You have seven seconds to capture someone’s attention when giving a speech. Seven. That’s all.
That’s roughly the average time for a play in professional football. Or enough time to read the first few lines of the crawl in the Star Wars: A New Hope film.
It’s not a lot of time. You have to act fast, because if you don’t grab them before the 30-second mark, you never will.
And yet, how do most people begin?
“Hi, my name is Susan, and I am here today to talk about…”
Then they ramble on for a few minutes or more about what they are going to talk about and setting the stage for that information instead of getting right to it. That kills your speech or presentation.
Two weeks ago, I attended an online conference, and the speaker spent 27 minutes rambling about her subject and herself before starting the session. I stayed long enough to time it because I was curious how long the opening was going to be. I dumped out once she began.
Unfortunately, this is not uncommon. It’s happened countless times to me in the past month alone.
But this blog will help. Not only with how to open, but how to close a speech, because they work together.
The opening earns attention, and the ending gives the speech meaning and closure. You need both.
The Importance of Openings
The beginning of a speech (or any writing) carries extra weight. It’s what hooks the audience into the work. The first few sentences either grabs them or you lose them. This is make-or-break time.
The opening cues the audience into the type of talk you will give and whether it’s worth their time. Should they pay attention? Will you be interesting? Will you offer something of value? Something new?
They can answer those questions in the first few seconds, or minutes if you’re lucky and they stick around that long.
While most won’t get up out of their seats during in-person talks, they will tune out mentally. If you’re online, they will start doing something else off-screen or simply dump out.
That’s the important job of the opening—to get them interested enough to stick around.
The ending tells them what to take away from the speech and should fulfill the promise from the opening.
You cannot underestimate the value of your opening.
Don’t Waste Your Opening Seconds
Your opening should not be a warm-up or a space for housekeeping issues.
This is the time for you to grab attention and make an impression. You cannot do that with bland material everyone has heard a million times before or with a weak opening.
Instead, establish interest right away. Give an alarming statistic or fact. Share a relevant story. Set the scene for your content. And connect the purpose of your speech to your opening words.
You need to hit hard and stand out. No rambling. No caveats or waffling—“this is the case most of the time, but sometimes it’s something different…” Stick to your position and share that. You can address anomalies later in the body of the speech.
You can introduce yourself later too and deal with any last-minute details they need for context.
Think of that preamble stuff most people lead with as your backstory. Just as in a good story, you need to weave that material into the body of your writing so it doesn’t distract.
Your opening is where you make your case. The middle is where you defend it. The ending is where you wrap it up and leave a lasting moment to hold. Don’t confuse them.
Open with Curiosity, Story, or an Image
A strong opening typically includes one of the following:
- A short story
- A provocative question
- A striking statistic
- A quote (if compelling and fresh)
- A surprising statement
- A moment of tension
- A sensory detail
The best openings are those that make people question something, raise curiosity, or surprise them.
But make it relevant to your topic. Don’t shoehorn something in as a hook and then make a left turn into something else entirely. That will break trust with your audience, and you will lose them because it will feel like a bait and switch scenario.
Your opening must lead directly into your talk and spark connection, curiosity, or emotional stakes.
Here are some openings from speeches that do just that:
“President Walsh, trustees, faculty, friends, noble parents…and dear class of 1996, I am so proud of you. Thank you for asking me to speak to you today. I had a wonderful time trying to imagine who had been ahead of me on the list and had said no; I was positive you’d have to have gone to Martha Stewart first. And I meant to call her to see what she would have said, but I forgot. She would probably be up here telling you how to turn your lovely black robes into tents. I will try to be at least as helpful, if not quite as specific as that.”
Nora Ephron, 1996 at Wellesley College
“I’d like to begin by thanking the class marshals for inviting me here today. The last time I was invited to Harvard it cost me $110,000. So I was reluctant to show up.”
Conan O’Brien, 2000 at Harvard
“I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.”
Winston Churchill (First Speech to Parliament as PM, 1940)
”Okay, now I don’t want to alarm anybody in this room, but it’s just come to my attention that the person to your right is a liar.”
Pamela Meyer, “How to Spot a Liar” TEDTalk
”Imagine a big explosion as you climb through 3,000 ft. Imagine a plane full of smoke. Imagine an engine going clack, clack, clack, clack, clack, clack, clack. It sounds scary. Well I had a unique seat that day. I was sitting in 1D.“
Ric Elias, “3 Things I Learned as My Plane Crashed” TED-ED talk
“If you get hold of two magnets and you push them, you can feel this pushing between them. Now, turn around the other way and then they slam together. Now, what is it the feeling between those two magnets?”
Richard Feynman, “What Does Why Mean?”
Each of these opening lines works because they capture attention through story, humor, questions, or shocking statements. They make you want to know more. That is what a good hook does.
The Ending and What It Needs to Do
The ending isn’t simply where you stop speaking. It’s where you wrap up your point with flair.
It also serves as the last influence you have on your audience.
Cognitive and neuroscientists agree that the end of a speech has a far greater impact than any other section, including the opening. The audience remembers the ending, and it has a profound effect on how they feel and what they do next.
An ending should:
- Plant your idea in your audience’s brains
- Inspire action
- Return to the central idea
- Give the audience closure—no loose ends
- Echo the opening when appropriate
- Clarify the takeaway
- Leave a final emotional impression
This serves as your final opportunity to connect with your audience.
A great ending isn’t just a summary of what came before it. It’s your final moments to show how the talk mattered and tell them what they can do moving forward.
This section can include:
- A callback to the beginning
- A poetic ending
- A final story beat
- A twist or clever ending
- A universal truth
- A question
- A memorable final line
- A reflection
- A warning
- A call to action
Here are some examples of good endings from speeches:
The ending of Conan O’Brien’s commencement speech at Harvard:
”Ladies and gentlemen, class of 2000, I wrote that this morning. As proof that when all else fails, you always have delusion. I will go now to make bigger mistakes and to embarrass this fine institution even more. But let me leave you with one last thought. If you can laugh at yourself, loud and hard, every time you fall, people will think you’re drunk. Thank you.”
Sir Ken Robinson’s TED talk “Do Schools Kill Creativity?”
“Our education system has mined our minds in the way that we strip-mine the earth for a particular commodity. And for the future, it won’t serve us. We have to rethink the fundamental principles on which we’re educating our children.”
Maya Angelou
“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”
Martin Luther King, Jr., August 28, 1963
”Free at last. Free at last. Thank God almighty, we are free at last.”
Patrick Henry, March 23, 1775
”I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”
Tim Urban, TED Talk “Inside the Mind of a Procrastinator”
”We need to think about what we’re really procrastinating on, because everyone is procrastinating on something in life. We need to stay aware of the Instant Gratification Monkey. That’s a job for all of us. And because there’s not that many boxes on there, it’s a job that you probably start today.
Well, maybe not today, but … sometime soon.”
What to Avoid in Your Ending
The worst way to end a speech is to:
- Fade out
- Apologize
- End abruptly
- Add “that’s it” or “that’s all I’ve got” or some other dismissive phrase
- Leave the audience without closure
- End with information instead of meaning
The Takeaway
The openings and closings of your speech are the most important sections.
They are what people will recall because of a brain phenomenon called the serial position effect. This effect makes people remember the first things they hear (the primacy effect) and the last things (the recency effect). German psychologist Hermann Ebbinghaus discovered this tendency, which is called the serial position effect.
This means your opening and closing are not separate entities or there for decoration. They serve a vital role in turning your speech into something memorable.
First, you need to hook them…and quickly. Without that, they won’t even listen, much less remember. Then, once you have them, you need to finish strong so they carry your message forward and convert it into long-term memory.
A great beginning, followed by a strong close. That’s what every speech needs.
Give them a reason to listen and a reason to remember.
In the next blog, we’ll talk about how to keep that middle from sagging, so they make it to the end. Our first blog in this series covered how to pick your topic.
If you need help with a speech, sign up for a free discovery call to see if coaching could help.