How To Develop Strong Verbal Communication Skills

• Similar words can have very different meanings!
• Choose your words carefully to maximise your communication skills.
• Words can give you tremendous power. Don’t underestimate them!

Words are spoken everyday, and so are often taken largely for granted. As a result people throw them about, without fully considering the impact or implications of the words they use.

The fact is words are rarely neutral, but instead tend to be loaded full visual imagery and emotional connotations.

In simple terms, what this means is that the words you use can affect the way a person thinks, and the way they feel. The emotional meaning of words, therefore extends far beyond their dictionary definition.

Same Meaning, Different Words 

Compare the words “denomination”, “sect” and “cult”. All of these words have virtually the same literal meaning. They describe a group of people who share a common religious or spiritual belief. However the emotional baggage each word carries is very different.

When you hear the word denomination, most people think of a respectable mainstream religious group. For example, the Catholics or Christians at your local church. The word sect however brings up a different association, something more radical and less mainstream.

The word cult brings up an even stronger association, such as the “Heavens Gate” cult. This cult believed a UFO hiding behind a comet, was coming to take the followers away. In order to board this alien spacecraft, these Heavens Gate “cult members” committed suicide.

As you can see from these examples, similar words have the power to uniquely alter a persons mood, attitude and feelings, even though they may have the same literal meaning.

Advertisers know this very well, and will carefully choose certain words to make the viewer feel a certain way. The purpose of this feeling or emotion created in the viewer, is to trigger them into further action (i.e. purchase of a product).

The Power Of Words

Since words can have a powerful influence on our emotional state of mind, it is worth examining what words create the most emotional impact. By using these words, you will vastly improve your communication skills.

So let’s now have a look at how you can improve your communication skills by using words.

Positive & Negative Words

To start with, lets broadly define words as either positive or negative. Positive words make us feel warm, confident, secure, optimistic and happy. Positive words are like someone giving you a hug, and saying how great you are.

Negative words are the opposite. They can cause fear, depression, anger, low self esteem and anxiety. Negative words are like someone punching you in the face, and telling you how bad you are.

A good example of the use of positive and negative words can be seen with politicians. Politicians will use positive words to describe themselves, and negative words to describe their opponent.

This creates a simple positive emotional attachment to them, and a negative emotional attachment to their opposition.

Attention Grabbing Words

These are words that immediately capture your attention. They will either make you look at them, or listen to them intently. Here are some of the most powerful attention grabbing words that are commonly used in advertising.

Benefit, guarantee, money, results, easy, health, new, safe, free, how, to, now, save, fun, love, proven, you/your

Of these words, the most powerful are the following:

New

Go on eBay and have a look at some of the listings. You will often find many items are promoted as “brand new in box” or simply as “new”. The word new conveys freshness, cleanliness and something which nobody else has touched.

New is a very powerful and frequently used word in advertising, because it is so effective at grabbing your attention. In contrast, its counterpart “old” suggests something that is worn out, used, dirty or outdated.

Free

Free is perhaps the most powerful word of all. Tell someone they can get something for free, and you are sure to quickly gain their attention.

This is why advertisers often use “free offers”, as it allows them to get your attention, thereby increasing the chance of you spending some money.

One of the most common ways this is done, is to offer a “free gift” when you purchase something. However, if you examine this statement carefully, you can see that it actually makes no sense.

A gift by definition is free. It is a gift that someone is giving you without obligation. Because the word “free” is so powerful, adding it before the word “gift” ultimately makes the gift seem more appealing.

Another example of the power of the word “free” comes from research done with promotional items in supermarkets. It has been found that given a choice of three options;

• Half price
• Buy one get one free
• 50% off

The middle option, “buy one get one free” consistently outperforms the other choices in terms of sales.

All of these make the exact same offer, however the words that are used greatly influence the results that are seen.

Again, what is happening here is that certain words are evoking a certain emotional response in people.

These emotional responses lead to certain actions depending on the word. In this example, the use of the word “free” results in the greatest number of sales.

Other words which are especially effective at grabbing a persons attention are the words “shit”, “fuck” and “sex”. These words also tend to have a shocking effect and can be used to arouse a person and lower their defenses, prepping them for a persuasion attempt.

Labeling

Words can also be used in the form of labels. Labels can be used to create an association between a person(s) and something they are not.

For example, before the start of World War 2, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party started encouraging the use of words such as “vermin”, “insects”, “pigs” and “garbage” when talking about the Jewish people.

By labeling Jewish people in this manner, the Nazis succeeded in causing the German people to see Jews not as people, but as animals or dirt.

By creating this label, the Nazis also created a negative emotional association with Jews, which caused people to resent them and even cause them physical harm.

Labels such as this are dangerous, as they can cause people to reject other ideas or groups of people before ever listening to the facts behind an issue.

What Does your Label Say?

Whilst not all labels are as dangerous as those used by the Nazis on the Jews, they still can be harmful. For example, if you consistently display lazy behaviour, someone may “label” you as being lazy.

This label is likely to spread to other people, and once it does, everyone will think you are lazy and assume you are good for nothing.

Another example of a label is one which is commonly given to women who sleep with lots of men. Women like this are sometimes called “sluts” or “whores” by other men.

Once this label gets spread to other people, men are likely to assume she is “easy” (willing to have sex with anyone) and may try to grope or force themselves upon her.

Women like this sometimes end up getting raped, all because they were labeled as a slut.

Generalities

Sometimes a persuader will deliberately avoid using specific language. This is often seen with politicians who face mixed crowds with strong conflicting views.

To win over the audience the politician will use generalities that have positive associations, but essentially lack any real meaning or substance.

The purpose of the generality however is not to inform, but rather to leave the full meaning to the imagination of the audience. This tactic is used to make us approve and accept something, without fully examining the evidence.

An example could include “the war on terror”. This sounds reasonable, but what does it actually mean? How do you define terror? Who is causing this terror?

Terror could mean terrorists, just as easily as it could mean people who oppose the government.

War could mean using the military to attack another country, just as easily as it could mean using the Police or FBI to arrest people in your own country who are perceived as causing terror.

A good generality therefore tends to be short, catchy and easy to remember. It will also evoke emotion in the listener, and be open to many different interpretations and meanings.

Euphemisms

When persuaders use generalities, they are trying to win over their audience with emotionally suggestive words.

However in some cases when the truth would rather be disguised, persuaders may attempt to pacify an audience by trying to take the emotional impact out of a word. By purposefully making emotionally void.

The public promotion of war by governments provide many good examples of euphemisms. For example, in 1940 the United States changed the name of the “War Department” to the “Department Of Defense”.

“The Ministry of Propaganda” was changed to “Public Relations”, after the negative association of the word propaganda with Hitler.

“Civilian dead” was changed to “civilian causalities” and later “collateral damage”. A word completely emotionally removed from the pain, suffering and death caused by war.

During World War 1 soldiers were said to have suffered from “shell shock” a term used to describe the effect of shock-waves from exploding bombs on the soldiers body. This was later changed to “combat fatigue” in World War 2, then “post traumatic stress” in Vietnam.

These examples show how different, but similar meaning words, can evoke a variety of emotions.

So when you want to lessen the impact of something shocking or distasteful, use words which do not evoke strong emotional reactions or associations in the listeners mind. This way it will be accepted more readily, and with less resistance.  

Antithesis

Antithetical statements are short sentences that are composed of 2 halves with opposite meanings. Here are some well known examples:

“One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind”

“When the going gets tough, the tough get going”

“Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country”

You have most likely heard these statements before, and the reason they seem familiar is because antithetical statements are easy to remember and therefore widely used and quoted by other people.

Antithetical statements are usually short, and approximately balanced on each half of the sentence. People who use them are considered to be sophisticated, articulate and insightful.

This is important because communicators who use words in novel and memorable ways, generally tend to be much more persuasive than those who use bland everyday terms.

Repetition

Research has shown that in order to remember something, we must be exposed to it repeatedly. Ideally at least 3 times.

The first exposure serves to introduce you to something, the second exposure familiarises you with it, and the third exposure causes you to think, remember or take action on it.

In advertising it was discovered that people respond best to messages if they are repeated over a prolonged period of time.

For example, an advertisement will be more effective if you saw it on 3 separate days, rather than 3 times on the same day.

This period of delay allows the brain to process the information you have been exposed to (in this example, the advertisement). During this period new neural pathways (brain connections) related to that advertisement will start to form.

The second time you are exposed to the advertisement, the neural pathways formed during the first exposure will be strengthened, and strengthen again in the third exposure.

The stronger your neural pathways are related to a particular message, the more you will remember it and the better you will understand it. This is why repetition is so important.

When speaking, repetition can therefore be used to make short sentences more powerful and more memorable. Using repetition can also make your message seem more persuasive.

However in order to use repetition successfully, confine your repetitions to key words and phrases, and for best results, use repetition 3 times or more.

Here are some famous statements that use repetition:

“…Government of the people, by the people for the people…”

Abraham Lincoln

“Never in the field of human conflict was so much, owed by so many to so few”

Winston Churchill

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