VO Pro: The Business of Voice Over and Voice Acting

Actors, in general, are notoriously bad business people. And statistically, we’re bad a booking work. Even elite voice actors will book 5-10 jobs out of every 100 they audition for. Chances are you’re booking way less than that and today I’m going to teach you why.

First, there are some overarching truths about voice actors:

1. We are historically, willfully passive. 
According to the State of VO Survey, conducted by NAVA, the National Association of Voice Actors, about 75% of us report reaching out to market our services less than 3 times a day. Think of literally any other business in the world and imagine what would happen if that business marketed to 2 or less people a day. They wouldn’t be in business. So, what about voice actors? The same number, 75% report making less than $40,000 a year. Can you live off that? Can your family?

2. There are way more voice actors now than ever in history.
This was true before COVID, and a saturated market became drenched during the pandemic. This is the basic problem confronting the pay-to-plays – how to fairly distribute a relatively small number of auditions to thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands of voice actors.

You can’t control the number of voice actors and the saturation of the market. But what you can absolutely control is how you go about finding business in a sea of talent.

So today, I’m going to break down the 7 REAL reasons you’re not booking more voice over jobs.
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Let's face it. There's a lot of B.S. and myths out there about becoming a voice over actor, a professional video actor, and about the voiceover industry in general. And sadly, a lot of this bullshit is put out by snake oil salesman, so-called coaches in this business who will fleece you from your money or pick your pocket. And I'm not being disingenuous.

So today we're going to bust the top seven myths about becoming a pro voice actor. And we're going to set the record straight.
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Today, a fascinating discussion with the CEO of UK-based Voquent, one of the major voice over service providers globally about their recent stand against AI. It's an especially strong stand in the context of the ones that the other voice over providers have taken in recent months, and we talked to Miles Chicoine today about that stance. Miles has got some amazing insights, some really interesting insights about AI and how it's affecting both the voice actors and the world at large. 

This is our chat with Voquent CEO Miles Chicoine.
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Here, today, right now, those developing generative AI are threatening to put a lot of us out of work. In October of 2020, the World Economic Forum said that while AI would likely take away 85 million jobs globally by 2025 (and we’re more than halfway there, by the way), it would also generate 97 million new jobs in fields ranging from big data and machine learning to information security and digital marketing.

And for a prime example of just how this is happening, look no further than our own industry and the current SAG-AFTRA and Writer’s Guild of America strikes against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which includes the major streaming services and Hollywood studios.
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Maybe you’re building your voice over website for the first time. Or maybe you’re redesigning your VO website. How do you design your voiceover website to not just look good, but to actually help grow your business? Specifically, what are the website features you must have? How do you make it easy for customers to do business with you through your website?

My voiceover website, PaulSchmidtVoice.com has been nominated twice for Best Voice Over Website at the SOVAS Awards. I worked in web development for several years, and so I had a big advantage over most voice actors when building out my site.

So in this video I’m going to give you 6 website features you must have on your voice over website to insure it will help you grow your VO, and at the end I’ll tell you how you can get my Top 10 Website Strategies ebooklet that has 4 additional strategies you can use to boost the effectiveness of your VO website design.

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This clip is from our VO Freedom Master Plan Coaching Calls and was recorded on August 3, 2023. These testimonials were spontaneous, unsolicited, and unscripted. I had no idea that these students were going to speak up like they did.

Our coaching calls are private events and both students gave me their permission to use this clip. 

I am super grateful to them and all our VO Freedom Master Plan students and VO Pro community members. The connections I have made with these folks and the ones they have made with each other will be the legacy of this program. 
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My voice over website: https://paulschmidtvoice.com

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When you think about it, the gym and the VO booth have more similarities than you might think, and I think the gym is a great metaphor for the booth. Both are dedicated spaces where you’re focusing on self-improvement, on learning new skills, on getting uncomfortable and stretching and literally growing. In both you have tools for feedback – in the gym it’s a mirror, in the booth, it’s your headphones and studio monitors. Both have coaches or trainers to help guide us. 

So, let's dive into the 9 voiceover lessons I've picked up from an unlikely place - the gym.
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GVAA Rate Guide: http://vorateguide.com

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SAG-AFTRA is on strike, and it can be very confusing to non-union actors and voice actors, and those who aren’t actors. 

Today I’m gonna break down the major issues around the strike, why this is a watershed moment in the history of acting (and no, I’m not overblowing it), and why non-union actors should not only pay attention, but should absolutely support the strike and advocate for us all.
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https://sagaftrastrike.org

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Loneliness. Doubt. Knowledge gaps. Distraction. Overwhelm. Rejection.

Voice actors battle these struggles every day and oftentimes they lead to unfocused action, wasted resources, poor decision-making, and feelings of overwhelm (or VO-verwhelm).

Without the right support and resources, it's no wonder why so many voice actors and audiobook narrators burn out before achieving their dreams.

VO-verwhelm is a real thing, and today we’re going to talk about what it is, and how to recognize the feelings of overwhelm, reduce stress, and simplify your VO life.

Here are 7 strategies to tame the overwhelm beast:
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One of the biggest objections I hear from voice actors is I don’t want to be spammy in my email marketing. And I get what people are saying here, and they’re right. They don’t want to be perceived as sending irrelevant, salesy, sleazy messages to poorly targeted, or not targeted at all, people. In other words, if they reach out to prospects, they want that to be a quality engagement and I 110% support that philosophy.

BUT there’s another kind of spam. And it’s this second kind that you may be sending and not even know it. It’s unintentional spam. It’s messaging that you’ve taken the time to craft, taken the time to target your prospects, taken the time to try to do all the things right, and yet it’s not even making it to your prospect’s inbox, because the ESPs, the email service providers are marking it as spam and culling it from the system before you’ve ever had the chance to say Hello.

Today, we’re gonna break down email deliverability, and at the end, we’re gonna give you resources to give yourself the best chance of getting that email delivered safely and soundly.
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EMAIL DELIVERABILITY RESOURCES: https://welcome.paulschmidtpro.com/email-deliverability-resources-yt

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Say Hi on Social: 
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My voice over website: https://paulschmidtvoice.com

GVAA Rate Guide: http://vorateguide.com

Tools and People I Work with and Recommend (If you use these links to buy something I may earn a commission.): 
Recommended Book List with Links: https://amzn.to/3H9sBOO

Gear I Use with Links: https://amzn.to/3V4d3kZ

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

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Way Better than Linktree: https://pillar.io/referral/paulschmidtpro

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