Say It Like You Mean It!

The phrase “communication is key” is a phrase that I’ve heard my whole life, along with the phrase “it’s not what you say, but how you say it”. I never thought much about those phrases or believed them to be true when I was younger, but the older I become I realize exactly how important and true those phrases are. Communication plays a big part in our everyday life from communicating with our collogues, friends, peers, managers, clients, etc….  Communication is also essential in marketing, how we communicate messages to clients and how those messages are perceived is one of the most important components of marketing in my opinion. Different aspects of communication such as pronunciation, tone, pitch, projection, etc.. all affect how the message is perceived by consumers.

When producing video content for example all of these elements are extremely important, if your words or the speakers’ words isn’t articulated correctly it can make the speaker come off as uneducated especially if the content is supposed to be formal. You don’t want to be filming content for a presential campaign and having the “president” in the video saying something like “Ain’t it a good day today?” or “I’m gonna win this race because I’m the best candidate”. If wouldn’t make sense, it would be extremely strange and probably make the audience no longer interested in listening to the speech because and quite frankly; would you vote for someone that spoke like that?

 How the words being delivered are pronounced, goes hand in hand with how they are articulated as well. Without the ability to properly pronounce each letter of your words as they’re meant to be pronounced, according to the article Vocal Aspects of Delivery “a mispronounced word will obliterate a speaker’s credibility, and the audience’s attention will be focused on the fault rather than the message”. Improper communication is like a trickle-down effect. All of the different elements of communication all affect one another and go hand in hand. The pronunciation and articulation of words can also affect your tone or how your tone of voice is perceived by your audience.

The last thing any marketer wants is for the message to come across their audience in a negative, if your tone is off then it can also cause the audience to pick up on every other little nuance such as; the pitch, pronunciation, etc… much faster. Let’s keep with the example of a presentational campaign video, if you’re trying to deliver a message that is supposed to convince your audience to vote for you ideally the tone of voice would be something upbeat, motivating and happy. You wouldn’t want to listen to someone that sounds uninterested, dead or not motivated to gain your vote, they need to say it like they mean it. If they sound unmotivated to gain your vote, you’ll be just as uninterested and unmotivated to vote for the.

Different elements of communication can have either a very positive or negative affect on marketing campaigns. It’s important to ensure that elements such as projection, tone, pitch, the rate in which you are speaking, pronunciation, etc… are all taken into account when it comes to the communication aspect of marketing because it can really make or break your content and how your audience views it. Considering communication elements is also important in your everyday life as well because as we’ve all heard “it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.