Communication skills is a key to success, whether you're speaking in front of a large audience or trying to get a point across to a new friend. If you want to know how to speak well and confidently, you've to believe yourself, speak slowly and carefully, and have strong convictions about what you're saying.  Before you speak, you have to make sure you really believe in what you say. Making conversation with strangers and speaking in public takes confidence and good interpersonal skills. It is very common to lack confidence in these areas. However, with practice and a positive outlook, you can gain confidence in speaking to people.

Eye contact will help others to listen to your thinking carefully.  This will promote your own confidence, which is important when you speak. With more confidence, people will take your thinking more seriously. Visualize yourself giving your speech. Imagine yourself speaking, your voice loud, clear and confident. Visualize the audience clapping, it will improve your confidence. Body language can go a long way in making you appear and feel confident. 

 Tips

• Don't be nervous when you make mistakes. Nobody is perfect. It is normal for everyone to make mistakes. Just calm down and keep speaking bravely.
• Try and try again! This may be difficult for a shy person at first, but you need to force yourself to speak, and not seclude your thoughts. If you have some ideas, then try to speak out! Don't just keep them in your head.
• If you have self-confident issues, try to think that you are the only one who has sound knowledge about the topic. Then go ahead and impart your knowledge to the audience in an effective way.

 Steps

1. Show that you are confident: Make eye contact when they do; don't be afraid to look into their eyes to let them know that you aren't cowering in fear just from eye contact. 

• Look straight in their eyes to show that you're not afraid and talk to them. Direct eye contact is taken as a challenge. Showing you are not afraid to do this could make them question going through with anything.
• Speak clearly: Don't speak softly,or speak too quietly. That way those intimidating people will understand what you say, while looking in their eyes, speak your mind like you don't care.
• Boost up your confident: Are those 'intimidating people' really more important than you? What do they have that's so special?
• Praise yourself every day. This will promote your own confidence, which is important when you speak. With more confidence, people will take your thinking more seriously.

Even public speaking is not your best attribute, you can still project a confident, professional image in meetings or public forums. You can improve your ability to speak confidently in meetings much as you would work to improve any other skill.