Chapter 28 Give sincere, heartfelt appreciation

Audiences are made up of many individuals, so they respond as individuals.Public criticism of an audience is bound to lead to resentment.Compliment them for something admirable they've done, and you've got a passport to their hearts and minds.This requires some research on your own.Exaggerated, gross phrases like "You guys are the wisest audience I've ever had to deal with" are also outraged by flattery that most audiences consider empty. To paraphrase the great speaker Giancy M. Depp, you have to "tell them something about them that they didn't think you might know".For example, a person recently wanted to give a speech at the Kewanee Club in Baltimore, but he couldn't find any special information about the club. He only knew that one of his members had served as the international president and one had served as an international director. Not news to those at the club.He wanted something new, so he started: "The Kewanee Club of Baltimore has 101,898 members!" The members listened, and the speaker was simply wrong—there are only 2,897 Kewanee clubs in the world.The speaker then went on to say:

"But even if you don't believe it, it's still a fact. According to the statistics, the club does have 101,898 members, not 10,000 or 20,000, but 101,898. How did I figure it out, The International Kewanee Organization has only 2,897 clubs. The Baltimore clubs have had an international president and an international director in the past. From a mathematical probability point of view, any Kewanee club that wants to have both an international president and a director The odds are 1 in 101,898—a number, which I was told by a PhD in mathematics from Johns Hopkins University, should be quite reliable."

When talking about this kind of subject matter, the attitude must be 100% sincere.With words without sincerity, you may occasionally deceive the audience for a while, but you cannot deceive the audience forever.The "highly intelligent audience...", "these beauties and knights from New Jersey...", "I'm so glad to be here because I love each of you." Don't do that!If you can't speak your heartfelt words, then don't force yourself.