Top tips to perfect your
WEDDING SPEECH
Delivering a wedding toast will be one of the most memorable public
speaking moments of your lifetime. That wedding speech could be for your
best friend, your mom, your brother, or your sister. When someone asks
you to speak at their wedding, one thing is for certain, you definitely have
a special bond with them. That’s why it’s so important to get your words
right. The urge to honour your loved one is also why preparing wedding
toasts can feel so daunting. But as long as you put in the work, speaking at
a wedding can be a truly serene – unstressful – experience. Here are five
tips for delivering a spectacular wedding speech!
1. Know your relationship
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by Frankie Cena
3. Evoke an emotion
Reflect back on the best wedding speech you have ever heard. I guarantee it
made you laugh or cry. Some of us are really good with comedy, while oth-
ers are more suited to drama, and some can manage both with ease. While
it’s essential to prioritize what the friend getting married wants above all,
you should also try playing to your strengths. Reflect on your best memories
with your loved one. Sit down in a stress-free environment and write down
the most precious moments that come to mind. Those memories will be the
bread and butter of your presentation. Once you’ve identified them, the rest
of your speech will flow freely.
Ask yourself, who are you delivering this toast to? Is it your childhood friend
who’s tying the knot? Is it your uncle, or your college roommate? Are they
sweet and serious? Or are they frivolous and funny? Before you deliver the
speech to your audience, remember that it’s first and foremost for your loved
one. The speech should be designed to appeal to that person, and to express
the nature of your connection with them. Is this speech for the dad you love
so dearly, but who doesn’t like to laugh at himself? Your guiding thought
should be, “What would this person want or expect from me with this
speech?” Of course, the answer to that question doesn’t have to be a mystery.
Don’t be afraid to reach out and ask a bride or groom what they want. They
undoubtedly have a vision for the speech they’d like to see you give, and it’s
OK to ask what that is. 4. Practice!
2. Know your audience and know your setting 5. Have fun!
Your setting and audience can have a significant impact on the type of speech
you give, and how you give it. There are so many different factors to consider.
On one hand, you could be one of 10 people presenting toasts to a crowd of
500 well-wishers spread out around a hotel ballroom. On the other hand, the
wedding could have an intimate backyard setting with a handful of speeches,
and a grand total of 25 guests. The best way to calm the nerves is to get to
know the setting and prepare your speech accordingly. Prepare a list of ques-
tions about the setting to ask the bride or groom. For example, you need to
know things like, will there be a microphone? Where will your audience be
sitting? How long is the speech supposed to be? Will there be a projector for
the slide show you prepared? As the age-old adage says, knowledge is power!
Just like your fourth grade choir leader/soccer coach/equestrian instructor
told you, practice makes perfect! Remember to read your speech in front of
others before the big day. That way you’ll see if the jokes you’d planned actu-
ally land, and you can solicit opinions about whether those cute anecdotes
about the bride or groom’s misspent youth actually cross the line. Yet another
benefit of practicing your toast is that it will make you more comfortable
with it, which will in turn make you calmer when it comes time to present it.
However, avoiding the pitfalls of “over-practicing” is equally important. You
don’t want to come off as rigid, which often happens when you memorize a
speech word-for-word. Find the sweet spot between spontaneous and overly
studious!
A wedding is a joyous celebration of love. Everyone in the audience will
either be drunk, or on their way to being drunk. The audience wants to have
fun. That means you should enjoy yourself while delivering your speech so
everyone else assembled can have a good time, too.
Follow Frankie
at his website, on Instagram, or Youtube Channel.
www.facebook.com/frankiecena and for more info on public speaking,
www.fdtacademy.com