Speaking with Confidence: Our Ten Top Tips

Impact Factory’s Robin Chandler outlines simple methods for speaking with confidence!

How Do You Speak With Confidence?

Public speaking creates anxiety in everyone, and that includes professionally trained public speakers who spend their lives in front of audiences. Fortunately, a few surprisingly simple pointers can give you the foundations for speaking with confidence, and help you shine in the spotlight.

1. Minimise risk

This may sound like a no-brainer but always check your equipment. Knowing that the risk of mishaps and malfunctions has been minimised leaves your mind clear to focus on delivery.

If you need a projector or monitor, make sure it works. If you need a microphone and speakers, run a sound check. If you need props, then check everything is ready to hand. You might even consider having backups for key items in case anything goes wrong.

That said, all the planning in the world cannot prevent something unforeseen, although it helps to try and foresee as much as possible. If things go wrong, never panic or worry. Your audience will understand and sympathise. In fact, some of the best presentations I have seen are when speakers were forced to go ‘lo-fi.’ Their reliance on style and professionalism ended up having an even greater impact on the audience.

2. Pour a Glass of Water

This is another simple but vital tip for public speaking with confidence that even professional speakers rely on. Even if you don’t think you need water, have a glass of water available. All the air passing in and out of your lungs while speaking can dry your mouth and throat, and a sudden squeaky voice or coughing fit can be awkward for both you and the audience.

Bear in mind that a dry mouth can also be the result of anxiety, and having a glass of water available serves as another brick in your wall of confidence.

3. Concentrate on Your Opening and Closing

The opening and closing of your speech or presentation are the most important moments. From the outset, you want to capture your audience’s attention and focus them on the subject.

At the end, you want to summarise your key points in a way that motivates the audience to take the action you want them to take. Leaving your audience wanting more is one of the seven laws of presentation success.

During preparation, it helps to write your whole speech or presentation, and then return to the beginning and end to make them as powerful as possible. You are likely to have many messages you want to convey, but the aim is to bring them together under a uniting phrase or two that you leave the audience with.

Finally, practice so you can deliver the content smoothly and clearly. This is by far the most important contributor to speaking with confidence. By the way, check out our article on how to avoid the common pitfalls of public speaking.

Read – Professional Speaking: Five Common Pitfalls

4. Speaking with Confidence: Get in the Zone

If you suffer from anxiety as most people do, then it helps to spend a few minutes preparing beforehand. However, don’t think about yourself because this can heighten your fears. Instead, consider your audience.

Remember that audience members are people just like yourself. You may know many of them, and some may even be your friends. Focus on what connects you, such as the subject you are speaking about or the group task you are all seeking to accomplish.

Another key tip for speaking with confidence is to bend in the middle of your body. Before the speech, simply touch the side of each knee with each hand and this will help to release the muscles around your midriff and lower back. In turn, this will free up your movement and relax your breathing.

5. Use Gestures

Hand movements can help to convey messages and add emphasis to key points. However, always use gestures that are natural to you, or they may seem awkward and out of character.

It helps to plan ahead and think about the kind of gestures that work best at certain points. Think about a gesture you would naturally use to reinforce a spoken point, and then consider whether you need to exaggerate it slightly so the audience can see it clearly.

6. Move Around

It can feel natural to stand to one side at the start of the presentation but don’t be afraid to go centre stage when you feel more relaxed and are speaking with confidence. However, don’t get rooted to one spot. Professional speakers often use the whole stage to add life to their delivery.

There are no fixed rules on how or when to move, and always gauge what you think is best for the audience and the content. If you feel moving about might be inappropriate, then restrict the space you use and focus on gestures instead.

Check out Public Speaking – The Art of making speeches

7. Own the Space

Being the sole focus of a group of people is bound to make you feel self-conscious. This can cause you to doubt your reasoning for standing in front of them, such as a fear you don’t belong there, or that you don’t have the knowledge to act as a thought leader on this particular issue.

Here is another simple tip that will have you speaking with confidence in no time. Do little things that make you feel like the presenting space is yours. You can place a glass of water or your notes down somewhere. And feel free to move them as you move around.

8. Make Eye Contact

Eye contact helps us to really connect with others, and there are many benefits of gently making eye contact with members of the audience throughout your speech or presentation.

Overall, eye contact demonstrates you are talking to people rather than a room. It also helps your concentration, and lets you see whether audience members are nodding, frowning or falling asleep, which gives you the opportunity to change the way you deliver your messages.

Eye contact is also extremely valuable when you deliver critical messages as it reinforces their importance. Never fix eye contact with one single person for too long though, or they might feel singled out!

9. Use Rhetorical Questions

Rhetorical questions are an excellent tool for speaking with confidence as they engage your audience in an organic way. Injecting questions such as “so why are we doing this?” or “what does this give us?” also convey a sense of connection between the speaker and the audience.

Look for suitable places to add a rhetorical question. One of their best uses is to prompt the audience to think about the message you have just delivered. They act as a useful ‘equals sign’ that people can try and calculate for themselves.

10. Say Thank You

Always thank your audience for their time, input, and questions, which is a simple courtesy that shows you appreciate their attention. Whether you feel you performed well or poorly, your audience will appreciate your gratitude.

Check out the Top Ten Inspirational Speeches

Read – Motivate and Influence an Audience