pushbike, or a mischevious kid throwing a frisbee at his Dad’s head! If it makes you grin, it’s gold!

Doing this will really develop your initial conversation skills quickly, which is key if you want to make more friends easily.

As I approached the two seated girls, I noticed that they had both (for some unexplained reason) removed their shoes and tucked them under the bench! I was bemused by this quirky fact and the first thing that popped into my mind was the goofy idea:

‘I’m going to steal your shoes!’

Now, this might not have been the most perfect line in the world but just the thought of sharing that silly idea made me smile, so it was perfect. After all, I was already starting the conversation from with a ‘Win/Win’ mindset: it’s either going to turn out well/ or make me laugh.

(NB. You can read more about the win/win mindset in Chapter 5 of my free ebook. Stick your details on the sign up form on the right to get it now!)

The spontaneous icebreaker I used happily made both of the girls laugh, which was great. However, most importantly, my joke made ME laugh too, so I knew I was going to have fun!

Already the conversation was charged with some happy emotions, which makes everything else to come that little bit more easy.

Keeping the Conversation Going

When you strike up a conversation with a witty observation, it’s easy to let the giggles fade into silence (and most people leave at that point). For the conversation to continue, you have to be different and keep the dialogue going: this often takes focused effort on your part, so be ready for it!

You have to take full responsibilty for the conversation as soon as you begin speaking, hence it’s best to continue enjoying the topic of conversation -no matter how anyone else chooses to react to it! To keep the conversation going, it’s vital that you take it upon yourself to keep your mouth moving as much as possible to begin with.

In the video, this happens the moment I ditch the joke and ask:

“Where are you from?”

Not the most exciting question to ask a stranger but I am showing an interest in them. At this point, I choose to listen carefully to their short answers and make reasonably long statments about what they say. Doing this helps the conversation along by introducing new topics to talk about and provides yet a further reason to stay in the conversation.

The situation is not uncommon: they are sitting and I am standing. This could just as easily be happening at a table in a bar or on a sun lounger by a swimming pool. It may seem common sense to sit down with them and join them on the bench straight away, but why rush?

The longer your conversation continues, the more comfortable the people you speak to will feel. I chose to sit down when they started asking me questions about my life, which showed that they were curious about me too: hence, sitting down at this point feels like a natural progression in the conversation.

(And it should do!)

Building Rapport

I believe a pivotal point in any conversation is when you establish first name terms with the people you talk to. Some conversations with strangers can last hours with out this formality passing. However, when people are spread out (such as in a park, or even a quiet airport terminal) I have found that learning a person’s name will acclerate rapport in the early stages of conversation.

From this point the conversation flows pleasantly as we share stories about what we’ve been up to and where we are going during the rest of our day and life in general.

Once we have reached an invisble point where we all have around five cool facts we can share with each other we have established a strong sense of rapport. From here all that is needed is to remain talking comfortably, suggest doing another activity (frisbee?), or take their details and meet them another time, which is what I demonstrate here.

Having great conversation skills is about making everyone feel comfortable as quickly as possible. When you make people feel comfortable you make more friends easily. You don’t need the charisma of Bill Clinton to pull this off, just patience and a gentle persistence with the discussion at hand.

However, what should you do when your conversation doesn’t go to plan? See below for more tips!

Exclusive BONUS Video: How to Talk to Difficult People

It’s never easy talking to difficult people! During recent filming I encountered another two women on sitting on park bench: one seemed warm, whilst the other was very aloof. I decided to make an exclusive video, revealing what I DISCOVERED when how I persisted with the conversation and maintained a positive attitude!

You can only see the video on how to talk to difficult people on my Facebook Page (to find it, scroll down the wall to August 2011). Keep up to date with more exclusive videos like this one by clicking “LIKE” on my Facebook page once you get there!

When creating an aura of charisma, you need bucket loads of presence.

Today, I’m going to reveal one big secret that gave President Clinton the ability to effortlessly draw people into his world; and salesman Jim Eastwood (from BBC One’s ’The Apprentice’) the means to persuade others… with an almost hypnotic power. Indeed, Eastwood’s Irish charm was so evident that the UK media dubbed him ‘Jedi’ Jim Eastwood!

- So what makes Bill Clinton and Jim Eastwood so capable of exuding presence?

Well, according to Michael Ellsberg, author of ‘The Power of Eye Contact’ it all has to do with the number of behaviours a person employs when communicating their message to others. Ellsberg uses the jargon term ‘modalities’, which refers to simple gestures that you can use when talking to someone.

For example, winking when you talk to someone adds extra weight to your message, as does touching them. However, combining both behaviours has a synergistic effect that makes you stand out. It seems this is a key factor on how to stage presence.

Here’s a helpful list of modalities:

• Smiling & eye contact
• Raising your voice
• Facing somebody
• Winking
• Touching them
• Raising an eyebrow
• Pointing

Ellsberg noted (originally on Tim Ferris’ excellent blog) that Clinton employs a simultaneous mixture of ‘eye contact, smiling, touch and rasing his voice’ to communicate a powerful message to his listener.

Without a doubt, Clinton’s eye contact is so powerful that Chuck Close, his portrait artist, remarked: “When he looks directly into youreyes, he has an almost laser-beam-like-lock-on thing that he does. He makes you feel like he’s really connected to you”

With that in mind, I was curious to know what was the optimal number of modalities to use at any one time if you wanted to radiate the aura of Clinton, or the Irish charm of Jedi Jim Eastwood.

I took to the streets of London and carried out five experiments to demonstrate how to stage presence.

The goal was to break the ice, using an increasing number of modalities:

• Experiment 1: Using touch
• Experiment 2: Raising my voice whilst facing them
• Experiment 3: Smiling with eye contact; and raising my voice whilst facing them
• Experiment 4: Smiling with eye contact;  touch, raising my voice & facing them
• Experiment 5: Using as many behaviours as possible (frankly, being a mad person!)

It seemed using that 3-4 modalities created the strongest presence, which wasn’t too overbearing for the listener. However, using less, or more, gestures came across awkward and uncalibrated in most cases. This results mirrors the behaviours of both Clinton and Eastwood and seems to be the strongest way of staging presence.

EXCLUSIVE BONUS VIDEO: JIM EASTWOOD!

I was suitably impressed and intrigued with Jim Eastwood’s communication skills that I made an exclusive video revealing the secret of Jim Eastwood’s Irish Charm! You can only see it on my Facebook Page (to find it, scroll down the wall to July 2011). Stay up to date with more exclusive videos like this one by clicking “LIKE” once you get there!