naldeta.info

You have to know as much as you possibly can about the people who will comprise your audience. You must uncover what their interests and expectations are. You must also take into consideration where you’ll be speaking, what time of day it will be and what logistical and technical considerations may play a role.

Your whole objective is to effectively and successfully get a specific point across to them. Hence, you must first understand to whom it is you’re presenting and where they’re at, philosophically, in relation to your point. The more information you have at your disposal, the more effective your persuasive attempts will be. Consider the following list of questions when striving to learn more about your audience:

1. What is their common background or interest that brings them together to hear you speak?
2. Who are these people as individuals (business professionals, students, mothers, etc.)?
3. Will your audience tend to be more one gender than the other, or will they be pretty equally mixed?
4. Do you need to be aware of their political, religious, professional or other associations?
5. What will their average education and/or income level be?
6. What topic can you speak about that they will universally care about and understand?
7. What types of things would they be looking to get out of your message?
8. In terms of your key point(s), are they likely to agree, disagree or be indifferent?
9. What is their general age range?
10. Will they tend to be more conservative or liberal in their life views?
11. Is this likely to be an easygoing or more demanding type of crowd?
12. How long will you be likely to keep them engaged? How much time is even permissible?

These types of questions will allow you to customize your presentation to your audience. Obviously, you will not present to a board of college professors in the same way you would address a group of inner-city youth. After you’ve discovered all that you can about your audience, you begin to tailor and customize your message and decide exactly how to present it. This process is a simple formula, really: discover, design and deliver. So, once you know all there is to know about your audience, you must then figure out how to organize your presentation in the most appropriate fashion. Again, when doing so, there is plenty to consider. Think about the following ideas when you are in the “structure and design” mode of your persuasive message:

1. How much time is allotted for you to speak?
2. What will the setting be (auditorium, office, classroom, etc.)?
3. How large will your audience be?
4. Will you be speaking from a platform in front of a microphone, or will you be sitting in an intimate circle?
5. What time of day will it be? Will your audience be tired, refreshed, hungry, preoccupied, etc.? Should you/can you consider scheduling a break in your presentation?
6. Will there be any possible distractions that you can avoid by knowing about them in advance? For example, noise from neighboring rooms, outside distractions, children, traffic volume as people move from one room to another, sunlight producing too much glare, etc.
7. Can you inspect the presentation venue ahead of time? Where will you present from and what will your audience’s seating situation be?
8. What equipment will be accessible, if needed, like an overhead projector, a portable microphone, a flip chart, a blackboard or a dry erase board (along with chalk or markers), etc.?
9. What kind of sound system will be used, if any? Can you come to the venue early to do a sound check and familiarize yourself with the equipment?

Another crucial part of the “design” phase in the discover-design-deliver formula is the crafting of your actual message. What is a good outline for the message itself? The first area of concern is your opening. How do you grab your audience’s interest within the first fifteen to thirty seconds? In this brief window of opportunity, you must also introduce your topic. In other words, what is the issue being discussed?

Learning how to persuade and influence will make the difference between hoping for a better income and having a better income. Beware of the common mistakes presenters and persuaders commit that cause them to lose the deal. Get your free report 10 Mistakes That Continue Costing You Thousands and explode your income today.

Conclusion

Persuasion is the missing puzzle piece that will crack the code to dramatically increase your income, improve your relationships, and help you get what you want, when you want, and win friends for life. Ask yourself how much money and income you have lost because of your inability to persuade and influence. Think about it. Sure you’ve seen some success, but think of the times you couldn’t get it done. Has there ever been a time when you did not get your point across? Were you unable to convince someone to do something? Have you reached your full potential? Are you able to motivate yourself and others to achieve more and accomplish their goals? What about your relationships? Imagine being able to overcome objections before they happen, know what your prospect is thinking and feeling, feel more confident in your ability to persuade. Professional success, personal happiness, leadership potential, and income depend on the ability to persuade, influence, and motivate others.

Are you frustrated with giving business presentations – and having your recommendations being ignored? Are you often cut off or interrupted by competitive peers or an impatient boss?

If you’ve had it with not getting the attention you deserve, you don’t have to take it anymore. Now, it’s easier than ever to get your ideas and suggestions noticed. Use your presence, body language and voice to command respect and get noticed.

Many professionals I coach are sick and tired of the run around they get when presenting to groups. Whether they present to funding committees, associations, or intact teams, the common complaint I hear is: “No one listens to me!”

Fortunately, you can gain confidence and skills in getting people to notice your ideas – and pay attention to what you have to say.

Take an instant inventory for yourself.

• Do your presentations seem to fall short of what you imagine?
• Do audience questions derail you — and you lose your train of thought?
• Do you talk and talk…but people still don’t seem to ‘get it’ even after you have explained your point again and again?

Most likely, there are some simple tactics that can solve this tendency to not get the respect you deserve.

In a brand new online course in Visual Storytelling, you can follow a step-by-step blueprint to get the attention you deserve. Telling persuasive stories is a lot more about following specific steps, than it is about your specific recommendations. 

Whether you decide this course is for you — or not, here are three tips to help you command attention:

Tip 1: Pause

Pause before you speak. Catch your breath. Hold yourself straight and tall. Professional speakers often use a pause to command attention. You can do the same thing. Use this tactic at the beginning of your talk.

But, while you’re at it – experiment with adding potent pauses during your presentation as well. Before you give a recommendation for action, add a pause. This signals to the group that you are in charge.

Tip 2: Stand Tall

Your body language communicates authority – especially when you stand and sit with confidence. In presentation coaching and training, body language is a crucial part – it is what your audience sees, feels and responds to.

By standing with leadership presence, you communicate that you are the authority in the room. Watch public speakers and notice how they do this naturally.

Tip 3: Project Your Voice

If you are mumbling your words, people assume you are not confident. They instantly assume you don’t have a well thought-out message.

The best way to project confident leadership is to project your voice. Speak as if you are communicating to the person in the last row. Share your ideas with enthusiasm and energy.

This can help you command respect with even a tough crowd.

Whether you are an experienced subject matter expert, or new on the job, you can learn how to communicate with authority and confidence.

When you speak, stand and communicate with authority, people will listen. Before you know it, you’ll get noticed and be able to command the respect you deserve. 

Adding humour to your speech or presentation can be beneficial because it helps you to connect with your listeners (most people like to laugh and be entertained) and it can help them more easily remember your message.

The purpose of this article is not to turn you into a comedian. It’s just to present you with some ways to add a little humour to your speech.

With that in mind here are two fast and simple, down and dirty formats for including humour in your next speech or presentation.

The first is called: “Joke Format”

This details a way in which you can format street jokes (jokes that friends might tell you in a bar) together to form a comedy monologue like old school comedians, like Bob Hope or Jack Benny. Here’s the format:

1) Put the 2nd funniest joke first

2) End with the funniest joke

3) Counter a good joke with a bad one.

4) Organize jokes according to theme.

Now, I’m not saying that they used this format, I used Hope and Benny as an example of the style of comic that might have used this approach. Although, I have to say, the “counter a good joke with a bad one” seems more in-keeping with the comedy format of old school comics, rather than modern stand-ups. I think today’s comedy professionals try to have continuous funny lines. This particular point seems to indicate a groaner type of joke, like a pun.

But just to remind you the purpose of this article is not to turn you into a comedian. You don’t have to worry about that.

That said, I don’t think there’s anything necessarily wrong with using such a funny line in a speech, providing of course that it ties in with your overall topic and it doesn’t offend anyone overtly. Some people might be offended by a groaner joke, but that’s too bad. It makes you come across as human because we don’t always come out with incredible zingers like they do in sitcoms.

The other format is called the “Message Format”. There are two types for this format:

A)

Intro

2nd Funniest joke

Main body of Jokes

Theme

Funniest Joke

With the second one being as follows:

B)

Intro

Funniest joke

Other Jokes

Theme

This last one ends on a serious note instead of a laugh. Personally, if I’m doing a humorous speech I’d rather end on a laugh. But that’s just my personal taste.

What you might consider doing is reducing your actual speech or presentation by about a third or even a half. Keep the core details that are necessary to convey your message to your audience. So what do you replace the edited content with?

Humour. Funny stories, funny jokes, maybe you could quote other comedians or witty people as long as you give credit where it’s due. There’s no sense delivering a line by Woody Allen in your presentation and passing it off as your own. There will always be someone who can attribute it to the original author, plus it’s highly unethical.

Not only that but by saying something like: “as Woody Allen once said…” you can immediately get your audience into a better state to laugh as they’ll remember their favourite Woody Allen moment. Then if the line doesn’t have everyone rolling in the aisles then you can get out of it by saying, “obviously it’s much better when Woody did it”. Your listeners will love you all the more then because you will have revealed yourself to be slightly vulnerable.

You would have to judge for yourself what you think is appropriate. I would have to guess that it may be better for you to end on a comment about your overall theme. What are you trying to convey to your audience? What’s the take home message that you want them to walk away from your speech remembering?

If you can follow some of these pointers in your next speech you’ll be well on your way to being remembered for your humorous speeches and you’ll get people congratulating you afterwards because you made them laugh and in their eyes you just became the star.