Audiovisual Cultures episode 75 – Leighanne’s Voice with Leighanne Turner automated transcript

hello and welcome to audiovisual cultures with me paula blair in this episode i have a fantastic conversation with voice artist and speech coach leanne turner huge thanks to your wonderful members at patreon.com forward slash av cultures for all your support and thanks to all listeners and everybody who’s engaging on our socials it really means a lot stay tuned to the end four ways of getting in touch and for supporting the podcast i connected with this week’s guest leanne through matchmaker.fm and this is a website that connects people who make podcasts with people who would like to be on podcasts so big thanks them for all of their work on that do enjoy this really insightful conversation with leanne and i’ll be back with a few more bits and bobs at the end

hello leanne thanks so much for joining me today how are you doing yeah i’m good thanks paula it’s just really great to see you today and i’m really excited to speak to you excellent yeah i’m really loving your background on this embryo it’s so sparkly and gorgeous and colourful mine’s very boring thank you so much um so leanne could you tell us a bit about your work and what you do yes so i have my own voiceover and speaking coach business which means it’s in two parts so the voiceover stuff is where i i describe my own voice as a ear candy which means it’s something that you like to listen to so i use my voices ear candy for those who like to listen to podcasts audio books uh meditation apps um radio promos and adverts e-learning and explainer video type of things so that’s what i mainly do for the voiceover work for kind of external clients and things like that um and then in regards to the speaking coach side of my business that’s where i’ll use my own speaking voice to help train women speak more effectively in business and that could mean walking them through coaching them through webinars um providing digital products like audio books ebooks audio books templates and stuff on topics like how to develop a strong strong voice in the workplace or just in general and how to use storytelling techniques to be an effective speaker how to say no effectively and not feel guilty and how to present yourself effectively in interviews with the strength of your voice because you know i found that as many women that i’ve worked with they look great on paper but when they go into the interview they just kind of do their own thumbs down so i work with women there are a few men who i’ll work with but the majority of my client base is women in business or in corporate who want to be able to um speak effectively in business or corporate fields oh that sounds really excellent work um yeah it’s i’ve been really keen actually to speak to people who do voice coaching and speech and it’s um an area of culture i’ve become quite interested in i think because of making the podcast i’m more into united people’s voices and things and i’m also very aware that i am a 35 year old woman with the voice of a small child so yeah me too yeah um so it’s something i feel very conscious of but i also um i don’t really want to change who i am or how i speak so um i was quite keen to find your podcast because you deal with that sort of thing of how not to lose yourself yeah so um there’s quite a lot of stuff that we could get into there from um from your from your introduction to yourself and yeah so i’m really keen if it’s okay to um to think uh to talk a bit about your podcast and the training that you do because um i think certainly in the pandemic um i’ve been speaking to so many practitioners who are saying well i’ve got these skills and knowledge and i actually want to share that to help people and so it’s really great to find people like you would you be happy to tell us a bit about your podcast and that sort of thing that you do yeah definitely so the podcast i really love because um i just like to be able to share obviously my thoughts and feelings but during the podcast i’ve also doubled up with some other experts as well to hear their focus and stuff so so it’s like a double whammy podcast you can sometimes hear me by myself talking then you’ll hear other conversational pieces so it’s a bit of both um so mainly the podcast is to to be like if you’re ever at the gym and you’re running and you’re like i want to learn at the same time rather than hit my good spotify music list um it’s something that can help train you and you it’s things that you can actually practically do that day while i’m talking etcetera so like some of the ones uh that i’ve kind of there’s one that i really really am excited to when that one goes live that’s going to be next week or so it’s um with a lady who i’ve done a conversational podcast with and she talks about her name is marissa bailey clements and she talks about um the imposter syndrome now that can happen in many areas of life but particularly when you have to speak on a zoom call do training or you’ve got to make that phone call or you’re going to go for an interview so she talks but often people can feel fearful of speaking or what they’re about to say because they get an imposter syndrome in their mind and she gives a really great technique um on the podcast and she’s got more obviously on her own website and on instagram about you need to name and shame the imposter syndrome so she calls her imposter syndrome all those negative faults linda so when linda pipes up and says oh you can’t do that she’s like oh linda what evidence you have show me why i can’t do this tell me show me all the evidence and of course linda is an imposter isn’t she so she doesn’t have any evidence she’s just saw smoke um so then that’s how you can shout down linda or call your imposter whatever name you want whether it’s a girl named boy name whatever it is so she calls it that and then so she goes head to head with linda in her own mind and then that’s how she’s able to get over that kind of imposter feeling and a lot of times people feel that they can’t speak but they actually can but their first stage is their mind that’s where they need to speak loudest first and she tips on a little bit of that because that’s why some people you know that they sound nice when you talk to them on the one to one or a small group setting but when it gets that big numbers 10 20 hundred thousands etc they’re like oh no the numbers it’s gonna be it’s gonna that too many people gonna hear me stumble and mumble and stuff but that’s when linda’s talking too loud you know so really great speakers have been able to speak effectively in their mind first before it comes out of their mouth and that’s where the training comes in what is your own mind saying about what you can do because with the voice you hear it it okay so your listeners hear it once just from what comes out of your mouth but you hear it twice because you hear it within your head then you hear it out and so you may think i don’t some people like i don’t like the sound of my voice it’s because you’re hearing the inside one not just the one that’s coming in other people only hear the other one that comes out which goes through sound waves through your ears rings in and then goes in secondary voice or second sound that your voice produces so that’s why some people i don’t like the sound of my voice on the phone or such and such because you hear its primary sound first inside and that’s not always how it sounds when it comes out and transmits into someone’s ear and so yeah i think in regards to skin it goes back a stage when it goes into the mindset first which is with a lot of stuff you’ll see like great afflicts like you know people like my one of my favorites usain bolt like yes he can run if he didn’t tell himself that he believed he’s the fastest and the greatest not once not twice but three times over he would never really have won all of those golds and medals and stuff because he actually told himself first he’s gonna win and then he just showed everyone else that him in his own mind had a conversation about you know so that’s what i really notice when you look at people who really achieve stuff they tell their own mind stomach first then they deliver gosh yeah that’s um a really amazing way of thinking about i we’ve taught um various guests have talked about imposter syndrome on the podcast and that’s a totally different way of thinking about it that’s fascinating definitely yeah definitely i’ve never heard it like that before when she said i was like wow yeah gosh yeah i’m really looking forward to hearing that then stop being right next next week um brilliant cool um yeah so i mean that’s the thing isn’t it because so much about our voice it’s not just about the voice it’s not just about how it sounds but it’s that thinking process and the mindset yeah before it even comes out so yeah there’s so much more work to do you can have all the training in the world to sound a certain way but if your mind’s not in the place where you need it to be yeah so yeah because you get into loads of of different areas like that about mindset and confidence yes definitely yeah yeah it is it’s definitely everything whether it’s speaking losing weight learning to drive uh going to the shops it all starts off in the mind that’s where the real work happens everything else was already what your mind convinced it can do great and then um so but but i mean then the practical application of things i mean do you when you coach people is it yeah so there’s so there’s those barriers mentally to get over but then do you have clients that want to actually change their voices you know what what kind of training is it that you would do with people yeah so there’s there’s often a range so i’ll have people who want to do speaking coaching where they just want to have more confidence and strength from the voice that they have and so they want to be able to naturally go for a business negotiation do a training or meeting so those are kind of like your speech speaking coaching people and then there’s another part of p there’s another group of people on my client list who are very keen to do uh accent reduction and accent softening work now those are two different things so actually softening work would be someone like for yourself or you’ve got an accent and i will train you to soften the way how you pronounce certain words so they may imitate more of someone with a london accent or a liverpool accent or a spanish accent so we’ll train the way how you move your mouth your lips and the way you breathe when you speak so we can soften something so that’s actually reduction just so you can articulate more to to sound like you’re from a different region so that’s that’s kind of accent softening so you can sound like you but just soften if you may say something in a sharper way just soften that a little bit sharpen it here etc that’s accident softening but an accent reduction would be to remove your accent totally often like what you see famous actors do so a key one would be um idris elba so he’s a born and bred londoner from east london as well so it’s got a little twang and we naturally speaks but you’ll see him in other shows and movies where he’s got an american accent so he’s had vocal training where he’s been trying to remove the english accent and replace that with american english articulation and an accent etc so those are the different types of clients i can work with in regards to accent work um so i’m not really a fan of accent reduction unless you’re trying to do it for a movie or you need it for a particular song etc because some people can have an accent maybe from i don’t know from asia but when they sing they sound american because they have learned how to imitate an american accent through singing but when they speak it’s slightly different and so i’m not a fan personally of accident reduction because i feel that your accent represents who you are where you’re born you know your cl your what you’ve learned at school you’re fun you know all of that stuff i feel that your accent is as unique as like your your fingerprints so i’m not really a huge fan of accident reduction unless it’s for a particular purpose i don’t really like to work with clients to say i need to reduce max and i don’t want to sound like i’m from asia i need to sound like i’m a born and bred lander so i can get this job that’s not really what i would advise because you’re not even really being yourself then you’re fighting against your own mind once again because your mind knows i’m from this particular area but my mouth says i’m from london you know so slightly you don’t live in conflict within your own mind so i’m happy with people who want to do that for movies or for a song etc but um i’m happy i i i enjoy the accent softening clients because i can understand they just want to sound more articulate you know because there could be some clients i work with from chennai uh some from even from france just the articulation of some of the words so there’s a lady from france who i worked with uh and she would say the word so the word clothes she would say clothes clothes so it’s just things like that just softly and um this was and this is not just her this is other french clients i’ve worked with so the word money she would say monet which is like monet the painter so i’ll just say you painting you painting that much money painting just to let her start to trigger that she make sure she say money like cash money rather than monet like the painter so just things like that those are little techniques just to soften the accent so she still sounded very french but she was softening the accent so that she can be more clearly understood to a british english audience who where she was going to go and transact business too fascinating yeah i’m really glad she picked up an axe in there because i did wanna um throw in that elephant in the room with mine you know because um living in england and being a northern irish person you know i have done a lot of that softening that you’re talking about that my normal accent would sound more like this and i talked dead fast you know what i mean so i have really slowed down i’ve mellowed it i’ve softened it quite a lot so um it’s really cool that um to hear you talk about that but also to say that yeah it’s so much a part of our identities so that’s part of where we’re from and everything and you carry it with you and i know a lot of people who have erased it quite a bit yeah um which i think is a bit sad yeah me too but uh yeah so that’s really encouraging and positive it’s brilliant yeah definitely definitely yeah because i heard the difference when you just shifted so like when you go back home with your family and friends do you just go back straight back yeah because it’s so much easier to talk in that way you don’t have to think so much you can just reel it off and stuff it’s just so much easier on your brain as well definitely yeah cool yeah um but yeah so much of it is about being an effective communicator so we will i think um there’s not there’s nice studies in linguistics where you look at that people just will naturally without any training really without having to be told we’ll just do those sorts of things or slow down or pronounce things more just because they know that the person they’re speaking with is maybe a speaker of a different language or whatever the situation is that it calls for i think a lot of us naturally do that but there are people who who don’t and maybe need a bit of help um so it’s all really fascinating areas of just i think culture and looking at how we even communicate with each other yeah yeah so um brilliant i mean uh so on the likes of your podcast you you tend to get guests who talk about a wide range of stuff so you’ve mentioned that before but um yeah you’ve you get some a lot of insight not just from the uk but from the likes of the usa as well and i was wondering if you pick up on differences in diction and accent and presentation and just all the manner of things you know how do we sort of perform our voice through our bodies and and that sort of stuff i mean is there anything in that sort of area that um you’d like to speak about or um yeah so in regards to presentations yeah or yeah so recently i’ve been talking a lot about presentations kind of like online versus the offline what we used to do and things because often in like in this new normal a lot of things are online and so you’re only being viewed on this small screen and things like that or um and before you can have the benefit of someone’s body language you can hear that there’s humor in their voice because sometimes if the connection’s not great or the wi-fi is you know chipping out it starts just um you know stunt what it is that the person’s saying and things so definitely with presentations um online which it seems like it’s going to be for a longer term than what we thought we thought we’d be back in business by september but it’s not so we’ve got a bit more patience um definitely with presentations i think it depends on where you’re going to present i don’t like a finely rehearsed or heavily practiced presentation because it really locks in the person because you’ve got to be able to know the material and bespoke it for the people who are listening so you could have the same material go to teenagers go to women in their 30s go to canary wall warfare with investment bankers and go to a care home you’ve got the same material but you know how to bespoke it etc so to fine tune it bring in different jokes bring in an example that’s relatable to the audience stuff so i do agree with practice makes not perfect but progress practice makes you feel comfortable with what you’re gonna say so that when you’re actually gonna go and deliver it you’re like okay i know i’m going through these three points i’m gonna do an introduction a middle and an end and then send in a freebie but i don’t like when it’s too fine-tuned because if what i always advise against is obviously people who write down their notes word for word should be just kind of like the bullet points because if you know your stuff and you’re an expert in this stuff no one you don’t need to practice that’d be like someone saying oh i need to write the names of my children down just in case i forget them you’ll always remember that it’s in your heart and if it’s something that you’re talking about obviously at work and stuff you might be doing the courtly stats the numbers and figures you probably need to have written down but the qualitative information the story behind all those numbers just be familiar with it but not have it memorized because if you go then someone’s distracted someone’s on the phone your shoes are hurting you all of that kind of memory game and and and and and it just kind of all goes out the window and stuff so i think talk like you’re talking to your friends obviously engage it if you’re in a professional court format one but be very friendly because people everybody wants a friend whether you’re going to speak as the lecturer or the professor everybody wants that friendly voice you know to tell them even if it’s the toughest information it needs to be done in love you know yeah so yeah don’t don’t memorize your stuff word for word be fully aware of it and the points but don’t don’t memorize it because that locks you in and then if you have to deviate you’re like oh my gosh this is where the fear comes in you haven’t got that flexibility you need flexibility anything it’s a move in moving wheel it’s constantly on the move when you do talks or training or meetings and stuff so it’s that fine line between being quite personable or coming across as perhaps a bit robotic and yeah because i think yeah i think probably if you if you’ve rehearsed it so much that’s by rote it doesn’t sound like you may not necessarily yeah and and and you can’t fool people people can hear when you’re being a robot because if they’re trying to intercept and you’re like oh i’ve lost my train of thought yeah but you would you haven’t lost a trainer for because you were reading off the notes and that you know kind of thing so it’s not genuine like what you’re saying it’s not genuine for someone to just read off i mean if you’re just reading off some just email me the notes and i won’t show up quite simple and save each other all the time you know so stuff like that because i’m i’m here to to hear you to hear what does your mind think to hear what does your heart think about this particular topic i mean some topics not much heart in it you know but you know that’s what i want to hear from you i don’t want to hear that you’re very good at memory games you know it’s not a game show yeah okay okay that makes a lot of sense um so you mentioned earlier that you tend to have mainly women clients so i was wondering if you’d like to to talk a bit about that so um i mean uh i feel like i’m in these conversations all the time because i listen to a lot of feminist podcasts and stuff so um it’s normal to me to to talk about are you empowering women and women in workplaces and things so um but i i don’t know if all of my listeners would be into them to the extent that i am so i was wondering if you would like to talk about well what why do you focus on women so much and is there particular problems with not problems necessary but do women encounter more issues with with voice and what thoughts and observations would you have on that yeah so i’ve often found that women in the workplace uh don’t always feel confident to speak up particularly about when it’s stuff about a salary negotiation or trying to negotiate a fee and like a man or conflict go in there and say yeah i need 120k for that job and the lady will be like oh no can i ask for that because you know i’ve just got married there’s likely i’m gonna she’s got different um reservations in her mind she’s gonna go can i just got married me and my husband are planning children then i know i’m gonna be off an attorney then i know they’re gonna pay for there’s all these different different woes and woes and woes and things that come in but a man’s like confident as if like i’m the best you’ve you’re gonna get and if you don’t paint that you’re not just you’re not gonna get this ladies don’t some ladies who have worked with they don’t always come with that idea it’s that hashtag you know like know your worth so you need to know your worth so you can go and tell people this is how much it’s gonna cost you this is your investment in me if you want me there for a year or however long whereas men are quite confident in that because women can sometimes be in and out of the workplace because often child care and then the other side of the spectrum when you’ve got aging parents who can become ill as well it’s often the woman that has to change her work schedule so she can attend to aging parents it’s not always here that a man’s like oh i’m gonna be off for the year i’m gonna take the paternity leave or you hear that man’s mom is ill and he’s gonna work half day et cetera so he can be that you know you don’t or often it does happen you don’t often hear that the impact on a man’s working lifestyle and i’ve just found that the women that i’ve worked with who’ve had my client base on um it can often be women who may have come from a different industry because that’s where lack of confidence can come where someone may have come from like could be coming from an education industry moving into selling cakes online very fantastic cakes but because they feel that that gap in between it seems like it’s not a relatable two industries how can they confidently ask for such and such money and enough that people have been in the industry for 10 or 15 years and i’m like it’s not how long you’ve been in the industry it’s the quality of what you produce because someone could have been in the cake industry for 10 years they produce a wedding cake it looks like that someone could have been doing it for a year and they produced a fantastic one with engineered electricals and lights and stuff it’s about the quality that you produce so um i i i really do feel that i mean it’s quite obvious there’s a there’s a pay difference between men and women in certain industries and stuff but that’s slowly changing which is great um but there’s often been this deficit between men and women men and women and and and empower women so they can feel strong in what they’ve got to say because women have a lot of value to add women can see different things in the workplace that men don’t see they’ve got this kind of all-rounder looking where some men are quite tunnel vision depending on what the industry and on the goal whereas women are like okay this is the goal what about these other mitigating factors that’s why it’s great to have a woman in your team and i really respect him i remember when barack obama put his cabinet ministry together there were a lot of women featured in that usually it’s quite male dominated one or two women here and there but there was a heavy presence of women there so he knew he could understand the benefit of having this type of extra eyes on what the project you’re trying to do so and that women may feel hesitant to um explain why they’re going to add this much value why they’re going to be able to do this and um you know you know just not just was linked to money but just the value that they can bring is second to none you know yeah brilliant stuff um i was thinking from a technical point of view as well um a few years ago i read up on scholarship and science studies that um identified that microphones are this is a massive surprise everybody are calibrated to men’s voices yeah yep because they have the korean that you know cis women wouldn’t have and that sort of thing and um and i was wondering if if you’ve ever encountered because now we’re in this world as you’ve pointed out where so much of our communication is being done like this via screens and via microphones and things um i was wondering if if that’s now become an extra area that you’re having to compensate for and and work with women clients and that sort of thing is it you know how do we what microphones are are good to amplify us and and make our voices sound good and how do we want to sound and do we want to try and have a radio voice and do we want yeah do you know yeah

we’ve with microphones they they can do different stuff and different voices sound different on a microphone so say for example the main one that i recalled on is uh a rode microphone and it’s like a front facing one some people have top facing ones or all rounder ones etc so the way how i sound on that road may be different with from another woman who sounds on it so with microphones i’ve always highly suggested that it’s best to test them out because different voices pick up differently on different microphones i think if you just get one that makes you sound like who you are you know and which could be any could be the scythe and highs that could be the new many there’s so many that you can choose from it’s like it’s like christmas it is and i think it’s best to test them out if you can if because i’ve i’ve been to like music shops where they’ve got them all out and then you can actually test them and hear how you sound on them and i think that’s the best way to pick a microphone um that’s what i found for me personally that was a device that i was given from my uh voiceover coach you just really test them out and see your eyes out yeah cool cool okay um so um i think i had one of your podcast episodes that i was listening to you talked a bit about i think it was with a guest um you talked a bit about connections between the voice but also somebody’s um visual presentation so how they look and and maybe body language and that sort of thing as well um and i was wondering if you had anything any comments on that too you know like can our voice um can it facilitate or be facilitated by how we present ourselves you know how we look in our bodies or our faces or whatever yeah definitely like um like body language and how and how you dress for whatever environment you’re speaking is very very it needs to be in support of what’s coming out of your mouth you know so if you’re going to go and speak to five frogs and go and do story time on a friday it’d probably be more advisable to wear something colorful something that they’ll be attracted to or something that they’ll think oh i know that jumper or things like that for five years something that’s colorful engaging and bright and that will go along with like this person looks friendly i like this person they’re wearing my favorite color i’m going to listen to them so that kind of what you’re wearing kind of helps form this friendship or this speaking friendship quicker than only relying on what you say so and i really do think with what you’re wearing should should be uh should be something that not saying you’re dressing for the audience you’re actually doing for yourself to yourself can feel comfortable but something that will support what you’re saying and the audience will see as okay she’s an expert in say for example as a makeup girl she’s an expert in makeup girl she’s got the right clothes on she’s got the makeup on she’s got the instagram look that type of thing um but it must also be comfortable for you because it’s the worst thing when you need to go to a team meeting and do a presentation or go and do a zoom and you just don’t like your top your shoes are hurting you and your trousers are too tight it just it just offsets you and it doesn’t let you use your whole mind’s capacity on delivering delivering deliverance from what you need to say um so body language is really key and yes in this new normal but even more so when you do the face-to-face things because people can tell when you’re not interested they can see in your um in your in your expression like there was one guest i spoke to and we talked about network network working and how it was done previously when you go to an event now a lot of it’s online and just even this simple thing to be aware of in body language when you’re speaking to someone you’re face to face but what what lets you know if you have that person’s full attention is not just their eyes not just their their body looking it’s their feet because people’s feet will point to where they want to go so if they’re fully engaged their feet will be looking at you if they’ve got bored of what you’re saying the feet will slowly turn because they want to move their face and shoulders weren’t looking at you but the feet have kind of said i’m out of there you know so those are type of little tendencies that you’ll see in body language and things and other things that you’ll see kind of in this new normal regards to body languages some people are not hands people they’re not got the jazz hands so that doesn’t mean that they’re not interested in what you’re saying but kind of things to really build rapport and friendship is to smile to nod and to kind of give thumbs up and all these type of things not like you’re like a five-year-old school teacher and stuff but you know just to um because it’s much more difficult to engage your listeners full attention through a zoom or just for a podcast because that body language that sound that kind of movement and things that’s all part of the communication what the struggle is now is that we’ve got select for example it’s 100 communication you’ve got the eye contact you’ve got the body language then you’ve got the sound you’re only working with 30 now and you’ve got to build everything through this tiny 30 window to build trust i’m an expert listen to me engage all of these different things with just this small bit of sound or this small square yeah yeah challenges um so uh i was uh wondering as well if it’s okay to ask you a bit about your voiceover work because that’s quite cool i’ve never i don’t think i’ve ever met a voiceover artist before so i was wondering if you would talk us through a bit of what that entails yeah so everyone gets into this voice over industry through so many different avenues it’s not like you know being a doctor you must go to college go to university then you do your residency then you go off into the hospital it’s not so structured you can get into so many different avenues so my one is i remember years and years just growing up people say leon you’ve got a nice voice you should do something with it i didn’t quite know what that meant and stuff so 2016 when i set up the business i was i’m going to do voiceover that was just what i was going to focus on but then i realized that speaking coaching was actually a growing industry that people kept asking me for help in regards to the voice over stuff the stuff that i do and i’ll often get contacted online on instagram wherever wherever they’ve heard my voice and they’ll say okay i’ve heard your voice and can you read this script for me so you may give like an audition piece so say for example um let’s just go so one i did for adidas um so they they sent me the scripts i get to read them through check that i’m okay with it with the word in and the tone and if if i actually sound right with the voice with the script because sometimes they’ll pick one or two or three people but they’ll hear your audition your demo tape which is kind of like your audio cv so it’s got a range of all the different styles of work that you can do um so then they’ll hear that they’re like okay i like the sound and tone and pace of this voice we’ll ask her to read our particular script and see if she can really pop it you know so you may be competing against yourself and other feuds who’s going to go into the second round so with adidas i read the script they said it sounds great they gave me some direction of where they wanted different push and lifts and stuff and then everything’s done remotely so this kind of new normal has been my normal for ages so i’ve never met any of these clients like face to face and stuff so i was emailed through an agency to have the added script um did the recording i send it over to them their engineers their side will edit it put it towards lay on the video and then i’ll just see the end product and stuff so yeah it can be quick it can be long some of them even though you think it’s like a it’s like a three-minute read that can actually take more than an hour because you’ve got yeah you’ve got to read it change this change this take out this all of this the editing behind it and stuff that can take time and then it’s the pickups meaning the the re-runs that they want can you edit this bit can you say this word again change it so it’s not just it’s not not just that oh it’s only a two-minute advert it takes so much longer to put that all together because of the length of time you’ve got to do and even though like you see as a three-minute advert i probably could have taken 20 minutes because when i say each line i put a space in between and that helps with editing and stuff like that things like that so that was what i did for adidas then you just see the end product if you do some of the stuff are private things with non-disclosures on so it doesn’t go out into the public realm even though it’s your voice it’s for internal use only one i did for the landscape institute that one was a really great one i was to encourage more women into the landscape um and business so that was an advert you see them all kind of going off to college and stuff and university um and so i did the voice over on that and so i was just emailed by an ex that was that time was the explainer video the production the video production company and they asked about if you can do this piece of work and i was like yeah it seems like a great project and then i see the copy version on youtube and that so there’s so many different ways how you can use it um right now i’m working on a kind of like a meditation app but not really like not the kind of slow kind of put you to sleep one but the more like i’m your kind of coach meditation kind of kind of self-care kind of thing working on that um and then it works in so many different ways i’ve done radio adverts where they’ll send me the um send me the flyer so i’ve got to make up something from the flyer so like so stuff like that um usually i’ll get a script to read uh then we’ll go for it and i say this must be the final version any more changes will be chargeable and stuff like that yeah it’s all been done just remotely but with the voiceover stuff it’s really something you need to if you think you want to do it try it um don’t think you’re gonna be like this huge celebrity and stuff like that but get lots of training because your voice that you sound like may not be one that’s selling at the moment may not be one that people are buying so you need to know where does your voice fit are you good for animation can you do adverts have you got the bass voice can you do audio books because there’s so many different parts of voices so i mainly do like radio adverts explainer videos meditation art podcasts but there’s other people my friends they only do animation uh some of them only do adverts and promos others only do audio books and and radio plays so there’s so many different niches that you can do it depends on the sound of your voice and definitely getting training and coaching because i have a trainer and voiceover coach um and he gives lots of advice about the sounds how to refine it and stuff and just point him into the right area of where i should be trying to book work because you can book work anywhere but more more niche area more niche you go there’s probably easier for you to focus your skills i would say okay and um i was going to ask you if your setup if your arrangement for this work had changed at all but are you set up with a home studio sort of thing anyway or yeah yeah so i set up a home studio i got it made myself because i’m quite tall so the ones that were out and about they didn’t look pretty they didn’t really have my favorite color and couldn’t really do that you know move how i want to move when i talk so i had one built for me so yeah home studio is a must if you want to go pro as a voiceover because there’s always studios you can book and if you just need to do a certain recording so there’s all studios in central london so i’ve had work from other clients where they don’t want to release the script uh for an email they want it to be going through one secure location to protect it and you’ll go after a studio that they’ve booked and you go there the scripture’s in front of you you you read it and then you leave and you don’t get anything else so definitely i’ve had i’ve done work in a studio depending on the client’s needs but all of it majority of it 95 of it is at home on my home home studio definitely but you don’t need this i was talking to my cousin about that you don’t need like a huge home studio you need to have a uh recording area and that could mean in there’s so many ways you can do it um that could mean in your wardrobe sitting inside your wardrobe because all those clothes and stuff they really reduce the sound or you can sit on your bed throw the quilt over your head and record that way because the quilts are really good at you know condensing the sound and you could be you can’t record in the bathroom because there’s no way you can stop the bounce noise but in a in a cupboard in a closet in your wardrobe with a fit caught on your head those are very good or if you’ve got thick curtains on the window you can like you know in those posh hotels and they’ve got those huge thick curtains those are really good to do really really good you know so you can start anywhere and you can even order you know of course acoustic tiles from amazon put them up in a corner or you can get like the there’s like a shield one you can get so if you don’t have a home which is permanent could be renting or you just don’t have a space or when your child goes to sleep you use their play area you can get a microphone and a recording shield etc put that up and go for it you know so it doesn’t have to be this fixed thing so that when family come over for sunday dinner they’re like oh i’m sitting by the microphone eating no it’s you could you can have it movable you can definitely have it movable so yeah yeah cool cool that’s good it seems like um an industry in which you can survive in this brave new world for a while definitely great stuff um yeah so um i’m just thinking is there is there anything else you’d like uh to get into i don’t want to take too much of your time um you’ve been so generous with everything you’ve said so far it’s brilliant um but yeah i i suppose it’s just ed do you have any punchy tips for how can i have my voice heard more effectively for a range of situations you know yeah that sort of stuff yeah i think for sure how how have you how to have your voice heard in a number of situations to get someone to listen to you first because some people think they sound great or some people think they don’t sound great but when they get an actual uh ear that can listen to them and say okay when you say these words you could just slow down you can be a bit more punchy and what i find as well i know i’m always talking about talk talk talk speak speak speak but some of the ways you can actually get your voice heard is actually stop speaking and just listen to what’s happening in the environment so you’ll hear what your audience wants or what the current conversations are then you’ll be able to formulate in your mind okay i need to ask this question or come with this response so if you’ve heard that people are saying oh there’s no cold food or water drugs in the office etc you can come and say you know what i’ve been able to negotiate a contract for the cold war i’ve heard that the people are complaining so i’ve been able to negotiate this contract i’d like to put on the procurement list can we go for this come so you’ve already kind of heard the need it’s kind of like doing the research before so you can speak effectively before you get into that environment and stuff so be very punchy yeah the thing about practice you know i don’t say i don’t think people should memorize stuff no it’s not maths tests it’s not doing your times tables practice things you can be comfortable with them so it feels natural uh get someone to listen to you so they can hear how you sound because you may be too critical on yourself rather than what your listeners actually are so that’s really helpful um i also think as well that if you’re not sure how you look record yourself set up a facebook live page and invite one or two friends who may not be your besties but some type of people you could have met in a speaking group on facebook let them watch you ask them for their thoughts what do they think you can improve that’s a really good one record into your phone send yourself your own whatsapp voice notes and just hear how do you sound and things like that i think that’s really key and read out loud daily because a lot of times as an adult i don’t know why we don’t read out loud daily when we’re a small child and we’re learning to read we’re reading at home in bed we read out loud it’s exciting but it’s like when you get older it’s like you must turn into this adult professional and only read in silent you know silent mode and and that really stops you from getting comfortable with your voice so those who who don’t like listen to their own voice i say read out loud for 10 minutes read a book a blog you know your whatsapp messages just read them out loud get comfortable with your own voice you know so i think that would really be key because some people think they don’t sound good but they do it’s just that they’re not used to hearing their voice out loud that’s fantastic advice and thank you for that um i would second that reading out loud definitely um i find quite early on in lockdown i was actually struggling to read anything at all and i find that if i just sat and read it out loud i actually concentrated on it yeah yeah and then it it doubled up as a bit of practice for you know doing this as well so yeah i would definitely back you up on that one definitely it really it really helps region out loud and particularly good but that’s written very well with the punctuation because if you’re someone that when you read out loud you have to obey those penance pronunciation marks because that helps you to learn how and when to breathe because some people are not speaking effectively because they have they don’t really breathe correctly some people just breathe in for the nose they don’t use the mouth so the diaphragm is not engaged so when i have clients like that i’ll often advise them which is what i do myself i say start going swimming because swimming is one where you can learn how to breathe effectively if you can breathe effectively and train your lung and your diaphragm in a pool of water you can do it even more effectively out in the dry air so that’s one thing that i don’t know if any coaches are advising that but that’s what works for me train start training how to not just swimming like that but you know proper head in like that like you’re a pro in the olympics that type of swimming where you’re training yourself to breathe because that really strengthens your lungs and your diaphragm and that’s why i think a lot of people struggle with they say i can’t speak for 10 minutes because your lungs your stomach and your vocal cords are weak because they’re not trained effectively so if you start training yourself how to breathe properly by doing seminar even like when you jog start singing out loud because that works that you know you’re doing an activity and you’re seeing so you’re opening up this lungs capacity do those things or just going for a walk singing out loud with your headphones on whatever that trains it then you’re going to strengthen it because some people don’t think they can’t speak well it’s actually under underlying tools that they don’t have strength in there’s a lot behind it with the voice there’s a lot there’s a lot behind it okay gosh that’s really fascinating and stuff yeah yeah definitely yeah brilliant is there any other area of your work that we haven’t covered that you would like to point out yeah yeah definitely so um every month i usually try to have a different theme of um of what i want to teach so over these last few months kind of july and august time i’ve been uh had up one of my new courses which is called how to use storytelling to become an effective speaker and that kind of taps into kind of you know great speakers like you know oprah winfrey matthew mccoy joanna lumley she is very smooth dame judi dench all these type of ladies michelle obama and so these people are very good at the way they speak and it’s not just because because their voices are all totally different so it can’t be because oh because she’s got a nice voice that’s why she’s a good speaker no pull it back these people use storytelling techniques like they know how much timing to use they know when to use dramatic pauses they know when to speed up have jokes have tears etc these are all techniques that are used when you’re growing up when you’re reading stories as a child or at school they all have these different type type of techniques in the story built into them to build suspense to build engagement and those are the techniques that we’ve learned as a small child what we still need to use as an adult when we speak because that’s how you engage a person’s attention if you can engage a seven-year-old eight-year-old reading a book even more so you’ve got to build those techniques move them out a bit use those for adults when you’re speaking so in the course i go through different techniques and and relate them back to these kind of one some of my favorites who i like to speak and just to learn how to engage someone when you speak it could be on a one-to-one on a date five people are training me in it could be a conference just learning those techniques so that’s on my website leanne http://www.liandvoice.com and on the speaking tip shop page and then you’ll see like all the different digital products i have and i’m always having um different things i’ve got a newsletter that comes each week i’m sending out information about how different tips on how to speak more effectively um i think the most recent one was about are you looking after your money maker and your money maker is your voice and like some people like i’ve got sisters she’s a primary school teacher and she’ll every year for sure she’ll get laryngitis she’ll lose her voice and stuff and that’s an indicator that’s like the end extreme of not really looking after your voice and that can happen to anybody particularly getting into this season of on top of chronovirus flu season and the cold season and stuff so it’s i give lots of different tips and techniques of how to look after your voice because if you don’t have a voice you even talk on to the phone and stuff you’re often very limited i know we’re in a text messaging just lifestyle now but if you can’t speak you really do feel limited you know so i go through and that’s all my news that i give each week so i’d love people to join if they want to hear from me and my podcast is out every single tuesday um and then i always release them uh i always release like a new course something in regards to speaking it’s always under the umbrella of speaking but this month’s current theme is using storytelling to be an effective speaker so i’d really love people to check that out definitely do loads more stuff as well ebooks audiobooks but i don’t want to kind of bring out a shopping list but those are the key things that are happening right now yeah oh that’s awesome thanks yeah i don’t i’m quite curious about audio books too but yeah it’s only if you want to get into that right now i won’t make you yeah i love audio books um i find them that i find that you need a lot of endurance as a voiceover to record them because it’s quite a lot of hours you’ve got to sit or stand depending how strong you are to record them at the uh because every different part of the book moves isn’t it it’s like it’s like a it’s like a written movie audio books i find so you’ve got to be able to be very excellent at moving through the script or the text etc using that but as a consumer i love listening to audio books it’s one of my favorite things i love reading but i love that the audio books i feel like i feel like the author’s walking with me you know i love it i love that it’s like someone’s walking with me holding my hand telling me look at the colors look at this etc i love that but because i know how much work because imagine a nine hour audio book it is double triple four times a month to get that recording down laid edited ready to go that’s what but because that’s why i even probably enjoy them listen them even more because i know how much labour went in to get that book to where it is to get it on audible or wherever it is you buy it on brilliant brilliant great stuff um okay so um you’ve mentioned where to find all of your your newsletter and your new courses and everything um do you wanna uh tell everybody where to find you on your socials and repeat your website again just so that we can all find you and follow you and find all your links and everything yeah definitely so i’m on facebook and instagram i’m uh leanne’s voice so you’ll be able to find me and i’m leanne wright l-e-i-g-h-a-n-n-e so it’s not that common so if you put in any of the other version you might not find me so probably just chuck into google and put in leanne’s voice you’ll probably see liam pinnock from oh i’ve forgotten that girl group but her name comes up because she spells her liam the same as me um but put in leanne’s voice and you’ll find me on instagram on facebook i’m on twitter on twitter i’m called leathervoice um and i’m on link tina’s work if you want to be professional i’m on linkedin and uh those are the key ones i’m on and i also love a bit of tick tock tick tock has just been my new thing i love doing the videos yeah i just love it so i just got on tick tock and of course i’m also on youtube as well which get the longer version of the free classes because i teach live classes um every thursday three o’clock about speaking skills um and you can see it live on instagram um and then you can also watch it on youtube as well the replay um and then yeah i love those and my website is http://www.liamsvoice.com oh that’s wonderful thank you so much yeah i can’t wait to check out all your new things as well it sounds brilliant yeah brilliant okay well leanne i can’t thank you enough for being so generous and um giving some so many great tips and insights into everything you do with speak speech coaching and everything so um yeah thank you can’t wait to see what you do next yeah it’s been excellent thank you so much paula for having me on today it’s been great speaking to you and i hope the listeners really got loads of gems from it and please feel free to stay in contact and um any listeners that want to get hold of me paula’s got my details and you can get hold of me i’m not one of those people that like no you’ve got to go through my pa charlotte and felicity i have not liked that at all if you message me it’s me getting back to you oh that’s lovely thank you so much that’s brilliant yeah i’m sure people will get a lot out of this i certainly have yeah it’s been brilliant thanks definitely thank you so much

this has been audiovisual cultures with me paula blair and my very special guest leanne turner this episode was recorded with zoom and the music is common grind by airton used under creative commons 3.0 non-commercial license episodes release every other wednesday wherever podcasts are available with early access to our patreon members do see the show notes or support page at

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