Useful Tips on Writing for the Ear

In the public relations industry, being able to write a speech is essential for any PR professional. As a PR student, I realized writing press releases and pitches are constantly presented in our daily duties and classroom curriculum and seldom speeches. Indeed, writing a speech is an important skill we should all hold as public relations/communications students; and it’s important we know the difference between writing for the eye and writing for the ear. 

Writing for the ear should be concise, catchy and consistent. To further enhance and improve your knowledge of writing speeches, below are some helpful tips.

1. Remember a speech is intended to be heard, not read- A speech has listeners, not readers therefore you should write as you would speak. 
2. It should have unambiguous objectives- As any writing, it’s important to have clear and consistent objectives. Having a thesis will surely engage your audience and permit them to follow on. 
3. Be sure to use concrete language- It is important you paint a picture to your audience while delivering your speech to help them visualize what you are presenting. Unlike written work, the reader does not have the advantage of rereading if they had any difficulty understanding a sentence or two. 
4. Know your audience- Tailoring your speech to cohere with your audience is nothing but a smart move.  Nowadays in any industry it is essential to know your audience. 

Whether you are writing a speech for President Obama, a product launch or even for a school event, the aforementioned tips can be used as a head start to writing speeches. 

Do you have any experience with speech writing? Let us know what did and didn’t work for you!

This guest blog post was written by PRowl Public Relations staff member Kadesha Holder

Social Media And Speeches

Speeches and social media may not seem to have much in common. Generally, speeches involve lots of one way communication from speaker to audience. Social media, on the other hand, is much more interactive. Utilizing social media when making a speech allows you to keep the audience more engaged simply because they feel more involved. Here are some ways to use social media to improve upon your speech making:

1. Research- Social networking sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook have groups where people with common interests can join together on one page. Before giving a speech, you can access these groups and see what your future audience is talking about. You can poll members of these groups to get their opinions about topics and issues, and shape the dynamic of your speech from the results.

2. Interact- The best way to keep your audience engaged is to interact with them. Live polling websites such as Poll Everywhere offer free live polling. While you are asking your audience poll questions, they can take a more active roll in your presentation. Also, encourage members of your audience to discuss your presentation live on their various social media networks. Create a hashtag so that those who aren't present can still take part in discussion.

3. Evaluate- After your speech or presentation is over, you will want to evaluate how the audience perceived it.You can do this by searching the hashtag you created on Twitter, or by going back into LinkedIn and Facebook groups and polling members who took part in your presentation. By checking results over social media, you can collect responses much faster and track them with ease.

Have you ever used social media when giving a speech? If so, tell us how you went about it.