Public speaking Tips

Public speaking is the number one fear in most people, the number two would be fear of dying for most people. So many people get stressed out at the thought of speaking in public that many of us would like to avoid this problem entirely, but this is hard to do. If you are a small business owner, or as part of your current job you are expected to provide presentations to others, then you need to get over your fear of public speaking. If we want to be leaders or achieve anything meaningful in our lives, we will often need to speak to groups, large and small, to be successful.

The big secret behind the truth about public speaking is is IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE STRESSFUL! If you keep just a few key principles in mind, speaking in public will soon become an invigorating and satisfying experience for you.

So here are my five key tips for great public speaking:

1. Relax – remember the audience are there to hear what you have to say. They are looking forward to what it is you are going to deliver. They want you to succeed, therefore they are behind you.

2. Realise it is not about you – Remember, the essence of public speaking is to give your audience something of value. The audience are there to hear the message you are going to deliver. The purpose of public speaking is not for you to get something out of it from your audience. It is about YOU giving useful information to your audience.

3. Speak in simple terms – you don’t have to make it overly complicate,just get your message across in terms that are appropriate to the audiences needs. All you need are two or three main points to convey to your audience.

4. Don’t preach to your audience, instead try to engage with them, they will warm to you and interact in a positive way.

5. Inject a little Humour or tell a story (your story if appropriate). If being funny feels comfortable to you go for it, it usually works and breaks the ice letting the audience warm to you. Or if humour is not appropriate then tell a story that is relevant to the topic at hand.People tend to engage well with stories of meaning and if they have some personal bearing to you, the audience get a feel of what you are like as a person,therefore you are engaging.

Hope the top tips help you out when you next have a presentation or talk you have to do publicly. You will have noted that I did not mention ‘practice’ normally when you practice too often it tends to come out worse,instead carefully look at what message you are going to deliver and write down your key points that you want to get across. If the subject is something you are well versed on you should have no problem delivering your message, so go out there and DO IT!