I'm trying to get sound to my speakers from my laptop. I connected the mic plug to the headphone jack output

Question

I'm trying to get sound to my speakers from my laptop. I connected the mic plug to the headphone jack output

Answer 1

What kind of speakers are they?  Are they powered speakers or regular unpowered stereo speakers.  If they're not powered you need an amplifier to drive them.  Connect the audio out jack from your laptop to the line in jack on the amp.  

If they're powered speakers you should be able to just plug them into the audio out jack on the laptop.

I'm confused about the mic plug.  You can't get audio out of your laptop by plugging a mic into the audio out jack.  Or do you mean that you connected a cable from the audio out jack on your laptop to the mic in on an amplifier?  The might work but the audio out is line level.  Going into a mic input might overdrive it and make it sound terrible.