If you want to be more effective, more persuasive and more trustworthy, and if you want to keep your audience awake and help them remember your messages, then you absolutely need to add more humor to your next business presentation, sales pitch, or talk. There are hundreds of ways to add some fun and humor to your presentations, here are just 40 to get you started:
Forty Ways to Add Humor to Your Talks
- Share funny personal anecdotes.
- Add jokes, but write your own and keep them safe, short, and relevant!
- Create a humorous program title.
- Create a fun welcome and/or directional sign.
- Incorporate humor into you prewritten introduction.
- Start your program with a humorous entrance or opening.
- Research “inside” examples of your audiences’ humor.
- Use props. Look for household items, joke props or posters that convey a humorous message linked to your topic.
- Create a funny video clip.
- Parody a famous book, movie or TV show.
- Add humorous sound effects that support your message.
- Throw in a totally incongruous slide into an A/V presentation.
- Add cartoons to slides or overheads.
- Take advantage of spontaneous moments such as a cell phone ringing in the audience or an unexpected audience comment to add some humor.
- Create a list of humorous “blooper comebacks” for any possible miscues.
- Use exaggeration to add humor into a story or example.
- Marry unrelated ideas: How is marketing similar to dating? How is managing employees like training a dog? How is managing time similar to managing children?
- Reverse gears. Look at your topic from the opposite/reverse perspective.
- Use the “Rule of 3’s” to set up a pattern and then break it. (“The three most important things to take when hiking in bear country are: a noise maker, a field guide and . . . someone who you can outrun.)
- Sprinkle in humorous quotes from fictional characters or family members.
- Seek out strange or quirky trivia related to the topic.
- Create a “Top-10 list” related to your topic/message.
- Create a “What’s In and What’s Out” parody related to your topic.
- Create a “good news” vs. “bad news” list related to the topic.
- Conduct a fun survey and/or share the results of a humorous survey.
- Add humorous quotes or cartoons to your handouts or giveaways.
- Change the meaning of your audiences’ commonly used acronyms.
- Plant a funny question in the audience.
- Incorporate a magic trick.
- Find a funny historical connection: “Did you know, that on this day in history. . .”
- Use the “old bait and switch routine.” (When speaking in Calgary, tell the
audience how much you enjoy talking in. . .Cleveland)
- Use funny costumes/costume parts to change your persona in a story.
- Incorporate fun audience role plays or activities.
- Add a game-show style quiz or contest.
- Have fun door prizes that relate to your topic.
- Spoof terms of vernacular (e.g. a “gaggle of goose” or a “knot of toads”).
“I’m pleased to be speaking in front of a _________ of _______” .
- Add some humor related to the location.
- Poke some good-natured fun at the boss. (Audiences love this, but make sure you get permission from the Big Kahuna beforehand!
- Look at your topic from an unusual perspective. What if James Bond hadn’t attended your image workshop? How would a five-year old deal with time management issues?
- Write a funny song or poem related to your topic.
Michael Kerr is a Canadian Hall of Fame business speaker and the author of The Humor Advantage: Why Some Businesses are Laughing All the Way to the Bank and The Jerk-Free Workplace.
