Top 3 tips when you speak in front of an audience

I won the first prize at the International Professional Public Speaking Competition in June 2019 in London. When I shared my achievement several people asked me for few tips as they are either afraid to stand up in front of an audience bigger than 2 people or no matter how many times they spoke in front of an audience, they always have butterflies in their stomach and their throat closes so they can barely speak.

Here are the top 3 tips I can give you if you are afraid to speak publicly:

Tip #1: Use your peripheral vision

Peripheral vision is when you look at someone but you concentrate on the people and things on the left and the right side of that person. In such state the whole pressure of “the eyeballs looking at you” disappears. Its easier to stabilise your breathing as the human brain switches from one-to-one look to a state of analysing the audience. 

Tip #2: Put a smile on your face

No one likes scowling faces. Remember that your audience will mirror you at the moment you start talking. When a speaker say a joke with a straight face and doesn't smile after that, the reaction of the audience will be a confusion. Some will laugh and some will mirror you. Those who laugh will not laugh again on your next joke as they will feel outsiders and will try to blend with the others.

Even the most serious topics in the world deserve a little smile time to time or a nicely plugged in joke so the mood in the room lifts up and is easy to digest seriousness or bad news.

Tip #3: If you have slides with you make sure they have minimum text

Think about a time when you have someone talking in front of you and flipping between powerpoint slides. Do you listen to the person or you are reading what’s on the slides and kind of switch off what s/he is talking about? It's the same when you are the one presenting. 

Did I hear a big Uhhh- relief? Now, don’t try to put as much text as possible thinking that this will take the pressure off your shoulders as you will get exactly the opposite effect. Your slides should be one or maximum 2 words only, best is to be just a picture which 

a. It will lift up the mood in the room and

b. It will remind you what you wanted to talk about

As more text you have as quicker you will lose the audience. As less text and more fun pictures you have as more likely the audience to love you and relax in front of you. That’s what you want - a relaxing audience! Because the relaxing audience engage with you naturally and remembers more of what you are saying.

If you want to get over your public speaking fear and you want to do it in a safe environment, the easiest, and free of charge way, is to do few Facebook Live-s. Yep! You read it well!

Here is something I will admit to you. When my mentor asked me to do my first FB Live in December 2016 I was so nervous that I couldn’t press the “Go Live” button. However I was determined that this will be the day I will do it. I always do my own promises. I wrote down a script in the morning, then start listening to my favourite podcast, then I read a book, I cooked, … in other words I did all kind of distractions I could think of and 6 hours later I was still shaking and resisting. At the end I was so upset that I just wanted all this to be over. Guess what? When I started my FB Live I completely forgot my script and start talking about the podcast I listened in the morning. Surprisingly my friends loved it. Even more, two of them sent me books as a present (I talked about the best books I read in 2016). From there onwards I was still shaking and was nervous every time I did FB Live-s but after a month, doing one or two videos per week, I got to the point of writing the topic and pressing straight away the Live button. If you still think you can’t do it, and as you now know how I started, I will only remind you that last weekend I won first prize on an International competition for Professional Public Speakers. It’s powerful to practise as much as you can. 

Be bold and start from somewhere. Write in the comment below how was your first time when standing in front of a camera or an audience. I will be very happy to read about your success!

Thank you lots,

Bilyana