Closing your speech with impact can open up the doors of opportunities because what you say last determines how your audience members feel once they walk out of the doors and go back to their lives. You can give a wonderful speech but if the ending is weak, your audience will walk away feeling like the […]
Continue readingHave you ever been inspired by a speaker and ready to take on the world but then 3 days later you were back to normal? I know I have. Would you like to be the kind of speaker who not only inspires your audience for the short-term but also touches their lives for the long-term? […]
Continue readingHave you ever heard the following advice? As a speaker you should take your audience on an emotional rollercoaster Do you know why people dispense that advice? Because it’s true! You absolutely should take your audience on that ride. But how do you do it? One way is by using what I like to call energy […]
Continue readingAs you may or may not know, Mitch Meyerson and I wrote a book called World Class Speaking and we later created a course where we certify World Class Speaking Coaches. At the heart of the program are these 12 World Class Speaking Competencies that we (Certified Coaches) help our clients master. As a speaker, […]
Continue readingSo often I watch speakers tell stories that sound like this: “I did this and I did that and then I did this and then I did that and then this happened to me and then I did that…” And then, at the end of the story, they turn to the audience and say, “And […]
Continue readingOne of the best ways to stay connected and deepen your connection with your audience is to let them beat you to the punch. What does this mean? Let’s use some examples to clarify this delivery strategy. Example #1 Listen to this quick audio and think about what happens after I say, “I joined Toastmasters in […]
Continue readingMost of the time my job is to tease you and make you wait for the breakthrough point but today I’m coming straight out with it. As you may know, speaking involves creating a series of scenes into which we bring our audience members. But the question is how do we bring them into these […]
Continue readingStrong Suggestion: Bookmark and save this page for future reference! This is a page worth bookmarking, because it can become the gift that keeps on giving as you navigate through this wonderful art of public speaking. Before you dive into my Top 10 posts from 2010, here is another valuable gift. For years people have […]
Continue readingThis is an excerpt from the book World Class Speaking by Craig Valentine (that’s me!) and Mitch Meyerson Warning: As I posted this and re-read this, I realized something you’ll surely come to see. Because this content is in the opening chapter of the World Class Speaking book, it’s a preview of what’s to come in […]
Continue readingWhen companies bring you in to speak, they don’t want a cookie-cutter presentation. They want you to customize the message and the experience just for their staff. Doing so means the difference between being re-hired time and time again (and building a lucrative business without much marketing cost) or doing “one-off” speeches, burning that bridge, […]
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