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Speaking Tips
My Top 10
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Research before you accept the booking - Doing research before you accept a booking is an absolute essential. If someone offers you a booking never accept immediately unless it is absolutely clear what you are going to be doing, or it is very similar to something you have done before.
Many speakers are so glad to get a booking that they will take on anything and often regret it later. Clarify with the prospective client exactly what is required and how long you are expected to speak for.
This is especially important if you are someone who is used to selling from stage and then delivering a service afterwards. If you do a 45 minute session which is geared towards selling, it may be difficult to convert this into a 2 hour presentation.
Only after you have clarified the booking details and thoroughly researched your topic should you agree to do the presentation.
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Write your speech out in full. - The idea is not to memorise the speech but to make sure it flows well and is properly constructed. It is also at this stage that you can enrich the vocabulary and add devices like similes and alliteration.
Keep working on the written speech until you are happy that it moves smoothly from start to finish with very few branches. If you do have to branch off make sure you arrive back as smoothly as you left.
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Reduce the speech to cue cards or memorise the main points - Nothing is worse than watching someone read an entire presentation. It is extremely difficult to maintain rapport with an audience when you are continuously looking at a script.
If you are concerned about remembering your speech, write out bullet points on "Cue Cards" these should be around 14cm X 10cm and have no more than 3 points on each card. Write big and bold so that a quick glance will remind you where you are or prompt you if you are stuck.
If possible speak without any notes at all. This will make you look more confident and allow you to engage with your audience. The secret to this is knowing your subject intimately. The better you know it the better you will appear to your audience. Memorise the key points and any special phrases you want to use. Change your material regularly to avoid looking stale.
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Use an arresting or humorous opening - An arresting opening builds instant rapport with your audience. Some experts claim that if you do not connect with the audience in the first 7 seconds, you will struggle for the rest of the presentation, remember you never get a second chance to make a first impression.
Audiences want you to succeed and if you give them a chance to like you they will take it. Making someone laugh always increases the chance of them liking you. If humour is not your thing carry out a hand raising exercise. If you are presenting to a group of company employees. you could ask for all those who have been there for less than a year to raise a hand, then for those who have been there between 1 and 5 years, then those over 5 years. This way everyone raises a hand and feels involved.
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Keep interacting with the audience - Audiences get bored and restless very quickly so include lots of variety, hand raising exercises and jokes are excellent for giving people a chance to adjust their posture or cough.
If you are confident that you are delivering quality material and you are speaking for over 30 minutes, occasionally stop and ask the audience to tell their neighbour the most interesting thing they heard in the last section. Only do this if you are sure you can regain control very quickly.
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Vary your voice - Pace, Pitch and Pause - Boredom is synonymous with monotonous. Monotonous is derived from mono tone, speaking without change of pitch. It is very important to change the pitch of your voice even just a little. Variety really is the spice of life, without it you could have a very sleepy audience.
Pace is equally important and it can be used to dramatise points, indicate urgency or emphasise key points. The correct use of the pause is one of the most underused speaking devices. Audiences need time to assimilate information. When you say something important pause for at least b3 seconds to let it sink in. 3 seconds is an eternity to a speaker but a mere instant to the audience.
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Make Eye contact with several individuals in the audience - People love to feel special. If the person on the platform looks at them an audience member will feel as if the point being made is just for them. Many people advocate different "tricks" for making each audience member think you are looking at them. There are no tricks, just do it.
I break my audience up into 9 blocks and make eye contact with someone in each block. I repeat this process over and over but going through the blocks in a different order each time and making eye contact with a different person in each block. This gives the appearance of looking at everyone, without it looking artificial. If you make eye contact with someone different every 3 seconds, how many people can you include in a 1 hour presentation?
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Be sure your gestures match your words - Gestures are very important, they help emphasise points and assist the audience in understanding you. Lots of speakers just let gestures happen naturally (I fall into this category). This looks quite good and often helps a speech flow well, but sometimes the important gestures are lost in a sea of smaller ones.
Practice keeping your hands still when you are not making specific gestures. Then when you do gesture it will add a lot more import. Don't be scared of BIG gestures. They may feel a bit strange at first but once you have practiced a few times they become second nature.
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Have a memorable ending - This pretty much matches the arresting opening, but timing is crucial. Make sure you have your ending prepared and always let the audience know it is coming. Finishing with "and in conclusion" or " my final point is" or something similar, will get the audience ready for that final statement.
Don't finish with a joke. It is important that your last statement is remembered and relates to your talk. If you were talking about energy saving you could close with "and finally (pause.......) empty rooms don't need lights"
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Have a friend in the audience to give you feedback - No matter how good you were, or thought you were, you can always be better. Sometimes, even while you are speaking, you will notice things that can be improved but you won't always remember them.
Audiences are generally polite and will seldom tell you if you got something wrong, unless it was really bad. Most of the time you will be fed platitudes, thanked and paid. If you were good you might get asked back or you might get recommended to others. If you were not so good you won't be invited back and any word of mouth will be negative.
Where possible have someone that you can trust in the audience. Very few organisations will refuse to allow an "assistant" to attend. If no-one else is available I bring my wife along. Make it clear to whoever accompanies you that they should feel free to make any observations they wish and that you will accept these without rancour.
If you disagree with your "assessor" DO NOT tell them, simply thank them in the same way as you would for positive feedback and mull over their points later. Often you will come to agree with them but even if you don't you will still be friends.
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