A picture says 1000 words. Words that draw in your audience as well as accompanies the message you want your audience to walk away with. Using powerful images in your speech can help you in multiple ways. Want a couple of tips on how to use imagery? Well you are reading the right blog!
Connection to Audience - When selecting your images, be strategic. If you are looking to make your most impactful point you need a strong image to accompany your words. What's important to realize about images is that people interpret them in their own unique way. Images can be used to describe nouns - pain, anguish, happiness. When you use images that display these emotions you audience will feel them with you.
Room to Breathe - A well timed image can give you time to gather your thoughts. Even though you have practiced about 23,445 times, things don't always go as planned. A well time pictures allows for you to gather your thoughts and think about the rest of your speech. The image can also foreshadow for you: tell the audience what direction your speech is headed in.
Wake Them Up - Please, no death by PowerPoint. If you have images that are simply PowerPoint slides full of text then you will lose your audience quickly. By time you finished reading your first slide your audience has taken out their phones and started to respond to email. To be honest, your speaking material may be a bit dry. Industry conferences are full of audiences who are there just to listen long enough to get a stamp or some other type of validation for your program. So when you know you are entering the dry material in your speech, wake up your audience with a funny image, or a meme that people in your industry share. Do this every few minutes to keep your audience up (if you are presenting dry material).
What are your images saying about your speech? What are they saying about you? Do you have powerful imagery to incorporate, or stats/charts/graphs that will put your audience to sleep. Speaking is an art form, enjoy it! Paint your portrait and your audience will set back and marvel in your imagery.
