Speaking Tips Resource Guide

Here is a wonderful roster of speaking tips and related websites:

www.aresearchguide.com/3tips.html

Keep Them on Time

Strive to be the one speaker at their meeting or convention who gets the meeting back on schedule. If you were scheduled for 60 minutes and you're given 42, still end at the original time, on the button.

It's an old saw that few speakers are ever penalized for speaking too little. Many are penalized in the minds of their listeners for speaking too long. You can become a hero to the host or meeting planner and possibly the larger group, by getting them back on track.

The How of Wow

Notes from The How of Wow by Tony Carlson

* According to Tony Carlson only 1 in 500 speeches is good enough to be remembered. To be among those remembered, Carlson says you need to give audiences insight, enlightenment, meaning, stimulation, wit, and entertainment.

* Emulate the greats and soon your own style will take over but with the power of the greats

* Few speakers ever rehearse enough. Every extra moment you have ought to go into rehearsing.

* Your opening line can be a shocker that lets the audience know you mean business. Don’t be afraid to say something that people already suspect, but noone will say except for you.

* Show your vulnerability early in the speech. I recall when Tom Peters said at an NSA convention. “It’s intimidating to think about speaking to a roomful of speakers.”

* Keynotes benefit by a strong start, a rising middle, that grows and grows until you feel a sense of catharsis, a climax of emotion that your audience enjoys.

Excellent Meeting Resource Books

Event Planning by Judy Allen

Planning Successful Meetings and Events by Ann Boehme

Complete Idiot's Guide to Meeting and Event Planning

How to Start a Home-Based Event Planning Business by Jill Moran

Complete Guide to Public Speaking by Jeff Davidson

The Fear of Speaking

A clarification!: It has been said that speaking before a group is the number one fear of adults – a statement which daily is widely misinterpreted. The number one social fear of adult is speaking before groups.

Given the choice of speaking before a group or trying to scale a 500-foot vertical sheet of solid rock, being operated on for a brain tumor, or being held-up at gunpoint, most adults find speaking before a group to be far less frightening.

Don't Offer a False Front

Dr. Dean Ornish once said that the elaborate effort to support a false front is one of the most stressful things a person can do. In the context of speaking, that means be yourself: you'll have more energy and you'll connect better with the audience.

World Champions Speakers

Here are the Toastmaster’s last 20 winners:

World Champions of Public Speaking

2005 Lance Miller Glendale, California
2004 Randy Harvey Sherwood, Oregon
2003 Jim Key Rowlett, Texas
2002 Dwayne Smith Decatur, Georgia
2001 Darren LaCroix Auburn, Massachusetts
2000 Ed Tate Aurora, Colorado
1999 Craig Valentine Ellicott City, Maryland
1998 Brett Rutledge Auckland, New Zealand
1997 Willie Jones Honolulu, Hawaii
1996 David Nottage Auckland, New Zealand
1995 Mark Brown Mount Vernon, New York
1994 Morgan McArthur Idaho Falls, Idaho
1993 Otis Williams Cincinnati, Ohio
1992 Dana LaMon Lancaster, California
1991 David Ross Norman, Oklahoma
1990 David Brooks Austin, Texas
1989 Don Johnson Torrance, California
1988 Jerry Starke Milwaukee, Wisconsin
1987 Harold Patterson Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
1986 Arabella Bengson Islington, Ontario, Canada