Every one of these comes from not knowing what the job involves until you’re halfway through the night, and every one is easy to avoid if you know about it a few weeks out.
1. Treating the catch-up with the couple as optional
If you know the couple well, it’s tempting to skip the proper sit-down, because you already know how they met and you know the families. But there’s plenty you won’t know yet. You need the running order, who’s speaking and in what order, the songs, and the traditions they want and the ones they definitely don’t. You need the no-go zones: exes, family tension, divorced parents, anyone who has died. And you need stories, because the best material on the night comes from the couple themselves. Ask each of them separately how they met. The two versions are never quite the same, and the difference is usually the funny bit.
Book it six to eight weeks out, over a drink. An hour and a half is plenty.
2. Getting a name wrong
The mistake people remember at a wedding is a name said wrong, especially the couple’s surnames, the parents and anyone in the bridal party.
At the catch-up, get the couple to say every name you’ll need out loud and record it on your phone. Then write each one on your cards the way it sounds, not the way it’s spelt. Check what people actually go by, too. Matthew might have been Matty since primary school, and his mum will notice if you call him Matthew.
3. Never giving the speakers a time limit
If anything goes wrong at a reception, it’s most likely during the speeches, and most long speeches happen because nobody ever told the speaker how long they had.
About three weeks out, contact every speaker. Tell them where they are in the order, roughly when they’re on, and that the couple would love about four minutes. Ask them to time it when they practise. Most people have no idea that a thousand words is seven or eight minutes out loud. On the night, find each speaker during canapés, give them a five-minute warning before they’re on, and show them how to hold the microphone.
The Wedding MC Handbook has the rest: word-for-word scripts for every part of the night, three full run sheets, every template, and seventeen chapters on doing it well, from someone who has done it hundreds of times.
Get the book for A$394. Holding the microphone at your chest
Most wedding speeches are only heard properly by the front tables, and it’s almost always because of where the microphone is.
Hold it just below your chin, about two fingers from your lips, pointing at your mouth. When you turn your head to look at the couple, turn your hand with it. Never cup your hand over the round mesh end, because it muffles you and causes feedback. And stay behind the PA speakers, the big boxes on stands: walking out in front of them is what makes that squeal. There’s more in the guide to how to hold a microphone.
5. Saying the name first
When you introduce someone, the room starts clapping the moment it hears a name. Say it first and they clap over the rest of your sentence, so nobody hears the lovely thing you wrote.
Give the context first and the name at the very end:
He’s been Sam’s best mate since year 7, and he’s promised me this speech is under five minutes. Please welcome the best man, Josh.
It works for every entrance and every speaker, and it’s the easiest way to sound like you’ve done this before.
6. Borrowing jokes from the internet
Generic wedding jokes could be told at any wedding, and the room can tell. The laughs that land are specific: something about this couple, or something that happened at the ceremony that afternoon, which could only be said tonight.
Allow yourself one inside joke for the whole night, at most. A few people at one table will laugh and everyone else will feel left out. Stay away from exes, money and anything you wouldn’t say in front of the couple’s nan. And have a recovery line ready for when a joke dies, because it happens to everyone. The wedding MC jokes guide has more.
7. Waiting for someone else to make the call
When something goes off script, like the couple running late back from photos or the kitchen falling behind, it’s easy to assume someone else is sorting it. Often nobody is, and four or five people end up walking up to the couple one after another, asking what they want to do.
If there’s no planner clearly making the calls, it’s you. Find out the options from the venue coordinator, then take the couple one short question with a recommendation attached: “The kitchen’s twenty minutes behind. I’d like to do the parents’ speeches now. All right with you?” Then sort it, and let them get back to their wedding.
The short version
Sit down with the couple, record every name, brief the speakers, hold the microphone two fingers from your lips, put the name last, keep the jokes specific, and be the person who makes the call. Do those seven things and you’ll have the night well in hand.
Get the free starter kit. The welcome script word for word, a sample run sheet and the speaker briefing, by email.