Present Like a Pro: The 4 Brain Hacks Used by Top Performers [Social Intelligence Brief]

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1:12You missed your shot to connect. Today we're going to help you break through that hesitation. You'll learn three simple, proven openers and a two-step drill to crush any anxiety before it even starts. Let's dive in.

1:34Now, we know that hope is not a strategy. When you wait for that perfect timing, you actually hand the opportunity to the louder person. In fact, pro-networkers stack planned approaches. A 2023 LinkedIn Bain study found that the top 10 % of Rainmakers initiated four times more chats per event, meaning the more prepared you are going in, the more likely you are to have great interactions that lead to opportunities. So our goal today is to teach you how to be proactive and strategic with your networking and give you three simple ways that you can strike up conversations with anyone instantly. Now, when it comes to the science, compliments work great.

2:11They light up our reward circuits for both the giver and the receiver. So meaning not only do you make the other person feel good, you feel good too, because oxytocin and dopamine surge when we give that compliment. Now, the second strategy is actually direct requests, and they trigger higher compliance than many people predict. This was a cross-cultural field study done in 2024 that found this exact strategy works. Now, the last point we wanna make scientifically speaking is the more you put yourself in high anxiety-educing interactions, the less likely you are to feel anxiety in the future. So practicing these reps and using these three strategies that we're about to share with you actually make it easier for you in the moment to strike up that conversation.

2:54So let's talk about our first play, which is something that we teach all of our X Factor Accelerator members. The more you appreciate others, the more they appreciate you. So can you walk up, give them a genuine compliment and ask a curious question? Here's a great example. I love Barry's Bootcamp, as I've shared on the podcast numerous times. Of course, it's a training program that involves sprinting on the treadmill and then lifting weights. And oftentimes I'm watching people on the treadmill over from me sprinting at speeds unimaginable. And I remember I was trying to make some friends, build a social circle here in LA.

3:29I just moved to a new part of town and I was regularly attending this Barry's Bootcamp class. And I saw this one guy who was just constantly killing it on sprints. After class, I shared with him, hey, I couldn't keep up with your sprints on the treadmill. How long have you been a runner? And that simple compliment followed by a question struck up a conversation. and over time I built familiarity going to class after class. We ended up starting hiking together and all of a sudden a friendship formed. So when you think about an easy way to strike up a conversation is to give someone else a genuine compliment, show that appreciation and then ask a question that elicits a simple response and you're gonna be off and running in a conversation in no time.

4:06Maybe you're checking out an art gallery over the weekend and you happen to see the photographer there. You walk up to them and say, I love how you paired those prints. What drew you to surrealism or what drew you to photography. And you're going to find that that simple compliment evokes a fast and easy conversation with someone else. Now, I know what you guys are thinking listening to this because AJ and I, we hear it all the time. And usually the first thing is you are thinking about why this is not going to work because you're trying to get out of doing it. So I want to get you into the mode of thinking about why this does work because we're playing on appreciation.

4:47Everybody has something that you can find about them that is interesting or unique to them that you appreciate. For some of you, you might be thinking, oh, but if it's not genuine, we'll make it genuine. Again, rather than trying to think of reasons why this won't work, we want to get you thinking about reasons why it does work. We're important that you find the one that most suits your personality because when you begin to practice it, and you will, if you want to reduce that approach anxiety, you would be surprised at how well and how smooth you will get at all three of these. So let's start thinking about why this will work.

5:38And here's the thing. When you make that compliment, you light up their reward center and And then you open up an opportunity for them to share a little bit about themselves with that follow-up question. You put the spotlight on them and they're feeling great. So of course, they're going to add to the conversation. It's the easiest way to break the ice. Now, the second strategy you want to share is even easier. Everyone listening has a set of eyes. Make an observation and ask a simple question. Maybe you're at a food fair and you've been standing in line at the food truck waiting for that food.

6:08You look around and you turn to someone and you say, hey, the line's twice as long for these ramen buns. Is this the food that's going viral on TikTok? Have you tried it before? That simple observation and allowing the other person to share in that observation with you is one of the easiest ways to break the ice. Or maybe you're like me with a dog at the dog park and you turn to the person next to you and you say, hey, your lab seems to be hurting my cockapoo. How old are they? This simple observation allows someone else to share in the environment with you and then asking a question elicits that great conversation.

6:38Observations work best in areas where there's a lot of stimuli going on that you can point to. And the other thing that makes this fun is that it puts you and the person you're speaking to on the same team discussing something that you're both looking at. So from there, you can go on with something that we teach in our accelerator programs, which is we statements, creating the illusion that you're working with the person that you're speaking to. You're now on a team and the exaggerations and the banter can fly from there. It's incredibly fun. If you're still overpaying for wireless, it's time to say yes to saying no.

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9:10Go to quince.com slash charm for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash charm. Free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com slash charm. Now the last strategy is even more straightforward. So if you find yourself to be very direct, well, that's exactly what we're going to do. We're going to go direct and we're going to ask a question. Make that polite, direct introduction. What's your reason for interest? And then open with a question. So maybe you are hanging out at a pitch night and you walk up to someone and you're like, hey, Maya, I'm also a supply chain nerd.

9:48Your dashboard really caught my eye. What data streams fuel that real-time feed? Now, this simple strategy, you call out something about yourself, your reason for making the introduction and ask a follow-up question, very quickly is going to strike up a conversation. Maybe you're like me browsing the bookstore. In the fiction section, you turn to someone saying, hey, I want to read more fiction kick. Read anything you'd recommend lately? Obviously, in a bookstore, there's that direct opportunity for you to ask a great question of a fellow reader and get a great recommendation and boom, the conversation is flowing.

10:21Why I like the direct method is it takes the guesswork out. You don't have to think about anything at all. In fact, you can just talk about what you were doing previously to walking over and talking to this person. In fact, we had one of our friends had showed us this trick that he used with his clients. And it's something that we had done in the past as well, which is you walk up to somebody, maybe it's in the park, maybe it's at a social event and you say, Hey, you know, I was just sitting over there and had seen you walk in and I was compelled. It just shows the confidence that you have in yourself to be able to go so direct.

11:05And the best part is you're literally just giving the play-by-play of what just happened. So you don't even have to be that observant to go direct. Now, why does it land? Because when you clearly show intent, it reduces that uncertainty. Why is this person talking to me? Well, that completely dissolves when you go direct. And that's why we end up seeing with our clients in the X Factor Accelerator that they actually get a higher yes rate by going direct. So today we shared three clear ways for you to strike up a conversation. So no longer will you be flat footed in those situations where you know you should be saying something, whether it's making an appreciative statement and asking that question, whether it's making an observation and asking a question or just straight up going direct and asking that question.

11:50All three of these strategies add a question at the end. Why? Because all great conversations involve the other person. And the best way to get them talking with you is by asking them a question after sharing something with them. So here's our practice plan this week. We want you to pick your arena. Might be the park, might be the bookstore, could be the dog park, even as I shared earlier, or go to that food truck festival. What you're going to do is you're going to run these three strategies on strangers five times while you're there. We're talking five interactions. Pick any one of the three and walk up to five people.

12:25Now, of course, you're going to notice that first time your anxiety might spike a little bit. It might be a little difficult for you to get those words out of your mouth. But by the time the fifth one rolls around, you're going to find that that anxiety is completely dissipated and you're having a great time and you might end up even making a new friend. So here's what we want to do after. We want you to share a little bit about how you felt after that. Odds are you felt a lot better after that exercise than before. Why is this? because we all mentally work ourselves up with that anxiety before we go and do it.

12:57And we see this time and time again with our comfort zone challenges inside the X-Factor Accelerator. They feel a little intimidating at first. They feel a little bit outside your comfort zone. But by doing it five times and practicing it, you're gonna find that you just stretched your comfort zone and that approach anxiety just started to dissipate. Right, Johnny? Absolutely. And if you're serious about this and you commit to it, you can greatly reduce any of anxiety that you feel in just a weekend. And if you continue on with it before you know it, you won't feel anything at all. I remember when our clients would ask, how long am I going to be stuck with this approach anxiety?

13:38And my answer was, well, it never leaves you as fast as you would like it to, but it certainly doesn't take as long as you think it's going to. And as I mentioned, it's just a couple of sessions over a weekend, and you would be surprised how confident you're feeling. And don't worry about having incredibly long, deep, drawn-out conversations with people. We're looking for micro-interactions to get started. And there's data that we've talked about on the show, how micro-interactions improve your well-being. So head out to the park, head out to that cafe and go make people's day as well as reducing your approach anxiety.

14:21Now, if you're listening to this and you love the strategies, but you want more reps, join us in our X Factor Accelerator. Every week we're meeting and practicing these exact same skills and giving you direct feedback, right, Johnny? Absolutely. And this is one of the skills that we make sure that our clients knock out first in our X-Factor Accelerator program. There's all sorts of comfort zone challenges that work you up to be able to make these approaches so that you can hit the stairs and level up at each time. And as AJ mentioned, all of our clients, after doing a few of the comfort zone challenges, they look to increase the intensity because it becomes a lot of fun.

15:06So get out there and knock it out. If you're ready to stretch your comfort zone, head over to unlockyourxfactor.com and apply now. That's unlockyourxfactor.com. All right, go out there this week and get your approaches. We want to hear how it goes.

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