Why The Need For Speaking Skills Can Only Increase

TJ’s Insights

October 3, 2005

Conventional wisdom says that the need for traditional public speaking skills will decrease because of the following trends:

More people will work at home so information will be passed along though email and phone calls, not formal presentations.
With a rise in terrorism and fuel prices, business people will travel less to professional conferences; therefore there will be fewer speaking opportunities.
More and more of the business world is migrating more of its functions to the Internet. And, as we all know, the web is made up mostly of pages of text.

Therefore speaking skills are going to be as relevant as knowing how to operate a slide rule, right?

Wrong!

Every assumption above is flawed.

The more people work at home, the more likely they are to join professional and business associations that meet in person and feature speakers.
People might complain about travel more, but every year more and more associations sprout up and grow. The number of conventions grows. The meeting industry is growing. All of this means that more professional people have to speak at them.
The biggest blunder is in assuming that the web will stay a primarily text-based place. Now that broad-band connections are widely available, video and audio are spreading throughout the Internet. And unlike advertising on big national TV or radio networks, putting video and audio on web sites is relatively inexpensive. Therefore, it is only a matter of time before every web site, even one-person- freelancer-web-sites-from-home, will feel obligated to have video and audio on their web sites.

Video and audio will soon be required on most web sites. The easiest and simplest video and audio will consist of one person talking. I don’t believe every small business will be required to spend a fortune on high production values, but those that don’t have simple and straight forward audio or video of one of their executives speaking will be missing tremendous opportunities.

Prediction: the single best way of using video and audio of the web will be for a primary spokesperson to explain the who, what, when, where, and why of a business to every web site visitor. Imagine capturing the typical conversation you have when a prospective client calls your office to discuss your products or services. Now, capture the essence of that conversation in video and audio. That’s what should be on your web site.

Prediction: Whether you are a senior executive at a major public corporation or a sole practitioner working from home, the need for you to be able to speak well and present your ideas in a captivating manner is only going to increase dramatically in the coming decades.

I now create multiple video and audio clips for the vast majority of web sites that promote my businesses. If you want to get a sense of how simple video and audio can be, you may want to check out a few of my sites below.

http://www.mediatrainingworkshop.com/

http://oneononespeechtraining.com/

http://presentationtrainingworkshop.com/

http://privatespeakingtraining.com/

http://oneononemediatraining.com/

http://privatemediatraining.com/

http://mediatrainingpartnerships.com/

http://www.tjscoachingprogram.com/

http://mediatrainingschool.com/

http://www.presentationtrainingschool.com/

http://mediatrainingfreevideo.com/

http://speakcast.com/

http://www.tjsvoicesave.com

http://freespeakervideo.com/

http://www.mediatrainingworldwide.com

http://www.publicspeakingtrainngskills.com

www.tjsinsights.com

http://www.tjwalker.com

http://www.mediatrainingworldwide.co.kr/html/index.htm

If you would you like to learn how to use the principles described in these insights, you may want to consider attending TJ’s next public speaking training workshop http://www.mediatrainingworkshop.com/

Or his public media training workshop http://presentationtrainingworkshop.com/

Protect Your Voice with TJ’s VoiceSave http://www.tjsvoicesave.com

New Book, TJ Walker’s “Media Training A-Z”

http://www.mediatrainingworldwide.com/mediatrainingaz.html

Do you need a keynote speaker? http://www.mediatrainingworldwide.com/keynote.html

Please visit the Media Training Worldwide store at http://www.mediatrainingworldwide.com/learningtoolsonlinestore.html

Media and presentation training workshops http://www.mediatrainingworldwide.com/workshopcalendar.html

To sign up for a subscription to TJ’s Insights, go to www.tjsinsights.com

Author of Media Training A-Z

& Presentation Training A-Z

TJ Walker

Media Training Worldwide

212-764-4955

Media Training Worldwide provides more media and presentation training workshops and seminars (54 separate courses) than any other company in the world. Media Training Worldwide also publishes more than 100 presentation training books, DVDs, CDs, and other information products and is the largest presentation/media training publisher in the world. For a product catalog or more information on training services call 800-755-7220 or visit http://mediatrainingworldwide.com/mediatrainingcatalogapril2004.pdf.

Media Training Worldwide

110 West 40th Street

Suite 203

New York, NY 10018

212-764-4955

www.mediatrainingworldwide.com

May Re-Print without permission IF you provide a link to Media Training Worldwide at http://www.mediatrainingworldwide.com and 212-764-4955.