Persuasive Speech Topics

Are you ready to persuade your listeners but don’t know what to persuade them about? Finding a good topic for your speech is a very important step in the Speechmaking Process so don’t be lazy here and put a lot of thought into it. Think about a subject that will be of a great interest to you. You will spend hours researching it, so make it a fun time for yourself. Choose something that fits your educational background; don’t choose a field that is too complicated for you: you have to be able to explain everything in your own words.

Persuasive speech has a goal to convince your audience to take your side, so be passionate about your subject. Use the art of persuasion techniques – give examples, analogies, and use quotes of famous people. When choosing a topic, consider the fact that you will need to give both view points: the opposing one and the side that you have picked. Furthermore, you will have to support your opinion with some evidence, which is factual data from a reliable source, so listeners will truly believe in your words.

Next important point is considering your audience: think about their age, tastes, preferences and whether your topic will be appropriate for the occasion. Don’t be selfish here and if you don’t want your listeners to fall asleep, try to make them interested in your topic. It’s also a good idea to choose one of the current issues. Just look through newspapers, magazines, news, Internet articles and you will see that there are a lot of controversial issues to choose from. However, be creative and try to pick something unique, because there are some topics that everybody knows too much information about.

Time is also a vital point for consideration in any kind of speech. If you are required to speak for more than 10 minutes, you can choose a broad topic with different aspects to cover your time. However, if your time limitations are short, narrow your topic down, make it more specific. In general, it depends on the grade level: the higher the grade, the more detailed, complex, and narrow subject is expected to be.

If you have a list of several good topics and you are doubting which one will be better, in order to understand if it really suits you, test-read few articles in that topic before making a final topic choice. Don’t choose something to complicated and technical or something too simple. And remember – the key to a successful speech is confidence!

Use this list of TOP 30 TOPICS: