Much has been written about the excellent James Surowiecki book Wisdom of the Crowds, a look at how markets, in various forms, are routinely better than experts. Zagat has built a whole publishing empire based on this single principle. Index funds routinely beat most mutual funds on Wall Street. And yet, very few people think to apply this principle when it comes to public speaking.

I contend that nearly every aspect of a presentation can and should be subjected to the wisdom of the audience—specifically the speaking audience. But how, as a practical matter, would this be done?

Let’s say you have to give a new sales presentation to 100 prospects on Thursday. Well, on Tuesday, round up five colleagues in your office and give them your presentation. By “give them” I mean stand up and deliver them; don’t give them the text. Afterward, ask questions.

1. What slides does your audience remember? Any slide your audience doesn’t remember, then listen to their wisdom. Your slide is worthless—throw it away.
2. What messages does your audience remember? These messages work, so move them up and expand them in your speech.
3. Did you audience enjoy and remember your introduction where you talked about how happy you were to be there and about the boring history of your company? If not, then get rid of it—the wisdom of the audience has spoken.
4. What details and factoids does the audience remember? Any details or factoids that were in your speech but not remembered need to be either presented in a new and better way, or they should be eliminated from the presentation.
5. Where did you bore your audience? Get rid of it.
6. Where did you confuse your audience? Go into more detail here.
7. What does your audience want more of? Add this.
8. What does your audience feel compelled to do after hearing your speech? If it’s not what you wanted them to do, then you have big trouble.
9. What information would they have needed to hear from you in order to make them take the actions you wanted them to take after hearing your speech? Then add this to the speech.
10. How can any aspect of this presentation be improved? Add accordingly.

In addition to having a small group of colleagues give you feedback on your presentation before you give your actual speech; there is nothing wrong with asking a select number of audience members from your actual speech to give you feedback on these questions too. That way, you can refine your speech to make it better and better, the more often you have to give it to different groups.

It constantly amazes me that large multi-national corporations will spend billions of dollars on marketing research based on questions asked of housewives in malls and unemployed people with nothing better to do than answer a telephone survey. And yet the most valuable form of marketing research is often right in front of an executive and is ready to present itself for free, just for the asking. Isn’t it time you tapped into the wisdom of your audience?