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Public speaking skills can take you far. The benefits of being a good public speaker do not only stop at name recognition. You can take control of your time, build a business around your core expertise, travel as much or as little as you like and more.

• Having a public speaking career can offer you the opportunity to do what you love to do.
   
• Public speaking can bolster your self-esteem and self-confidence.
   
• Being a good public speaker can build your business, for you will be seen as an expert.
   
• Public speaking experience and help you become a more organized thinker.
   
• Public speaking can help you recognize your own potential.
   
• Public speaking can help you conquer you fears.
   
• Public speaking gives you a powerful avenue to help others.
   

These are compelling reasons for you to polish your public speaking skills. These skills can provide a great lift for you and your career.

Your body movement during your presentation has the ability to strengthen the impact of your message … or it can seriously be a distraction. One of your goals as a speaker is to look so natural with your movements and with what you say that no one even notices that you are using intonation and inflection or body movement as a means of emphasizing the points of your speech.

What kinds of mannerisms are distracting?

• Swaying to and fro
• Hanging on to, dare I say clutching, the podium or lectern
• Finger tapping
• Licking your lips or biting your lips
• Fidgeting with clothes, pockets or jewelry
• Frowning
• Fussing with hair
• Bobbing your head
• Flailing arms at inappropriate times

Being of Mediterranean descent (Spanish) and having ADD, I know how difficult this can be. But if I can do it, you can too!
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One of the most common reasons people fear public speaking is that they blank out and forget their entire speech. I remember when I was competing on the speech team in highschool, I did a speech on memory. In the middle of the speech during the competition, I blanked out and ended up saying something stupid like, “And it does this [blanked out, paused] for many reasons.” Arg!

Sometimes it feels like you can practice and practice and practice and when the moment comes that you need to remember your presentation, everything goes blank! However, there are ways that you can fool proof your message so that the parts you actually have to memorize are minimal.

You do this by incorporating triggers into your presentation. These triggers can be things like power point slides, props, and stories that you scatter throughout your speech. What the triggers do is prompt you to talk about the next point in your presentation. The triggers also serve as a trigger to help you remember what to say next.

There are four primary ways to remember your presentation.
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The real success of every presentation is leaving your audience with something of value. What do they get out of spending time listening to your presentation?

Many people believe that they need natural brilliance in speaking and presenting well. They believe that they need to be polished, smart, witty and charming all before they actually start to build a speech. Those attributes can come naturally, but most often, they come as a result of passion, knowledge and practice.

One of the most important factors in a successful presentation is serving the needs of your audience. Going back to the idea that you need to leave your audience with something of value, caring for your audience’s needs doesn’t require perfection. You can make mistakes during your speech and it’s going to be okay. The projector equipment can fail and it’s still going to be okay. You don’t have to include humor in order to be a success. True perfection in public speaking is more like being successful at reaching your audience.
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As a professional speaker, everything you do the minute you walk into the room sets the tone for your message. Without even speaking one word, you can determine just how many people you will reach because their engagement with your message depends on you; not on them. You can have a great topic and great presentation skills, but if you are not able to communicate the passion you have about your topic, none of it really matters.

Expect the Best

Go before your audience expecting to make an impact. People aren’t interested in what you know. They want your information for themselves and passion is the “grease” that lubricates that passage of information. Do you expect your audience to receive what you have to say? Do you communicate that you’re excited to be there and you’re excited that they are there as well?
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