Speeches are the most powerful and direct means of communicating your thoughts, ideas, and vision to your audience. While some speeches are forgotten in a day, others live through history. Mahatma Gandhi’s Quit India speech, Nelson Mandela’s I Am Prepared to Die, and Mother Teresa’s Nobel Lecture are just a few examples of unforgettable speeches. What do these famous speeches and any other well-written speech have in common?
The most important thing to remember while writing a speech is to write it with your utmost attention. The person listening to it should feel your words and the innate emotion. It should not just be a mumble jumble of big and complex words without emotions.
Here are a few easy steps you can follow while writing the perfect speech on just about any topic.
Conduct A Thorough Research
When you get topics for speech, you might get something you have absolutely no knowledge of or something that you know only little about. Before you start to write, read about the topic and make yourself familiar with it. Since half knowledge is dangerous, it is critical to conduct thorough research and gain as much knowledge before writing on any topic.
Doing thorough research will give you plenty of things to write about and develop your own perspective on the topic. It also means you will not just drag one or two points in the entire speech.
Learn About Your Audience
A speech you would deliver to young children will differ from the one you would deliver to the adults. Similarly, people from different geographical areas and demographics will all prefer and like different things. Hence, while writing on diverse topics for speech, do not write it based on what you want to tell your audience, but it should be based on what your audience wants to hear.
Start Strong
Regardless of your topics for speech, consider giving it a strong start. A speech that manages to grab the attention from the beginning tends to be more effective. A person’s attention in a speech keeps degrading as it moves from beginning to end. But, if you have a great start, you will manage to hold on to them for a longer time. On the other hand, a speech that starts dull tends to lose the listeners by the time it is even half-finished.
Draft Your Speech With a Natural Tone
One thing that will decide whether the person listening to you will be engaged in your speech or not is your tone while delivering it. When you write about a topic, you use complex words and long paragraphs, but when you speak about the same thing, you use short sentences with simple words.
Most people make one common mistake while writing a speech: not maintaining a flow and writing things randomly. Avoid doing that to deliver a smooth and engaging speech.
Include Some Interesting Facts Or Stories
Remember! We have all had times when we had almost slept while listening to a speech. To make sure this does not happen with your audience, avoid monotony. Bring out some facts or stories that might awaken interest in your audience. It can be that one differentiating point between your speech and any other average speech.
Avoid Dragging
Nobody likes repetition. Hence try to add more material to your speech instead of just dragging one or two points throughout the speech. Give the audience more to think about. It also makes the audience believe that you know what you are talking about.
End With A Thought-provoking Note
After concluding your speech, end your speech with an interesting and thought-provoking idea. If you want to read about more writing strategies for different topics for speech, iSchoolConnect has several blogs solely dedicated to helping students with their speech.