Learn English with TV Series: Inventing Anna

If you're working on your English watching TV series and movies can be a great

way to hear how advanced speakers use English in lots of

different situations, including business situations. Today,

I've got a clip for you from one of my favorite series Inventing Anna,

where we'll see her boyfriend promote his business or pitch his

business to a potential investor. Um, and then how his girlfriend, Anna,

makes that pitch a lot better. You ready? Let's go. Hi,

I'm your English coach Christina,

and welcome to Business English with Christina,

where you become better at English and better at business.

And in today's episode,

we're gonna help you become better at pitching your business

or at least knowing what to do and what not to do. Now,

today's episode is really more about listening because we're going to

take an extract from a TV series designed for native speakers and

help you to better understand it. But if you need more help on actually

creating a pitch for your business or your product or your startup idea or

whatever, go over to my blog and sign up for the newsletter.

You can find other resources on how to create your pitch,

but also you'll get exclusive invitations to new

free master classes or interactive workshops that I'm going to be

organizing, uh, once a month over the next, um, the next few months.

So I'll put the link down below, go over there, sign up,

and then come and learn with us today,

I'm gonna give you some different strategies on how to use TV series

for improving your English and specifically your business English. Now,

as a neuro language coach,

the first tip that I can give you is before you

start watching a series or a clip,

try to see if you can find a way to understand

the main idea of the story or what's going to happen, because that will help it,

you know,

help you more easily follow what the characters are saying. So

what is the story behind the series inventing Anna? Well, it's a,

it's based on a true story, um, very in like unbelievable true story,

but there was this, um,

woman named Anna and she somehow

managed to convince like all of New York fancy rich

society that she was a German Aris,

that she had tons of money,

and that she was just a very wealthy, successful business person,

when in fact not at all,

but she managed to scam them out of a lot of money

and investments and things like that. And they gave her a lot of money.

And like I said, it's an unbelievable story, but it's true.

Yeah, I know you've gotta watch the series to see, to see what happens.

And in this specific clip today we're watching Anna and her

boyfriend Chase. They are on a yacht in Ibiza because that's, you know,

I guess what rich people do, I don't know. Um,

and Chase wants to pitch his business idea to an investor named

Henrick or HIN for short.

So Chase hopes that Henrick will invest in

a startup idea,

which is an app that gathers data from people's

dreams.

So now that you know what's gonna happen in this clip,

you're ready to try and to understand what is going on,

trying to understand some of the English.

And when you're doing things like this,

give yourself a simple goal at first one that is realistic and attainable.

Just try to understand maybe the main idea or

catch a few key words. Now,

here's what I will give you as your first little

simple goal. Watch this clip and see if you think,

is Chase the boyfriend? Is he successful in his pitch or not?

Data is the new time, yes, but it's dream data subjective,

and honestly, it sounds about as valuable as well dreams, which I mean,

what's bigger waste of time than sitting and listening to someone tell you their

dreams? Totally the worst amounts.

God Chase is working him so hard on this app of his,

he's so shameless fantasies.

How do you think Chase is doing? Not so good, right?

Yeah, we agree that it was not so good. So how did you know that?

Well, maybe you caught that HN said this.

What's a bigger waste of time than sitting around listening to someone tell you

about their dreams? So he's, he's not convinced. And then the other guys also,

they, um, support Hins idea.

They say things like totally the worst or in other words, like,

it means I hate when that happens.

And then also there was, uh,

a woman that Anna is talking to who sees the,

the scene happening over on, on the yacht, I guess. And she says,

God, Chase is working him so hard on this app of his,

he's so shameless.

And to work someone hard in this context means like really

insisting,

trying to force someone to believe something or to convince them,

and it's not subtle or conversational or nice or

effective. And saying that someone is shameless is basically saying like,

he should really be embarrassed. Um, like he is shameless.

He has no shame in what he is doing. Um,

probably not a good, let's say, um,

feedback or appreciation of the way that Chase is pitching.

Now here's another tip for when you're trying to improve your English with

movies or TV series.

Listen for details and maybe expressions that you can use.

You know,

spend a little extra time maybe focusing on one short

clip and really understanding it deeply and maybe getting a few ex

you know,

a few useful expressions for you rather than trying to understand

the entire 45 minute episode, um,

just by sitting down and watching that, because that's really hard. So, um,

let's watch the next few minutes of this clip and see if

you can find two expressions.

Listen for two expressions that mean these things.

I just have one more thing to say and then I'll stop.

And the second expression will mean it's time to stop talking about work

now. Okay.

See if you can find or understand the expressions that mean those things.

His just really passionate.

About it. Sure, and that's great in all, but we're on vacations.

He needs to chill and come on, let's dance.

Got it. Just to close the thought, chase enough with the shop talk.

Did you find those expressions because they, I don't know,

they could be useful in your next business conversation or a future

business conversation, perhaps. For example, if you want to say to someone,

I just have one more thing to say and then I'll stop talking about this topic.

You can use an expression that Chase used,

which is just to close the thought,

just to close the thought.

And if you want the conversation to move away from business and maybe

to something more informal or casual,

you can say enough with the shop, talk enough with the shop talk,

which means, Okay, let's stop talking about business now.

And for example,

if you're talking with a business contact and you see that, you know,

you're, you're talking about business and you see that maybe the conversation is

starting to slow down or to die, you can, I guess like,

you know, get the conversation going again with a fresh topic by saying,

but enough with the shop talk. So tell me about your last vacation or something,

something like that to just say,

let's stop talking about business and let's talk about, um,

you know, something more personal or non-business related.

And that's a great way to actually show that you're interested in this person,

not just as a business partner or a potential client,

but as a human being. And we all love that.

So the fourth tip that I can give you is to watch and observe

communication and business strategies in a clip.

And that means watching to see something specific, for example, here,

watch and see if you can see what is different about Anna's pitch

compared to Chase's pitch.

And I'll give you a little more help and guidance to help you, um,

find the answer to that question. Think about, you know,

what is Anna's strategy like,

does she talk a lot about Chase's business and how great the

business is? Or does she ask some unusual and maybe

interesting or surprising questions?

Uh, hold on what question? How old are you? Live fifties.

About that? Yeah. Why?

I'm just curious what the age is when you draw the line.

And I think that we can all agree that Anna's strategy is ask

great questions because that's what will get the attention of

the person listening to you. You wanna see more of her strategy? All right,

listen to this and see what her strategy is.

Does she want to sound like an expert,

like she is better than him or that she knows more than him?

Or does she want to show that, you know, she's like,

Hi too, that she's, you know, maybe hesitant, a little unsure.

She's asking questions. What's the strategy?

Position yourself as the expert or show your vulnerability.

Let's see.

You know, I wonder, is it, that's the closer you are to death,

the more sure you need to be abouts live about the stuff you know,

or you think you know, because

it can be scary to get old.

This combo is really bumming me out.

<Laugh>, yeah, let's all just what, what not because I can relate.

I'm scared about what to do with my life, so I avoid the question,

try to outrun it, but it haunts me. Does step hunt you?

And a stop? You are a it's fine. It's my guess.

I can handle it.

Of course you can. And he wants to answer.

Look at him.

I think about death more these days. Sure. So what.

Do you have a dream about it?

Do you think other people your age dream about

death? The fear?

Yeah, they do.

So you can see that Anna, she's,

and I don't know if she's really doing this or just acting for, uh, the pitch,

but she's like, you know, oh,

like I have these questions and I think about these things and I'm,

I'm afraid and I'm worried. And she,

she keeps asking really interesting questions and, um,

opening more of her personal self, um,

to the person listening. Now,

keep in mind that this is a TV series. It is not real life. Um,

you do not have to be as bold as Anna is,

and you can still do a really good pitch, you know, in, in either case,

I think it's safe to say that Anna has gotten hins attention here.

So now when she tells him what is so great about this app,

he is listening to her.

If I'm big pharma,

wouldn't it be valuable to know this so I can sell you Xanax or whatever.

You are good <laugh>. She's good.

You say you're looking for a job.

Me, <laugh>? No, no. I made the pledge not to work for others.

Huh?

You can make a pledge too.

How's a hundred k? Very generous, thank you.

And you know, like you see,

Anna's pitch is much more effective than Chase's pitch where he's trying to just

convince someone how great his app is. Of course,

he's not gonna say something different,

but Anna has put herself in the position of the person

listening. And you know, that's a great strategy.

And even though we don't have to pitch in that same

very bold way that Anna does,

there's still a lot that we can learn from her strategy.

The first thing is get the listener's attention, ask interesting questions,

and then let them talk. Let your listener know that you know,

you have the same fears and hesitations and concerns that they do

sympathize with them. Show your vulnerability and be human.

And once you have your listener's attention,

then is the moment to say how great your product or your service is,

but simply and quickly to make them want to know more.

Now, if you want to, let's say,

go back and watch the entire episode, uh,

this entire episode of Inventing Anna,

go over to the blog and I've got the link, um, to the, not the link,

the episode number so that you can find it in Netflix.

And also a quiz to help you test yourself on your

listening skills. And as I always say, if you don't use it, you lose it.

So here's how you can practice your English today. In the comments down below,

tell me,

is there a movie in English or a TV series that you really

enjoy and that you like to watch to improve your English?

Or just to have fun watching something in English?

Put it in the comments and share it with us. Uh,

share it with me because I'm always looking for a good series and movies

to watch. Um,

and I hate scrolling through Netflix and trying to find something that I don't

know if it's good. So if nothing else,

send me your idea so I can have something fun to watch on Netflix.

And if this lesson was useful for you, I would love to know.

And there are three ways that you can tell me.

Give this lesson a thumbs up on YouTube and subscribe to my channel so

that I can make more business English lessons for you. Um,

and go and sign up for my newsletter list so that you can get

the invitations to our free monthly interactive workshops that

are coming soon.

It's something new that we're trying and I'd love to try it with you.

And of course, you can watch this movie, Movie. It's not a movie.

It's a YouTube episode about a movie,

an understanding and inspiring film for entrepreneurs in English.

Thank you for getting to the end if you arrived here,

and I will see you next time. Bye.