Demographics of your audience

By:  Ellen Egan

We have seen in the past few posts that successful public speaking is more than just talking about a subject about which you are an expert.  To get the audience applause at the end of the presentation, you have to do the audience analysis during your preparation.  As you analyze your audience, you begin to understand that they  are as important to the success of your presentation as you are.

The next step in your audience analysis is to find out the demographics of your audience.

• What is their age?
• What is their gender?
• What is their educational background?
• What is their job and/or their position within the organization?
• Where to they live? (If it is pertinent to your presentation)
• You may have some other demographic questions that you think would be appropriate for your presentation.

With all of this information, you can more easily draft your presentation to meet the needs of your audience.  A successful presentation is one where the needs of the audience are being met. 

 To your success,

Ellen

Understanding your audience for better public speaking

By Ellen Egan

As we prepare for our next public speaking event, we have begun our audience analysis and we know the answers to the questions: Who are they? Where are they from? and How many are we expecting?

The next step in analysing our audience is about their Understanding of the topic.

• What is their knowledge of the subject? 
• Are they experts or the general public?
• Is there controversy about the topic and they are biased on particular points of the discussion?
• Have they heard other speakers about this topic recently?

Answering these questions will help you to tailor your speech to their level of understanding.  You don’t want to talk over their level of understanding or they will get bored.  You also don’t want to talk below their level of knowledge or they will get frustrated.  If you have an understading of the audience’s position related to any controversy about the topic you can either address the controversy or avoid it.  If they have recently heard other presenters about the topic you can do some research on the speeches they have heard to better understand the viewpoints and information that the audience has already heard.

As you get more information for your audience analysis, they start to become more participants in your presentation and you will be better prepared.

To your success,

Ellen