In a previous article, we talked about Mehrabian’s “7-38-55” rule and why the tone of your voice, in some cases, is more important than the actual words you are saying. You can read the full article here.
In this article, we’ll focus on how to master your tone (the sound of your voice) to ensure that what you are saying (and the meaning that you are trying to get across) aligns with how you are saying it.
We’ll focus on four main parts of tone:
- The tempo of your words (fast or slow)
- The pauses between those words
- The pitch of your voice (high or low)
- The volume at which you speak (loud or soft)
All of these, together, comprise the non-verbal part of your communication on a phone call.
- Tempo
A fast tempo is like electronic dance music, it gets you excited. It seems like you’re building up to something and you want to keep moving forward.
There is one main part of any sales encounter where you want to have a fast tempo, and that’s when you’re showing value. This is the perfect time for your prospect to be getting excited about your product. This is also a time when you want to raise your volume.
A slow tempo is like smooth jazz, it calms you down. You feel like you can lean back in your chair and relax and mull over your thoughts.
A part of the sales encounter where you want to maintain a slow tempo is during objection handling. During this part of the call, your prospect is usually trying to rush off the phone (especially if they think they’ve made up their mind that they’re not going to buy).
As a result, your prospect will start to talk fast: “I don’t know … I can’t really think about this right now … Can you just call me tomorrow?”
If you start talking fast right along with them, then the encounter will spiral out of your control, like a snowball rolling downhill and gaining speed.
Instead, if you begin to talk with a slower tempo, this will have a calming effect on your prospect, and they may be willing to stay on the phone a little longer.
- Pauses
Pauses are related to tempo. Because tempo is the speed at which a passage of music is played. Pausing stops the tempo.
In a sales conversation, these pauses play a crucial role during transitions (points in the conversation when the opportunity to speak switches from one person to the other).
One of the most common transitions occurs right after you’ve asked your prospect a question.
For example, at the end of the call, when you ask for the sale, that’s a great opportunity for a long pause.
Or, when you’ve asked your prospect an open-ended qualifying question, a long pause gives your prospect the necessary space in the conversation to provide a detailed answer.
A more subtle opportunity for a pause is when your prospect has finished talking, but they actually still have more to say. This often happens when your prospect is giving objections.
I’m generally a proponent of punctuating all transitions during a sales conversation with long pauses—it’s a signal of confidence and grants you control over the tempo of the conversation. If you need to slow things down, a long pause will do the trick.
The only exception would be during a part of the conversation when you want to keep up a fast tempo, like when you are showing value.
You can read more here about the power of the pause on a sales call.
- Pitch
A high pitch (tenor, flute) is sweet and whimsical. It’s hard to get mad at someone when they’re using a high pitch.
For this reason, you can use a higher pitch when you’re joking with your prospect, building rapport, or being sarcastic.
A low pitch (bass, drum) is more direct and commanding. It can come off wrong if used incorrectly, but is very helpful for exuding confidence and establishing control over a conversation.
A lower pitch is most useful when you want to come across as confident and convicted, reasonable and thoughtful, or when you want to show your prospect that you care and that you truly understand where they’re coming from.
On the topic of pitch, it’s also important to be conscious of upspeak and downspeak.
Upspeak occurs when your pitch increases as you approach the end of a sentence or a word.
This is typically used by a speaker to indicate that they are asking a question. One often unintentional side effect of upspeak is that the speaker seems like they are unsure of what they are saying.
Downspeak is the opposite. It occurs when your pitch bends downwards as you approach the end of a sentence or a word.
It’s very important to avoid upspeak during a part of the sales conversation when you want to be inspiring belief in your prospect. Instead, use downspeak as a more convincing tone.
If you are asking a question, say, during qualifying, then upspeak might be helpful to signal non-verbally to your prospect that it is their turn to respond with an answer.
- Volume
Loud volume usually goes along with a fast tempo when you’re building excitement.
Loud volume should be used sparingly during rapport building (when you’re laughing loudly at your prospect’s jokes, for example) or when you’re showing value (saying something like, “THIS is what sets us apart from our competitors”).
At any other time, you risk sounding like you’re trying to “bulldoze” or talk over your prospect.
Especially if your prospect has a soft volume, make sure to bring your volume down to match theirs.
Soft volume usually goes with a slow tempo when you’re speaking with confidence.
It’s a bit like telling a secret. You know that the information you have is valuable.
A particularly good time to talk with a soft volume is when you’re offering a discount: “This is actually the deal we had running last month, [pause here] but I talked with my manager [pause here] and she told me that we can extend it for one more day.”
It should almost sound like you have your hand over the receiver on your phone and you’re talking quietly so that not even your co-workers can hear you.
Now, we’ve reviewed the four main parts of tone:
- The tempo of your words
- The pauses between those words
- The pitch of your voice
- The volume at which you speak
Last, but not least: tone-matching (a.k.a., mirroring) is the trump card when it comes to tone.
Tone-matching is exactly what its name suggests: matching your tone with your prospect’s.
If your prospect is bubbly and chirpy, then you should raise the pitch of your voice to meet theirs. If your prospect speaks quietly, then make sure to avoid speaking loudly at risk of drowning out your prospect’s voice.
In all of the examples that we discussed above as we were reviewing the four main parts of tone, you as the salesperson were controlling the conversation with your tone.
When we’re tone-matching, we voluntarily give up this control.
There are two situations in which to use tone-matching:
- When you’re building rapport (at the very beginning of the call)
- When your prospect isn’t following along (at any point in the call)
When you begin the sale, you should match your prospect’s tone as best as you can.
This is because we want to avoid any possible friction at the beginning of the call. Especially during rapport building, you want your prospect to think, “Hey, this person is like me.”
Studies show that people like other people who are like themselves.
Once you are both speaking in harmony, then you can start to adjust your tone to see if your prospect will follow along.
For example, when you’re showing value and talking with a faster tempo and louder volume, your prospect should start talking faster and louder with you.
If your prospect is still speaking slow and soft, this might mean they’re uninterested or not paying attention (or at least not getting excited about what you’re saying).
If this happens, you need to return to tone-matching to check-in with your prospect.
If done correctly, you’ll start the encounter by matching your prospect’s tone, meeting them where they are.
Then, as you begin to use your mastery of tone to control the conversation, your prospect will start to follow along, matching your tone, without even being consciously aware that they’re doing it.
This control of tone will allow you to speak to your prospect’s emotional decision-making, while your literal words speak to their logical side.
You can click here to see different tonal patterns written on staves according to music theory.