Be Better at Business English Small Talk: Your Favorite TV series.

5,711 views ・ 2022-06-06

Business English with Christina


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

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- Small talk.
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Many business professionals feel uncomfortable
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making small talk in English,
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but it's a really important skill
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if you want to grow your business, build connections,
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and get those opportunities.
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You know, in English we say it's not what you know,
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it's who you know, and small talk plays a big part of that.
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So today, you're gonna increase
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your small talk skills in English
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by learning how to talk about a fun, light,
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and popular topic of small talk, your favorite TV show.
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Let's go.
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Hi, I'm your English coach, Christina,
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and welcome to Business English with Christina.
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Where you become better at business
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while becoming better at English.
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Did you know that a lot of advanced English speakers
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and native English speakers actually sometimes
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have quite a difficult time making small talk?
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Yes, even we native speakers,
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we need to work on our small talk skills also.
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And that's especially important if you are an entrepreneur,
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a business owner, or anyone who has to do
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any kind of networking to grow your business.
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Today we're gonna focus on just one
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great business communication small talk skills strategy
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to help you improve your confidence
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when you're making small talk.
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So what is this one strategy?
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Asking more questions than you answer.
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It'll help you build great connections.
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I promise.
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Your goal is to ask questions
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about your conversation partner,
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but without getting too personal.
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And so a favorite TV show is a great topic.
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You know, a lot of people watch TV,
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or they have their favorite shows, or maybe even movies.
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They can share something personal,
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but not something that's too personal or private.
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Now remember in small talk,
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your goal is to find common ground
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or things that you have in common, and to create rapport
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to strengthen your business relationship.
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And you do this by showing interest in the other person
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by asking questions and making small talk.
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You know, some people might recommend like a basic question.
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Like, yeah, and so that's what our company does.
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Oh, okay. Interesting.
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And have you seen any good TV series lately?
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Yeah, "Stranger Things."
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But I mean, that just sounds kind of random
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if you're not already talking about the subject of TV.
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We can do better.
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You know, most people enjoy it
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when we listen to their advice, when we ask them for advice,
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and we put them in like a position of authority.
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Okay, we're just talking about TV.
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It's not like geopolitical strategy or anything,
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but still, it's always nice
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when someone asks us for our advice.
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For example.
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You know, I just finished a really great series,
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and I'm looking for a new one.
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Any recommendations?
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A lot of times if you're working
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in an international context,
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you'll meet people from other countries and other cultures,
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and one way that you can build a connection with them
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making small talk about an easy topic like TV
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is to ask them about TV shows from their country.
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For example.
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Wow, I've always wanted to visit Brazil.
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Do you know any good TV series
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that take place there that I could watch?
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You know, I'm a narrow language coach,
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and so I know how important it is for you
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to practice little by little,
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but over a regular period of time.
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And one of the best ways to do that
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is in our Faster Fluency Conversation Club,
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where you can talk about the topics
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from these video lessons with people all over the world
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so that you can practice your small talk skills,
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become more confident, have more vocabulary,
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and get to know people from lots of other cultures.
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The link to learn more
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about the Faster Fluency Conversation Club
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is down below the video, and I hope to see you there.
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Now, when you're making small talk,
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you don't wanna just ask one question
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and then that's the end of the conversation
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because that kills the conversation,
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and you don't wanna do that.
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So you want to ask follow-up questions
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to continue to develop the conversation,
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to make more connections with the person,
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to find those things that you have in common.
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And here are some ways that you can ask follow up questions.
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If the person that you're talking to
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tells you about a science fiction show that they like,
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you can ask something like.
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That sounds really interesting.
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Are you a big fan of science fiction?
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You can also ask the person to share
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what they really like about the series.
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You know, I've never seen "Downtown Abbey,"
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but everybody tells me I should watch it.
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What do you like about it?
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And, you know, when you're asking for advice
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on shows to watch or they're telling you
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about shows that they like,
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if you have already seen that show,
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then it's like high five yourself because that's a score.
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You have something in common with the person,
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and you can build on that for your small talk conversation,
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and I got way too excited about that.
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Sorry.
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Anyway, here's some questions that you can ask.
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Oh yeah, that is a great one.
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Who's your favorite character?
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Or.
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Oh, I love that show too.
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What's your favorite episode?
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- And, you know, these questions,
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they might take the other person by surprise.
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They might be like, oh, I don't know.
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That's okay, because it means that you've asked a question
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that is not like the typical, you know,
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small talk questions that everybody expects.
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So it's okay if they're a little surprised,
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and they take a minute to think about it
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because it means you're getting into
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the more interesting conversations and small talk.
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Now, maybe one of the reasons
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that you are a little nervous about making small talk
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in business situations is, well,
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not because you don't know what to say,
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although that might be part of it,
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but it might also be that you're afraid
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that you're not going to understand
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what the other person responds to you.
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And it's true that listening and understanding
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is a really, really, really important part of small talk
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in making connections.
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Okay, so here's a challenge for you.
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Let's say that we're at a networking event,
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and you just asked me about what else,
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my favorite TV series,
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because that's the topic of today's lesson.
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And I'm gonna give you an answer, like a typical answer.
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The way I would answer it
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like, if my friends or family asked me this same question.
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So very, very normal native speaker like,
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and listen and try to see if you can catch
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four or five expressions for talking about TV shows.
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Are you ready?
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Here we go.
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Yeah, actually, I'm watching this series right now.
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I think it's called "The Roman Empire,"
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and it's like part documentary, part TV series.
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Like, you've got the action, you've got the conspiracies,
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you've got the betrayals and all of that.
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And like, it's really like as good as any
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fiction political thriller, like honestly.
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There's another series that I really like.
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It's called "Inventing Anna," and it's about this woman,
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this Russian woman who pretends to be
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like this rich German Aris.
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And she ends up tricking like all of
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like New York high society.
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She borrow tons of money from banks
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that of course she can never repay.
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And then in the end, she goes to jail for it
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and it's her story basically.
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And it's like, it's based on a true story.
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So did you catch some useful expressions
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for talking about TV shows,
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and did you catch the titles
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of the two TV shows that I talked about?
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Maybe you've heard of them or maybe you've watched them,
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but you can tell me in the comments on the blog
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because then we'll see that we've got something in common.
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And, you know, while you're over there on the blog,
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you'll be able to see the script, the transcript,
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of exactly what I said there so that you can see,
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you know, you can check your comprehension skills.
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See how much you actually understood,
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and maybe see if there were a few words
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that you didn't understand.
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Well, you can check them.
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So go over to the blog post and check that out,
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and tell me if you've seen those series also.
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So there you go.
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Today you learned one strategy
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for making better small talk,
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asking more questions than you answer,
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and talking about the topic of your favorite TV show,
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your favorite TV series, whatever you wanna call it.
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What's your favorite TV series?
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Tell me down in the comments below the video
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because like, yeah, honestly,
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I am looking for some interesting TV shows to watch
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because I am now going back
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and re-watching episodes of "The Crown,"
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which honestly is one of the best series I've seen ever.
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If you don't know it, go and check it out.
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But you can also share your favorite TV series
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with me in the comments.
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Now, if this lesson was helpful for you,
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I would love to know, and there are three ways
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that you can tell me.
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Give this video a thumbs up and subscribe to my channel
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so that I can continue sending you
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some business English lessons every week.
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You can, number two, go over to the blog post
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that goes with this video, and you'll find a short quiz
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so that you can test yourself.
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And number three, you can watch this next video,
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which is going to give you some more vocabulary
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for talking about movies.
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Now it's kind of an older episode,
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but hey, it's the vocabulary hasn't changed in two years.
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I promise.
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Thank you so much for improving your English,
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and your business with Business English with Christina.
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And I'll see you next time.
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