Analyze Your Audience

Determine demographic, psychographic and situational characteristics of your audience
Just as a gardener must tend to the individual needs of each plant, a speaker must know his/her audience well. Learn all that you can about your audience in order to meet the needs of your speaking occasion.

• Click here to learn more about characteristics of your audience.

Consider cultural considerations
Ignoring cultural differences and expectations is considered rude and impolitic.

• Click here to learn more about considering cultural differences.

Interact with your audience during your talk
All speakers seek to converse with their audience members in order to reach them. As you are delivering your talk, consider adopting a heightened conversational tone.

• Click here to learn more about interacting with your audience.

Get feedback following your talk
If you are enrolled in a public speaking course, you will receive expert feedback from your instructor who is trained to do just this. Much like a referee or judge sees a performance differently than do the fans, your instructor will be looking at elements of your presentation that many audience members may or may not notice.

Your audience members can give you some useful information as well, particularly about how well you adapted your talk to their particular needs.

• Click here to learn more about soliciting feedback following your talk.