What Makes a Great Professional Speaker?

by Jaimie Abbott

People think that you have to have all this skill and talent to become a professional speaker!

However, there are other important factors that determine your success. Technically, you can say and do all the right things. You can have the right information and present it in an organised format, but your true success will be found in your ability to connect with your audience rather than presenting a speech well. People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care!

Here are your real tools that you'll need to have that will spur you on to success! Making a mistake at the podium doesn't mean failure. Your biggest mistake is not reaching your audience with the message you have.

1. Your attitude speaks through and through. Why are you presenting this information? Are you here because it's a job requirement or a way to make money? The attitude you take concerning the material you present will show through in your presentation.

2. Your passion communicates more than you'll ever say! Passion brings a professional speaker's material to life for their audience. Your audience will know if you are passionate about what you're speaking about or not. Moreover, they will need to draw on your passion to move them into taking action.

3. Your ability to empathize with the needs and wants of your audience will make you a success! You must have an ability to respond in a split second to the needs of your audience. In order to do this, you have to start interacting with your audience to get a feel for where their hearts and minds are concerning your message. You'll have to think quickly on your feet and be able to adjust your message and you'll have to become sensitive to "feeling" out your audience.

4. Your ability to make your message easy to understand and implement will help you reach more people! The easier your solution is, the easier it will be for your audience to take the action you're recommending in your presentation.

5. Your physical energy communicates the passion and life in your message. Excitement is contagious.  You've got to get your audience excited about what you'll be presenting. This requires having the physical energy to rev up your audience as you speak excitedly, move about the room excitedly and present your material in an exciting manner.

6. You must love in order to become a success. This is the heart and soul of true charisma. A general love for what you do, the topics you speak on and the people you're speaking to are needed elements to your speaking career. This love will pass on even when you are talking about the latest theory in quantum mechanics!

These little talked about characteristics will be the true foundation of your success! More than technical skill, these soft skills are the real tools you'll need to get bigger paid speaking jobs. These tools are the elements that will draw your audience to you. If you take the time to work on building these skills, your success as a paid speaker will be inevitable.