People asked for this after the last big post on all this stuff, so I went back and updated the old article I wrote. Obv it's a wall of text again, but nowhere near as bad as last one.
Meeting women during the day has always been my favorite variety of pick up. I guess I just admire the audacity of it; plenty of guys can have a couple drinks out at night and find the courage to go talk to a girl, and everyone runs some degree of social circle game, but a day time cold approach is truly a rarity and sight to see. Additionally, most nights I just don't enjoy spending my time in a club since I wouldn't have much reason for being there other than chasing girls, and personally that feels a bit exhausting. I appreciate having the opportunity to have a proper conversation with a girl and getting to know her as opposed to the blaring sound of your average club or crowded bar. I've been asking girls lately how often they get cold approached directly during the day, and most of my answers are around 1-2 times a year, and my guess is that would be from a guy who's just taking a shot with no technique.
At this stage, I've done somewhere between 200 and 250 direct day time approaches. I've done them mostly in Australia, Vegas, and a few in random places like Africa and Dubai (not the locals!) The methods and style I've learned is much of the result of Soul aka Jeremy (who I spent time with in Sydney), Paul Janka, and talking over details with my friend Tim Stubbs. Soul deserves the majority of the credit as he is the predominant author on the subject, and an excellent teacher.
Approaching:
I've tried a bunch of different methods and openers. Over time and study I've boiled it down to what I believe are the most effective ones. Before we get into actual openers, let's discuss some logistics involved in opening.
First off, eye contact, body language, and tonality are hugely important. Stand up straight, look her directly in the eye, and deliver your opener slowly, smoothly, and at a decent volume. Smile, but don't beam from ear to ear and don't keep the smile permanently on your face. Carry yourself with the naturalness that you would speak to someone your familiar with in conversation.
If a girl is sitting, go sit down next to her (unless it's a table with just a seat across, in which case you'd sit across.) If she is walking towards you allow her to go past then turn around and come up along the side. I used to attempt to approach women just as they were about to pass me, but this leads to two major problems; the girl may think you are trying to sell her something, and stopping a girls forward momentum is actually quite difficult. Approaching from the side I have realized is vastly preferable. If a woman is walking the same direction as you simply speed up a little and come up along the side, and again tap her briefly on the shoulder or arm and start your opener. If a woman is aware of your presence don't heavily chase her down the street/mall, it'll come off creepy. This is why you need to approach quickly, if she sees you and you linger around then take a shot it simply doesn't come off very confident.
Types of openers for day game: I've found two kinds of openers are optimal for day game; direct and situational. Direct is clearly the best because it immediately sets you apart from nearly every other guy she's ever met because nobody has the balls to do this. Situational is very good when a direct would be inappropriate, like say standing behind a woman in line at Starbucks. If you bomb her direct there it's really uncomfortable if she's not responsible and fairly awkward for everyone within ear shot. Natural openers can be okay for some spots during the day, particularly when it's a semi-social circle setting like a college campus union, but if you try to cold approach moving girls with them they'll simply think you're being polite and keep walking.
Execution of direct opener: Approach the girl, maintain eye contact, touch her briefly on the shoulder or arm (when appropriate, don't do this to a sitting girl across a table), and say "Excuse me, I know this is very forward of me, but I saw you from across the sidewalk (or whatever it is) and I thought you were really cute (gorgeous, looked stunning today, etc) so I wanted to come say hi."
You can modify this to your personality and the occasion. I'm pretty chatty when I go up to girls so my opener is a bit more high energy and less full blown smooth than the way Jeremy does his. It's something like "Excuse me, I know this is super random of me and pretty forward, but I saw you from across X and I think you are absolutely stunning, so I had to come say hi."
I've read a number of thoughts on opening with excuse me, and after trial and error I think it's better than not saying it. Because a direct day approach is a pretty crazy thing to do, being as polite and non crazy as possible seems highly pertinent. If you're walking up to some girls or a group that's conversing, make your first line "I apologize for interrupting but.." It's the same with the "I know this is very forward of me" portion, you're stating that you recognize you're doing something out of the social norm and this lends you some credibility. As for the compliment portion, making it specific to the girl is better than something generic. If she's wearing a stylish and eye catching red dress then something like "I thought you looked stunning in that stylish red dress of yours" is a nice way to get specific.
Here's what will happen after a direct opener. Roughly 10% of the time the girl will be amazed and thrilled and just launch into an effortless conversation with you.Roughly 10% of the time the woman will seem a bit shocked and uncomfortable, and will look to exit the conversation immediately. About 80% of the time the woman will be somewhat pleasantly surprised but flabbergasted or say something only brief. For this 80% you need to transition. I often start by offering my hand and introducing myself as that anchors her to the conversation briefly and reduces some of the tension. I know some guys say not to offer your name, but in my experience this helps lock the girl in and prevent walk-aways, since it's more rude to walk away from Tony, who was nice and polite, than random nameless guy.
Transitioning:
For a transition I might have something in mind. If I'm in a city with lots of tourism I'll ask what brings them to that city. If I'm in a mall on a weekday I might ask "So you just knock off work to go shopping and leave the rest of them to sort it out?" If I'm on the sidewalk I might ask a simple "So what are you up to today in Melbourne?" I might just make a statement/comment/observation if something relevant occurs to me. Whatever you do, stay away from a transition that will lead to an obvious or brief answer. Asking a girl in a mall what she's up to today will almost always result in an answer of "Shopping" and a look that says "Duh." You can say simply "So what are you out shopping for today?" and go from there.
When you open situationally the conversation will flow a little more naturally. You're often opening with a question or statement so just keep going and eventually change tangents to something more suggestive. Try to make situational openers playful when possible so the interaction has an air of flirtation. Say for example, I was in that Starbucks standing in line behind a girl. I might say "Excuse me, I've never drank a cup of coffee before in my life, can you make a recommendation?" Or if I'm in a clothing store I might take a piece of clothing, hold it up on myself and ask a woman "Do you think this will cover up my love handles?" (I'm a pretty thin guy so it's clearly a joke.) Or in a book store where a woman is reading a magazine/book "Hey! We have a something in common!" *She inevitably asks what/huh/etc* "I too can read."
Mastery Topics:
These are a recent discovery of mine, taught to me by Jeremy. I used to think in fairly linear attraction then qualification then comfort terms during day game. Jeremy proposes that you essentially combine the three and make them all more efficient by thinking about what you're knowledge about that appeals to women, what you look for in women, and where and how you can build common ground on those shared interests. For example, my mastery topics I run with are things like travel, style and fashion, food, movies, reading, socializing, working out, poker, adventurousness and writing. When I enter a conversation I'm looking to move the conversation in the direction of some of those topics and look to find out if we have a shared interest in them. By getting on subjects I am knowledgeable and passionate about I'm able to display value.If and when the girl reciprocates by elaborating on her having similar interests this gives me an opportunity to compliment her on aspects of her personality as opposed to her looks, where we started. That said, mixing in compliments about her looks during the course of the interaction is normally a positive thing. After complimenting the girl I'll likely point out how cool it is that we share that interest, and that I really appreciate someone with those qualities and know how rare it is. We'll build some comfort by getting a little more in depth on the subject.
You want to go through this process a few times over the course of your interaction so the girl has concrete, legitmate reasons to see you again and not flake. If you're getting flaked on a ton while doing day game (and we all get a lot of it from what I can tell) you need to amp up your qualification and comfort. It might feel impressive to build a lot of attraction while in the girls presence, but that dissipates quickly when you leave her. She needs solid reasons to actually go out on a date with you, other than you being slick and charming for a few minutes on the sidewalk. For those who have done some of this, if you think back on the times that the interaction went really well and the girl met up with you, you'll likely realize that you wound up qualifying her naturally because she possessed the things you look for in a woman and you were happy to find it. Just make sure to let her know.
Once you get into conversation, I think maintaining an air of active disinterest is pretty important, in that you've come up and said something very direct and now you need to cool it and just be chilled out and normal. I like to relax my body language and lean up against something if there's a good surface near by. I speak calmly, and a bit sarcastically. I want to be a little bit challenging, in that just because I came up to crack on to this girl doesn't mean I'm throwing myself at her, I'm sussing her out a little too. I still maintain a ton of eye contact.
Jeremy aims to have these interactions last about five to ten minutes (Janka shoots for 45 seconds, which I think is totally crazy in any city outside of Manhattan and probably not optimal there but he would know better than me.) In my experience, the girls who wind up meeting up are the ones I spend more time with. This is probably because I'm nowhere near as efficient at qualification and building comfort as more experienced guys are, so right now most of my approaches that work out are like 10-20 minutes, sometimes longer.
Closing and follow up:
As you're going through the interaction you should be pinging for the girls logistical situation. Why is she where she is? What part of town does she live in? What kind of places does she like to go out to? Does she come into this area often? You can do a brilliant pick up on a girl who is completely into you, but if the logistics are no good you're ****ed.
I used to vaguely suggest a date idea before, then get her number, then try to arrange the date in the follow up. I've learned from Jeremy and Tim that the better way to go about things is to set a date during your interaction, and get a number as a result of that date. Jeremy usually closes by saying something like "You know I'm really enjoying talking with you. I think we should continue it some time over a drink, how do you feel about that?" I was originally surprised he phrased it as a question since my normal line was something like "Put your number in my phone and I'll message you about that etc" What he aims to do is ask the girl how she feels about the drink (outside using appealing emotive language) is to watch the girls reaction and gauge how genuine she is in wanting to meet up. One reason he has such a low flake rate is that he won't take a number from a girl who doesn't seem keen to meet up, and if she hesitates he'll say something like "You know you're under no pressure and I won't be offended, but I'd really enjoy getting to know you better."
Once the girl agrees you should set up what you're doing, when you're doing it, and where you will meet. It helps to have knowledge of the city you're in so you have good suggestions and recommendations in mind, so do some homework on the good places where you are (or where you're visiting.) Aim for a date that night, and if she's not available try to get it set up for the near future. Lock down the details then exchange numbers, and if you can punch something fun and memorable into her phone under your name. It doesn't need to be stellar, just something playful. I often put "Guy in suit."
Also, when talking with the girl keep an open mind about interesting date opportunities based on common ground. Some girls won't commit to a date as sexually threatening as drinks at night based off fives minutes of chatting on the street, so finding things that are appealing for you both to do will help reduce flaking. Besides, you should want to be doing fun stuff with the women in your life. If I can sense they're cool with it, I like to get girls to smoke pot with me in the evening.
Another thing to keep in mind is trying to bring girls into your reality (by which I mean, daily life.) Do things with her that you would naturally do anyway and find ways to incorporate her and make it fun if it wouldn't be otherwise. These days I actually invite girls to come hang out with me while I work (which, when not dolled up, is me sitting at home playing poker on my computer.) However, I'll work towards turning it into more a of a date; we'll order food, I'll have movies that we can watch while hanging on the couch and I switch to my laptop, I'll engage her in chat nearly the whole time I play, etc. By the time I'm finished working I've laid all the ground work and I've already got her comfortable in my apartment. Logistics solved!
For follow up game, I normally start off by sending them a text later in the day with something fun, light, and with a callback humor reference if possible. I can't tell you how to write call-back humor for an interaction I wasn't present in, so you'll have to be creative. Just don't make the follow up text overly long, it sounds needy. On the whole, try to keep your texts shorter than the girls. I've also begun to call girls a lot more. This is for everyone's benefit; some girls won't meet up because they fear social awkwardness and chatting on the phone for a bit will sooth a lot of this. Additionally, I use a phone conversation to figure out whether this is a girl I'm actually interested in meeting. Sometimes I'll have a 10 minute conversation with a girl and realize that getting drinks with her would be a total bore, even if she is really hot.
Know that most guys flake rates are quite high. Janka keeps meticulous track of records and says that he sleeps with 11% of numbers he gets, which is not surprising considering his mass efficency method. Jeremy says he gets a date out of around 70% of his numbers, which is excellent but also keep in mind that he focuses on not taking bad numbers and is extremely experienced. Personally I get a date with about 25% of my numbers right now, which seems a bit low but comparable to other guys on my experience level. There's certainly room for improvement there and it's something I'm working on.
Appearance:
As for your appearance for day sessions, I like to lean on the formal side (as I always do) but calibrate it to my environment. I like to wear a suit with no tie most sessions, the suit lends me an air of legitimacy but wearing a tie would be a dash too formal though I still like to mix it up now and then. Fashion is one of the things I like talking to girls about (and something they almost always like talking about) so I prefer mine to be noticeable. Still, you need to match your clothes to your location. In some places a suit is simply too out of place, so toning it down will look more normal.
For the most part though your style should just be congruent with who you are. As I've written before, women often aren't particularly fussed exactly which style yours is, they just like to see that you have one and have put some thought into your appearance. Don't wear things that feel really unnatural to you just because you think they will make you more appealing to girls.
That's about it for now. As always if there's question or comments, throw 'em at me.
for bond
