Characteristic means of conveying something to some of the audience (5)

I haven't cracked this one yet — but the brilliant team at Fifteensquared have:

Homophone, or not, depending on your pronunciation (“to some of the audience”) of TRAY (a means of conveying, or carrying, something). Personally I’d pronounce the T at the end of TRAIT, but the dictionaries accept both pronunciations, and Serpent has acknowledged that the homophone won’t work for everyone.