When you speak with confidence and articulation on a subject, your listeners will more likely trust you and see you as an expert in your topic. Speakers typically run into problems when they try to fake their expertise or knowledge. As long as you practice what you preach and speak with confidence, you’ll be able to win your audience.
Gary Vaynerchuk loves public speaking and is confident in front of a crowded room. One of his biggest pieces of advice is to walk into the room and ask how many people know who you are, expecting “90% of the room doesn’t know who you are.” He suggests doing this to get a temperature of the room in order to get a feel on what the audience knows about your topic and yourself. You can’t assume what the audience knows or doesn’t know, but regardless, he suggests sticking with what you know and being humble about it.
Everybody finds comfort in different things when it comes to public speaking. For me, I like Keynote slides with short bullets, that way if I ever lose my train of thought, I can quickly glance at a slide. While others, such as news anchors, find comfort in cue cards. While others may find all of the above distracting and just “wing it.” Everyone is different and in the end you need to pick what works best for you.
In the end, great public speaking involves confidence, energy, expertise and being comfortable in your own skin. Do you have any additional tips that help you? Comment below!
