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Hi everybody, Paul Stefano here. Voice actor a voiceover voice-over
artist you know the drill by now, with another VO booth confessional. Talking about bad demos. How does this still happen? You would think it would be easy with all the information out there on the interwebs and in Facebook and Google+…oh wait not that one I guess . Still, you would think it’d be easy to find out who was a good demo producer and who is just trying to take your money, or may not care that much about their work.

Now, our colleague Tom Dheere at https://tomdheere.com put out a
post this week on one of the Facebook groups about a person who got duped into making a bad demo. Now the frustrating
part is that the talent was actually pretty good. They had some quality reads and definitely showed some some spark in their performance. However, the demo production was really, really bad. In spite of all the information out there, people still get confused. I know in my podcast I’ve tried to tell people some of the good resources to use in order to make a demo, but the fact is some people still get duped.

So it got me to thinking, what if there were some volunteers in this great voiceover community that we all love that might be willing to donate some of their time or at least give a substantial reduction to someone who may have been tricked into making a bad demo
through no fault of their own? So I have a pretty good studio here based in Baltimore and I’d be happy to donate my studio time. It’s probably the only thing I can really offer at this point in my career.
I wouldn’t want to direct somebody or offer coaching, but I can offer my space and my engineering abilities behind the
board, and I’d be happy to do that.

I was wondering if anybody else out there might be willing to offer some of their services? Maybe a demo producer, a casting director, a coach. Anything at all that might help someone who again,  through no fault of their own really got screwed when shopping for a demo. Let’s call it the VO Cavalry.

If that’s something you think you might be able to do please let me know in the comments here. In doing so, maybe we can help
people who really have gotten hosed when producing a demo because they didn’t really know what they were doing.

Let’s do some good in the world and put an end to Bad Demos!

I have a confession to make. I struggle with knowing my worth and charging appropriately for my services. You may have heard me on my podcast The VO Meter, (www.vometer.com) discussing how it is SO important to set a rate for your voice over work that is commensurate with the amount of work involved, or the usage of the finished product; ideally both.

Well, with respect to Spike Lee, I haven’t always Done the Right Thing.

Like many of my readers or listeners, I’m sure…once upon a time I didn’t know what I was worth. Client asked me for 500 words at $50? “Sure, that sounds great”, I said. Do a 50,000 word audiobook for $100 per finished hour? “No problem, I can still pay an editor and make a profit”, I would mutter.

That’s a profit right? More than I would have made otherwise? The problem is, those rates are nowhere near industry standard. How do I know? Well, after being in this business for several years I found there ARE resources out there to turn to in order to find out what IS a fair rate. A great example is the Global Voice Acting Academy, or GVAA rate guide. You can find it here: https://www.globalvoiceacademy.com/gvaa-rate-guide/

David Toback and the fine folks at GVAA have taken the guess work out of the process. The best part, it’s completely free to use! They just want to stop the race to the bottom that has plagued the industry, and help people know what they are worth.

Speaking of…Even after all the research I have done, and preaching to the choir about doing things the right way, I still struggle with this, and I demonstrated it again a few weeks ago. A client came to me with a project. A series of power point presentations they wanted narrated. They offered me $100 per finished hour. The carrot they put in front of me was the promise of 2000 hours. Some quick math in my head and I said “That’s a lot of money!”. So I accepted it. Then, I sat down and did a few hours of videos. I thought “This is a ton of work!” I should have known better, but I caved. Sad, I know.

So, I decided to get some help. I reached out to my agents at The Atherton Group, TAG and requested them to step in on my behalf to re-negotiate my deal. After all, this is a lot of work and if we can get a fair rate, it would be beneficial for both of us. The agent made the offer of a fair rate, straight from the GVAA guide. You know what? The client didn’t say no!

Now, they didn’t exactly say yes either. The discussions are ongoing, but things look promising. I don’t expect them to jump at the GVAA rate after what I had originally agreed to, but I do expect we’ll get closer, and that will be a huge step in the right direction for me.

I know it’s hard. If you are doing this, or running any full time business, it can be hard to turn down a paycheck. We all have bills coming in, and sometimes it seems something is better than nothing. It is not, however, if you damage your own career, or even the career of your colleagues, by setting the expectation of lower rates being okay.

So, say it with me, break those old habits, or don’t start bad ones in the first place and KNOW YOUR WORTH!

Be EVERYWHERE!

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. It’s an expression with which we are all familiar. Did you know that the reverse is also true? As a voice over artist, you have to make sure your eggs (so to speak) are EVERYWHERE! Recently, I’ve started to have the fruits of my labor, pay off in surprising ways for my voiceover career.

You see, when I first started. Everybody I talked to (at least the ones I respected) told me voice-over is a long game. I get that; even wrote a previous blog about it, The Long Game

As a veteran of several different business ventures, I know it takes a long time to prospect, build up a client base, garner enough trust to get referrals from clients, and ultimately have repeat clients. Being a voice actor is no different. It’s a business, at its heart.

So, those early years in my business, I put my name out and sent demos to anyone and anybody that would listen (and often times to people who wouldn’t). Online casting sites, production houses, videogame producers, radio stations, agents to name a few. I worked with several freelance sites, audiobook publishers, elearning companies. I even searched for and placed ads on craigslist.

I had some success right away. Some clients I still work with today. Not everything worked out. I have parted ways with several companies, and casting sites, and added new ones.

Then this month, it finally happened. I was contacted for work from three places I couldn’t even remember submitting my demos to. One was from a production house to whom I sent my demo 2 years ago. I went back through my email and realized they never even answered me! Apparently, however, they kept me in their database, and when this project came up, they sent it to me! The other contact came from a smaller online casting site (no not THAT one). They sent me to jobs that I was already booked on based on my demos. Finally, a friend from Church, and Youth baseball contacted me and asked me to do the voicemail for his company’s integrated voice response system or IVR. I asked this friend, how he even knew I did voice over. His answer, “I think we are connected on Linked In”. Another place I have not only my profile, but clear statements that I’m a professional voice actor, and my website.

For those of you just starting out, this is the holy grail of voice over. Clients reaching out to you for work, not the other way around. Now, these jobs are not going to pay my mortgage this month, or even my latest microphone purchase, but the point is, its a start. I don’t expect this to be the norm from here on out. Any freelancer from any walk of life will tell you that business is a constant roller coaster. There will be highs, and lows, and at times you’ll scream you want to get off.

The point is, you have to constantly be looking for new opportunities for people to hire you for voice work. Whether that be a local phone message, a national commercial, or anything in between. As the saying goes, ABC, always be closing. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket, put them in EVERY basket.