Unless your speech if absolutely fascinating, any “pause fillers” you add repetitiously, like um, or y’know, or OK will start to stand out.
They will capture the audience above your speech.
Start by listening to others – sports commentators, interviewees on television, anyone speaking publicly.
Listen for their fillers then you will learn to listen for your own.
Gestures can make or break a presentation. Normally, they flow naturally as a person expresses their thoughts, but if they are wooden or distracting, then they spoil whatever point the speaker is trying to make.
My latest free set of tips is about gestures – how to overcome the problems of being distracting or wooden, or when they just don’t work for you.
Visit the courses web page and click the button, and I’ll send you the first in the series.
Public speaking Success Tip
If the structure of your speech involves “Tell them what you are going to say, say it and tell them what you just said…” then the Introduction, Body and Conclusion are vital.
But just as crucial, are the links between those parts – the bridging. They provide another opportunity to remind the audience of your message, and to link the parts together seamlessly.
Often as you take breath to launch into the next point of your speech, the following utterance carries the weight of that breath or pause, and therefore is an ideal opportunity to reinforce your message.
…
When I was planning for my recent all day presentation I was considering the post lunch sleepiness that most audiences experience. I wanted to do something totally different that I knew would shock them out of their afternoon low.
So I bought a muskrat trap. I was talking about the “traps” AKA deep trouble you could get into by spam email marketing.
I set the trap with great care. Then I put a pencil into the trap to set it off. The pencil snapped showing the trap to be real . . . This got their attention.
I then reset the trap and talked about how learning what I was going to teach them in the next section would keep them from getting hurt in the email spam trap.Then, with lots of suspense building as I approached the trap, I set it off with my bare hand, I let out a fake Karate-like scream, the trap slammed on my hand and I held it up hanging from my fingers. . . . Believe me this got their attention!
DO NOT TRY THIS! DO NOT TRY THIS! DO NOT TRY THIS! I know how to do this without getting hurt. I am not responsible if you break your finger or get hurt in any way !!!
There are many other ways to shock people. You could put a needle through a balloon, you could stick a knife through one of their coats. Stop by any magic or gag shop for tons of ideas. Just don’t get too outrageous and scare people unnecessarily.
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