When you are nervous, speechless, or don’t know what to say, you might unconsciously use ‘um,’ ‘well,’ or ‘er’ to buy yourself more time to ponder over your words. However, this oral habit can diminish your credibility and make the audience uncomfortable. Not to mention, it can make your video look less professional or even disorderly.
If you’re searching for a solution to this problem, you’re in luck! This article will explore how to stop saying ‘um’ when presenting. But before getting into it, you need to understand how people use filler words in speech and when they become problematic. It will also outline tips for eliminating ‘um’ from your speech, especially when creating videos. Finally, if unavoidable, it will introduce some tools to help remove filler words from your videos.
In this article
Part 1. The Use of "Um" in Our Speech
Many people believe that using ‘um’ in speech, especially when making a video or presentation for an audience, is a sign of anxiety. However, professionals have found that this filler word is a placeholder that people use between statements to gather their thoughts or remember a specific part of their presentation.
In essence, the ‘um’ word only comes into play when the speaker is having a hard time expressing themselves. The word is meant to buy you more time to think about the next point to make before speaking.
Moreover, people use ‘um’ to voice out their thoughts or show that they’re thinking of a statement to make. People also use ‘um’ to make their presentations more humane and relatable to their audience.
Sometimes, the ‘um’ word comes in other variations such as ‘er,’ ‘em,’ or ‘uh.’ People typically use these variations to avoid ‘awkward’ silences or empty points in their speech.
Part 2. When Does "Um" Become a Problem
While they might not necessarily indicate anxiety, filler words can be problematic. This is because these filler words hinder your communication with your audience to a large extent.
Imagine making a presentation to your audience, either online or physically. Suddenly, in the middle of your presentation, your mind goes blank. As a result, you’re short of words. Then, you uncontrollably roll out the ‘um’ filler word.
Of course, this situation leads to an uncomfortable silence, both for your audience and yourself. But beyond the silence, in those broken seconds, you might lose your audience’s attention. This is because the ‘um’ filler word is distracting, specifically in professional situations.
‘Um’ also becomes a problem when it becomes frequent in your speech. This makes it increasingly difficult for your audience to pay attention to your point. Rather, they pay more attention to how often you repeat the filler word.
Part 3. Basic Tips to Eliminate "Um" from Your Speech
Learning how to stop saying ‘um’ so much is no easy process. The time it takes to get rid of filler words in your speech also depends on how dedicated you are to tackling the issue. Safe to say, by taking deliberate steps to eliminate this and with the right guidance, you’ll be saying goodbye to constant ‘um’s in no time.
Here are some tips on how to stop saying ‘um’:
- Make Full Preparation for Your Speech
- Monitor Your Speech Pattern
- Incorporate Pauses and Silence into Your Speech at an Appropriate Time
- Use Simple and Short Sentences
- Make Eye Contact and Gesture Interaction
- Calm Your Nerves
- Keep Practicing
When learning how to stop saying ‘um’ when presenting, you must prepare for your entire speech. This step involves both planning for the presentation as a whole and preparing your speech on paper.
To do this, you can write out your speech on paper, order each paragraph accordingly, and develop a progression. While doing this, you must ensure that each point leads to each other and none is left hanging. When you do this, each prior statement serves as a reminder of what comes next, thus making your speech flow better.
You must monitor your speech pattern, both when preparing for your speech and while speaking. Monitoring your speech pattern when preparing helps you find loopholes in the speech where ‘um’ might slip in. By identifying this, you can structure your speech better.
Besides, this tip helps you identify cues where specific elements come in during the speech. For example, you can easily know when to chip in an icebreaker or statistic to back up your speech.
One of the best ways to avoid saying ‘um’ in your presentations is to add deliberate pauses to your speech. Filler words like ‘um’ serve the purpose of giving you time to think and gather your thoughts in many scenarios.
So, by creating these breaks yourself, you eradicate the need for these filler words. As a result, your speech sounds more professional without the districting fillers.
Complex sentences can be difficult to remember, especially under the pressure of a presentation. This can lead to unwanted silences and disarrayed thoughts.
To avoid this, you should use short sentences that are more concise. While doing this, use simple words that clearly state the point you want to make. In the end, your speech would be easier to memorize. This gives you more confidence to even build on the speech on the spot.
Making eye contact with your audience gives you a confidence boost to continue your speech smoothly. You can focus on a specific person who’s paying deep attention to your words and subtly interacting with you.
Aside from eye contact, you can also add gestures to your speech. For example, you can use your hands to demonstrate elements in your speech or point out key aspects of the speech. This distracts your subconscious from focusing too hard on what to say next, making the speech more natural.
Before taking center stage or even grabbing a camera for your presentation, take steps to calm your nerves. These steps could be anything from breathing exercises to playing a quick game to relax your mind.
Other ways you can calm your nerves include going over the script again to distract yourself from the audience. And before you start the speech, after getting on stage, it's always a good idea to take a deep breath.
Practice makes perfect, and this is no different. To master how to stop saying ‘um’ when presenting, you must practice as often as possible.
To do this, you can go over the script on walks, in front of a mirror, or even record yourself. By doing this, you can note weak spots and work on them immediately. To an extent, practice also reduces the anxiety that builds up right before the presentation.
Part 4. Advanced Tools to Eliminate "Um" from Your Speech
In truth, learning how to stop saying ‘um’ completely isn’t a one-day process. It takes time for the methods above to take effect. Luckily, there are other ways to remove ‘um’ from your speech before perfecting it. In this section, we will introduce some tools for removing ‘um’ from your presentation:
VEED.io Filler Remover
VEED.io is video editor software suitable for both beginner-level and professional video editing. It uses dynamic AI to convert text to speech, create avatars, and much more. Despite all of these features, VEED.io has an outstanding filler remover feature.
With this tool, you don’t have to perform multiple takes to get the perfect video. Instead, the software identifies the filler words for you and removes them. Best of all, it does this within seconds, cleaning up the audio so it sounds way crisper.
This amazing feature is accessible on VEED.io’s premium plans.
Descript’s Remove Filler Words Tool
Descript is an audio and video editor focused on streamlining the editing process through collaboration. This platform works by transcribing your video's audio. Then, it analyzes the script for filler words like ‘um,’ ‘er,’ and ‘em.’ Once the analysis is complete, these words will be removed to polish the final video.
With its powerful AI, this tool cleans up the video’s audio and removes distracting fillers. As such, it is a game-changer for people who want to create quality videos but haven’t learned to stop saying, ‘Um.’
Conclusion
Though it may seem harmless, saying ‘um’ too many times in your presentation can become an issue. So, it’s always best to learn how to stop saying ‘um’ before it does. In the meantime, you can use tools to remove these filler words from your videos.
If these tools don’t meet all your video polishing needs, you can opt for Filmora as an added tool. Once our incoming filler word remover goes live, you can be the first to explore its possibilities.
Among its benefits, this tool makes your presentation clearer and more engaging to your audience. It also saves time and effort by requiring only one click to remove filler words. Plus, it can be used by anyone who wants to create professional oral presentation videos.
So, whether you’re a content creator or a businessperson, this tool is the solution you need!
