Public speaking tip – Make sure image and message support each other

My last tip was about being deliberate about creating an image.

The most powerful choice you will make is how you get that image to support your message – how you
put the two together.

It may be totally supportive, in that the image is unobtrusive; seamlessly part of the message and the complete package – an incredibly effective combination.

Or you may choose to create an edge, a mystique.

Your body language, your facial expression and gestures, your clothes and your grooming all need to work towards the impact you choose to make. And they will contribute as powerfully to the impact you choose to make as a person as they do to the impact you choose for your presentation to make.

This package, this combination of impact, message and image are what people take away from your
presentation. They are the wow you create. But the pivotal word, there, was “choose” – the impact you choose to make, the impact you choose for your presentation to make.

Whatever you may be trying to achieve, don’t let the impact of your presentation be an accident. Right from
the beginning, it needs to be part of the planning. When you are visualizing your production, toying with ideas
and possibilities and first drafts, make the impact of you as a person and of your performance an integral part of that process. Visualise it and work it into all aspects of your production planning.

Then you have the foundation for creating the “wow” factor.