Voice Intonation Tips for Conference calls by M.

Gibson, Oct 28, 2013

Intonation is considered 30% of communication; its your tone of voice when speaking. It includes voice
volume level, emotional tone, pace, pitch, and cadence at which the words come out of your mouth.

In order to host a successful presentation on a conference call, you usually have one tool – the way you speak.
Your voice can get participants to tune in, listen carefully, and stay engaged throughout the call or it can
confuse, bore or irritate them.

If you’re finding that participants are less than engaged or that everyone seems to be waking up from a long nap
when it’s time for Q&A, maybe it’s time to evaluate the way you speak to make some improvements on your
voice intonation.

Where’s the emphasis?

Get someone’s feedback to determine where you are putting the emphasis on your words. Are you putting the
emphasis on the end of all your sentences? If you are – it’s not a good thing, as it triggers your audience to think
that the statement is a question. The proper emphasis can direct people to focus on strength, confidence, and
clue into important parts of the conversation.

Do you speak too softly or too loud?

Volume is an important quality of voice intonation and an important aspect of making an effective
presentation. There are a lot of distractions around the participants and the last thing you want to do is make
them have to work to pay attention to you. Your voice should command the attention of those listening
but not irritate them into distraction.

Are you speaking too fast?

If you’re going through the words like you’re hyper from too many Red Bulls, you’re talking too fast. When it
comes to making a presentation, people don’t want to have to work to listen to you – they want their
experience to be easy and enjoyable. If they are struggling to keep up with you they are probably just going to
tune you out. You want a natural cadence that best reflects a conversational tone.

Improving voice intonation is not something that can be done overnight. If you think you need to work on your
speech patterns you’ll want to start as soon as possible by recording your next conference call and evaluating
your speech. Finally, correct intonation is learned over time from good environmental examples and by
practicing; find good models to copy and practice intoning questions, statements, promises, speeches and
the whole range of human emotional tones.

How have you improved your voice intonation? What are your tips for improving tone, pace, pitch , cadence,
and the overall quality of speech?

Business Communications | Conference Calls