5 Tips for Delivering a Natural, Powerful Speech on Camera
You can usually tell when a presenter is reading from a teleprompter.
The eyes scan left to right, the voice goes flat and the face stops moving. This is the "teleprompter stare," and it breaks the connection with your audience.
A teleprompter should support your delivery. In VocalScroll's Voice mode the text follows your speech, so you set the pace.
Here are five tips for avoiding the stare and sounding natural on camera.
1. Avoid the "teleprompter stare" with good placement
You look like you are reading when your eyes sweep across a wide block of text far from the lens.
- Physical eyeline: center your webcam at the top of your monitor.
- Camera behind the text: choose Behind text under Camera view so you can see yourself while you read, and keep the line you are reading as close to the lens as you can.
- Narrow text: a narrow block cuts down on horizontal eye movement, so your eyes stay steadier and closer to the audience.
2. Use the pause
Nervous speakers rush to get it over with. A fixed-speed teleprompter makes that worse, because you hurry whenever you fall behind.
In Voice mode, stop talking to emphasize a point and the prompter waits. Take a breath, sip some water or let a joke land, and the text stays in place.
A 2-second pause before a key number or announcement makes you sound thoughtful and confident.
3. Speak with your body as well as your voice
If you stand completely frozen, your voice sounds frozen too.
- Shoulders back, chest open: good posture opens your lungs, so you can project without straining.
- Use hand gestures: gesturing keeps your energy up and adds inflection, even when your hands are out of frame.
- Smile and nod: start with a warm smile and a small nod. It relaxes your audience and your body.
4. Format your scripts for oral delivery
Long, complex sentences read fine on a page and make you stumble out loud.
Before you load a script into VocalScroll, run through this checklist:
| Script polish check | What to do | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Shorten your sentences | Break any sentence longer than 15 words into two. | Change: "We are launching this platform which will completely revolutionize marketing..." To: "We are launching a new platform. It will completely revolutionize marketing." |
| Write out numbers | Spell big numbers the way you say them. | Write "one point five million" instead of "$1.5M". |
| Use contractions | Write the way you talk. | Write "don't" instead of "do not", and "we're" instead of "we are". |
| Mark the pauses | Put [pause] or [pause 2s] on a line of its own, and use a line break between ideas. | [pause 2s] before the key line. |
5. Handle going off script
Sometimes you will want to tell a quick, spontaneous story or add a comment.
In Voice mode the text holds its place while you ad-lib and picks up when your words match the script again. If you lose your place, tap a word or use a section in the Rundown to jump back.