Tactics Tuesdays: Interest Loops

Let’s have a quick look at combining interest bait with open loops – something we’ll dub ‘interest loops’. This is really only for intermediate and advanced socializers, but might still be an interesting read even if you’re not there yet.

As a recap, interest bait is anything you say that piques a girl’s interest in what you’ll say next or why you’re saying it. For instance, “You know who you remind me of?” or, “Can I ask you something persona?”

An open loop is a conversation thread you open, then leave open, while you switch over to another conversation thread. For instance, if you open a loop talking about your recent trip to California, then without closing that thread switch to having her tell you about her semester abroad in France. When the semester abroad thread ends, you can return to the California trip – or just open more loops.

The benefit of interest bait is its ability to intrigue girls who might otherwise not be tuned in (or even have one foot out of the interaction).

The benefit of open loops is that conversations feel ‘incomplete’ when they still have conversation threads left open… so you can keep a bunch of loops open and she’ll feel more committed to continuing the conversation.

So what happens if you combine interest bait with an open loop, creating what we’ll call interest loops?

 

What an Interest Loop Looks Like

The first time I noticed someone using interest loops was on the now-defunct mASF forum. Talented natural A2daMIR often used interest loops to hook in girls who were annoyed with or indifferent to him. His most common interest bait was “I just noticed something about you” or “I just realized something about you.” When the girl asked what, he’d delay answering and instead switch to a different conversation thread.

Like so:

[in the gym]

GIRL: [not showing much interest in him and probably about to walk away]

A2DAMIR: I just realized something about you.

GIRL: What?

A2DAMIR: I’ll tell you in a minute. Could you watch my bench for a second? I need to fill up my water bottle and don’t want anyone to steal my towel.

Then when he’d return he’d start talking to her about something unrelated and not mention the thing he’d noticed about her. He wouldn’t resolve that thread until many minutes later, usually just before or asking her out, and with some humorous observation (like “Well I just noticed you spend a lot of time standing around talking to hot guys like me instead of working out”… which is a funny chase frame if you’re the one who pulled her into conversation and are the whole reason she’s still there talking instead of working out!).

Another mASF natural named Lifeguard also used interest loops. His would proceed like so:

GIRL: I’ve been playing violin since I was five.

LIFEGUARD: You know what they say about girls who play violin…

GIRL: What?

LIFEGUARD: [laughs] I’ll tell you later.

He’d then change the subject to something unrelated (or return to another, earlier opened open loop).

Neat little tactic, I thought. But what’s it do for you?

 

Effect of an Interest Loop

I don’t think I fully realized how powerful interest loops were until I had girls use them on me a few times. For instance, I might have told a girl I was a writer, and had her reply, “You know what they say about guys who are writers, right?” Then if I asked what, she’d say, “We can talk about it later,” then ask me what kind of stuff I wrote.

Well, this kind of thing just about drives you crazy. What’s she mean by that? Is it something sexual? Is it some kind of self-esteem thing? Is it something else entirely? You just have no idea, and your mind keeps coming back to it.

The reason it works is because (especially when the interest bait is about something the other person realized/noticed about you, or something ‘people say’ about something you do or someplace you’re from) you start to wonder if you are DOING something or EXHIBITING some trait that you aren’t aware of but other people pick up on.

Because the target of the interest loop doesn’t know if the observation is about something good or bad, she’s in suspense wondering if she is accidentally signaling something weird or bad about herself without knowing it. Alternately she may wonder if she’s actually showing something off worth being proud about, which she does not even know is on display.

It’s such a little, offhand comment, but it sticks in the mind and starts to drive people kind of crazy as they struggle to guess what it is you mean.

 

Creating an Interest Loop

The best interest bait for a good interest loop implies something about your target herself:

• “I just noticed something about you.”
• “Hey, you know what I realized about you?”
• “You know what they say about girls who do [activity].”
• “You know what they say about girls from [place].”
• “Did you know you can tell how a girl [does something] from the way she [does whatever other thing she’s doing]?”

For example on that last one: “Did you know you can tell how a girl makes love from the way she eats an apple?” if she’s eating an apple right in front of you. What that does is makes her wonder what very private, personal thing she’s advertising to you (and anyone else paying attention) right now in this moment as she chows down on her apple. Unless she’s a robot it’s going to drive her a bit nuts with curiosity.

But rather than give her the satisfaction of knowing right away, you are going to keep her in suspense. So you’ll beg off with one of the following:

• “I’ll tell you later.”
• “We’ll talk about that in a moment.”
• “Well, we’ll get to that… but first:”

Then change the subject.

I’ll give you some examples so you can see exactly how this works.

 

Example 1: Apple Girl

Let’s take that earlier example of the girl eating an apple. Here’s how the full interest loop looks:

HER: [talking about an art project she’s working on] [bites apple]

YOU: Did you know you can tell how a girl has sex from the way she eats her apple?

HER: Really? How?

YOU: [laugh] I’ll tell you later. [sly smile] But you were saying about your art project?

HER: Right, well blah blah

So now she’s back on the earlier conversation thread, but she’s got this thing in her head making her wonder what you’re able to tell about her lovemaking from how she eats her apple… wondering if OTHER people are aware of it… and every time she takes a bite of that apple she’s going to be self-conscious about it.

Then you just keep opening other loops / jumping to other conversation threads for a while and let that simmer. At some point you can finally give her the answer. People really do eat the way they have sex, so it’s a pretty good analogy for any kind of food where there are different ways to eat it. If you want to know how you’d tell her what her lovemaking is like based on her apple consumption, just think about whether she’s an itty-bitty nibbler or a ravenous chow hound who takes huge, lusty bites out of her apples and you’ve got a pretty good idea!

 

Example 2: Stockholm Girl

Here’s another example. Say you’re talking to a Swedish girl, and you find out where she’s from.

YOU: You have an accent. Where’re you from?

HER: I’m from Sweden!

YOU: Oh no way. Where in Sweden? You from Stockholm?

HER: Yes!

YOU: Uh-oh. Well you know what they say about girls from Stockholm.

HER: What?

YOU: Let’s talk about that later. What’re you doing over here?

HER: I’m studying for my blah blah blah degree

You have now opened a loop on a very intriguing subject (something about her, as a woman, that “people say” but she does not yet know). She’s curious what it is, but rather than give her immediate satisfaction you have hooked her in to sticking around while you build more repartee and rapport in the conversation.

Pretty groovy, right?

 

Closing the Interest Loop

At some point you will of course need to give her an answer for “what people say” or what you noticed about her. This is where your ability to improvise comes in – and why I say only intermediate and advanced players should be using it.

Beginners can obviously tell a girl “You know what they say about girls who X!” but then when it comes time to name what “they say” about such girls they’ll struggle.

Nevertheless, here are a few pointers on resolving an interest bait properly:

• Make sure it’s nothing insulting. Don’t say anything she might take offense at. Seems obvious, but especially if a guy is inexperienced at this the first thing that pops to mind might be something rude. Don’t use it. If you’re teasing her (and you will probably be teasing her), it should be fun.

• If it’s obvious, at least make it funny. If you tell her you just noticed something about her, and then make her wait for it, and then tell her you noticed she has highlights in her hair, that is not funny, nor is it clever; it is just obvious and kind of dumb of a thing to say you just noticed then make her wait to find out about. Obvious observations have to be funny, or else they aren’t suited to be resolutions to an interest loop.

• It can’t be anything too involved. This needs to be something simple. If you’re about to launch into a five-sentence spiel about the thing you noticed, that’s too much for a line of banter like this. Whatever you say, make it short and sweet.

This is bad:

“I just noticed something about you. I’ll tell you later. [LATER] Your hair is kind of oily.”

Also bad:

“I just noticed something about you. I’ll tell you later. [LATER] You have really curly hair.”

Good:

“I just noticed something about you. I’ll tell you later. [LATER] Well, what I noticed is you have booby trap hair. See, if I stick my finger in a curl right here, I might never get it out again. [DEMONSTRATE]”

What makes that last one funny? She’s been waiting for minutes, thinking this was some significant thing, and instead it turns out it’s a joke. That’s funny. The other two aren’t funny, because the first one is a basic observation that’s a little bit rude, and the second is just a really boring, basic observation.

Another example:

Bad:

“You know what they say about pescatarians. But we’ll get to that. [LATER] They say pescatarians don’t get enough red meat!”

Also bad:

“You know what they say about pescatarians. But we’ll get to that. [LATER] Pescatarians are really healthy.”

Good:

“You know what they say about pescatarians. But we’ll get to that. [LATER] Well, what they say is about two years in they suddenly get really good at swimming.”

The first two examples are bad because the first one is a really obvious joke that also sounds like it might be being pushy (people get really pushy about diet… so anyone talking about how “Your diet is lacking X” sounds like he might be trying to push his diet on you), and the second one is just a boring, basic observation.

The third example is good because it’s a really ridiculous joke… that after two years of eating fish she suddenly becomes an excellent swimmer. It’s funny for the same reason the booby trap hair joke is funny: she’s been stewing for minutes, thinking this is some profound thing you know about her as a pescatarian, worried she might have to feel self-conscious, only for it to turn out to be a silly joke.

 

When to Use Interest Loops

You should not usually use interest loops as openers (however… there’s an exception for every rule!). Instead, you can sprinkle them into your conversation as random teases and intrigue builders. You can also use them if a girl’s interest seems to be flagging and you want to rope her in a little longer while you rebuild the connection.

Don’t overuse them. You can really only use them so often with any one girl before the tactic grows stale.

However, sprinkled in, they can add a lot of intriguing energy to your conversations with women – intriguing energy that she won’t be able to get out of her head.

Chase Amante