It amazes me how some speakers will show up for a speaking engagement and really not know anything about the audience to whom they are speaking. Many speakers just get lazy and feel that their message is so important that anyone would want to hear it. They couldn’t be more wrong!
Your core message may be about the same for everyone, but knowing your audience will allow you to slant the information so that the audience feels it was prepared just for them. They will relate much better to the information and think much more highly of you for creating something specifically for them. Of course, in many cases you were only slanting your information, but I won’t tell if you won’t.
When thinking about your audience, think as to whether they are going to be left hand brain or right hand brain or a combination of the two.
For example, a person who is “left-brained” is often said to be more logical, analytical, and objective. A person who is “right-brained” is said to be more intuitive, thoughtful, and subjective. So depending on who your audience are, may depend on how much colour, imagination or stories you leave into your presentation.
Left-hand brained people tend to be engineers, scientists, computer programmers and accountants and will usually love flow charts, graphs and details. Whereas right branded people tend to be counsellors, designers, architects, psychologists and may prefer images, headlines and big picture ideas.
There is no need to pigeon-hole people but it is useful to know who your audience are before taking to the platform. You may bring in particular anecdotes which relate to the audience and you wont be able to do this unless you ask the question beforehand. Of course, if you dont know the answer to this one, then keep your stories generic.
