Sooner or later it had to happen, right? Your best bud would get married leaving you cruising in the single lane on your own. You played that scenario in your mind a few times before.
At the same time he asked you to be his best man, which includes making a wedding toast at the reception for about 375 people. Public speaking is your worst nightmare, but you can’t let your buddy down so you said you’d do the job.
Banish some of the jitters early by focusing on the wedding toast not on your performance jitters. You can talk yourself into panic or you can talk yourself into giving one of the best wedding speeches ever heard. You pick!
Learn from these suggestions on how to make an excellent wedding toast.
- The key to success is starting early and being totally prepared. Do your research by talking with others who have given wedding toasts and check out web sources and library books too. Don’t go with “off-the-cuff” remarks. They simply won’t cut it when the time comes, trust me!
- Face the fear and use it. It’s only energy after all! When making a wedding toast, it can be very valuable to have extra energy at hand that you can use to captivate your audience and make your wedding toast memorable. A speech without the energy of performance anxiety is lacklustre and totally lacking in passion.
- Allow for several drafts. We’re not talking beer here, but rewrites of your speech. Don’t expect to nail it right off the bat. Write the wedding speech, let it sit for a few days and look at it again with fresh eyes. Then make some changes. Repeat this process until you feel comfortable with the results.
- A touch of humor is great in a wedding toast but it only works if it is gentle humor. There is no room in a wedding speech for sarcasm, spicy tidbits, gross jokes, too-personal stories, in-jokes or bad language.
- Share how you met the groom, how long you have known each other and one or two of your exploits. Talk about when he introduced you to his bride, how beautiful and talented and perfect for him she is and how you believe their marriage is bound to be wonderful. Make your wedding toast remarks tasteful and sincere.
- Shorter is better. Try for three to five minutes for your wedding speech.
- Mirror, mirror, who is the best prepared of all? Run through your wedding speech, gestures and all in front of a full-length mirror. Use a stopwatch.
- Take five. Try to grab a few moments in the exact place where you will be giving your wedding speech to get a feel for the mike and the room from that vantage point.
- Raise a glass. This is the actual toast of the wedding toast. Make eye contact with the bride and groom when you toast them. Lift your arm from the shoulder, toast with a full glass. This takes place at the very end of your wedding speech.
- Walk to the bride and groom. Embrace the groom and the bride and go back to your seat. You’re finished with the wedding toast. Wasn’t that a great experience?
