A Little Rebranding For My Presentation Coaching Website

 Hi Everyone. We have added some new links and a new book to my danbalestrero.com

Presentation Coaching website   Danbalestrero.com

Does Your Presentation Sound As Good As It Looks?

Your expertise is your ability. Your credibility is your presentation. The ability to present effectively determines your financial success. In fact, everything in life is about vocal presentation.

We connect with people, get hired, teach, and close deals based on the effective use and clarity of our voices. Whether you’re a teacher, receptionist, lawyer, salesperson, politician, program coordinator, CEO, team leader, doctor, negotiating or interviewing, it is your voice that carries your ideas to people. Success is a voice driven activity.

Voiceover artists use techniques that represent the human voice in it’s most effective natural state. They know how to personalize ideas and sentences in ways that can make them millions of dollars. They are in a word, persuasive. Taking voiceover classes can vastly improve your communication and presentation skills.

I just listened to a financial expert give a power point presentation to 200 hundred people in San Francisco’s Financial district and it was simply boring. Even though he was an expert, no one talked to him at the reception... bad for business. Everyone seemed to swarm around the presenters who brought energy and life to their presentations.

Rapport with people isn’t magic, it is composed of certain elements in a person’s presentation. Are you ever frustrated because the training you’ve had doesn’t give you the results you want? Whether the training works or not depends entirely on delivery. The secrets for achieving your ambitions are contained in your own voice. All of success in business and personal relationships depends on your tone of voice. Think how often our entire day has been changed by how someone spoke to you.

Success is a vocal skill that you can develop. None of it is magic. It’s common sense that if you develop your voice and improve your delivery, you can increase the effectiveness of your presentation and have the power to persuade that will give you the edge you need for greater success.

Here's My Book About Escaping Personal Traps and Achieving Success:)

Everything I needed To Know I learned In Hell: Some Thoughts on Turning Darkness Into Light, or How To Escape The Mess You've Made

The Life Changing Importance of Voice Development

Voiceover artists, actors and all professionals have many skills to learn. Perhaps one area that is overlooked or doesn’t get enough focus is voice development.

Our Voice is the Engine that carries all of our ideas, thoughts, and  plans to everyone we come in contact with. Voice development benefits not just voiceover artists and actors, but everyone. People with superior speaking skills have an enormous advantage over others who are less polished. All great athletes have workouts and its not because they don’t know what they are doing. It is because in this competitive world communication skills need to be honed to the highest levels. A trained voice is more responsive to a persons intent in a conversation. Having control over ones tone of voice and breathing is not only an asset in voiceover work, but also critical in communications both professional and personal.

- It's Never Just About The Words in VoiceOvers or Life

I think maybe the most important thing people taught me when I was starting out, was the absolute importance of "tone of voice". It was emphasized that first contact with clients and casting directors and everyone in ones world use tone of voice to figure out what we mean and if they want to engage with us. Words are important of course, but they are only a small part of the communication at best.
We naturally want to tip a personable server in a restaurant more because it contributes to our experience. It's the same when a salesperson is helping us that seems present and engaged; we are more likely to make a purchase.

The same principle applies not only to doing great voiceover work, but also to getting voiceover work. People hire the people that they like the best. The most important talking you do occurs before the job is even offered. Always take time to listen to new clients needs and to make sure the conversations are centered on them. Being easy company that is well spoken with a tone of voice that is attentive can do a lot to improves the number of jobs one gets.

- Correcting Speech & Breathing Problems

Through the years may people have come to me for help with certain speech and articulation problems that were slightly defective as well as accent correction and of course shortness of breath (non medical).

In speaking, the principles of articulation, clarity and naturalness are the primary skills required for effective communication. These qualities can be refined and dramatically improved by using voiceover articulation techniques.

Learning cadence exercises and other voiceover techniques provides the reframe of coordination to help resolve a wide range of these problems. Fixing these kinds of issues can contribute in a major way to success in any professionals career.

Whether you're a teacher, sales professional, lawyer, CEO, public speaker, voiceover artist, broadcaster or presenter, contact me for a free consultation and lets see what can be done to resolve anything in your speech that you feel is a distraction in your communications with people.

Superior Speaking Skills Will Create Greater Success

People who have the most responsibility in business need the most effective communication skills. Our Voice is the Engine that carries all of our ideas, thoughts,and  plans to everyone we come in contact with. A leader with superior speaking skills has an enormous advantage over someone who is less polished. All great athletes have coach’s and its not because they don’t know what they are doing. It is because in this competitive world communication skills need to be honed to the highest levels.

How often after a meeting or presentation have we felt that we fell short of what was needed to succeed? The coaching of speech for business success is one of the most important investments an executive can make. It can literally increase ones income in ways that are life changing.

The most limiting factor in a persons career is often as simple as not developing their speaking skills. We don’t listen very closely to people who don’t impress us, and the main reason we aren’t impressed is because of how someone speaks.

We have entered a great new age where communication is dependent upon our ability to connect, and our ability to connect depends on what we decide to say and our manner of delivery. This is the result of the intensity of the information age. We cannot rely solely on the fact that we have the authority or the answer. We must have the ability to organize and personalize thoughts in order to be heard and understood. This has become of paramount importance in, corporations, hospitals, organizations and all of the service industries. How we communicate with our voices and how we organize ideas has never been as important as it is today. Our voice is the engine that carries our thoughts to people. Our voice and presentation is the point of first contact. The point of first contact must be maximized in order to achieve success consistently.

A business person gives many kinds of presentation to many different kinds of groups.

The vocal game plan needs to be different for each different circumstance. When giving a presentation, “one size dos not fit all”. The manner of a presentation to a group of sales people is different than the manner that is used to talk to investors, or a board, or a jury. Those different approach’s need to be worked out using a persons natural speech patterns and personality to communicate successfully.  Voice coaching is designed to orchestrate the various vocal elements for maximum natural impact without going outside the natural compass of ones voice or personality. Learn the secrets that Hollywood voiceover artists use to make millions, to take your career to a whole new level.

Some Thoughts On Reading Inspirational Copy

Aside from all the regular corporate narrations, voiceovers for How To Videos and commercials, there are Inspirational Narratives. We spend a lot of time pitching, talking and explaining everything from healthcare benefits to how not to get your arms ripped off while using certain machinery.
All of those voiceovers serve a necessary function. An even more important human necessity is inspiration.
There is a vast market for reading inspirational copy. The source may be religious, new age, leadership, communication, relationship, or success. The important thrust is always inspiration to live a more spiritual life, a more fulfilling life, a more complete life, a better life and whatever that means to you personally.
When we receive the copy for one of these projects it's important to really think through who the audience will be. How do they view life and their own hopes and dreams. No one likes to be lectured or talked down to, we all want to feel like we are in it together and the ideas are being shared. The tone of voice used in sharing great ideas is never condescending or patronizing. It is always warm, friendly and very personal.
In order for the message to be "heard" we have to be the story teller who is devoid of any affect. Everything must be "idea driven" and sound like it's the most reasonable conclusion.
There is hardly anything more important or a voiceover job that is more satisfying than inspiring or comforting people with uplifting text that contributes to their spirituality and peace  of mind while they navigate their lives.

- The Single Most Important Thing You Can Do For Your Career

People ask this question of me all the time. It's a natural and good one. The most important thing you can do for your career is practice. When you practice on a regular basis you naturally will experiment and explore your voice and how to control it. It's way too easy to keep approaching things the same way year after year. Success and progress requires a life long effort to refine and improve expression and reading skills. Nothing can be more limiting than having "some success". This can trigger an endless repetition of the formula. Greater success requires building on what works not just relying on what has worked. Practice, experiment, evolve, have fun:)

- How you use your voice can change your life

 The Power to Persuade can create unlimited success. Our voice is the engine of that success. We can use it to create empires or a successful life, or to complain and explain why we are victims. Our tone of voice is very often a reflection of how we view the world. If we’re nervous and up tight the voice often has an edge and puts people off. Whether a person wants to be a voice over artist or more successful in their own profession it is extremely important to look for the good or opportunity in all situations and be patient. The things we say to ourselves control our mood and tone of voice. It is useless to do voice exercises to improve how we sound if we are saying negative things to ourselves because the voice will reflect the sound of mistrust that is in our minds.

We want to be optimistic, but not delusional of course. It’s important to use our voice to bring a positive experience to other people; To work at being pleasant. Then we notice that we have positive experiences ourselves. We really do attract and create the situations we are in. All of this is a process and takes time.

It is perfectly natural to say things like, “why can’t I do that,” “I wonder how to do that”, oh I could never do that.”

In order to develop greater ability to persuade people we must practice and be patient. Learning to allow for process is one of the most important things that we can practice in in our lives. Process is how the earth was made. Process is how math, science and art achieve all their great accomplishments and inspirations.

If we don’t allow process because of impatience we are literally making the choice to NOT understand because we have interrupted the process of building up familiarity, understanding and skill. Voiceover artists, teachers, sales people and everyone can become more persuasive and successful as we improve how we speak to others and the things we say to ourselves.

- Learning How to be Yourself

Well, here’s the task for all mankind let alone a voiceover artist. Whether in a person’s business life or personal life, we spend a lifetime asking our selves who we are. Learning how to be yourself requires that we know who that person is, to some degree at least. The advice I give people all the time is to simply say: “Your best chance of getting work is to be yourself.” It does'n’t matter whether it’s a voiceover job you’re trying to get, or going to the next job interview, be yourself”.

It’s a useful “bumper sticker” slogan, but I’d like to talk a bit about the process of the discovery and how to relax into that, and how to trust it... and what it means and what it doesn’t mean. 

When we get to a place in our heads where we can “be ourselves” the advantages are huge. Life isn’t nearly as stressful. We stop being angry. We stop taking things personally and start viewing things as feedback that allows us to make corrections and move on. When we learn how to be ourselves and accept ourselves, we stop criticizing everyone else. The stress of NOT being ourselves or knowing ourselves is exhausting and frustrating. It can create a lot of stress and we can find ourselves acting out on people because of it. So in learning to be ourselves we are UN-cluttering our minds and freeing the hard drive space between our ears to engage in the process of success.

When we are comfortable in our own skins people will enjoy being around us. And of course that is very helpful in getting jobs, voiceover jobs, or any job. In these times that is becoming more and more important. This is important to remember. It is not merely about being the most talented voiceover artist, plumber, teacher, sales person, lawyer or dentist. A lot of people could do the actual work, but people hire people that they like the best. The best plan in the world is to like yourself and be yourself.

- Warm up Your Voice Before You Work

This is a reminder that its best to warm up your voice before any VO session and also before any presentation or business meeting. When our whole system is warmed up we are naturally more responsive to ideas and create more nuances that make our vocal efforts more natural and more persuasive.

- The Importance of Authenticity

There are many qualities that make up a successful voiceover career. There are many ways to look at the success of any voiceover artist. Different vocal qualities create different kinds of appeals.
There is a recurring quality that I've noticed over the years that has a major influence on a persons success. That quality is authenticity.
Many people are very well spoken and have learned the various styles of voiceovers. There is an issue however that in some cases the voice is stuffed into the style instead of figuring out how that voice and personality can best represent that style without going outside of the compass of the voice or personality. In other words there is a loss of authenticity. Some times casting directors will write notes like, "Nice voice...doesn't mean it". If something isn't idea driven, if it does't sound like you're speaking spontaneously to a close friend, it lacks authenticity.
It doesn't sound like a person "means it"
Exploring the dynamics of your voice when you are most authentic and natural can pay big dividends in taking your voiceover career to the next level.

- Some Thoughts On How To Succeed in Voiceovers, or Anything

One cannot help but notice how differently businesses and people behave. We all see restaurants, service companies and individuals that have radically different approaches. We all tell stories about the impossibly stupid as well as the amazingly great.
Here are just a few thoughts about some things I've noticed that help create success.

Always, always be on time and provide service in a timely manner. We have a local cafe that just opened that tries to justify waiting 40 minutes for a sandwich because everything is made from scratch. People create bubbles they live in that aren't connected to the quality of service they are providing and then wonder why people stay away.
If I have a VO project due at noon, I deliver it by 10am, period.

Listen to what people are saying and sympathize. The thing most people want more than anything is to know they are heard, and that you are their ally. Don't allow the difficulty of a situation to break the bond of the mutual effort required to find resolution.

Be responsible for your actions. Companies, people and yes artists sometimes spend a lot of energy avoiding responsibility for mistakes. Own it and fix it. Stuff happens all the time that isn't correct, people just want to know you're on it and it's going to be fixed.
I've heard a lot of stories from different people, explaining why they aren't more successful or the poor quality of the work wasn't their fault. This includes VO artists, escrow companies, cafe's, plumbers, automobile service departments, etc. An important key to success is to provide quality service in a timely manner according to the standards of the particular  industry. It is not to have a big pile of explanations justifying poor work, service or bad attitudes. No one cares about excuses, just results.

The most important thing I have seen and experienced and benefited from is kindness. There is nothing more appreciated from the weary as simple kindness. Kindness is the most inspiring, helpful, healing, transforming, success generating, problem solving miracle that anyone can experience.
Whether one is in a voiceover session with advertising clients, negotiating a contract, managing a sales team, helping a dissatisfied customer, or trying to solve any other problem, being kind is really a miracle force that can change lives and produce unlimited personal success.

- Success and the "Power To Persuade" - What You Can Learn From Voiceovers

The human voice is a wonderful musical instrument. We rely on it to transmit the symphony of our ideas and feelings. The ability to persuade determines our financial success. Everything in life is about presentation, we connect with people based on how well we do it Whether we are  teachers, CEO’s, sales people, lawyers, politicians, religious leaders or managers, our voices are the engines that carry our ideas to others. Our voices provide the point of first contact with people.

We all want to be able to communicate effectively with people in our personal and professional lives. We all want to do it better and more successfully. No matter who we are, we all seek the power to persuade.

Non of this is magic. Rapport is composed of certain elements in our delivery. Voiceover artists have refined those elements to enjoy tremendous success with their communication skills.

Becoming aware of them, mastering them, hands us the keys to effective and successful communication which can take our lives to a whole new level of success. Whether you want to be a voiceover artist or just enjoy new levels of success in your profession, study the art of voiceovers.