Critical Tools to Connect with Your Audience
THE POWER OF PERSUASION
Every speech is an opportunity to influence people’s behavior: the way they think, the way they feel, or the way they act. Sounds like manipulation, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, sometimes it is. For centuries, dictators and bigots have used speech to incite people to violence, turn them against one another, and foster hatred. And they still do, both online and in person. Public speaking is a tool, and it can be used for good or for evil. I present here tools of persuasion that you can use in your speeches, presentations, and conversations, and I ask you to use them responsibly. Recognize the power you have when you speak in front of a group, and use that power for good.
The second of the Three Questions is, What is your goal? That goal usually involves some sort of influence. Even an informational presentation should persuade your audience that you are a credible source and that your information is accurate.
Thousands of years after it was written, we continue to reference Aristotle’s Rhetoric and the three modes of persuasion he describes.1 He writes that speakers persuade an audience through a combination of three elements: ethos, logos, and pathos.
Ethos
Whenever you speak in front of an audience, your credibility and authority do a lot of the talking. If you are viewed as credible and knowledgeable, then your audience will be more inclined to listen to you. Perhaps it’s your title of CEO that led to the speaking invitation you received. But your ethos doesn’t just come from your title. It comes from your experience. Maybe you’re new to the company but you have twenty years of experience in the field: that experience is part of your ethos.
When you are nervous before a speech, reminding yourself of your ethos is an important confidence-booster: “I’ve been researching this subject for twenty years. I’ve got this.” A lack of ethos can also lead to a lack of confidence: “I just graduated from college; why should anyone listen to me?” In that case, the third of the Three Questions, Why you?, will help build your confidence because it comes from your passion about your subject.
Logos
The words you use matter. Your language and argumentation matter. Logos is about your ability to craft a logical argument and present facts that reinforce your position. When your speech rambles with no end in sight and your arguments don’t make sense, you lack logos and are less persuasive. We’ve all sat through those kinds of presentations.
To many, logos is the most obvious of the three modes of persuasion. In fact, some people think that a logo is the only mode of persuasion, but facts alone rarely persuade an audience. In fact, confirmation bias shows us that when we are confronted with facts that contradict our beliefs, we reject them and hold even more firmly to our beliefs.2 If you’ve ever tried to win a political argument with an ideologically opposed uncle, you’ve quickly learned the uselessness of facts, especially when he seems to have his own. Facts and logic are a crucial component of your persuasive argument, but they will be even more powerful when you include the third mode: pathos.
Pathos
If you don’t believe in what you are saying, you can’t persuade others. If you don’t care about your subject, then your audience won’t care either. This isn’t about the content; it’s about your passion for or interest in the content.
Pathos appeals to people’s emotions, and emotion is a very strong persuasive element. I mentioned earlier that a speech is an opportunity to build a relationship of trust with your audience: we do that by showing that we are real people with real emotions. Emotions are universal. No matter which country you live in or what language you speak, everyone can relate to feelings of fear, love, hope, or loss. Telling a personal story is one example of using pathos; asking the audience to imagine a vivid scenario is another. After describing statistics to illustrate a trend, a single story can make those statistics come alive with meaning.
Ethos, logos, pathos. How do you decide which to use? A powerful speech or presentation has some combination of all three, and the exact balance depends on your audience and your goal. Who are you speaking to and what do they relate to? If you’re speaking to a skeptical audience that doesn’t know you, focus on your credibility: ethos. If you’re speaking to a group of facts-driven scientists, include a solid argument in favor of your position: logos. If you’re speaking to a group of concerned parents, include an emotional appeal to their desire to protect their children: pathos. There is also overlap among these three modes: your facts can provide an emotional wake-up call and your credibility can come from a personal story.
Five Elements of Persuasion
In my fifteen years of experience in helping clients craft persuasive messages, I’ve found that an argument is persuasive when it answers five questions that your audience is thinking:
1. Why you? Why do you as the speaker care about this subject? If you don’t care about the subject, then you can’t persuade your audience to care.
2. Why me? Why should your audience care about this subject? Make it relevant to them.
3. Why now? What makes this argument urgent and timely? Convince your audience to take action now.
4. Why bother? Will we even be able to make any change? Give your audience hope for a positive outcome.
5. Okay, so what’s next? What should we do? Give the audience a specific call to action. The easier you make it for the audience to take action, the more likely they will be to do it.
When you craft a persuasive argument, try to answer those questions as well. You’ll find you can easily integrate them into Monroe’s Motivated Sequence or any other structure.
In addition to answering those key questions, there are specific tools that you can use to make a speech or presentation more persuasive.
Tools of Persuasion
One book that opened my eyes to the power of persuasion was Made to Stick by Chip Heath and Dan Heath.3 Ever since it came out in 2007, I’ve kept coming back to it for its power in public speaking. The Heath brothers studied what makes ideas stick in people’s minds, regardless of their validity, and found they contained one or more of these six principles. You can use each one in a speech:
Simplicity: Use a clear, concise message instead of getting lost in the details.
Unexpectedness: Use a surprising quote or statistic that captures people’s attention.
Concreteness: Use vivid descriptions that paint a picture in the mind of your audience.
Credibility: Base your quotes or arguments on a credible source, someone the audience knows and respects.
Emotions: Appeal to people’s hearts as well as their heads; tap into shared values.
Stories: Tell stories to make the audience feel like they were actually there with you.
As you read through your speech, ask yourself:
• Does my argument have an appropriate balance of ethos, logos, and pathos?
• Does my argument address the five elements of persuasion? What can I do to create urgency around the issue and give my audience a sense of hope? Do I have an appropriate call to action?
• What persuasive tools will work best?
THE POWER OF STORY
The year was 2012; it was a warm summer day in Washington, DC. I was walking toward a building in Farragut Square, two blocks from the White House. I still remember the business suit I was wearing and the sense of anticipation I felt in my heart. I was about to start a new job in a new city, and I had my whole life ahead of me. What happened next changed everything.
That’s the beginning to one of my own personal stories, from a defining moment in my life. Storytelling is one of the most powerful tools you can use to connect with an audience. Our brains react differently to stories than to facts and figures. When you describe smells, sights, or sounds, your audience’s brains light up in those sensory areas. Your audience’s imaginations actually feel the emotions you describe in your story. Annette Simmons, storytelling expert and author of the book Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins, says if a story “changes the emotions of the group, it changes what happens next. Emotion changes behavior.” 
Professor Paul Zak, a neuroeconomist at Claremont Graduate University, found that hearing emotional stories releases oxytocin, a chemical that increases trust and empathy in the minds of listeners.4 If you are speaking to an audience who is skeptical about you, then by hearing a story, they can feel what you feel and relate to you as a person. They start to trust you.
How did your family members form your values? Probably by telling stories about when they were young. My family stories shape who I am and how I perceive myself. Take the story about my grandmother as a young woman taking a bus alone from New York to Florida, or my mother learning to fly a plane while she was nine months pregnant with me. These two stories are part of our family lore and shape my independence and love for travel.
In my experience, the most powerful stories are not the ones where everything goes according to plan: the most powerful stories show a struggle and highlight your failures instead of your strengths. It could be a humorous story that tells the audience you can laugh at yourself, or a story of shame that shows your vulnerability. Through our own failures, audiences see us as human beings and relate to us on a deeper level.
Several years ago, I worked with a group of public school principals in Washington, DC. They were a group of dedicated, driven leaders trying to provide a safe, nurturing learning environment for their students, many of whom came from disadvantaged backgrounds. We brainstormed ways they could win the trust of their students whenever they spoke at school assemblies or even one-on-one. Rather than sharing the stories of their leadership successes, which put them up on a pedestal, these principals instead looked for stories of struggle and loss that made them relatable to their students.
Stories don’t have to be overly personal. As a business executive, you can tell a story about when you first started working in your organization and what you learned in that junior role. If you’re a sales manager, you can tell your junior salespeople what it was like to open a new office and have to build your own book of business, without any guidance along the way.
And if storytelling is personal, that’s okay. We are not robots doing business with other robots; we are human beings connecting with other human beings, even if we’re talking about finance or policy or supply chain. When we connect on a personal level, we build trust, which leads to better working relationships. If you’re pitching a new client, a personal story about how you learned the value of customer service is an incredibly powerful way to say to the client, “I will be here for you.”
A caveat: this doesn’t mean that the story should be too personal. Subjects such as disease or dating or divorce can feel like too much information and can make your audience feel uncomfortable.
Sometimes an international student in my class at Harvard will suggest that using stories is something “you Americans” use. But stories are universal. Using them in a speech or presentation may not be as commonplace in business or politics in your country; but even so, it is still a powerful tool that you can use in your own way. Let’s talk about how to find and choose a story.
How to Find a Story
Start with the end in mind. What point are you trying to make? What value are you trying to impart? How do you want your audience to feel? Think about an anecdote from your professional or personal life that illustrates that point. For example, if I were giving a speech about the importance of gender parity in the workplace, I could tell a story about being the only female at a conference.
I picked up a few great exercises from international keynote speaker Olivia Schofield: Make a list of all the pivotal experiences in your life, from childhood through adulthood. Next to each one, write the lesson you learned from it. Or make a list of the important people in your life. Write down how you met them and one story that happened with them. These anecdotes become your story database; the next time you’re writing a speech, look through that database to select a story that fits your message.
In Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins, Annette Simmons talks about six different types of stories you can use; I highly encourage you to read her book, which walks you through crafting each one.5 She also uses the following storytelling prompts: tell us about a time you shined; a time you blew it; a mentor; or a book, movie, or current event. Those four prompts reveal rich examples of stories you can share.
How to Choose a Story
When you ask the first of the Three Questions, Who is your audience?, you’ll know which stories to use. Will your audience relate to stories of perseverance, or failure? Are they more analytical, or emotional? Will your story resonate across borders and across age groups? If the story personally embarrasses you or someone in your audience, it may not be the right story. If you are afraid you’ll break down in tears telling the story, it might be too raw to use. If the story references another person, check with that person to make sure you have their permission to use the story.
Don’t make up a story: if the purpose of a speech is to build trust with your audience, then you destroy that trust by lying to them. You can make up a parable, but be clear that it’s not a true story. Similarly, don’t use someone else’s story as your own. You can reference their story with attribution, but check with them first.
How to Write a Story
I received the following guidance from professor Marshall Ganz at the Harvard Kennedy School, who teaches leadership courses on public narrative and community organizing.6 He explains that a story has a character, a plot, and a moral. Within the plot, there is a challenge, a choice, and an outcome. As you write your story, here are some questions to help you flesh out the story. If you weren’t the character in the story, use “you” below to refer to the character.
• Where were you? Focus on one moment in time: set the scene by explaining where you were and what you were doing. Be as descriptive as possible so the audience feels like they were right there with you.
• What happened? What was the challenge that confronted you? Describe what was at stake and how you felt.
• How did you respond? What choice did you make? Your action results in an outcome.
• What was the outcome? Paint a vivid picture of what happened as a result of your action.
• What was the moral? As a result of the story, there is a moral or teaching lesson. Match that moral to a point you are making in your speech.
Mistakes People Make When Telling a Story
1. They don’t tell a story. They simply list a number of events. A story is something that happened at one point in time.
2. They skip crucial details. You were there; you know what happened. But those of us in the audience who weren’t there need more details. Make sure your story walks us through what happened without skipping a step—or if you’re condensing a long story, make sure the critical transitions are there.
3. They describe too many details. It’s important to provide context in the story, but don’t get carried away. Many people reveal so much background that they start to distract from the story itself.
4. They don’t talk about how they feel. The power of a story comes from creating a feeling in the hearts and minds of your audience. And if you don’t share how you feel, the audience won’t feel anything—about the story or about you.
5. They don’t connect the story to the message. Some people will tell a story without connecting it to the message of their speech. The story and its moral should be relevant to a point in your speech.
Test your story on others; it’s a good way to make sure you feel comfortable telling the story. Sometimes we choose a story without realizing that it feels too personal. If you’re telling a story about a family member who passed away after a long battle with disease, and you cannot tell the story without dissolving into tears, then the story might not be ripe yet. It’s okay if you show emotion while telling a story—in fact, it’s critical—but if it distracts you from the message of the speech, then it might be too personal. Test this out on others before using it in front of an audience.
How to Tell a Story
So you’ve written a story. How do you use it in your speech? Where do you put it in your speech?
There are three particularly effective ways to use stories: to open your speech, to close your speech, or to illustrate a point. You could do all three, but that depends on the length of your speech and the makeup of your audience. If you’re giving a technical presentation or pitch and are concerned that the audience will spend all their time reading the slides instead of looking at you, you can add professional stories to get them off the slides or handouts. Once you start to tell the story, your audience will stop looking at the slides and start connecting with you.
Don’t introduce the story. Many people will get up and say, “Good morning, I’m going to tell you a story about something that happened in my life and how it shapes who I am today.” Just tell the story. One of my students demonstrated this approach brilliantly when she started her speech with this sentence: “The shooting started at five thirty in the morning.”
Don’t read the story from notes. The beauty of a story is that you know what you’re talking about. You don’t need to memorize statistics or background information. Don’t worry if it doesn’t come out exactly as you practiced—it never will. Trust that, as a result of your practice, you will tell a good story.
Pause after you tell the story, both before and after you reveal the moral. Many times, people will rush through their story and then move to the rest of their speech without giving the audience time to absorb the moral. In the audience, we are experiencing this story for the very first time. We need time to think about what it means for us. Give us time to do that. Make sure your facial expressions and voice match the emotion of the story. If you’re talking about a personal tragedy, let your face and tone reflect it.
If you’d like to hear other people’s stories, check out TheMoth.org. The Moth’s mission is “to promote the art and craft of storytelling and to honor and celebrate the diversity and commonality of human experience.” They host live storytelling events around the world and their tagline is True Stories Told Live.7 Some of The Moth’s storytellers are famous, but most are not. They are regular people who want to share something that happened to them in their life. I’ve spoken at one of their storytelling events in Washington, DC, and I’m a devoted listener to their weekly podcast.
Professor Ganz says that “stories, strategically told, can powerfully rouse a sense of urgency; hope; anger; solidarity; and the belief that individuals, acting in concert, can make a difference.”8 Stories help you speak with impact.
Once you’ve written your speech or presentation, take a step back and ask yourself where you can add a story to illustrate your point. Think through events in your life that have shaped who you are, and turn those into the stories you share going forward.
THE POWER OF HUMOR
Do you think of yourself as a naturally funny person? Are you able to tell jokes that leave people rolling around on the floor in laughter? That’s not me. And that’s not the kind of humor you need in a speech.
Humor is an incredibly powerful tool. The moment the audience laughs with you, they connect with you. When you use humor, you demonstrate that you’re confident enough to laugh and that you don’t take yourself too seriously. It can lighten up a difficult subject or situation, calm your nerves, and capture your audience’s attention.9
When people think of humor, they usually think of telling jokes. They think, “I’m not very good at telling jokes, so I’m not very good at humor.” Actually, I don’t recommend you tell a joke. There’s a particular skill to telling jokes, such as rhythm and pausing. Comedians can work for years on crafting a single joke. Luckily, there are many other ways of using humor in a speech.
Ways of Using Humor in a Speech
Stories. A story with a funny or unexpected outcome is a great use of humor. Maybe it’s “the craziest thing to ever happen in our store.”
Quote. A humorous quote is a great way to start your speech. I love this quote by George Jessel: “The human brain starts working the moment you are born and never stops until you stand up to speak in public.”10
Comic image. In the American business world, Dilbert comics are a constant source of dry humor. I love the “demotivator” posters sold by www.Despair.com. Just make sure that you have permission to use a particular image.
Situational. Commenting on a shared experience, like the office kitchen or the conference-room air-conditioning, can be a great way to make everyone laugh and remind them that they are all in this together.
I once attended a fabulous (and funny) workshop with humorist and speaker Judy Carter, who spoke for a National Speakers Association DC chapter meeting. Ever since, I have recommended her books and resources on how to use humor in a speech. Her book The Message of You has powerful tips and techniques for using humor, as well as being an excellent guide for someone looking to develop their skills as a professional speaker.
Where to Use Humor
A great place to use humor is in the beginning of the speech—remember Tim the Dairy Farmer telling us to make the audience laugh within the first eight seconds? When introducing myself, I like to say, “My name is Allison Shapira and I’m a recovering opera singer.” It captures people’s attention because it’s unexpected, making them laugh. If no one laughs, then I prepare for a tough audience.
You can use humor right after a difficult subject to lighten up the mood and transition to a new subject. An incredibly effective place to use humor is right after you make a mistake. I once saw a speaker onstage try unsuccessfully to make his slides work. He looked at the audience sheepishly and said, “Live by PowerPoint, die by PowerPoint.”
I was once leading a workshop for a US government agency that was simultaneously being broadcast to hundreds of remote workers. I was wearing a lavalier microphone to transmit the audio to those watching remotely. Halfway through my presentation, the microphone stopped working. The audiovisual technician walked up to me while I was in mid-sentence, gave me a handheld microphone, walked behind me, and started fiddling with the microphone receiver clipped to the back of my belt.
How did I respond? I took a minute to pause and breathe, then said to the audience: “I’m going to continue talking and pretend that there isn’t somebody standing behind me right now playing with my belt.” Everybody laughed, eventually the mic issue was resolved, and we kept going. If the audience sees you laugh, then they can relax.
Having talked about the power of using humor, we should also mention the danger of using humor. When speaking to people of different nationalities, remember that humor is very cultural. What works in one country may not work in another. My normal opening, “I’m a recovering opera singer,” doesn’t quite work outside the US, because international audiences don’t understand the “recovering” reference. Even in the US, the reference could confuse people. The one time I met one of my musical idols in person, I walked up to her after a concert in Central Park in Manhattan and gushed, “I’m a recovering opera singer, and you have been a huge inspiration!” She took a big step back, looked at me with a worried frown, and asked, “What did you say you were recovering from?”
When using humor, ask yourself if you are making fun of someone. It’s okay to laugh at yourself, but not at other people. Think very carefully about whether your humor will come across as prejudicial. Perhaps many years ago it was okay to joke about women worrying about their makeup or clothing. Now, in a professional setting, it demeans the professional value that women bring.
Is it okay to use political humor? By now you’re far enough into this book to answer that question: it depends on your audience. Just remember that a closed-door speech is never really closed-door. If your speech is posted online, will the humor still be funny?
If you’re uncomfortable using humor, don’t force yourself to use it. Find something that you are comfortable with. We’ve all been in situations where we say something that’s supposed to be funny and we hear a wall of silence from our audience. Or, worse yet, a gasp of shock. Try out your humor on someone else to make sure it’s funny to others. Practice it, smooth it out, and make sure you don’t rush it. It has to feel comfortable to you before you go onstage.
Humor is an incredible tool to make your audience relax and connect with you. Take the time to find humorous styles that work for you, and test them out on others before using them in public.
Think about the audience and venue of your speech. What situational humor can you bring in? Which humorous and relevant stories can you tell that audiences will relate to? Practice them with a friend or colleague to make sure they are funny and appropriate.