Speech Writing: Tips for an award-winning speech
tips for an Excellent Speech writing
Achieving an excellent speech writing for a class, event, or work presentation can be nerve-wracking. However, writing an effective speech can help to bolster your confidence. With careful planning and an eye for detail, you can write a speech that will inform, persuade, motivate, or entertain! Use your time so that you can polish the text and practice it calmly to get the best possible result. Here are some useful tips to help you craft a winning speech.
- Research the subject of the speech well.
Informative or Persuasive speeches must rely on good research, which gives you credibility and reinforces your arguments. Substitute the thesis with data extracted from reputable sources: books, academic journals, newspapers, and websites of public agencies.
If the speech is for a school or academic subject, ask the teacher what the number and type of sources is expected to be.
- Catch the audience’s attention early on.
The opening sentence is perhaps the most crucial, as it is the moment when listeners decide whether to continue or stop paying attention. Depending on the subject and the intended result, a funny, sad, scary, shocking speech can be used as a hook.
A good introduction to a motivational speech about weight loss would be: “Five years ago, I couldn’t go up a flight of stairs without stopping to breathe halfway.”
If the aim is to persuade listeners to reduce consumption of fossil fuels, the first words may be: “Vehicles powered by oil products are the reason the human race is at risk of being destroyed by global warming”.
- Place the subject in an overview to convey the fundamental information.
The more specific the theme, the more difficult it is for the public to understand its relevance unless it is well spelled out. It is a crucial detail, as no one pays attention to what he considers irrelevant. Think about the grand scheme of things and find out where your topic is based. Why should listeners care?
If the purpose of the speech is to obtain funding for research on Alzheimer’s disease, provide data on the frequency of the disease and how it tends to affect the whole family. Support the arguments not in cold numbers, but in a combination of statistics and anecdotes.
- Organize the fundamentals in a logical sequence.
Once the subject and context are properly presented, proceed to the main points. Each of them has to be proposed clearly and clarified through information, evidence, facts, and statistics. Each point of the speech should be assigned an average paragraph.
A speech on cosmetic testing on animals can begin by highlighting the cruelties suffered by guinea pigs, demonstrating why such tests are unnecessary, and, finally, proposing alternatives that could make them obsolete.
- Anticipate the following topics and summarize what has been said.
Before addressing a new subject, summarize in one sentence your connection with everything discussed so far. Likewise, when you finish it, synthesize it in one sentence. Write these forecasts and outcomes with simple and direct words, so that the subjects are very clear.
To treat, for example, late muscle pain (referred to in the scientific community by the acronym DOMS), start by briefly defining what it is, delve into the aspects related to your argument, and end with a summary of the ideas you defend.
- Help the audience to follow you through transitions
The transitions make the speech more fluent and show the logical link between the topics. The lack of transitions is not always noticed when we read or write the text, but it will end up sounding garbled and unfinished to the listeners. Check for good transitions between one idea and another. Here are the most frequent transition words:
- So;
- In sequence;
- Before;
- After;
- Firstly;
- In the second place;
- At this moment;
- Next week.
- End with a call to action
As the end of the speech approaches, listeners should feel stimulated, ready to act. Encourage them to go deeper into the topic and to embrace the solution you presented. This is the perfect occasion to present more specialized sources and show how to participate.
Arrange a lecture on the impact of global warming on the polar bear population, for example, citing non-profit organizations working to protect their habitat.
A motivational talk in which you narrate how you lost weight can end with an invitation for listeners to start their own weight loss journeys. In that case, it would also be interesting to share resources that have been useful in your history.
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