How To Write A Best Man Speech

Hi, I'm Lawerence Bernstein a professional speech writer. I run greatspeechwriting.co.

uk. Irrespective of the kind of speech that you are going to give, there are two or three key things to bear in mind. Firstly, there is nothing to beat preparation.

Hopefully, you are not watching this with 24 hours before you are due to give your speech. The more time you leave yourself, the better. Second of all, don't worry about speaking for too long.

Often a five-minute speech is much much more powerful and impacting than a twenty-minute one. And brevity is often the key. And finally, although a lot of the videos I have created are about writing a speech.

Please remember that you can't think about writing and delivering separately. They are one and the same thing. You are writing to make the speech easy to deliver and if you think of it that way, then things should work.

So, I've got some advice on how to start thinking about writing your best man speech. There is obviously a lot of pressure on you on the basis that you are expected to be incredibly funny and witty and make people cry with laughter and with emotion. Let's take it back to basics.

You are sitting in a room writing the thing and for starters, you need to split what you've got to say into two areas. The things you have to say; The boxes you have to check, and the things that you might say and the things that are going to bring your speech to life. There are only three things as a best man that you have to say at a typical traditional wedding.

Number one is to respond to a toast on behalf of the bride's maids. Number two is to thank the hosts on behalf of yourself and all the other guests who are there for putting on such a fantastic day. And third is to finish with a toast to the bride and groom.

Within that frame work, there are any number of ways you can go about the more interesting part of the speech. In writing the thing, the most important thing to start with at the very start is relevance. Relevance is a recurring theme in any type of speech that you are going to write and really the speech needs to be relevant not just to the groom, he is obviously going to be the butt of most of your jokes and most of your content but also relevant in a way that the rest of the people in the room actually know what you are going on about.

There is always a danger in reeling off stories from nights out you've had in pubs and group holidays you've had together where the click-ish nature of the occasion and the jokes is just going to pass too many people by. So relevance is absolutely key. Probably the best way to avoid that and to ease your way into writing things so you get a good balance is to look at humor on one hand and then sincerity on the other.

You're trying to sum up a friendship with somebody that has probably lasted many many years and you don't want to just start going straight into a string of jokes. So, the fact that it is an honor to be this guy's friend and the fact that you've had some fantastic times together, and the fact that you trust him and that at the end of the day, this is all about friendship rather than making fun of someone in public is a fantastic way of setting you off and getting the audience on board. But, when it comes to the humorous side, yes, you probably do want to talk about some of the more outrageous things that have gone on in your lives.

Tell some stories that will probably surprise people and maybe even shock them but please don't fall into the trap of going to the wrong end of what I call the speech risk-o-meter. Don't start telling jokes that will embarrass people or stories that are going to make his relatives or his new relatives wonder what they've gotten themselves involved in and stories that are going to create more than a laugh but will create humiliation all around. Save those for the bar afterward and stick to things that are straight down the middle and that which anyone in the r