Every now and then in our business or private lives, here comes that moment when you need to make use of your persuasive speech in order to present your ideas to a person or a group. This enables influencing that person or group to a degree that that they are more willing to accept the change you propose. In other words, to convince them to act or think the way you suggest. You can make use of the following recommendations even if you want to improve our conversation skills - as conversation is our 'every day' communication it makes sense to improve it.
How will you manage to keep the audience interested? You may have previously prepared all your persuasive points, but how can you make sure that the way you present things will “rock the house”? Here are some tips:
1. When you are addressing to only one person, it is very important to maintain eye contact, thus being able to express conviction and emotions through your mind’s window to the outside world.
If you look to the floor while stating important points during your persuasive tentative, that person may think that either you are not so sure on your subject, or worse, that you are lying and that person you are talking to is not so very important to you.
When you’re presenting ideas to a large group, it is important to evenly distribute eye contact throughout the room.
Don’t look at the back wall or just the first few rows of people directly in front of you. Try to look at each of them from time to time during your presentation. You can do this by mentally dividing the space into segments and the audience into smaller groups. This way you can look at each group as you speak and everyone will feel important during the presentation.This is especially effective when you need to receive some feedback from your audience. If you look at the folks in front only, chances are that the people in the back will feel a little neglected and will most likely pass up the opportunity to speak to you.
2. Interaction is very important in a persuasive presentation. You can draw back important points as you speak to members of your audience and you can spark more interest by answering audience’s questions adequately and persuasively.
3. Your back should never face the audience. If you have to look at something behind you, do so by turning your head a little and moving your body slightly backwards to the desired direction.
Don’t make a complete turn so the communicative trance that you have worked so hard to create will not be diminished. Your physical appearance (including positioning) and voice are two factors that keep your audience hooked and riveted to your monologue.
4. Simple body language also affects the quality of a presentation. Arm and hand gestures during lengthy and detailed explanations are okay, but avoid folding your arms or scratching your hair while you talk. It’s distracting and such gestures can also diminish the person that people see and hear during the presentation.
5. Persuasion is more ‘in charge’ with putting things or facts in a different perspective, together with showing benefits arising from this new perspective, that haven’t been taken into consideration before. That is why the logical flow is the following: persuasion comes first, and only after that a new set of arguments and facts need to be added to the initial ones.
So, how will you be able to change a person’s point of view on a specific situation?
You need to re-frame the situation, to put everything into a new perspective, a perspective that is brighter than the old one, with benefits that the person cannot afford to oversee.
Engage Your Audience During Your Persuasive Speech