How to Captivate the Audience with Poor Delivery Skills
"If you want to captivate the audience and keep them on the edge of their seats, you must have dynamic delivery skills."
Have you heard this statement? Is it really true? In the past three weeks, I saw two speakers keep the audience on the edge of their seats despite poor delivery skills. Why? I wondered the same thing until the answer flashed into my mind a few days later.
The first speaker we’ll call Mr. Monotone. His voice was as flat as the roads of KS. He did move some and had OK eye contact, but his voice was stuck in one pitch. Normally his delivery skills would have put the audience to sleep, but all 300 people hung on his every word. Why? Keep reading.
The second speaker was at a different event with a room full of 90+ people. Let’s call him Mr. No Eye-Contact. I don’t want to be disrespectful, but I have never seen someone make such poor eye contact. He never once looked at his notes, because he did not have any!
Where did he look? The inside of his eyelids. His eyes were closed at least 90% of the time. I am not exaggerating!
But again, the audience was with him every sentence of the way. Why did these two speakers with poor deliver skills have such a tremendous connection with the audience?
Simple.
If a hungry audience is fed by a top chef, they listen intently.
This is the winning formula. Vocal variety, stage presence, and eye contact are all helpful. However, as I witnessed, they are not critically important when the speaker is feeding a hungry crowd
Mr Monotone had made millions on the internet and was addressing a roomful of internet marketers wanting to increase their income.
- Audience hungry for info on how to make money.
- Expert and credible speaker showing them how.
Mr. No Eye-Contact was a top expert in the health/nutrition field. The audience was made up of individuals hungry for information to improve their health. Again a winning formula.
Because both speakers were top chef’s or experts in their topics, this increased the hunger of the audience and they felt more satisfied.
Hungry Audience + Credible and Expert Speaker delivering satisfying content = Audience on the edge of their seats.
Both speakers are highly paid and popular, not because of their delivery skills, but because they are feeding hungry audiences.
How can we apply this:
- Choose topics your audience is hungry for.
- Speak in the areas you have expertise in.
- Let it slip out that you are a top chef in your topic area. Put it in your introduction. Slip in a few self-praises in a humble way.
Delivery skills are very important, but you can hold attention if you find a hungry audience and feed them well.
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