Five Tips for a Great Best Man Speech
1. Avoid novelty speeches
We’ve all seen clips on You Tube of people giving brilliant ‘novelty’ speeches e.g., as a song, or a stand-up routine, or a TV show parody. One of the best examples I’ve ever seen was a guy giving his speech like he was the commentator on a horse race!
And when it comes off, this can be really entertaining, or funny, or poignant. But when it doesn’t…
Unless you’re a performer or have experience at putting together a show, unless you’re one hundred per cent confident in your ability to pull it off and to pull it off well, think very hard before you go down the road of the novelty speech. If you don’t have the time to write and rehearse a ‘bit’ properly, walk away!
2. Don’t Try
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To Wing It! Maybe you give a lot of business presentations. Maybe you’re used to making pitches. Maybe speaking in front of a room full of people doesn’t faze you. That’s great. But no matter what, you shouldn’t try to wing your Best Man speech. This doesn’t mean that you have to write your speech out word for word, putting in every last comma and exclamation point. But you should map out clearly the main topics you want to talk about, the order you want to say them in, and the key points you need to include. If you do this, you won’t get stuck for words, you won’t forget to thank the people who need to be thanked, and you won’t get too carried away and go on for too long! 3. The speech isn’t about you! It’s a great honour to be the Best Man but remember, the day is not about you! And neither should your speech be. Sure, you’re going to talk about wild and fun times that you and the groom have had together, but it should be about what he did, not you. Make sure you thank and compliment the other people in the wedding party, especially the bridesmaids and groomsmen.
Say how much you’ve enjoyed spending the day with them, and what a great help they’ve been to the newlyweds.
And most importantly, don’t forget the bride! Sometimes a Best Man speech only focuses on the groom and what a great guy he is, but a wedding is about two people, and the bride deserves a mention too! It’s always good to compliment her on her looks, but more importantly to talk about the positive effect she’s had on the groom, and how being with her has changed him for the better.
Maybe you were at school with the groom, or you’re college buddies, but you haven’t seen him in a while and you don’t know the bride that well. In that case, you should also talk about how much you're looking forward to getting to know her, and that you hope you’ll be sharing lots of happy occasions with them in the future.
And the golden rule—the bride should never hear something about her new husband on her wedding day that she didn’t already know. It may be cool to embarrass him, but the Best Man should never embarrass the bride. If you want to tell a story that’s a bit risky, check with the groom that the bride knows about it, so she doesn’t get an embarrassing surprise in front of all her friends and
family. 4. Remember who your audience is Maybe you and the groom have spent a lot of time hanging out at work, or watching sports, or in the locker room. It might be that you like to rag on each other pretty hard. That’s great, but remember that a wedding isn’t any of these places. And the audience isn’t just you and your buddies. There’s probably going to be kids there, and elderly friends and relatives, not to mention the parents of the happy couple. So you need to keep an eye on your language. Sure, your stories can be fun, even a bit naughty, but choose your tone—and your vocabulary—wisely. The groom is the only person who should be made to feel uncomfortable by the Best Man’s speech! 5. Don’t Make it Too Long How long is too long? If your speech goes on for more than seven minutes, that’s probably too much, especially if several people have been invited to speak. When you’re planning or writing your speech, work on the basis of 160 words = 1 minute. This means that if your speech is much more than 1100 words long, you should seriously consider editing it down. Again, the day isn’t about you, so don’t hog the limelight or the microphone. And remember—it’s always best to leave them wanting more!
The speech I chose was Cal Ripken Jr.’s it was given at the Orioles home ball park, Camden Yards at his last home game before retiring. It is a special occasion speech and was given in front of over 48,000 fans. He used a tried and true opening sentence that although a little altered had a very familiar ring. He opened with “As a kid, I had this dream” a very loose but familiar take on MLK’s “I have a dream”. This was a great attention getter and probably had people on their feet immediately. This audience was already motivate to hear his speech so that was not an issue. Most of the fans were there for the purpose of hearing his retirement speech. He did not preview his points in the introduction he addressed those in the body of his speech one at a time. He did not try to establish credibility as he was speaking about himself so who knows more about him than himself.
Eidenmuller, Michael E. Great Speeches for Better Speaking: Listen and Learn From America’s Most Memorable Speeches. New York: Mcgraw Hill, 2008. Google Books. Web. 4 September 2010.
Firstly, on behalf of the bridesmaids, I'd like to thank the groom for his kind words, and I have to say they have done an excellent job today and look absolutely wonderful.
Ladies and Gentlemen – I’ll start by thanking Brian on behalf of the bridesmaids for his kind words.
I read somewhere that you can flesh out your speech by researching which famous people were born the same day as the groom (bridegroom), and make some sort of link. Well, Brian was born on 9th January 1976, just 24 hours after a whole host of famous and interesting people - musical luminaries such as Bowie and Elvis, and the modern day Einstei...
They say that before marriage a man will lay awake thinking about something you said, after marriage he’ll fall asleep before you have finished saying it.
It is customary for the best man to retell an embarrassing tale or two from the bridegroom’s past. As Gary’s oldest friend, this part of the speech fell to me. However, I had two problems with this. Firstly, Gary originally insisted on vetting the speech, which would have meant me going to the trouble of preparing two speeches. Luckily, he relented. Secondly, Gary is the original Mr. Nice Guy and it's very difficult to think of anything bad to say about him. So, back to you Steve!
As Father of the Bride, I am honored to be the first to speak this evening. I would like to begin by welcoming each and every one of you on this joyous occasion. It is good to see so many friends and family here today to help celebrate Paula and Manson’s wedding. I would also like to remember those who have meant so much to our family, but could not be here today.
be here with us today. For those of you who don't know me, I have been a friend of the groom's for seven years. He has many special friends, and haying the privilege of being chosen as his best man, from such esteemed company, is an honor the likes of which I have never had bestowed upon me.
Good Evening! For those of you who don?t know me, I?m Charlotte, the very proud sister of our glamorous Bride. I want to start by congratulating Kari and Ernest, and thanking all of you for coming here today.
I have also learned about different types of audiences and speeches including persuasive, informative, entertaining and delivering special occasion speeches. It came to my attention that whenever I was making these presentations or speeches, I needed to do so with confidence, consistence and practice before the actual presentation and completely eliminate the element of panic. It was also clear that capturing the attention of the audience and engaging them in the whole process, it was necessary to have a very strong introduction and also try and use visuals to deliver the message. It was therefore vital to respect each person’s diversity and cultural values (Lucas, 2011).
But what they do not know is that because they are worrying too much, they already have missed the real essence of the wedding. Planning your own wedding is a stressful task but do let yourself sweat off over small stuff. Who cares about flowers that are one shade off or your brother is wearing a tie that does not matches the wedding theme. You are marrying the love of your life and you are starting a life together, that’s all that matters.
You can talk about how grateful you are that you have gotten to meet this person or how grateful you are for how the day is playing out. And the chances are good that they will share a few things they are grateful for, or at least start talking about positive things since that is the tone that has been set. That conversation will definitely stand out for them.
I can not forget! The guests are a very important part of your wedding, which will accompany you on your yes I want, think of them, give them thanks for attending the big day. And there is no better time to do it right after the wedding celebration, there are many ways and very original: you command them a thank you message with a photo of you, take advantage of your first wedding video and Included one thanks to the end, make a brunch with the closest guests ... And enjoy the most of every moment!
In public speaking I learned many types of concepts, theories and terms of communication. In concepts of publicly speaking there’s, relaxation, practice, credibility, attention getters, attire, organization, volume, emotion, audience relation, and movement. In my first speech, “The any old bag speech” I quickly learned the do’s, don’ts and concepts of my speech performance.