You have a lot of things going on in your mind before you start presenting in public. Whether it is a public speech or a pitch in front of investors, you will lose confidence if you think of everything that could happen.
You can’t do anything to change the situation, but you can do something to help you feel confident during the delivery. The best way to deal with your nerves is to prepare well for your speech. When you go on stage with everything ready, you know that everything will end well.
Outline your speech:
Some people are confident when everything that they need to say is on their paper or prompter. Others want bullet points, so they can continue discussing off the top of their head. As long as you can naturally present the critical message, it does not matter what strategy you use. You can also decide what type of notes to bring to make it easy for you to remember the essential topics you need to discuss.
Do your research:
You can keep talking about a lot of things that you know about, but what you know is not enough. You need to back your claims up using facts. You can research online or use statistics from research. You will also feel like an authority during your speech when you know that the information you are presenting is not only based on your opinion on the subject.
Learn from others:
It also helps if you take time to learn from other speakers. You can get ideas from them on how to speak in front of a crowd, or in front of potential investors. You don’t need to copy them since you have your own style. You can observe them and find out what strategies they use work.
Prepare your visuals:
If you keep talking for several minutes, you will lose your audience. Their brains will start drifting away and will no longer be interested with what you are saying. However, if you have exciting visuals, they can listen to you, and also get information from the visuals. Take your time to select the data to include in your visuals. You can use slides that you will project on the screen, or you can also hand out A4 presentation folders. You can even do both if you think they will help you in convincing people to buy what you are selling.
Look good:
Sometimes, your physical appearance will help you feel confident when you speak in public. Therefore, you need to prepare yourself well and dress up. You need to wear nice clothing for the event and the crowd you are talking to.
There are things you can’t control when you present in public, but there are things you can prepare. Don’t expect everything to be perfect. You can learn from this experience and do better the next time. Eventually, you will find public speaking and presentations easy, but you still need to prepare well.
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