Wedding Speech Tips

Tips from you, the readers.

It's the big day, and you're speaking! Read on for general wedding speech tips, submitted by users and readers and people who know. (I especially like that last one.)

• "This is the best and brightest day of the bride (and hopefully groom's) life. Lots of time spent talking by anyone other than the happy couple cuts into that very short time that is the start of their new lives. Shorter - for a wedding speech - is better.

  "Anything said should reinforce the couple, their values, their faith, or the family and friends present as a whole. Ridiculing anyone in public is a bad idea, and people will remember mis-statements and cruel comments for many more years if associated with someone's wedding. You can be light, you can be deep, but don't say anything that could make anyone bitter.

  "If there's a bar, there are people more than utilizing it. If you will be one of those, keep your speech short and the words in it even shorter. If verbose, schedule your speech before the bar opens.

  "Anything you say can and will be recorded for time immemorial. At least five people with cameras, cell phone recorders, video cameras and good memories will remember what you say. If it can't be put in the paper or heard by your grand kids, don't say it.

  "I love you, man" is corny. "And I love your wife" is worse, unless you are a first degree relative of the bride."

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• "Start with a funny and personal story about the bride, groom, or both to set the joyous mood. Do not mention any past lovers of either person. Finally, end with something touching or romantic that makes the guests say 'ahhhh' and wipe away a tear."
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• "When writing a wedding speech, remember to keep it pretty short - no one wants to listen to your ten minute speech, then hear the bestman's also. Be brief, sincere, and a little humor is always a good thing."
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• "I think if one is giving a speech about an older sibling, one should try to semi-embarrass that sibling by pointing out the many times the older sibling pointed out the weaknesses and "bad points" of the younger sibling. Then the speaker should finish up by explaining how each of those "suggestions" were actually followed and made a better person of the speaker and how the speaker used the older sibling as a role model for improvement."
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• "Be gracious and genuinely happy for the couple. Include a funny story about them (if you're giving the speech, you should know the couple pretty well). Be sentimental, and wish them the very best in their lives together."
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• "A good/funny thing for the best man to say would be "Now that (the bride's name) is off the market, who ever has a key to her place should bring it forward now." Ahead of that time, the best man would have given keys to many men in the room, and they would all come up and hand the keys in."

If you still don't know what to say after reading these wedding speech tips, I recommend Wedding Speech 4U as a great resource to help you prepare your speech. They provide books (instantly downloadable and hard copy) containing everything from 20 professionally written speeches to speech writing techniques to wedding speech etiquette - all tailored to the type of speech you need to give!

Happy speaking.

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