The Audience Matters

• Author: Faith Dianne Pincus
• Profession: Attorney and former Federal Law Clerk
• Pages: 7-21

7

AUDIENCE

CHAPTER TWO

The Audience Matters

The A of my three-step AMI™ Method of Public Speaking stands for

Audience. One of the classic mistakes speakers make is deciding upon

their topic and creating their speech without ever considering the wants

and needs of their audience. If you think about it, that’s a lot like putting

on a dinner party for strangers without finding out if your guests have any

allergies or dietary restrictions. Before you prepare your presentation, it

is imperative that you know who is going to be on the receiving end of it.

Whether you have a specific assigned topic, a vague idea, or no topic

at all, you still have to figure out as much about your audience as possible

before creating your presentation.

So, your first question should always be: Who will be in my audi-

ence? Will I be speaking before a judge, a jury, a room full of attorneys or

other professionals at a seminar or conference, a room full of my client’s

staff forced to attend training sessions, or a room full of potential clients?

All of these audiences are different and have different wants and needs,

so prepare accordingly.

Your Audience: Six Questions

The first thing to do when preparing your presentation is to find out about

your audience so you can tailor your speech to their needs. But where can

you get information?

Sometimes it’s difficult to get factual background info, but at the

very least, you should be able to make an educated guess about the kind

of group you’ll be speaking to and what their expectations will be. No one

is ever asked to speak to a completely unknown audience on a random

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