When to turn away voice work
Tag: voice over
Blog #5
Nothing Happens Unless You Make A Connection!
Make a connection!
My best friend who owns an audio body shop told me some great advice. Nothing happens unless you make a connection.
What he means is, there is no way you’re ever going to do business with ANYONE unless you make some sort of a connection first!
Remember this simple rule, it takes 7 – 12 touches (or connections) before a business will remember you. So you have to think of different ways to connect with your clients that will not look like spam or sound pushy.
Here are a few connecting tips.
1 – I start by liking their business Facebook page or by subscribing to their YouTube page and making a comment on a video. These are small non-pushy connections and these days it’s better to create a personal connection than to just say right away “Hey, let’s do business.” Whenever someone sends me an email and says “I have a deal for you” I delete it right away.
Anyway, making a comment makes my connection more personal. It gets my foot in the door. I do this all the time. This way they SEE my name, Frank James Bailey when I post a comment on their video. If they want to look me up…they can.
2 – In about a week I’ll make ANOTHER connection by commenting on another NEW post or video.
3 – By week 3 I usually send them an email introducing myself. This will work very well if the company responded to the comments I made. (You see why I said like and comment first!)
4 – In week 4 I’ll make another comment on a post or video again. This way if they didn’t get my email they should know my name by now. After all, I’ve made a few comments on their posts.
5 – By the 5th week (or 5th connection) I’m sending out an email again.
6 – In the 6th week, if the business has a Twitter or Instagram account, I’m usually following them this week and “hearting” some of their posts this time.
7 – By week 7 I’m sending out a cold call.
There are many more ways to connect with people but this is my strategy and it’s worked for me so far.
Happy connecting and remember…nothing happens unless you make a connection!
Blog #4
Miro-Jobs sites have come a long way!
Back in 2011, I blogged about an up-and-coming micro-job site called Fiverr. This is what I said…
I recently discovered a website called Fiver.com. Now in case, you don’t know what this is, it’s a website where people can do just about any odd job (or silly job for that matter) for $5. There are people on the site doing crazy things like…”I will do 10 push-ups in your logo shirt for $5” or “I will review your website or youtube channel for $5”…or…”I will do a voice-over for $5”.
Those of us who have been doing voiceovers for a very long time know that some of the tops voice guys in the country get paid very big bucks for doing movie trailers or national commercials. When I saw that some people are offering a VO for $5. I was beside myself. Really, I was FLOORED!! When most voice actors charge up to $120 or more for a fully produced 60-second radio commercial. There are some people doing this for as little as $5! And get this….it’s actually only $4!! Because Fiver.com keeps a $1.
Now it’s 2022
Wow, has this site ever changed since 2011. Now I see a few of my voice-acting colleagues on the site. Some prices start at $125! And these voice actors offer more “add-ons” like background music for a fee, the “rights” to use the voice-over for whatever they want for a fee, revisions for a fee, and more. What I think happened was in the past several years Fiverr figured out that they can more money when their “gigs” can offer more money besides just…$5.
VERY IMPORTANT! I don’t use Fiverr and I don’t recommend it to anyone to use this site either. The reason I’m not on this site is that I got burned once doing a e-book. It took me over a week to record the audio and when I was done the client didn’t like my audio. So, since he was the customer, HE got his money back and he got to keep my audio too! I’ve searched all over the internet for my voice on that book and I still haven’t found it after all these years so that’s a good thing. Fiverr left me high and dry with wasted time and no compensation. That’s why I don’t use Fiverr.
So in closing, Fiverr has changed, and if you want to use Fiverr to get more voice-over jobs you can because you can actually charge a price that’s not just $5 anymore. However, be careful of the clients who (for some reason or another) don’t like what you give them and just want your audio for free.
Newsletter #6
Some of you have been asking what equipment I use as a voice actor. Here are some of the products I use as a professional voice actor and where you can get them.
1 – My headphones.
There are the Sony MDR7506 Professional Large Diaphragm Headphones. I’ve been using them for a long time. I haven’t worked in radio since 2009 but I still use them today as my go-to headset for voice-over work.
You can find them on Amazon by clicking – HERE.
2 – My Microphone
For all my recordings I use the Sennheiser 416 Microphone. This is the mic that all the professionals use when doing promo work for TV ID’s and radio station liners.
You can get your own Senheizer 416 Mic by clicking – HERE.
If you’re going to use a shotgun mic for all your voice-over work you need a pop filter that’s made for a shotgun mic.
Get a Pop Filter for your shotgun mic – HERE.
3 – Soundproofing
Finally, you’re going to need a quiet space to do all your voice-over work. To make a space really quiet you need soundproofing.
To get soundproofing foam click – HERE.
4 – A Computer
Finally, you need a good fast computer. Not a gaming computer but fast enough to run multiple programs and it needs to be a solid-state computer too. No moving parts! This will prevent any noise you don’t want!
Get this fast computer – HERE.
And that’s all you need to get started. If this info was helpful let me know.