This entry is the second installlation to a seven part series that answers to some of your most frequently asked questions below:

How do I interest, impact and impress the audience?

Can you share with me how I can influence my audience?

How do you make sure that your audience listens intently to you?

What suggestions can you give to help me capture the attention of the audience?

What are all the crucial ways to draw the audience into your speech hence connecting with them. Please elaborate in details each of the way.

E2. Solid Content & High Speech Value

Content is king! I have seen people paid thousands of dollars to listen to speakers who are downright boring. And you wonder why. Their saving grace lies in power content. The information that they share is perceived to be worth lots of money hence even if they speak in monotone or they refuse to come up with interesting ways to deliver the content, people will still bite their tongue and perservere through the presentation.

If content is information, then speech value comes in the form of tips or solutions that your audience can take home and use immediately, be it to solve a problem or to become more effective. The secret in impressing and impacting your audience lies in the substance of your speech.

Patricia Fripp, a well respected speaker in the industry defined substance as “what makes an audience’s business and personal life better if they act on it”. It could come in the form of a three step strategy, a recommended book to read or tips to solve a problem.

If there is no substance then there is really no point wasting your audience’s time delivering the speech. And for those of who are always seeking to impact your audience, this would be a good starting point.

Here are three questions to consider as you prepare your speech or presentation:

1. Does my speech contain substance?
2. Can the audience use it right away, like today?
3. Do they get better after hearing my speech?

Along the line of delivering solid content and high speech value is proper set up right from the start. One of the most effective ways of creating a listening for your speech is to inform your audience what they are going to get out of your presentation i.e. What’s In It For Them? A time-tested strategy is to first highlight the pain that they are currently facing (this requires diligent research on your end). By focusing on their pain, you create imbalance. This triggers a deep sense of urgency both consciously and unconsciously to erradicate it. And the solution lies in what you are going to share with them in your presentation. Here’s an example.

[Pain] A lot of us aspire to become great speakers who can inspire and impact people with our words. Yet you and I know difficult and daunting it is to become a speaker of that level. No matter how many public speaking books we read or public speaking workshops we attend, there seems to be something missing. The amount of effort we put in don’t seem to yield the kind of results that we yearn for…

[Solution] Sometimes the best way is to actually have someone take the time to show you how is it done. That was precisely what happened for me over the three years of my public speaking journey. I was blessed with a lot of great mentors who showed me the ropes and inspired me to teach others how to become great speakers.

[Show Possibility] What I am going to share with you today has helped me won several national-level speaking awards including the recent one at the International Speech Contest (Division Level) and the Humorous Contest held two Saturdays ago. The speaking skills I have gained over the short period of time has offered me several overseas job opportunities even though I was still a student then.

[Show Value] In the next two hours or so, I am going to share with you seven practical ways to radically improve your speaking ability so that you can start charming the pants out of the audience…

Cheers,
Eric Feng
Your Public Speaking Coach

P.S: Want answers from experts to ALL your pressing questions on public speaking? Dying to get hold of a cheat sheet that can help you win audience over in no time? In a hurry to become a speaker superstar? … … … NO YOU CAN’T until you get yourself a complimentary chapter of The FAQ Book on Public Speaking right now. (Download Free Chapter Now!)

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