How to Write a Speech: Tips You Should Know

Preparing a speech does not significantly differ from preparing other kinds of mediums. The main points are that you have to know the target audience, the required length, and the purpose of the speech. These aspects are equally important whether you are writing a speech for a college project, wedding, business conference, or any other occasion.

However, there is something about preparing for a speech that causes especial stress. If you deliver a speech that does not go over well, someone from your audience could lose interest, start talking, checking their phones, and ever walk out of the auditorium.

Sure, poor speech is not the worst thing that can happen to you. However, it is also known that an outstanding speech is capable to change multiple things. At least, it can spark the listeners’ imagination, catapult your business into a success, earn an A on the project, or ensure that the bride and bridegroom are still friends with you after the wedding.

So, if you are worried about your speech, bother no more. In this article, we will share some tips on how to prepare for a speech that will help you succeed.

How to Write a Speech? Clearly Define the Type of Speech You Are Writing

Since there are different types of speeches, you should clearly understand the essential similarities and differences between them in order to create a fantastic piece matching your prompt.

Informative speeches should inform your target audience about the important aspects of your topic. For instance, you may write a speech on the topic “How to do perfect make-up?”
Persuasive speeches should be based on reasonable arguments to convince the target audience to take some action. Such a speech is characterized by suggesting a strong argument and supporting it with solid evidence. For instance, you may compose a speech on the topic “People should improve the measures of environmental protection.”
Entertaining speeches should be engaging and amusing enough to entertain your audience. For instance, you may create a “Why it is important to travel” speech.
Special occasion speeches are usually written for some special purposes. For instance, you may compose a wedding speech emphasizing your friendship with the bride.

When you know what type of speech you need to write, you will be able to cope with this task perfectly.

Basic Principles to Know When Writing a Speech

Know the purpose. You must know what you want to accomplish with this speech. Do you want to educate, entertain, inspire your listeners, or argue a certain point? The tone and structure, as well as the general presentation, will depend on your goals.
Know the target audience. Make sure your speech is tailored for your listeners, both in terms of ideas and language. You should neither burden them with unnecessary information nor provide deficient data.
Determine the length. You should not underwhelm or overwhelm the listeners. Ten minutes may be too short or, on the contrary, too long depending on the occasion. It is not the best idea to leave things up to chance. The process of writing becomes easier when you know the required length.
Spend enough time on revising. No great speech was written in a couple of hours. Provide yourself with the time needed to practice the material and work through a lot of drafts. Do not expect to succeed on the first try.

Step-by-Step Guideline

There are many good ways to start a speech. One of them is knowing the step-by-step process of writing the speech. Here is a brief guideline.

Step 1: Write an outline. Determine the main ideas for all the sections.
Step 2: Highlight each key point in your outline. Do not try to use the perfect words in the draft right away. Just let every creative idea flow and write everything down.
Step 3: Edit your speech and polish it until you get a clear and persuasive draft of the speech.
Step 4: Practice a lot. The more you practice the speech, the more you will realize where the gaps are, which sections require revision, which transitions need improvement, etc. You will find out how you are doing on the length, as well.
Step 5: Revise, practice, and improve the speech until you consider it perfect.

The Universal Structure

Still, have doubts on how to write a speech? Here is an example of structure that can be used for all kinds of speeches.

Introduction

This is the part where you have to introduce yourself, explain the reason why you are giving this speech, and present your main thesis. Keep in mind that “who” and “why” can be longer or briefer depending on the context. For instance, if you are having a speech at a wedding, you will likely want to tell about your relationship to the newlyweds and why they mean so much to you. However, if you are presenting to your classmates at college, you can focus more attention on your thesis. If you have a speech in a business or motivational setting, the introduction is a crucial time to hook your listeners’ attention and arouse their interest.

Main Message

The biggest part of your speech has to be focused on presenting your thesis and supporting material in a clear and perfectly organized manner. Whether you are giving a wedding speech or a business presentation, make sure to speak clearly. It is unnecessary to share all the information you know about the topic. Instead, select several main points and present them to the audience. Stick to one idea at a time and finish the thought before moving to the next point. Make sure the transitions between ideas are logical.

If your goal is producing a memorable speech, then it will be interesting for you to know that according to numerous studies, our brain memorizes stories very easily. If it is appropriate, make your speech personal by including some description of personal experiences. Also, we remember big ideas better if they are condensed into several memorable words. That means you should work hard and do your best to sum up your thesis.

Takeaway

Think well what you would like your audience to walk out of the auditorium remembering. Highlight your main idea one more time, provide a couple of major takeaways, or tell one last story which illustrates your point in the best way.

How to Write a Good Speech to Make Your Audience Involved?

Still cannot understand how to write a speech? We have a few additional tips that may help you. Writing a speech is impossible without considering the needs and interests of your target audience. Thus, when preparing for a speech, take some time to think about how you can engage your listeners and make them interested in your speech. Try to write your speech with enthusiasm and passion and you will make your listeners follow the flow of your ideas.

Examine Famous Speeches

If you want to find out how to prepare a speech, you may gain writing inspiration by studying the great speeches written by famous people. By examining the well-known speech examples, you will figure out a lot of secrets turning a simple speech into an incredible one. In particular, you will understand how to start a speech, what a speech should include, and many other successful insights. The famous speechwriters use excellent devices to engage their audience. By recognizing these devices and applying them in your own speech, you will be able to understand how to give a speech of exclusive quality.

Get to the Main Point

Keep in mind that by including much irrelevant information into your speech, you will make your reader get bored. When it comes to speech writing, you should be very attentive because people may easily lose interest. If your speech is written on an important subject, make sure to address this subject from different perspectives predicting and answering the questions that may appear in the heads of your listeners.

Keep Your Speech Conversational

The way you deliver your speech is also very important. Remember that a speech is your conversation with your reader. Making it sound too official, you will not be able to get the expected outcome. A great way to check whether your speech sounds well is to read it out loud. Such a technique will help you understand if all your ideas flow naturally and smoothly.

We do hope that our tips for write a speech helped you understand how to do it right. However, even if you lack the necessary skills or experience, we assure you that by applying a professional approach, you will be able to create an impressive speech that will bring you the anticipated outcome. In case you find it too difficult to work on this paper, you can just order it at our writing service and we will gladly compose it for you. Our skilled writing experts know perfectly how to write a great speech meeting the needs of the most demanding audience.

8 Rules of the Most Boring Speeches

Have you ever heard a really boring speech? Either in the university or at the presentation of a new product we all had to listen to the boring speeches as if those speakers have never prepared for the event. Or even worse: it seems like sometimes they use some kind of rules for making their presentations boring. It is as if their speeches are intentionally boring. We don’t particularly believe in this idea although very often it seems like that is the case. It is no secret that one can easily find some speech tips online today. You can easily google search how to write a speech or even get down to specific things like how to start a speech effectively. Nevertheless, it seems like there are people who ignore all of those recommendations using instead some kind of rules for awful presentations. So let us imagine what kind of tips could there be for those who don’t wish to impress the audience by an engaging talk.

Rule #1. Don’t prepare. Those who believe that improvising is the best thing they could do while delivering a speech are somewhat right. But that is true of people who improvise within the frames something they are expert at or something they prepared for. No preparation often results in vague talks about everything in the world which is of no interest to the audience.
Rule #2. Speak quickly. Many presenters have a habit of speaking so quickly that it makes it really difficult to understand what they are saying. There are some “expert” speakers who can fire out the whole thing within a few minutes leaving the public wondering whether the the speaker needs to go home soon or one isn’t interested in actually delivering the message.
Rule #3. Speak quietly. Murmuring out the whole presentation is so irritating. It makes the audience mad since people can barely hear and concentrate on what the speaker is saying. Speaking at the correct volume is extremely important for those who wish to perform well on a stage. It seems not so important though for many speakers who just ignore all of those details.
Rule #4. Use abbreviations. As often as you possibly can. Abbreviations are appropriate when people you are talking to can understand them. Since usually speakers don’t know the audience very well most good presenters tend to avoid using abbreviations. That is not the case though for those who take as a rule different speech tips. It is almost as if a speaker wants to finish the presentation as soon as possible and using acronyms will help achieve that goal. So if you want to confuse the listeners just use as many abbreviations as you can regardless of whether people know what they mean or they have no clue what you are talking about.
Rule #5. Forget about the start. Those who know how to deliver an engaging speech understand that it is extremely important how a speaker starts a presentation. The first impression is crucial for people to keep the focus during the whole speech. The speakers who don’t really care about the listeners usually don’t bother to know how to start a speech effectively.
Rule #6. Forget about the end. People tend to remember what you say in the very end of the speech. So choosing what to say at the closing is an important move. That is true for those who wish to impress the audience leaving a long lasting thought in the minds and hearts of those who came to listen to the speech. Forgetting about the closing of a speech will help everybody forget both the speaker and the presentation pretty soon.
Rule #7. Who cares if you have engaging slides to go along with your speech? It takes so much time to prepare a PowerPoint presentation for the speech. It takes even more time to design a presentation using more sophisticated software. Everybody knows though that having engaging slides accompanying the speech is a great tool to deliver the message. Not all speakers make use of this recommendation. More than that, some speakers don’t even think about how to make it easier for the listeners at all.
Rule #8. Don’t write it down. Don’t ask yourself the question “How to write a speech?”. You don’t need writing it down. Keep it all in your head and maybe you will be able to prevent someone from sleeping during the presentation. There are hundreds of articles on how to write a speech and rightly so because it helps to have a clear understanding of the structure of the speech (something many presenters really miss). However, this “how to write a speech” issue doesn’t seem like a big problem for many presenters. Unfortunately.