How to Choose a Topic for Your Speech

If you’ve been invited to deliver a speech but not given any specific topic, you may feel overwhelmed by the multitude of topic options you’ve. But don’t worry! Know that there is no such thing as the best speech topic. It depends on your knowledge, areas of interest and target audience.

Before you start choosing a topic for your speech, try to gather as much information as possible about the event. For instance, you may want to know how many people are likely to attend the event, where they are planning to rent seminar room, what audio visual equipment is available in the training room rental venue. For more tips on how to choose a speech topic, read on.

Know your audience

It is important to know about the audience you’re going to address. Try to know about their age, gender, income level, occupation, location, cultural background and the key challenges in their life. Until you know enough about your audience, it would be impossible for you choose a topic that resonates with them.

Your areas of expertise

The next step is to list down topics on which you’ve above-average knowledge. You may not be an expert on these topics, but you should have enough knowledge to convince your audience. When listing your areas of expertise, don’t think about their value to your audience.

Topics you’re passionate about

Now identify topics you feel passionate about from the list prepared by you in the previous step. At this point, you simply focus on choosing topics you are enthusiastic about. Don’t think about your audience at this point.

Take your pick

Finally, it is time to choose a topic for your speech. Simply choose a topic that meets all the above three criteria. In other words, you should be knowledgeable and passionate about the topic. At the same time, your speech should be on a topic that’s likely to add value to your audience.