Be The Winning Speaker Part4: Ice the cake

Dear loving people,

 

Let us get back to our strategies of becoming a winning speaker and ice the cake with two more strategies:

 

Always interact with your audience: An easy technique to calm your nerves during a presentation is to engage the audience. Encourage them to participate. A simple way to do this is to ask your audience an interesting and topical question. You will be amazed at the responses you will receive.

If your audience has been sitting for a long time, you can interact with them by asking them to stand up, give their neighbor a friendly hand gesture, or by patting themselves on the back. This unexpected physical movement helps your audience stay more engaged with you for the rest of your presentation.

Should your nerves begin to raise, this gives you a quick break to compose yourself again before you continue on with your presentation. The key is to keep breathing…you will overcome your fears.

Always remember to breathe and enjoy: It’s common for anxiety to set in as you approach the platform to give your speech or even during your presentation. If this happens, then remember to take a deep breath and relax. You will get through it.

You can also relax yourself by simply focusing on a friendly face in the audience. For example, make eye contact with a listener who is smiling or nodding his head with what you are saying or has just laughed at one of your opening sentences or jokes. Once you find that friendly face in the audience immediately focus on that person and speak to him as if that person is your friend. This will calm you.

Public speaking can definitely be challenging at times but in the business world, it is really an inescapable part of the every day. As a business owner, you are by default the spokesperson for your company. So, embrace it and put your fears aside. Enjoy the experience!

 

Recapitulating and as a friendly reminder, when it comes to public speaking, remember to do the following:

1. Throw perfection out the door…don’t beat yourself up if you make a mistake or two during your presentation.
2. Be prepared and use an outline to present your ideas.
3. Add humor and humility to your presentation to connect with your audience.
4. Interact with your audience by asking questions.
5. Breathe and enjoy the experience.