Struggling to Persuade? Confidence and Presence Can Help.

The spoken word is a catalyst for change. From the boardroom, to the newsroom, to the courtroom, to the dining room; words are used not only to inform, but to influence. Every speech you give and conversation you have are opportunities to shape the world around you. In our inundated information economy, the value of your ideas is determined by your ability to persuade. To this end, few attributes can benefit persuasive speech like confidence and executive presence.

In this piece, we’ll explore how building the hallmarks of presence can make you a more confident speaker and move your audiences to take a desired action. But first, let’s lay some groundwork to define the art of persuasion and some pitfalls to avoid before taking the stage or flipping on your camera.

What is Persuasive Speech?

Persuasive speech is a form of communication intended to influence the beliefs, attitudes, and actions of others. Whether you’re an L&D leader shaping organizational culture, a sales manager tracking customer pain points, or a social media strategist pushing a brand narrative, persuasive speaking is an integral part of your job description. It’s how you convince colleagues, leaders, customers, and shareholders to adopt your vision and move forward on a chosen path.

I’m sure you can think of some prime examples of persuasive speech. Maybe it’s Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech. Perhaps Al Gore’s ‘Inconvenient Truth’ comes to mind. Or maybe it’s that time your daughter tried to convince you to adopt a ferret.

That’s because persuasive speeches come in many forms. Some move masses to action (or result in new family mascots), while others don’t make a dent. Why? In short, speakers who lack presence and confidence are often unable to capture the hearts, minds, and imaginations of their audiences. Without this key support, their ideas and vision for the future fall flat or lose out to competing perspectives.

Why Your Persuasive Speaking Might Not Be Working

To tighten your powers of persuasion, let’s troubleshoot what could be going wrong and where better presence could help.

1: Not Studying Your Audience

If you’ve ever failed to foster organizational change, close a deal, or motivate your team, you may be thinking more about what you want to say than what the audience needs to hear. We’ve all been there! But in order to persuade people, you first need to understand them.

Put yourself in the audience members’ shoes by answering the following questions:

• Who are they?
• What do they do?
• What are their hopes and dreams?
• What keeps them up at night?
• How will your idea, product, or point of view benefit them or solve a problem they care about?
• What are their existing feelings and beliefs about the topic at hand?

By considering what they care about, you can determine the type of content they’ll resonate with. And by acknowledging their resistance points, you can prepare to address any counterarguments or rebuttals you may face. To kickstart your thinking, Duarte’s Audience Needs Map™ is an excellent free resource that can help focus your talk for maximum appeal.

2: Not Using Enough Data

Another common pitfall we see is when speakers lean too heavily into emotional content without including enough supporting evidence. Audiences are increasingly attuned (and averse) to vibes-based arguments and marketing and may be hesitant to act if you don’t ground your talk in truth. Without research, data, or other qualitative/quantitative metrics to back up your argument, there’s a strong likelihood your argument will stall.

To avoid this outcome, make sure to conduct thorough research or collaborate with folks outside your department to get the information you need to create an ironclad, data-rich presentation.

3: Not Communicating Your Data Well

On the opposite end of the spectrum, speakers can also lean too heavily into logical content by relying solely on facts and figures. But without story, audiences are left adrift as to what the data means and why it should matter to them. “Data doesn’t speak for itself, it needs a good storyteller,” says Nancy Duarte, CEO of Duarte Inc. “The findings [from the data] can stay buried without the help of a communicator.”

Neither instance is ideal.

To strike the right balance, persuasive speeches and presentations alike require a rhetorical juggling act with three specific elements. You can learn more about this in our best-selling workshop, Duarte DataStory®. It was specifically designed to help professionals in data-intense roles communicate their findings as actionable recommendations with stories that resonate with customers, teams, and leadership.

How To Craft a Persuasive Speech

Persuasive speeches need three imperative components. And these three persuasive speaking components have held true for over 2,000 years. We all have Aristotle to thank for this timeless wisdom. They are ethos, pathos, and logos, and we’ll go into why they are needed when you begin to structure your persuasive speech.

The rhetorical triangle

3 Components of a Persuasive Speech Structure

Make sure your persuasive speech structure includes some aspect of the three below elements. They are essential for ensuring your persuasive presentation meets the emotional, ethical, and logical standards of your audience.

Ethos: Ethical Appeal

Establishing credibility as a speaker is crucial to winning over an audience. After all, would you take advice from a doctor who hadn’t gone through medical school? I think not. People are more likely to listen to someone they perceive as:

• Knowledgeable
• Trustworthy
• Ethical

You can establish credibility by demonstrating confidence, conveying your expertise, and sharing relevant experience (in a humble, non-braggy way of course). Taken together, these elements help build trust and authority on a topic: two cornerstones of executive presence.

Pathos: Emotional Appeal

One of the most effective persuasive strategies is tapping into the emotions of your audience. We can learn a lot about emotional appeal by looking at advertisements. Companies aren’t just selling a product – they’re selling a feeling, or a better state of being. Cars become calls to adventure, clothing becomes a boost of confidence, and software becomes a time-saver. 

These outcomes are illustrated through stories, metaphors, and vivid language or imagery. Harnessing these same tactics can ensure your persuasive speech operates on a higher level when moving audiences to action.

Logos: Logical Appeal

No matter how trustworthy you seem, or how compelling your stories are, most people need tangible proof. That’s why concrete evidence is essential to any speech or presentation. Include facts, statistics, customer examples, and expert validation to bolster your claims and enhance the credibility of your message. 

As I said above, it’s important to cover your bases and include elements of all three persuasive appeals when outlining your main messages.

And speaking of outlines…

How to Use a Persuasive Speech Outline

Now that you have your three components for your persuasive speech structure, it’s time to make your persuasive speech outline.

1. Use The Big Idea™ Framework to Focus Your Talk

What is the main point you want the audience to walk away with? This will serve as a thesis of sorts.

2. Compile Content to Validate Your Big Idea™ 

Next, determine what key messages you need to make to validate your Big Idea™. These may include problems, solutions, topics, specific events, periods in time, etc. You can then start to organize these messages into chapters.

3. Gather Supporting Points

Once you’ve defined your chapters, start adding supporting points. Those are stats, quotes, stories, use cases, metaphors, personal anecdotes, or other rhetorical devices to contextualize the ROI and make it real for your audience.

4. Read it Back and Fill in the Gaps

Your outline is probably looking good by now, but you’re not quite done. Review your outline aloud to see how it transitions from one point to the next. This is your chance to rearrange and reconsider your content. 

Ask yourself:

• Does my outline address the audience-specific questions posed earlier?
• Have I incorporated every side of the rhetorical triangle?
• Does it flow?
• Am I using enough contrast to keep my audience engaged?

Once you feel good about the messy middle of your presentation, start brainstorming a captivating hook and compelling call to action.

5. Determine Visual Aids for Your Persuasive Speech

Visual aids come in all shapes and sizes. Depending on your audience’s goals and intent, there are a multitude of options when it comes to selecting the right visual aid for your persuasive speech. We’ve covered the topic of how to choose the right visual aid for your speech, so let’s assume it’s a presentation (our specialty!)

What is a Persuasive Presentation?

A persuasive presentation is when you choose to deliver your persuasive speech with the use of a digital presentation deck. This is typically done with slide presentation software, and they usually have features like speaker notes or slide templates to help you tell your story in a visually appealing way.

That’s because presentations offer something that speeches don’t: visuals. Visuals enhance your ability to elicit emotion and provide supporting evidence. The most persuasive slides are simple, easy to understand, and complementary to your verbal message. So, keep your main message in mind, stick to one idea per slide, and if you want to stress-test your deck before taking it live, make sure your slides pass the Glance Test™.

Want more info on slide design principles? Allow me to save you some reading time by directing you to our on-demand webinar: Designing Slides and Visual Aids that Pop.

What is a Call-to-Action Speech?

If you don’t intend to move someone with your persuasive presentation, then you might as well send an email. A call-to-action speech is the same as a persuasive speech. It should move your audience into action through the art of persuasion.

At Duarte, we believe that every speech is a persuasive speech, and no persuasive speech is complete without a call to action. This is a directive for the audience based on your end goal. Narrow down the scope of your call-to-action speech by reflecting on what you hope to achieve with this talk and what the audience can do to help achieve that goal.

Here are a few examples of what call-to-action speeches can encourage:

• Turn audience members into champions for your brand
• Enroll in and complete a training course to close a skill gap
• Schedule a sales call or move forward in their buying journey
• RSVP for an in-person or virtual online event

A call-to-action speech can also revolve around the audience changing their belief system or adopting a new point of view about a topic. Maybe you don’t need them to act on something, but instead to feel differently about a person, product, or process.

Before developing your CTA, ask yourself: “Who are they when they walk in the room, and who do I want them to be when they leave the room?” To create this transformation, it helps to show up and speak with presence that matches the moment.

How Executive Presence Can Improve Your Persuasive Communication

Persuasive speaking involves more than just content. You could have the most robust, audience-centric script, but without executive presence, you’ll likely struggle to make the most of the moment. As an umbrella term of interlocking traits, executive presence combines public speaking prowess, appropriate posture, voice control, eye contact, and your overall demeanor. In other words, the way you deliver your speech or presentation has everything to do with the likelihood of it influencing the audience.

At Duarte, we define executive presence as the power to connect, influence, and stay composed no matter the room or the moment. This includes everything from capturing and holding an audience’s attention to leaving a lasting impression well after a conversation, call, talk, or event. Fortunately, you don’t need to be born with uncanny charisma – you can learn how to leverage your voice and speak with confidence.

The Best Way to Nail Your Persuasive Speech and Build Presence? Choose Duarte.

There’s a lot that goes into persuasive speaking. And that tracks – it’s not easy to change people’s actions and beliefs! The content you choose, the visuals you use, and the way you deliver all play a role in persuasion. Moreover, the success of these dimensions is downstream of having exceptional executive presence. That’s where seeking an outside perspective to pressure test your persuasive speech and refine your approach can set you on a course for career-long enhancement. All it takes is booking a quick call with a Duarte Solutions Architect. 

Duarte works with the world’s biggest brands to develop persuasive stories and visuals that have won countless hearts and minds. From CEOs giving their keynotes to thousands, to product marketers getting their go-to-market product launches exactly right, we can help!

So, if you’re prepping for a main-stage or career-defining event where you need to influence an outcome, consider working with a persuasive expert from our agency.

If you’re confident in your content, but not in your persuasive stage presence, home in on delivery by working with a speaker coach.

Or, if you don’t have a specific persuasive presentation to prepare for, but want to learn how to shape ideas into persuasive narratives, you can enroll in a public speaking and presentation skills course like Resonate® to help clarify the core of your idea and approach it as a storyteller.

Put the above tactics to the test before your next persuasive speech to build better executive presence and see just how influential you can be.

For more blogs and free resources to help guide your presence journey, visit The Duarte Guide to Executive Presence.