Speechwriting ad in Private Eye

On 18 September I also decided to run another classified ad for my speechwriting in Private Eye. The Eye is the place to advertise such services nowadays but I also wanted somewhere with a very large readership to mention this new public speaking tips blog.

While Private Eye pretty much has the monopoly as far as print advertising for us speechwriters is concerned, there are other national publications which can be extremely useful to speakers in other ways. Obviously the big major political speeches are reproduced in the papers (sometimes in their entirety in the broadsheets) but all national newspapers print stories with snippets from other high-profile speakers. Sometimes a broadsheet Diary column will reproduce a good one-liner from a successful topical after dinner speech by someone like Rory Bremner and you can use this to see what type of material works with certain audiences. You will also get the occasional tabloid story about some celebrity who has supposedly shocked a group with inappropriately risqué material (although the level of outrage is probably highly exaggerated!) and this can be helpful in determining what to avoid (although after a while this becomes a matter of simple common sense).

Public Speaking Tip #30: Keep cuttings of newspaper stories containing extracts from speeches and use these as a guide to what sort of material works - and what definitely doesn't!