Do I really sound like THAT

Sep 3

More often than not, when you're a new client joining the Bamby Media client roster and you submit your first recorded audio to us, we get this question...

"Do I Really Sound Like That?!"

You think you sound terrible. You're not used to the sound of your own voice and you feel so nervous about having other people listen to you.

It's not a normal thing for us to hear ourselves in our own headphones right?

Understandably, it makes you feel a little uneasy.

But don’t stress - you don’t sound terrible! You’re just not used to the way your voice sounds.

I am so excited to give you some really useful tips that you can easily perform when you’re recording your podcast to help ensure that your voice is sounding amazing.

Whether you’re worried about your voice sounding monotone, shrill, high pitched, nervous or you’re using filler words like ‘um’ or ‘ah’ too much, I share some practical methods to improve the quality of your audio and ensure your podcast sounds impressive and professional.

And if you still can’t stand the sound of your voice - it’s simple, don’t listen to it! Send it off to an editor to work their magic while you sit back and relax.

Resources mentioned:

Rode NT-USB Mini

Listen to: The best microphone for recording your podcast with your phone

Transcript:

00:00
Welcome to Pump Up Your Pod.
Today, what I'm going to be discussing is, Do I really sound like that? And the answer is, yes.
So this question is something that I get all the time from new clients when they first sign up to be a part of the Bamby Media family. They get their intro recorded, they get their trailer recorded, and they give it to me. And then we put it all together, we put it with the music, and they go, ah, do I really sound like that? Like, is that what I actually sound like? And it's shocking to people. Because if you're not used to the way you sound like, if you're not used to actually recording with a microphone and listening to yourself, it can sound very strange when you're listening back to it to yourself, you sound really weird. And it's really off putting, and it makes you really nervous.

And I wanted to come in here and say, it is so common for people to have that thought, Do I really sound like that I sound terrible. No one's gonna want to listen to me, you know, my podcast is crap before it even gets going. And they feel really bad about it. But every single person has that same thought, when they first start, if they haven't recorded before, they are going to think that they sound terrible. And I want to let you know that you don't 100% You don't sound terrible, you're just not used to the way your voice actually sounds. So that's the first thing. It is the kind of thing that you have to get over. Because your voice isn't really going to change. It is what it is.

But there are some things that you can do. If you feel like there's something that's really grating on you specifically, that you feel like you could improve on one of them being do you sound too nasally. And that's something that people will say all the time, oh, I sound a bit nasally I sound a bit I feel like I sound a bit shrill, you know, that kind of thing. And it is common to sound kind of nasally and but perhaps a little bit shrill. And one of the reasons why you can sound like that is because you're not getting enough breath when you're talking. So you're trying to talk too fast, you're not taking enough breaths. And it means that things get escalated, and it goes up in volume and it goes up in pitch and you're there getting it out of the and you can start to sound really shrill. Or if you're trying to sound too excited, like if you're trying to hype yourself up and go, Hey, guys, you know, I'm really excited about this. And it gets you at a level where you're not normally at. So one of the things to do to actually stop that bit of shrillness or that that kind of excitement is to actually just slow down to take a breath like this.

02:56
And then start instead of like starting before you've actually even taken a proper breath. Pause for a second and actually take that breath and take a lot of them when you're recording as well. So if you're feeling like you're going a bit too fast, you're sounding a bit too shrill. You don't have to be as excited as you think you have to be when you're talking on a podcast. So just chill out a little bit.

Another thing that people say a lot is I sound a bit like monotone. Like I sound a bit boring. That is something that definitely I hear a lot the way to combat that boringness is to actually have your cheekbones up when you're talking. So like me right now. I'm smiling as I'm talking. And that immediately brings your palate up palates like inside your mouth there. Bring your cheekbones up so that you're more like enthusiastic without being overly energetic. Do you see the difference there? So cheekbones up. Hi, this is me, I'm chatting. And I have my cheekbones up. And it's really nice to listen to. If I don't have my cheekbones up, and I'm not smiling. We can try that. Hi, this is me. And I'm just talking right now. And I don't have my cheekbones up. I'm not smiling, and I'm just talking. Can you hear the difference between the two of those. So again, this is me, no smiling. It sounds a little bit monotone. Okay, and now this is me, and I'm talking again, and I'm smiling and I can hear the difference in the way I sound. Having a cheekbones up and smiling is one of the things that's going to make you sound not monotone and it's going to really improve the quality of your voice. Okay, so that's number one or two.

The other one I wanted to talk about was um. Oh my gosh, when I'm editing podcasts, and especially if you're new to the game. People can say a lot. And it's super common because they want to feel the silence. They feel like they have to say something so it may as well be on They might not even recognise that they're saying, and it's not till they listen back later that they go man, I say, um, a lot. And one of the ways to combat that is actually, firstly, you have to kind of recognise that you're saying it. So you might have to record yourself and realise that how often you say, um, and then to stop yourself, you have to actually pause, instead of saying, um, you have to pause. So where you would normally fill the silence. So let let me just do it now. So let's say I'm going Hello, welcome to my podcast. And this is a podcast where I'm going to be talking about podcasting. And it's going to be really great. And I just want to, I just want to talk to you about this thing. And you know how people do that a lot, they go and down. And that kind of thing. Instead of trying to fill the silence with an arm with an arm, let it be awkward, like, actually let it pause, because it is so much more profound when you're talking. And you actually leave space for a gap for a pause, so much more profound the impact that you make when you talk, leaving those gaps, versus not leaving them and just having, because as soon as you have um, and ah, it makes you sound less professional, and it actually makes it a real pain to edit, we get a lot of stuff where we have to cut out the umms or ahhhs or that sort of thing. And it takes a long time, you know, costs you money to have things edited that way. So if you can try and be aware of that, and go into it with pauses instead of ums and ahs, just like I did, then.

So I didn't have the next thing thought in my head that I was going to say. So I just paused and I just allowed myself to take that break. So that then I could actually get the sentence out without saying, or that is a real skill. And it's something that you won't get straight away, you'll have to work your way up to having pauses instead of ums and ahs. But it makes you sound so much more professional.

And then the other thing to do, if you're sounding like you're a little bit too high pitched, and you're a little bit like this kind of thing. Pretend you are a news reader. news readers, you know how they always have that their voice is gonna blow like this, you definitely don't want to be that extreme. But sometimes what you think is extreme, isn't extreme enough. So let's say you have a script of something that you want to say, say it like you normally would say it, and then pretend you're a news reader. And then you meet yourself in the middle and you meld between the two, to actually get the right sound that you want to get instead of it being too shrill.

So those the big ones that I wanted to kind of focus on is, yes, if you listen back to yourself, and you're listening on a podcast, and you hate the sound of your voice, that's just you having self doubt, most of the time having self doubt, with you feeling like Oh, no one's gonna listen to my voice, my voice sounds terrible, oh my gosh, a lot of the time, it doesn't sound terrible, you're just not used to hearing it that way. That is something that you have to kind of get over. If it's something that you really feel like you could improve on there is those tips that I just mentioned. So how to get rid of the ums, how to sound less nasal, how to actually sound more enthusiastic, just by raising your cheekbones, there are plenty of ways that you can actually increase the quality of your voice, just by simple facial expressions that you do that no one sees because you're on a podcast. So it doesn't really matter, which is really, really cool.

And then the other issue that people have is just general nervousness. So if you're feeling really nervous, then that transforms into the way you come across, your voice starts to sound a little bit shaky, you feel like people can hear that and they can a lot of the time they can hear when your voice is feeling a little bit shaky. To calm those nerves, there's not too much that actually, you can do to calm the nerves other than just keep doing it. So before you actually start a podcast episode, take like five deep breaths. If you're someone that gets nervous about doing it, take five deep breaths, and then start and have the cheekbones up and breathe throughout. Because if you don't get enough breath in as you're talking, then it's going to transform into something that sounds like nervous energy.

09:29
If you hate the sound of your own voice, don't listen to it. So if you have an editor or someone and you know, they can listen to it for you, that's great. So you can just send it off to them and go, Okay, you listen to that, because it freaks the hell out of me that I'm on this thing and I don't even want to listen to it. So yeah, that's great. If you need it edited, maybe get an editor to do it. And it's a really smart move. Like if you're nervous about people listening to you. Don't listen back yourself first. Just Chill out, because whatever you think is wrong with you is not true. It's not true at all. No one's gonna listen to you and go, Man, this person's voice sounds terrible, I'm not listening to this, like it would have to be pretty bad for someone to not listen to it. So yeah, that's definitely a good tip.

And then the last thing I would say is, just make sure that your audio quality is good. So that's going to make a huge difference into the actual, do I really sound like that your sound bad or worse, if you don't have some sort of at least microphone to help you actually do a good job of it, I would recommend the road and two USB mini. It's a little USB mic that just plugs straight into your laptop. And it's super easy to set up and I've done a podcast episode. On that particular microphone, you can go and check it out, I believe it was last week's. So you can check that out. And that will definitely make a big difference in actually the audio quality because as soon as you have a microphone, everything is better. As soon as you have a quality microphone, it's going to pick up the juicy frequencies in your voice that are going to sound really good. So definitely get some sort of microphone.

And my last tip is, if you have a little bit of a gluggy throat, you feel like you're clearing your throat all the time when you're going to record and it's like, Hey, I know there's all this stuff in here. That's another big thing that I hear all the time. And it's a super easy fix. Firstly, never have chocolate. I know this is gonna be sad for some people never have chocolate or milk or anything gluggy or cheese up to an hour before you actually record a podcast episode don't have these things, because they will make you gluggy as hell and you will have to clear your throat a lot. So definitely don't do that. The other thing that then combats that always have if you can, a nice, warm drink of like lemon, honey, some sort of tea that feels really soothing. Anything that's kind of citrusy, anything that feels really smooth and your throat is going to be really really good for you not getting all cranky and here and having to cough and splutter and all that sort of thing. One of the worst things that you can do for your voice, just as a side note is to clear it like this. Like that. That's actually one of the worst possible things that you can do for your voice. So if you're feeling like you really want to do that, resist the urge to do it. And instead swallow like three or four times doesn't you don't have to have a drink at the same time. But swallow resist the urge to clear the throat. Because the more you clear, the more you need to clear. It's like a you know one of those situations where it goes round and round.

So they are my tips. Yes, you're going to be nervous when you first start a podcast, you're going to sound what you think is terrible. It's not going to be terrible. It's just that you are all up in your head thinking that you are way worse than you are actually you have to get over that. Because if you actually want to do podcasting, then you have to have a voice to do it. And I have mentioned some lovely tips here as to actually help you get over the things that we know are hurdles and that you can get over. Thanks for being here with me subscribe to Pump Up Your Pod the podcast if you want more tips from me about podcasting and all sorts of things. And it was just nice to be in my pyjamas here. It's cold here in Brisbane tonight. And I wanted to check in and say hello to everybody. And that is fine.