Public Speaking: Connect with your Audience, Part 1

"By hook or by crook…connect, connect and connect with your audience." Tom Peters

The most successful presentations are made by those who connect with their audience. But what does that audience connection mean exactly?

The American Heritage Dictionary defines "connection" as: "An association or relationship." In computer terms, a "connection" occurs when we join with others through a communication link.  Connecting with your audience is all of that. Communicating, associating, relating.

Connecting with your audience involves them in the core of what you are saying in your presentation, in the ideas and information you are giving them. At a deeper level, you’re not just giving a speech; you’re creating a two-way interchange based on common interests.

When we connect things, we bind them together. When we connect with our audience, we bind them to us. If we really connect with them, they’ll want to see and hear from us again. By doing this, we create the starting point of a relationship. When we feel a rapport with someone - -a person or a group — a sense of trust and affinity begins to develop. Whatever your objective — the information or points you want to get across — you need to be in sync with the people you are trying to reach – your audience.

Let’s look at some of the ways in which we can treat an audience so that they will trust us, feel a rapport with us and perhaps even want to hear more about our ideas or our products.

First, pay close attention to your audience. To get attention, you must give attention, so face your audience directly. This positive body language tells them you are open and receptive to them. Make them feel as if you’re communicating with each individual. Talk to them the same way you’d talk to a friend. Make eye contact with people in the front row, the back, the middle, to build a sense of personal connection. Even in a large group, you can create an impression of speaking directly to each person by making direct eye contact here and there throughout the audience.

Tell your group a story. Actually, every presentation you give is a story. Your connection with the audience via a story or two means you’re joining with them in a shared experience.

Dialogue with the audience non-verbally. Before starting your presentation, take a moment to stand silently in front of your audience. In this moment you can actually sense both the audience’s mood and your own. Do this throughout your presentation. Great presenters adjust their presentation, if necessary, when they face this moment. What is it you’re trying to say and what is the audience looking for? Listen. They’re speaking to you in their own body language – laughter, silence, the buzz of disinterested murmuring. If you’re not carefully tuned in to your audience, you are engaged in monologue. And in monologue there are no connections.

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