Good questions lead the conversation, you can have someone talking for hours based on the questions you ask as you guide them to where they want to be. To do this successfully you need to do a few things first.
-Understand others and show you do
-Clearly express yourself
-Be able to impose an influence on others
-Actively listen
-Ask open and detailed questions
-Take care of your own needs and goals during the conversation
-Exchange opinions in non conflicting ways
By asking penetrating questions on the topic you can lead entire conversations by asking great questions. This could be to your boss, co worker, girl your on a date with or a prospect. Ask great questions and the words will flow. All you have to do is listen carefully and actively to what they are saying. The more you listen, the better the follow up questions will be, now be fucking patient. There is nothing worse than asking a question, they open the hose and start talking only for you to interject with another question that kills the rhythm of the conversation. In person a few seconds pause (2-3 seconds) is ideal, online where “read” and the …. show up once you start typing. Follow the same game plan. Let them answer, read it over and give it a few seconds before typing the reply.
Ask unique questions, to start the conversation. You tend to have to start off a little
slower as you’re not going to walk up to or message someone right off the bat and ask them “what do they feel is the ideal risk reward for long term success”, no you fucking psycho, “hey how are you doing”, “good?” “Good?” Blah blah blah, get the little small talk out of the way so you can get into the meat of the conversation. Now don't free ball this shit or you will look stupid, follow up about a prior topic the two of you had spoken about or something fresh you want to discuss, better to be prepared with a game plan than get through the chit chat and be standing there holding your dick in your hand wondering what to ask next.
When they’re talking and you want them to continue, here are some layups to get them to continue talking.
That's interesting, tell me more
That's interesting so you’re saying (repeat back what they said in summary)
That's interesting so you’re telling me (repeat back what they said in summary)
If the convo is going south and you’re stuck with a troll let's take a step back and figure out why that happens. It tends to start from a source of anger that lies in our thinking, beliefs, attitude or our needs, expectations and judgements. If you feel angry, it very often means that some of your needs remain unfulfilled. When you choose yelling and making accusations as a method of expressing emotion, you'll have unnecessary conflict instead of solutions, and your relationship with the other person will only get worse. When all else fails you can use a few of the examples below to end the conversation and move on with your life.
That's interesting, why would you ask that?
That's interesting, why do you feel that way?
How am I supposed to do that?
Do you have balls?
In the Group Chat share a conversation where you were able to use :
That's interesting, tell me more
That's interesting so you’re saying (repeat back what they said in summary)
That's interesting so you’re telling me (repeat back what they said in summary)
Or if you got stuck with a troll how you were able to nip it in the bud by using:
That's interesting, why would you ask that?
That's interesting, why do you feel that way?
How am I supposed to do that?