After-dinner speakers must have the ability to excite and motivate their audiences/listeners by conveying messages that resonate in the minds and hearts of listeners.
After-dinner speeches can be difficult to deliver successfully; their target audience has just consumed food and may already feel full and sleepy.
1. Humor
After dinner speeches are an opportunity to lighten the atmosphere and provide entertainment, and when your audience has already experienced a delicious meal they will likely be more open to hearing humorous anecdotes or jokes.
An after dinner speech should contain a serious message to inform or persuade, while any humorous topics must still be appropriate to the audience. It’s essential that you know your target group to ensure any humorous topics will not offend or misinform them.
At an after dinner speech, humor can be included without offending anyone provided that the topic does not touch on sensitive subjects like race, religion, politics, sexuality or ethnicity. Furthermore, humor can be added through unusual perspectives – this makes the speech enjoyable even if no one laughs at your jokes!
2. Inspiration
After dinner speeches are an opportunity for you to connect with and captivate the audience by offering new and interesting perspectives and ideas. Your presentation should reflect both the target audience and type of event it is being delivered at, making sure all ideas presented remain pertinent and interesting for them.
An effective way to create an inspirational after dinner speech is by telling a narrative with an amusing thread, which can be achieved easily. Humor can be found in most stories; for instance if speaking before a sports group your narrative could involve basketball or rugby as examples of amusing stories linked together by this strategy. Creating such speeches is far more satisfying and inspiring than trying to explain complex subjects or persuade people to change their values or beliefs through explanation or persuasion alone.
3. Insight
After dinner speeches are often personal stories from personal experience or anecdotes that entertain and move audiences. After dinner speakers are known for engaging audiences through entertaining anecdotes.
After dinner speeches should follow a clear structure and polished delivery, as well as being tailored specifically to their intended audiences. Knowing this helps in selecting appropriate and stimulating after dinner speech topics for any particular event.
An after-dinner speaker must avoid making inappropriate jokes that could offend or provoke individuals, using humor that fits with both their audience, the tone of the evening, and purpose of event.
4. Motivation
After dinner speakers often find themselves asked to deliver speeches aimed at raising funds or awareness for particular organizations or charities. Their speeches should be humorous yet inspiring; providing motivation will inspire listeners to take action and make an impactful difference in the world.
After dinner speeches must be tailored specifically to their audience, and jokes that might cause embarrassment or offense should be avoided as should humor related to religious, political, sexist or ethnic issues.
Personal stories can be an excellent way to motivate audiences. Use an engaging narrative containing an introductory act, an unexpected turn of events that causes conflict, and an uplifting conclusion – this will create an emotional bond with listeners that leaves them craving more. Use props or visuals to support your narrative!
5. Entertainment
After dinner speeches can include lighthearted humor. Just don’t go overboard; otherwise you risk boring your audience or attendees.
Use stories, anecdotes and trivia to keep the audience laughing; just avoid any religious, ethnic, sexist or political jokes that might offend or provoke individuals or groups and that can damage your credibility as a speaker while also ruining the atmosphere at an event or celebration.
Keep in mind that after-dinner speaking requires performing and serious public speaking all at the same time. Your tone and topics must correspond with the audience’s mood or attitude for maximum impact, while making sure jokes come off naturally in order to maintain audience interest. Otherwise, jokes could easily fall flat causing their listeners to lose interest altogether.