Name

Short of physical appearance, your name is the key differentiator between you and some random guy across town. It’s the lowest bar possible for remembering details about a person. Miss this and you’ve dropped the ball. Never forget it and you make someone love you.

We’ve all heard the quote. As Dale Carnegie said:

Remember that a person’s name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.

Be careful here. Some people twist this quote to suggest that you should repeat a person’s name as often as possible during a conversation.

Don’t do that. That comes across as smarmy. Like you’re trying to pitch a sale even though you may just be talking.

Open the conversation with a warm greeting that includes the person’s name. Talk like normal.

Then, bookend the conversation with a similarly warm goodbye that also includes their name. Done.

Who are you?

Think back to a person who didn’t remember your name no matter how many times they’d spoken to you. Not exactly endearing.

Repeatedly asking someone their name is a surefire way to let them know that you don’t care to remember even the most basic details about them.

I can remember a time when I was employed in an office setting and routinely had to work across team lines within the company. There was a certain colleague of mine that never remembered my name.

Through the course of my employment, he went so far as to introduce himself to me no fewer than three separate times. Three times!

I’d spoken with this man a dozen times. He couldn’t even remember my physical appearance enough to realize he’d met me before let alone my name.

I know this wasn’t intentional and was likely just due to the fact that he and I only interacted once every couple of months. Still. The repeated introductions made me feel invisible.

You and I aren’t like my coworker. We care enough to remember people’s names. The following tools will help you lock away the names of every person you meet.

Tips to Remember

Play the Echo Game

Repeat someone’s name back to them as part of your own introduction. This works both ways.

If you introduce yourself first:

“Hi, my name’s Bill. How’s it going?”

“Hello, I’m Christine. Not too bad, how about you?”

“Christine, pleased to meet you! I can’t complain.”

OR if they initiate:

“My name’s Christine and I’m the manager here. Is there something I can help you with?”
“Hey Christine, I’m Bill. Actually, yes. Thanks for coming over.”

Improve Your Focus

Sometimes we miss a person’s name in the flurry of conversation just because we weren’t paying attention.

Pay. Attention.

This is the difference between someone feeling heard and someone feeling like you’re just there to cut the air before moving on to better things.

• Face the person fully
• Smile and shake hands
• Look them in the eyes as they introduce themselves
• Repeat their name back to them like we discussed above

Develop a Mnemonic Device for Remembering Names

Our brains are incredibly visual machines. Painting a picture of something in your mind makes you far more likely to remember that information. Grab yourself a copy of Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer if you want to explore that even further.

For now, practice building visual associations when you hear a person’s name. The more outlandish the better here.

I’ll give you an example.

I meet my neighbors for the first time. Their names are Matt and Mary.

Mary makes me think “Mary had a little lamb” so I picture her carrying a small lamb under her right arm.

We need to tie Matt in as well.

The first thing that comes to mind for me is “doormat”. I’d like to tie that image to his appearance, so I picture a custom doormat with his face stitched onto it.

To join the two together, I imagine Mary carrying her lamb into the house from the field. Her boots are muddy so she stops to wipe them on the doormat with Matt’s face on it before entering.

Sound stupid? Keep in mind: ridiculous builds remembrance.

Occupation

All of us have a name. Most of us are employed.

Most people spend a third of their daily hours working, so you can imagine that it’s a pretty integral part of their existence. Ask them about it. Have them describe their work lives to you.

The key here is to go deeper than surface level and remember the details. If someone tells you that they’re a maintenance man at an office, they’ve handed you the same generic detail they hand everyone.

However, if someone tells you they’re a maintenance man and you tease out that they’re the head of maintenance staff for the office, you’ve assigned more value to that fact.

If the person hates their job, they’ll likely be generous with the details. Be careful here. Try not to engage in a complaint-fest with the person, but ask them what they would change about it.

Sometimes people just want a sounding board and you can help them with that.

Similarly, if the person loves their job, they’ll likely be generous with the details as well. Ask them:

• What motivates you at work?
• What made you interested in the field in the first place?
• What does your career mean to you? For example, is it an opportunity to help people, make a positive difference, etc.
• What’s the hardest part about your job?
• What makes the difference between a good day and a bad day for you?

Let them elaborate and pick out several items to remember. The next time you see them, bring up those same key details and they’ll be delighted that you paid attention.

Hobbies

Even more important than occupation, taking an interest in someone else’s hobbies will guarantee affection. This is where a person truly shines.

Hobbies are special in that they’re something you do solely for yourself. You typically don’t paint or run because it’s required of you. Instead, you do it because it makes you happy, feel accomplished, relaxes you, whatever.

In my experience, hobbies are one of the easiest things to get a person to talk about. You should have no problem gathering details about somebody’s interests if you can get them on the subject.

Bonus tip: give yourself an edge here. Most people will rattle on about their hobby to a novice even if the person they’re talking to has no idea what they’re talking about. But if you have even baseline knowledge about the activity yourself, you’ve suddenly jumped ahead of everyone else in building rapport.

People like people who like what they like.

With that in mind, be a Renaissance man. Try a variety of hobbies. Be interesting yourself and you’ll equip yourself with the tools necessary to take an interest in others.

I go into more detail about this in a previous post.

Doing is more important than reading here. Sure you can grab a tennis magazine off the rack and use that to fuel some light conversation about the sport for a bit.

However, actually standing in a court with racquet in hand provides you with an honest opinion of it. That single experience is worth more than a hundred books on the subject.

Accomplishments

Accomplishments are like names. I truly believe we all have them.

Everybody is proud of something they’ve done. Search for these things.

This can be anything from job performance to the results of a hobby.

For example, maybe your friend is a runner and you know they’ve been training to run their first marathon. If you paid attention to the hobbies section, then it will likely come up in conversation at some point.

Be excited when the other person is excited.

Celebrate when the other person celebrates.

The key is to be genuine here. Develop the mindset that you’re just as happy for other people’s success as you are your own.

This can be very difficult.

It requires you to sacrifice your own ego and lift others up. That can be especially challenging if you feel like the other person is “doing better than you”. Often times you’ll find that you have a tendency to minimize accomplishments in that case.

Combat that.

Make the other person feel seen and applauded and you’ll naturally draw them to you. Keep in mind, this doesn’t mean you have to be a cheerleader or anything like that. Just a simple congratulations, delivered genuinely, is enough.

Be wary of another trap that a lot of us fall into. Don’t use someone’s story of success to insert your own.

Going back to the example of our runner friend, imagine they’ve just told you they completed their first marathon. You respond with, “Nice! I’ve actually run three marathons myself.”

See what you did there? You made it halfway there with the compliment, but then immediately spun off to your own accomplishment. Now that person walks away feeling like you didn’t actually care about their win since you one-upped it with your own.

Instead, compliment them and then ask them about the details.

• What was practicing like while trying to get to that goal?
• How long have you been working on it?
• If you could do it again, what would you do differently?
• What’s the next goal you have in mind?

Now that you know all about their achievements, you can take this a step further to make them love you even more. Look for natural opportunities to bring their wins up in future conversations with others.

When you do that, you reaffirm the feeling that you’re genuinely proud of and excited for the other person’s accomplishments.

Don’t be weird here. Don’t force the conversation towards the other person’s successes. Be on the lookout for opportunities to allude to them if the conversation naturally hits it.

In turn, the other people you’re talking to will see that you take a genuine interest in others and that will draw them to you as well.

Insecurities

Insecurities are different from the four previous items. You should remember them, but you should avoid bringing them up.

Here be dragons.

People appreciate those who are considerate of their shortcomings.

Say you have an acquaintance who’s pretty shy and doesn’t open up to people very readily. The last thing you want to do is go around telling everybody that your acquaintance is shy.

Not only are you calling attention to the fact that they’re less confident in social situations, but you’re setting the scene for everyone else. That person has even less of a chance to behave differently then.

Instead, go into conversations with the clandestine knowledge that your acquaintance is shy. Take opportunities to bring them into the conversation when you know they may not take them themselves.

Go a step further. Redirect someone else’s insecurities into positives if they’re brought up.

Imagine someone calls out your acquaintance for being painfully shy. You jump in by saying that they’re actually a really deep thinker and likely just taking their time before responding.

You’ve now built a mystique around that person where there was a weakness before. That will make someone adore you.

Combine this with the previous four items and you’ve got a winning combination.

The goal is never manipulation. Instead, the goal is connection.

Remember names, jobs, hobbies, accomplishments, and insecurities. Pick up on details and ask for them when you don’t have any.

Take a genuine interest in other people and you’ll naturally draw people to yourself. Thanks for reading.

-Two-Bit Stoic