Delivery & Presentation Of A Tour

Introduction

Guides often forget that the job is, in fact a form of public speaking. They arrive, armed with the facts – and then the hard reality hits. They must speak to a large audience. The Fear of public speaking is a phobia with no connection to reality, an anxiety that, to at least some degree afflicts 85% of us.

Fear Dampening Strategies

1. Focus on one Person: Good speakers often pick out one individual in the audience who seems especially sympathetic. They talk to that person, then expand their attention to others. Other common strategies, especially if everyone’s attention to your presentation bothers you: unfocus your eyes, look at an area just above everyone’s head.

2. Accept an Audience Desire to like you: People rarely show up for a tour in order to hate the guide – they are there to learn or have a good time. Exploit that good will. Know that they will be happy with even a modest successful performance.

3. View Nervousness as an ally: Adrenaline may make you nervous, but it also energizes you, makes you alert, and helps sharpen your commentary. Furthermore, the people who surround you at a site or, especially, who accompany you on a motor coach will probably be totally unaware of the nervousness that looms so large in your consciousness.

4. Know that experience lessons fear: Most Guides report that fear diminishes drastically after one or two tours and that after a week or two it disappears altogether.

5. Accept that you Know More than Your Audience: Fear of speaking is usually a dread of saying something wrong or stupid. Yet a guide almost always knows more than the person to whom he or she is speaking.

Presentation

Steps to remember when delivering a presentation

1. Be Enthusiastic:

Be enthusiastic, look good, feel good (not always easy when you have given the same tour 5 times that day). To be a really good guide, you probably need to love your subject, if not I suggest you chose another one. You can act for a while, but not forever. If you can make it interesting to yourself, it will be interesting to them. Enthusiasm is catching. If you are bored, your clients are bored. Your enthusiasm will be catching and your clients will be delighted. Believe it or not, they actually want you to have a nice time, too.

2. Look good / Feel good:

Dress appropriately for the job and feel comfortable in your clothes. If you are relaxed, your clients will be relaxed. They often want you to have a nice time too. Enjoy the guiding experience, if you don't, it is not for you. Find another job.

3. Introductions:

Introduce yourself clearly and simply. After a few sentences check to see the everyone understand English and in particular your English. Remember there are many thousands of different English accents worldwide and each takes awhile to get use to. In addition many non-English speakers will understand English if spoken clearly and distinctly.

4. Audience Assessment:

Assess your audience by being aware of:

• Nationality
• Age & sex
• Socio-economic group and education
• Do they have special interest
• How much do they already know
• Have they visit before
• Where else have they been
• Where else are they going
• How long will they be staying

N.B. Some of the above information can be obtained at the time of booking.

5. Body Language:

Use an open stance, don't lean against walls or slouch. Use your arms for emphasis or to illustrate a point. Do not cross them, it gives off negative vibes that you are hostile to contact. Smile a lot, keep good eye contact. Do remember, though, that different cultures have different norms. If you are guiding a lot of foreign visitors, make sure you know something about their cultural etiquette.

6. Effective Communication:

Do your homework. When taking on a tour make sure you know as much about their background as you can. Nationality, country of origin, age and sex, education, socio-economic factors and financial resources are always important. See if there are any special interests amongst the group, other than your specific tour. How long is their visit to the area? Have they been before? What background knowledge do they already have? Where are they going next?

7. Delivering the goods:

Your clients have certain expectation about the trip. Try to meet these. Ensure you visit all the sites on the itinerary, if they are expecting a specific route, still to it. Keep to time; they probably have other things to see.

8. You are the ambassador:

Remember, you are promoting your business, your area, your country or whatever. Try to do so in a favorable light, when justified. People will come with their own misconceptions about a country; try to dispel those that are totally bizarre. Give them the facts. The film set version or worse yet Disney world version of a country can produce a very false image. Get rid of the myth, if it is inappropriate.

9. Handling Questions:

Questions can be the true test of a guide. If you don't know, say so and see if anyone else has any bright ideas. Always show interest in the people who are asking questions, at least they are awake, listening (hopefully) and interested enough in the subject to ask a question.

Listen properly to the question and repeat it if necessary so the rest of the group can hear it. Repeating questions also gives you time to think about the answer. Some people will ask questions just to be difficult and probably aren't interested in the answer anyway.

Disarm with charm. Sometimes you can turn it back on them as they might be attention seeking anyway and see if they have an answer. They might be delighted to spout forth.

10. Smile and above all establish eye contact.

This should be with every member of the group, however briefly You should not fix your eyes on one person only, the most sympathetic or attractive, but note the shy person, the loner, the person walking with a stick, or the person with the babe-in-arms .

An Effective Commentary

People take guided tours to be informed. If they enjoy themselves, they will retain more information. An effective commentary is therefore made up of information delivered in an enjoyable and entertaining manner.

Information is a series of facts or data. This data must above all be accurate. It should also be:

Varied, covering all aspects e.g. an agricultural tour may also cover an important building, an interesting geological phenomenon or a day in the life of an agricultural worker.

This can be made enjoyable by the manner of the delivery:

• A smile in the voice as well as the face.
• Anecdotes and human stories rather than straight facts.
• Humor and jokes, but be conscious of your audience: different nationalities laugh at different things and offence to ANY member of the group must be avoided. Never make a joke at the expense of another.
• Endeavour always to use the positive statement.
  

In addition, remember that your role is to:

• Promote the area in which you guide.

• Dispel misconceptions: people travel the world with preconceived ideas about a place derived from television and films, maybe from novels and hearsay. Their ideas are sometimes quaint and you should aim for them to leave with a far clearer understanding of your home.

• Involve your interest: Find out about their interest; Draw comparisons with their own country.

TELL ME, I WILL FORGET

SHOW ME, I MAY REMEMBER

INVOLVE ME I WILL UNDERSTAND

Whether on site, on a walk or in a moving vehicle, check in advance:

• Your route: is any part of your route blocked off

• Your knowledge: is it up to date

• Timing: have you adopted your commentary to the time available

• Current events: how might you modify your tour

Above all be flexible, think of plan B .

Introduction

In your opening remarks, include a few aspects of the tour that will grab the imagination of your clients, facts that you can refer to later on: a historical link with the clients country, an unusual plant, a famous person, a special artifact. This will give your client something to look forward to and when you enlarge on that point it will already be familiar.

Very quickly talk about something that can immediately be seen:

TOP VISUAL PRIORITY – TVP

PEOPLE RECALL NO MORE THAN 20% OF WHAT THEY HEAR

THEY RECALL 30% OF WHAT THEY SEE

People may look at something, but until told what it is they often do not see it.

Only after having established what is visual, bring in the non-visual.

In structuring your commentary try to find links: the person whose statue is in the main square was born in that district, the drink you had at lunch was made from that fruit.

Delivery of Commentary

Voice – Learn to make the best possible use of your voice. A good voice will enhance your commentary and heighten your client’s pleasure in listening to you.

It should be understood that breathing is all-important. Breathing should come from the stomach. In using your voice your first aim must be to be heard.

Make sure you position yourself and your group so that you can be heard. Keep you group in front of you or beside you. Try to face your group most times. Remember you may have clients who are hard of hearing and who are therefore grateful to be able to lip-read to assist in hearing.

On a walk, do not give out information while moving, as only those close to you will hear.

The larger the group, the longer it will take for the sound of your voice to reach those furthest away from you. Speak more slowly as well as loudly. To increase volume be sure to maintain your breathing and push the volume out on the exhaled breath. Do not rely on your vocal cords to increase volume: this will result in shouting and very quickly strain you voice for which there is no cure but rest .

Clarity is as important as volume Make sure you articulate clearly, particularly vowel sounds. Do not speak through clenched teeth, but use the muscles around the mouth almost as though you were singing.

Variety can be achieved by changes in pitch, in volume and in speed. This is how you can emphasise a subject or capture attention. But finally do not forget the value of SILENCE ! Your silence will often silence others.

Words and Dates K.I.S.S. – “Keep it short and simple” is the perfect maxim for the professional guide. Short sentences, simple words. Using scholarly words can create a gulf between you and your client.

If you must use a technical word as in certain specific subjects, explain it. When mentioning a PLACE NAME, repeat it slowly even spell it.

NEVER UNDERESTIMATE AUDIENCE INTELLIGENCE

NEVER OVERESTIMATE PERVIOUS KNOWLEDGE

The professional guide will be able to make any subject understandable to the audience and will not make assumptions about client’s knowledge.

Dates should be used sparingly. Certain key dates cannot be omitted, but time can be identified in a number of ways.

The late eighteen hundreds : Just over five hundred years ago

But remember always relate a person to a period and a date to a relevant event.

Visual Aids

Teachers who have to make their visual aids must envy the tour guide whose visual aid is all around. A guide is not lecturing, but telling people what they can see: therefore you must illustrate your commentary with what can be seen.

Indicating

Indicate physically, pointing at what should be looked at; extend your arm fully and hold your indication long enough for all to look at.

On site, the larger the group the larger the visual should be; or in a museum case the object should be high enough for all to see. If you must describe a small object give people time to approach later and look at it.

In addition indicate verbally: “to the left/to the right”.

In a bus or taxi, avoid “straight ahead” since people at the back frequently cannot see and feel left out. If it is essential to indicate something ahead, add “…and shortly on your left/right…” .

Never say “over there” – the immediate response will be ‘where?’ Where necessary, add verbal details such as “the house with the red roof’, ‘the tree with the pink flowers’ and so on.

Remember the use of gestures to extend verbal descriptions: describe the shape of a building, the shape of a tree or fruit with your hands.

Position both your self and your group to see. Choose you position carefully so that you do not obstruct the very visual you are talking about. Choose stops where you can carefully talk about a number of visible items.