Bantering on the Fly

So, since I’ve been dubbed the banter king by a bunch of my fellow instructors I tend to get a lot of coaching clients that want me to teach them banter. The good news is most of these guys come to me for the right reasons. They don’t ask me to teach them all of my own personal banter lines, but how they can get to a point where they can banter on their own and improv.

One of the very important things is building your intuition. A lot of people might refer to this as cold reading, but I think it’s different. I think the idea of a cold read and warm are misleading to guys just learning social dynamics.

The idea of a cold and a warm read implies that when you first met someone you don’t know anything about them. Then after speaking with them you “learn” thing s about them. I hate the terms and generally don’t use them because I think there is a different scale.

I think everyone had a natural intuition. Intuition seems like one of the hippy tree-hugger words, but I think it’s more legitimate then that. I think that we are able to learn a lot about someone by just looking at them.

What are they wearing, how do they stand, how do they walk? Where are they looking? Do they look up, straight ahead, or at their feet when they walk? When the encounter people around them, how do they react? When they talk what does their voice sound like? How articulate are they are? What type of slang vernacular, or accent do they have or use?

Whether or not you are consciously aware of these things, they have a huge impact on your assessment of someone. Developing your “intuition” is really honing your skills to read between the lines.

If I were to meet someone, I could have a conversation with them in about 20 seconds with absolutely NO real content and be able to guess a lot of things about: what type of person they are, what their life is life, how confident they are, where they grew up, what type of relationships they’ve had in the past, and what type of day they’re having right now. There literally millions of assessments that you could make about someone very quickly.

Now, most people might argue that Yes, you could make those assessments, but how many times would you be right? The secret is that, you don’t have to be. When you’re wrong people correct you and then tell you the real deal – TO PROVE that you’re wrong.
But, each time this happens your intuition gets better because you start building this database of experience with meeting people and making quick assessments of them. If you don’t believe you can do this, then go read the book “Blink” for a change of perspective on this subject,

Obviously these skills are great for rapport….But they’re also KILLER for banter.

So, lets say you see someone and you get an intuition about them. You banter is merely you expressing that in a fun and playful way. Please read again: FUN and PLAYFUL.

Example 1:

Intuition: You get the feeling that this high class woman that you met at the bar 5 minutes ago, is actually a big dork and not as sophisticated as she tries to come off.

Banter: “You’re cute because you try to come off as this powerful and sophisticated woman, but I get the feeling you’re really a big closest dork that likes to stay home and watch cartoons in your underwear.”

Example 2:

Intuition: You are in line a Starbucks and the college student looking chick in front of you is fumbling through her purse and can’t find something. She is obviously frazzled.

Banter: “Are you alright (with a big smile)? It’s one of “THOSE” days, huh? Yeah, but those are great days though because they always end up starting like crap and just ending with a couple rounds martini’s and then it gets significantly better.”

So in both cases you use your intuition to figure something out about someone. Once you have made some assumption about someone, you present that to them in a fun and playful way.

Stayed tuned for finding ways to present information people in fun ways that gets laughs.