How to Get a Girlfriend with Connell Barrett - From Boring to Banter! 5 Flirty Banter Secrets that Create Instant Romantic Chemistry

Episode Date: November 11, 2025

Are you unsure how to flirt with women? Dating coach and bestselling author Connell Barrett shares 5 flirty banter secrets that help you create chemistry, avoid awkward silences, and get her into you. These simple techniques work both in-person and on the dating apps. It’s time to go from boring to being great at banter.Episode Highlights:2:11: Secret #1: How to Tease Her without Crossing the Line6:48: Secret #2: Make Her the Seducer (A Fun Roleplay that Women Love)10:40: Secret #3: The 5 Best Banter Topics that Ignite Chemistry17:12: Secret #4: How to Spark Attraction with Sarcasm20:28: Secret #5: The Playful Pivot: Never Run Out of Things to Say Again!TO TAKE YOUR DATING RESULTS TO A WHOLE NEW LEVEL, BOOK A FREE CALL WITH CONNELL TO LEARN ABOUT 1-1 COACHING:http://www.DatingTransformation.comEMAIL CONNELL FOR A FREE COPY OF HIS NO. 1 AMAZON BESTSELLING BOOK, “DATING SUCKS BUT YOU DON’T”:[e-mail]

Don't be the guy who's trying hard to seduce women. If you want to be seductive, make her the one who's trying to seduce you. Welcome back to the How to Get a Girlfriend Podcast. I am dating coach and bestselling author Connell Barrett. I am here to help you flirt like a champ, make sparks happen on dates and get a great girlfriend. and do it all by being authentic, your true best self. And today I have a really fun episode. Today is going to be all about how to talk to women, how to make sparks happen and get

really good at banter. I like to talk about what I call the seven dating superpowers. There are certain things in dating that are just superpowers that can make dates and your dating life reach whole new levels in your search for getting a girlfriend. And one of the superpowers is amazing magnetic banter. It's not required. You don't have to be the world's greatest banterer to get a great girlfriend, but it's a hell of a good superpower to have.

So today's episode is for you if you struggle with talking to women. If you try to flirt, but it gets awkward, gets boring to her, if you can feel women lose interest when you're talking to them or texting them, then I want to help you fix that. So what I'm going to give you today is I want to give you five secrets to getting really good at flirty banter. This makes this makes it easier and simpler to have good fun, light conversations with women and get dates. And the cool thing about these five flirty banter moves is you can use these both in real life and on the apps. This is for all parts of dating. And I want you to stick around. Hopefully you'll listen to the whole episode, but I'm

especially excited about the fifth secret number five, banter move number five, because once you learn the fifth move that's coming up in about 15 minutes, you're never going to run out of things to say again. And let's get to it. Let's dive right in. I'm just going to get right to the coaching today. And let's start with banter secret number one. Flirty banter secret number one, tease her the right way, not the wrong way. What do I mean by that? Well, I am not the first dating guru who has ever said anything about teasing, right? You've probably heard this before. Teasing can work wonders with women, but if you do it the wrong way, it's easy to offend women.

So you never, ever want to tease women about something that could cut deep in a personal way. Her looks, her weight, how much she drinks. my client Nick had a tough time once on a date he had a second day a first date with a woman and she ordered a third drink on the date and he was trying to tease her and he jokingly called her an alcoholic she got so upset she ended the date right then and there and she never spoke to him again after that night because she had somebody in her family had dealt with alcoholism and she took that kind of thing very personally. And I am not immune to screwing this up myself.

I remember I approached a woman one time, and she was walking her dog. She had this cute little shih Tzu, and I was trying to be cocky, cheeky conal, which is very authentic to me. And I tease her about her dog, and I compared her dog to a little rat, a sewer rat. She was not into that at all. it just was harsh and cruel because hey that a woman's dog anybody's animal pet it's like their baby it's like their kid it's like i called her kid a rat who would ever want to date a jerk like that so anyway i learned these lessons the hard way so the secret here is you want to keep teasing

to light topics and service level topics you know tease her about a nerdy hobby tease her about her her questionable taste in music or movies i'm a big movie guy i'm a bit of a movie snob i remember i once said to a woman on a date when she told me legally blonde what's her favorite movie i was like what legally blonde are you crazy i don't know if i can date you anymore she liked it uh so another another avenue for for a teasing fertile teasing territory is if a woman does something clutsy on a date and tease her for that. Clutciness is not something most women take deeply personally. I once took a date out to a fancy sushi place in New York City, a place called Nobu. Incredible, a wonderful woman named Jen. Hey, Jen, if you're out there

listening. I won't use her last name, but she's wonderful. Anyway, we went to Nobu, and she kept dropping sushi on the floor. And at Nobu, that's like 20 bucks. per piece of sushi. I said, Jen, if you keep dropping sushi, I'm not going to be able to pay my rent this month. This stuff is expensive. We need to get you chopsticks lessons. She loved the teasing. The next day I was texting her, hey, how did you do with your breakfast today? Did you keep dropping your spoon into your cereal? So I kept it up because she really liked it. So tease women about harmless surface level things. You know, if her first concert was Nickelback, roast her for that. Yeah, so that's the secret to teasing, just surface-level things. By the way, here's an

important note about this episode in general, but also about teasing in particular. I want you to think of any and all of these banter moves as pepper in a dish, not the whole meal. These five banter techniques, these should not comprise the majority of your conversations with women. At most, 20%, at most maybe even less think of banter as as pepper in a dish not the dish itself especially teasing because teasing is a very specific kind of banter that works with lots of women but not all not every woman wants to be teased so and also just take a less as more approach to this because your goal on any date with with banter and conversation it's not to be a performer it's it's banter is just it's like frosting on the cake but the cake is your authentic self

women like you for you not your game not your banter moves so i just wanted to say that okay let's move to banter secret number two make her the seducer make her the seducer what does that mean well first here's what not to do what not to do when first talking to bantering, flirting with a woman. Don't try to be all seductive by getting sexual really soon. That's generally not going to work, generally. This is actually how you creep women out by making vulgar comments about her body, treating her like an object, or talking about sex way too soon. That's not sexy. That's not seductive for the vast majority of women. Here's what works really well, often. Make her the seducer. Here's what I'm talking about. Basically, you take something that she says,

something very innocent, and you playfully misinterpret it as her trying to seduce you. It's a playful misinterpretation. It's a fun role reversal that lots and lots of women love. Because for once, she gets to play the part of the pursuer. Think about this. You know, this is how dating works, right men we're the ones making moves we're the ones pursuing basically typically so when you flip it around and jokingly accuse her of trying to get you in the sack oh man that feels surprising it feels cheeky and it feels a lot of fun to lots of women so let's say she says something like hey you need to meet my you need to meet my cat oliver he's a lot of fun now you have to be in her apartment to meet her cat right or her house so you could grin and say hey look

I know you're trying to get me to your place, but I barely know you. Let's take it slow, okay? I'm not ready to adopt your cat and move in with you just yet. Okay, it's a joke. This is obviously a joke. This is not intended for her to think. You are literally saying she's trying to seduce you. It's a playful misinterpretation. Or here's one I use many times. You're on that first date. She looks down and complements your shirt or your outfit. Hey, I like your shirt. I like your look. you could misinterpret that as her objectifying you and say, excuse me, my eyes are up here, excuse me, please don't treat me like a piece of meat, okay? So you're flipping that male-female dynamic and playfully accusing her of objectifying you.

And this basically does a lot of good things at once. It sends a subtle message that you're not like other guys. It also keeps the, it also pivots the conversation in the vicinity of sex, but not. literally about sex, which is a bit of a red flag. If you just talk about sex too soon, that's a red flag with lots of women. If you accuse her of trying to seduce you, you get plausible deniability of talking about sex. And by the way, as a bonus, some women get so into this fun little role reversal. It's so refreshing and cheeky that they actually commit to the whole seducer role. I once dated a woman named Roxanne, who loved this kind of banter.

And it was the first time I ever had a woman straight up say to me, let's go to your place. It was our second date, and she leaned in and said, hey, let's go to your place. I want to show you more of my moves. And she ran with that role of being the seducer, and she actually ran with it. And we went back to my place because it would not have been gentlemanly of me to say no, right? So remember, don't be the guy who's trying hard to seduce women. If you want to be seductive, make her the one who's trying to seduce you. Okay.

Now, banter secret number three, this one is so damn easy. It's like you can apply this today, tonight, your next date, your next conversation. Banter secret number three, use the best banter topics. And there are five of them. I'm going to give you five great banter topics. Another big mistake guys make is they think, oh my God, I have to be weird. witty. To banter, I got to be witty. I have to be funny. I have to be clever. I need great content. You don't. You don't need to be a stand-up comedian. You don't need amazing content.

You just need to stick to what I call the five best banter topics. Because just by staying in the right topics, that keeps the conversation in a light playful place or just light. And that's really all banter is. It's light conversation. about a light topic. That's all banter is. So here are five great topics that will essentially guarantee that banter is happening, or at least make it 90% banter likely. Number one, topic number one, talking about her hobbies and your hobbies and interests. People love talking about what they're into. People just love talking about their interests and hobbies. So you can ask her, what do you love to do for fun and share what you love to do for fun if you went on

america's got talent you could ask her you could say if you went on america's got talent if you went on a gt what would your skill be she'll tell you her talent that's a great topic to talk about um just make sure that whatever topic whatever interest or hobby that after she talks about hers make sure make sure that you share your own as well make sure you share what you're into on my first date with jess my girlfriend we talked a lot about her favorite hobby at the time was dancing she was taking dance classes she's a very very good dancer appearing in music videos we talked about her dancing we talked about my improv great light topics to talk about topic number two food and drink food and drink jess and i bonded over italian food on our first date we chatted about

cooking italian food she talked about what a good cook she is which she's amazing. I'm not a great cook, but I've traveled. I've been to Italy. We talked about travels to Italy, my travels, and her recipes. We also talked about things we disagreed about. Banter can be lightly confrontational, playfully confrontational. We debated about how she loves mushrooms and I hate them. We debated about how I love ketchup, or at least I like ketchup. She hates ketchup. She hates it. So we talked about that. So food and drink will always lead to a nice light combo about shared tastes. Another third topic is pop culture. Think TV, TV shows, movies, music. I once had an incredible date with a woman who used to be in my improv class.

I'll call her Rebecca, not her name, but I'll call her Rebecca. And all that Rebecca and I did one night after improv class, we were kind of eyeing each other in class. I could feel a little bit of a vibe. And then we had a group hang after improv. And then it was just the two of us, at the bar. And we just bantered about the Beatles. She loves the Beatles. I love the Beatles. We talked about basically books and the Beatles pop culture. I remember we had a fun little debate about the most underrated Beatles song. Underrated. Hey Bulldog is a John Lennon written Beatles song that we both agreed was a very great underrated song. We just bantered about this stuff for 90 minutes and then went back to my place and improvised a two-person scene.

you might say. And yeah, I can't say I use any fancy, fancy moves with her. We just bantered about the Beatles and books. That was more than enough. Topic number four, funny stories from your youth and her youth. Tell her true stories from your childhood. These are great light topics to talk about. Ask her, hey, what were you like as a kid? What are some of your favorite memories from childhood? And you can share your own, of course. So I've shared this one many times on many dates. When I was in fourth grade, I dressed up as a clown for Halloween. And I showed up to school with the whole nine yards, the big white painted face and the floppy shoes and the horn.

But so I get to school and I realize I'm there one day early. I'm off by one day for when it was dressed up for Halloween day. So I'm the only kid dressed up for Halloween. So there I was, a clown in more ways than one sitting in math class, which is kind of traumatic, I have to say. Maybe that's why Pennywise is so damaged. Pennywise wasn't evil. He just showed up one day. The only one dressed as a clown trauma turned him evil.

Topic number five, fun what ifs. Ask playful hypotheticals to get the two of you talking about fun, what ifs. this is a great banter topic ask her things like what actor would play you in the movie of your life if you could cast anybody or and answer that question yourself who would play you in the movie of your life for me of course it would be brad pitt because you know we're identical twins or you might ask her if you could have dinner with anybody who ever lived who would that be or you could ask her this this is a little bit heavier but it's still positive you could ask her, what was the best day of your life? Or if you could go back and relive the best

day of your life, what would that be? So these kinds of hypothetical fun what ifs spark stories and laughter and help the both of you open up. Those are five topics to lean on. Here are three topics to avoid politics, heavy social issues. That's no bueno. Complaining about work, which is easy to fall into. Not you probably, but a lot of women might come and meet you with the date. Not that women do this and men don't, but if you listen to my podcast, you're probably already aware of good topics. But if she is like complaining about what a long, tough day she had at work, that's when you would jump in and change the topic to something better. And don't talk about exes, or at least in great depth. Don't talk about bad breakups or too much about past relationships. Those are

bad topics. Okay, now let's move to banter secret number four. Number four, spark chemistry with sarcasm and irony. Use sarcasm. If you're not using sarcasm, that's a mistake. If being sarcastic as part of your personality, if it's not, you can skip this one. I'm not saying everybody needs to be sarcastic and ironic, but a lot of people are, but they play it too safe on dates. A lot of guys are afraid to be edgy, afraid to be a little bit dry. So yeah, be a bit snarky, be a bit sarcastic, if that's part of who you are. Many women love a guy who can sprinkle in a bit of irony, a bit of sarcasm. It shows edge, it shows confidence. So a super quick definition. Irony is when you say the opposite of what's clearly true. And you say it in a very deadpan, playful way.

Sarcasm is basically the same as irony. It's conveying the opposite. of what you mean, but there's an edge. There's an attitude in your voice. So basically, irony is very dry. Sarcasm has bite. That's the difference, right? So, for example, here's irony at work. Let's say on a date, she looks incredible, but she says, oh, I wasn't sure about this outfit. And you look at her and you dryly say, oh, yeah, you definitely don't look stunning. You're not drop dead gorgeous at all. She'll know you mean the opposite of that. So you're basically telling her she's gorgeous without being direct about it.

Not that you can't be direct, but there's something cool about conveying what you mean in an indirect way, or at least it's cool with a lot of women. Now for sarcasm, same basic rules apply. You can actually use sarcasm by text as long as you like underscore what word you're being sarcastic or you use all caps in the right way. let's say she texts you i love lazy sundays you could reply with a little snarky text oh yeah who wants to lounge around all day eating cheetos and watching netflix that's the worst all-capped worst you're using sarcasm to convey the opposite the key with either sarcasm or irony is just understand that clarity is important you she must understand your being sarcastic. Beware of irony and sarcasm. If it's too subtle, she won't get it. You want to be crystal

clear. Actually, Jess and I, my girlfriend, we basically told each other how we were really feeling about each other using irony. I remember she was going on a trip a couple, a few weeks into our dating. She was going on a trip. And I said, hey, I just want you to know that when you're gone, I'm not going to miss you. I'm not going to think about you every day. I'm not really into you. I'm not going to miss you a lot. And she said the same thing back. That's sort of like our flirting language. Okay.

And let's go to number five. I love this one. Here's an advance move that will absolutely leave her aching for a second date with you. And also, it's going to help you never run out of things to say. Bantor Secret number five. I call this the playful pivot. The playful pivot. This is when you bounce from fun topic to fun topic in a very natural way.

Women love this because the conversation bounces around, moves, and pivots in a very spontaneous, unpredictable way. It's kind of like you're taking her on a verbal bumper car ride. She wonders, where's this going to go next? Now, not every woman is looking for this, but when she loves banter, she loves great conversation, Oh, women absolutely go crazy for this. On my first date with a wonderful woman named Emily, who later became my girlfriend. This is back in the mid-teens. We bounced around from topic to topic.

Our date ended. We met at this bar. We sat up with a bar. Had a couple drinks. Just bantered, bantered, bantered, pivot, pivot. And our date ended with a kiss in the rainstorm. Very sexy, very romantic, under this awning on a rainy night. And she said, I had the, she said after we kissed and she got in, before she got in the taxi,

she said, I have the most amazing floaty feeling right now. I remember that phrase, floaty feeling. I feel really floaty. She was just feeling the feels. And I believe she was describing in part the light emotionally connected vibes that the playful pivot can give women. so here's the playful pivot here's what you do during a date you start you listen you get present and you grab a word or a phrase that one of you says and you use it to pivot to a new fun topic i'm going to do a demo for you just to give you an idea so i'm actually going to go

much faster than you need to go but i'm going to do this as a demonstration to make a point on a short podcast episode so imagine you and her are deep into a first date you're like 45 minutes in. You've had a drink. You're both into it. You're relaxing. Here's how the playful pivot might go. She says, oh, yeah, I just got back from Italy. You say, nice. What was the best thing that you ate? She says the pasta in Rome was incredible. Then you say, oh, you must be a pasta snob now. Do you judge people who go to Olive Garden? She's like laughing. She's like, well, kind of and then you might say oh speaking of judging what's a pet peeve you have about going out to eat so that's the magic phrase speaking of judging so i grabbed a word that i said judge or that

you said in this hypothetical you speaking of judging what's a pet peeve you have about going out to eat so i've changed the topic from italy to going out to eat and now we're in the area of pet peeves She said, oh, people who chew too loudly is my pet peeve. And then maybe I say or you say, oh, I'm the same way. So I guess dinner with a cow would be your personal hell, right? And then she says, oh, cows are so cute. I would enjoy that. And then I would say, or you would say, speaking of cows, I just watch Twister.

So I'm pivoting from the topic of cows. Cows make me think of the movie Twister, where there's a cow being blown into the air by the tornado. Speaking of cows, I just watched Twister. Remember the flying cow scene? I love that movie. What's your favorite movie ever? You would ask her.

Now, you've pivoted from dining, Italy, to pet peeves while eating, to movies to her favorite movie. And she might say, oh, the notebook. And then you would say, again, I'm not saying you should say this. I'm just giving you a hypothetical. And you would say the notebook, oh my gosh, that is such a chick flick. Why do I always pick the cutest girls with the worst taste in movies? And then she might giggle and say, hey, come on.

I like what I like. And then I'd say, you know, then you'd say, well, I'll get over it. It's not like you're very charming in other ways. Speaking of movies, who should play you in the movie of your life? And then she answers from there. And now we're talking about the actor. she should, who should play her in the movie. So you might need to rewind this podcast and listen to this again, but if you go back and listen, not only that I changed the topic for three

or four times, at the very end, I also teased this hypothetical woman on the date. I teased her for her taste in movies, but I also called her cute. So I'm weaving in different ways of bantering because when you master the playful pivot, you move from topic to topic, you can combine different banter techniques. In this example, I did teasing, sarcasm, and a fun, what if. I teased her for her taste in movies. I sarcastically said she's not really charming, meaning I think she's charming. I also called her cute, by the way, and I asked her a fun, what if. So I wove in three or four little techniques while also playfully pivoting. And this is what can give women that incredible floaty feeling.

So this was some nuanced, advanced flirting stuff for this fifth technique. If you just want to go to the basics, don't worry about the fifth one. But you might want to rewind and listen to move number five because it's pretty fun to get deep with this. And again, the cool bonus of getting good at the playful pivot is once you can playfully pivot to a new topic, you're never going to run out of things to say. Because the reason why guys run out of things to say, one of the reasons is they run out of what to talk about for that given topic. But if you never run out of topics, you'll never run out of things to

say. And by getting competent at the playful pivot, you'll never run out of topics. So you'll always know what to say because you can always just switch to a new topic. Anyway, thank you so much for listening to this episode of How to Get a Girlfriend. Until next time, we'll talk soon.