My husband and I joined a friend for dinner last week and as usual, a bit of business talk came up. I’ve mentioned here that my husband is a photographer, and our friend works for an agency and often is in a position to hire photographers, usually for out of town projects. We talked about the awkwardness of pricing, from both sides – the one holding the budget, and the creative who hopes for fair compensation. Apparently, it’s just as awkward to present a low budget to a photographer as it is gut-wrenching to quote a fair rate that sounds like a lot of money for a few hours of work. She’s one of the ‘good ones’ though and she does her research and tries to work with the client to find enough money to at least be fair.

We know for photos as well as voiceover, the majority of the cost of a project is for the usage and rights. I can’t remember where I heard or read this (I think it was a photography business blog), but another line of thought I love is that the client is paying for you to bring your past experience and training that has created your ability to complete the work quickly, even within just a few minutes. However, the quickest way to get deleted from my audition inbox is to say “this will only take you a few minutes” when we all know that is supposed to somehow be reflected in the rate I charge for my work and your usage. Would you ask a medical practitioner to reduce her fee because she completed a successful surgery faster than someone else would? Price and expediency should not be linked as long as the quality of the work is top-notch.

I corresponded with another friend earlier this week who was asked to submit a quote for a large IVR phone system. We went back and forth on the amount of work, the estimated finished time, the word count, the exposure/usage because of the type and size company it was, and came up with a strategy for her to quote a rate she feels is fair, although she’s still a bit uncomfortable asking for it. I think a lot of people would discourage themselves from charging a fair rate due to that feeling of being uncomfortable. Whenever that feeling comes up for me, it’s a chance to more closely examine the issue at hand and figure out what’s at the root of it. Not feeling that your work is worth the rate? Feeling intimidated by the client? Being scared of losing the business and you’d rather charge lower to ensure you don’t chase them away? When I feel that way when generating an estimate, I think that yes, just 5 years ago I wouldn’t have been comfortable charging that, but I’ve been doing this for much longer and am performing at a level where I know that the rate is fair to the client and myself for my voicework. Plus, a savvy agent would charge you that and likely add their fee on top!

I made it one of my goals this past year to put together a thorough ratecard for myself. Even with my happy little spreadsheet, I still have those moments of doubt in my own rates. Am I not taking into consideration how big of a project this is going to be? Is this rate sustainable for the industry and fair to me and the client? Or, am I charging too much? Back to our dinner from last week, our agency friend shared that she feels anxiety set in the moment after hitting “send” with an estimate/budget. I definitely feel that way when I’m quoting for a large project or for a client I’d really like to work with. Having a ratecard gives me a starting point for finding my confidence in that moment – I look it over and can remind myself of why I charge what I charge, what the benefits are that I offer my clients and that I’m being fair to myself and to the industry in maintaining respectable professional rates.

A few pointers for quoting voiceover rates:
1. Get the full script in your hands (well, inbox, that is.)
Being told that a project is 5 pages long doesn’t help you see what’s involved, how many files it’s broken into, how tiny the font is to fit it on 5 pages, how technical the writing may be and a bunch of other surprises that may be disappointing after you’ve already accepted a rate for the work.

2. Ask questions!
For example, what file format? – phone systems have notoriously funky file requirements and knowing you need 8mHz u-law wav files or 48khz vs 44.1khz audio in the beginning is good to know! How many different files does the client need? – with e-Learning you could be working with just a few or a few hundred files or more, and if you have to name them specifically for the client’s compiler then you may want to adjust your rate to reflect this additional file caretaking. Super important of course is, when do you need it? – I don’t know how clients feel about seeing a price breakout with “rush fee” tacked on, but I think there are times when it’s called for, and you’ll know when it feels right, and it’s your choice to show that line item in your estimate or not. Everyone’s definition of “rush job” is different, but in general if someone requires their audio returned within 24 hours on a large project and I have to change or cancel my personal plans to accommodate for a much longer day in the studio, that qualifies for a set rush fee in my book.

3. Compare rates to similar completed projects. If you’ve done medical narration before and felt your 4000 word, 8 page project about lumbar surgery went well and everyone was satisfied with the rate, and now you have a similarly technical project nearly double that size, you know you have a starting point to go from.

4. Have a ratecard or reference sheet you are comfortable with, but not too comfortable. For established VO artists, don’t be afraid to charge what your talents, skills and experience are worth. This is likely to change over time. Don’t price gouge based on ego, either (1 or 2 national spots don’t rocket you to upper echelon talent status) but certainly don’t sell yourself short. Remember that sometimes the client is not educated on rates or underestimates what’s involved or the cost of the usage they’re asking for, and sometimes they’re just trying to get the cheapest deal. I’d personally rather lose a few potential gigs by bidding fairly than retain clients who don’t respect the value of professional voice over work. There will always be someone willing to do it for $50 on Craigslist from their laptop in their kitchen, and I have no intention of competing with them.

**If you’re just starting out in voiceovers and realize you’re still sounding a bit rough and have much to learn, no, I personally don’t think you should be charging full scale rates as those rates in theory are for trained professionals, and you’re going to be working towards that. But you should re-evaluate your progress and not keep those same amateur rates when your talents and techniques have improved.

Resources
If you’re union solely doing union work, you’re protected by scale and the rate likely just is what it is. Non-union talent have the task of drafting their own rate card or quoting on the fly. The Voice Over Resource Guide provides a PDF of the most recent AFTRA rate card, and SAG rates can be found with a bit more digging under the Contracts tab and by selecting which type of VO rates you’re looking for. Specifically for non-union work, Voices.com has a rate education sheet for clients to better understand what is fair to expect, and Voice123 has a more outdated suggested rate sheet for the same reasons.

Don’t be fooled, working in a creative field is still running a business despite how artistic and creative the work itself may be. In our household, we run a few businesses in 2 different creative fields – voiceover and photography. No matter how good my husband and I are at our work, if we didn’t treat them like the businesses they are then we’d eventually run them into the ground due to lack of structure and business sense. I’m going to address just one aspect of spending in my business where I’m constantly evaluating my ROI because it’s a huge category: self-promotion, marketing and advertising. I’m including anything here that I pay for that promotes my voice to people who I believe will refer or hire me. I don’t go into any of the free marketing options in this post. Here’s what I consider to be important:

1) Making a Budget – First of all, yes you need to have one, even if it starts out a bit vague. This also means you should be keeping track of your gross income (look at your tax return and your pre-deduction total for VO income.) I’ve seen statistics suggesting that small businesses may allocate about 11% of their total operating budget to marketing and promotion. The past 2 years my percentage has been closer to 15-20%. Spend what you’re comfortable spending, but know that being super conservative here is going to hurt you. Besides marketing and advertising being a business write off come tax season, you need to know what you’re spending to see how much you’ve made back from those efforts.

2) Planning – The painful truth is, you do have to spend money to make money, but you should be planning how much exactly to spend and WHERE and HOW, not just spending indiscriminately. Between joining Pay-to-Play sites, paying for placing your demo and contact info on a website, and building and maintaining your own website, you could spend your entire annual budget online. You have a lot of options online if that’s where you choose to focus your energy; that’s what I prefer for most of my self-promotion and marketing. However, you should also think about targeted mailings and packages to solicit new agents or clients. As easy and free as it is to send an email, I believe people do appreciate the extra effort of receiving a nice FedEx package and it’s a way to stand out from the crowd.

Don’t forget to think about conferences and conventions! While most are primarily educational in focus, you may also connect with agents, producers or other talent who wear multiple hats in the studio as producers and casting directors themselves. There’s VOICE in L.A., NAB in Las Vegas, more genre-specific conventions (APAC for audiobooks, etc) and peer-led conventions like the newly created Faffcon series. Even if you don’t consider any part of this “marketing,” you will likely be bringing business cards and demos ‘just in case,’ right? Be sure to plan for these business essentials in your budget as well.

3) Research who you’re doing business with – In VO we all do the same thing, but the unique item we’re selling is ourselves, our way of doing business and what specialties we can offer our clients. Find the best fit when partnering or joining websites, link-trading and be cautious of people calling themselves online agents*. As in any industry, there are always people eager to take your money and offer little but empty promises in return. What good is it to pay to be listed on the front page of a website where half the other talent there don’t have professional quality demos? How likely do you think it is that a client will keep listening to sloppy amateurs until they come across your polished demo? When considering a paid-placement site, don’t be afraid to contact other voice talent currently listed and ask their experience before committing your money, and ask for traffic stats from the site admin upfront.

*re: Online agents – You should never have to pay for an agent. Period. If someone is offering you a buy-in to their agency, I’d see that as a red flag and suggest you move on. Agents receive 10-20% commission off bookings, and if they’re supplementing that income with an upfront fee, I’d wonder how many bookings they actually oversee and what your income potential is from an agent like that.

4) Non-Financial Investments – This idea covers a few trains of thought.

Technical investment: do my demos for this type of work sound updated, relevant and representative of my current abilities at their best? If you think heavy promotion can make up for an outdated demo, you’re not spending your money wisely. Be sure that you’re marketing a good product.

Emotional investment: is this a type of work that I’d love to do? I’ve spent a lot of my budget last year and this year marketing myself for audiobook work and have completed one book so far. As someone who loves stories, characters and in general a well-written book, I know I’m choosing to put more of my self-promotion eggs in this basket for emotional reasons, not ROI reasons yet. But audiobooks fall into my long-term marketing plan, as I don’t expect my efforts to pay for themselves within the first 2-3 years.

Time investment: Do you want to spend hours compiling names and email addresses off websites or would it be worth your time buying a database list? It also takes time to get up to speed, manage and track your advertising efforts; if you’re taking on too much then something is falling between the cracks. Know what you can dedicate time to working on and be realistic.

5) Evaluate based on actual results: This is the part that will help you achieve progress in your marketing. What works, and what doesn’t? Decide ahead of time how you plan to measure results. I heavily use Google’s free resources, including Analytics, when it comes to measuring anything that I want to use to direct traffic to my website. From Analytics, I can break down what parts of my website are more appealing to visitors and how much time is spent on each page, what people are interested in and the overall quality of the leads I bring in from each website I receive hits from. With Site Overlay, I can even see which demos are listened to based on where the traffic comes from! Any actual paid advertising (Google AdWords or other) can be broken down into which keywords and phrases worked best, which sites where I have an ad have lead the best prospects to me and just as importantly, I can find out what hasn’t worked in these areas. Like what we tell people with their radio or TV advertising, we can get them to your store but you have to sell them your merchandise. Site traffic analysis is a great way to see if you’re getting good leads but losing them due to an issue within your website.

I gauge the return on my investment from P2P and membership sites based on what I’ve booked through the site. I’ve dropped my placement and membership on 2 websites because of the overall low booking ratios I experienced there compared to the other sites I’ve been very happy with and renewed. Don’t be afraid to make changes, you’ll free up your budget to find a better fit next time.

You shouldn’t setup your marketing and let it float on auto-pilot. Check in on your efforts and adjust them over time. If you think you’re just too into your art to spend time thinking about keywords and campaigns, then pay someone to do it for you. You’re making an investment in your career, one that you may want to have for 20 or 30 years (or more, youngsters!) so it’s worth setting aside some time each week, each month and every year to evaluate how well your paid self-promotion endeavors are working for you.

I have a secret to share, and it’s one that many voice talents want to keep behind closed doors. I’m balancing a full time job in radio doing commercial voiceovers and production with my freelance voiceover and production business. There was a time when I felt that level of honesty would be looked at as if I didn’t have enough of a commitment to my business, but I’m confident enough in myself and my choices to know this is the right thing for me at the moment. I’ve also seen enough pompous posts in voiceover groups where the ‘high and mighty’ variety of full-timers look down upon those who must not have enough work or be serious enough about voiceover to leave their secure dayjobs, or who equate success with a certain number of national campaigns or a set income level. The sense of community is lost by some people in that regard and maybe they’re ignorant to the fact that there’s not a one-size fits all reason why some up-and-coming and also very successful voiceoverists haven’t left their office life behind.

I for one don’t believe in making a ginormous “leap of faith” when it comes to your family’s income and your career, when you can instead be patient, calculated and create an opportunity to transition from one for the other, with the freelance business already in operation. I’m choosing to do that because I feel like it gives me time to actually build my business up, and not jump ship and panic, desperate to attract more clients and be more likely to make bad choices.

Mahmoud Taji has blogged about his day job and I applaud him for being a great example of someone who can and does balance both aspects of his work life, and has done so publicly. That blog post in particular has some great personal insight into goal-setting to help find a better time to transition to being solely self-employed. Bob Souer had a wonderful blog post a while ago about the conflicting thoughts and timing of leaving stable work for being totally freelance, and cites several of those decisive moments in his career. There are countless other voice talents who may subtly mention other work they do but let’s face it, for the most part we want to imply that our voice over work is our only full time job for fear of “what would our clients think?” I live by the underpromise/overdeliver philosophy and I make sure my clients think, “Arielle does a great job and gets my voiceovers back to me before I need them.” They wouldn’t care what I do with the rest of my time because they’ll feel that their project is my top priority.

Last fall I participated in a retreat-based workshop with Maurice Tobias and she pointed out that it sounded like security was important to me. It is, and it does play a role in my decision making, but it’s out of logic and not out of fear. Leaving a full time salary position with insurance and 401k benefits is a very big decision because it plays into both short term and long term financial security. Last year, I grossed as much in freelance work as I did at my salaried job, but that doesn’t factor in the cost of running a business and buying my own insurance. As long as I stay with my radio gig, my duties involve voicing, producing and writing commercial audio from my own production studio, so I’m constantly working on my craft and hearing finished work of my peers and people whose work I admire. I can still submit quick auditions or pick-ups unlike someone who works as a lawyer or teacher and wants to make a complete career change. However like anyone else with a day job, my attention must be focused on my employer’s projects first, not my own initiatives.

For me, I still have my production/VO gig because I just haven’t been to the point where the scales have tipped towards unmanageable and I need to transition out of it. My life would certainly be a lot simpler if I just quit: my early mornings and late evenings wouldn’t be my prime freelance hours, a huge chunk of my weekends wouldn’t be spent ‘catching up’ on P2P auditions. I’d have more time to spend with my husband. I know I’d be able to more efficiently grow my business because I’d have the time to do that in between all the tasks currently pushed out of the 9:30-5:30 part of my day. When it comes down to it though, I’ve gotten very good at this balancing act and sometimes end up working 12-14 hour days to take care of my clients and work towards connecting with new ones. I know it’s not something I can do forever and certainly don’t plan to. But for today, for now, this is what’s right for me and my family. This would be harder on my husband and our marriage if he wasn’t also an entrepreneur. He works from home and runs 2 photography businesses and has developer/coding work for a few clients on the side, so we have an understanding about our time together and the sacrifices we’re making now to build strong businesses we can run together. We figure out how many hours we need to work after dinner, and I go to my studio and he’s at his desk. If he had a regular job, I think things would be different.

So yes, I do have a full time job outside of my freelance business for now. I would be much easier to quit my job and just focus on my freelance career, but I’m taking the road that requires patience in order to build a great foundation for a business that will grow to sustain me for the next 30+ years. Whenever I do make the transition out of my job, I’ll celebrate the milestone in my business and be sure to blog about that as well. I know I’m not the only one in this tricky situation, but most people won’t tell you that.

I’ve seen a few conversations floating around on this topic, and wanted to share my take on turning down work. I have turned down jobs before, usually it’s for content but once in a while it’s for knowing my own limitations.

Most recently, I was contacted about a very cool sounding gig that would have involved some singing for a company based near my hometown. I was so tempted to say yes, it sounded like a really fun project, but I usually don’t sing outside of the car (or the karaoke bar after a good drink). The owner pursued me after I’d said no the first time and had referred her to a more qualified friend; still she insisted I was the person for the project. I had to do a gut-check on it, and then firmly turned down the work. I know I’m not a singer and moreso I know that even if she thought I was being modest about my skills and still wanted me to give it a shot, at that point I’m wasting her time and mine. There’s a difference between accepting a challenge and accepting work outside my scope of talent, and I think the requirements for her job would have pushed me into the latter, and the end result is no good for either of us.

Most of the time, if I turn down work it’s based on the content. I don’t voice anything that sounds like a scam – quick credit fixes, winning free iPads, robo-calling telemarketing campaigns, congratulations you may be a winner website audio, but I’m okay with diet ads and legit debt consolidation programs. I’m cautious of infomercials for bad or ridiculous products, but am not turned off immediately by “but wait, there’s more.” Often, many of these gigs are lower paying or pay well below fair rate, which is another easy way to turn it down before digging into content. I don’t have anything against the people who do voice these but personally have to take a closer look at exactly who I’m representing before I agree to the work. This is also determined by my other clients – I choose to not do work that is in stark contrast or bad taste to the standard of the rest of the work I do.

When considering jobs in this grey area, I suggest that the voice talent imagine the website or company you’d work for is being profiled on a local or even national nightly news program for a news piece (on scams, pyramid schemes, cool new products, or altruistic small businesses… whatever you feel is most likely.) They pull your audio as part of their news package and now your voice is irrevocably tied to that copy and this business. Are you embarrassed to be associated with the company, or glad you did the work? I wonder how the Head-On voiceover talent feels, I hope she was paid residuals.

This is a pretty simple concept that can be found in most any industry. The first part – under-promising – leans heavily on knowing yourself, your products and accurately estimating your workload and your turnaround time. You should factor in a buffer for “in case of” (sick day, computer problems, national holiday, other deadlines that can affect your timeline, etc). The second part is easy – complete the job as soon as possible, and earlier than your buffered timeline. The third, critical aspect that can enhance a client’s experience with you is to communicate with them about where you are in the process, anticipate problems, and hopefully you don’t have to request a deadline extension but if something comes up then you better talk to your client about it (and often, at least in voiceover, you’re working with an agency who then has to relay this to the client.) It boils down to respecting others time!

This topic has been on my mind for several weeks due to a few different experiences I’ve had with companies who do or don’t live by this philosophy. I’ll leave out the names of the first company to protect the ignorant and prevent unearned web-hits, but gladly post the names in my second story. Grab a cup of tea or coffee, this post gets a little lengthy.

The Custom Order: I found a company, after much searching, that I was very excited to work with on a personalized clothing item. I’d emailed through their contact form and spoke directly with the owner, who reassured me that what I wanted could be done within their normal parameters. They’re in Canada and I’m in the US, but after a few email exchanges I felt really good about placing an order with this otherwise unseen company. I put a lot of care into gathering all the exact information they’d need to create my item, and as custom items go, it wasn’t cheap, but it was going to be well worth it. The website had a calendar section, and promised that 7-9 working, non-holiday days after placing my order, that it would be complete and would be shipped to the US. I placed my order January 30th, and based on their calendar that meant construction would be finished by February 10th and it should arrive around February 18th. My expectations had clearly been set by the promises the company made.

I heard nothing from the moment I placed my order up through the date the clothing should have been completed, so on the 11th production day I emailed asking about the status. I heard back 3 days later that my order would be shipping out that afternoon or the following morning and I’d receive an email from Canada Post with tracking information. Two weeks later (a full 2 weeks after my order supposedly shipped), and after 2 messages that went unanswered, I finally got a response. The company copy/pasted my tracking information and suggested that my order would arrive within a few days. Once I looked at the tracking info, I was furious that it had only been mailed off a few days after I sent my most recent inquiry into the order’s whereabouts. That said to me that my project was running several weeks behind in production or had slipped through the cracks, something they should have communicated to me or upon realizing the unmailed but finished product in their facility, they could have upgraded my shipping as good customer service. 6 days later, on March 7th, my custom order finally arrived, several weeks late with no apology or explanation.

What did they do right? They at least had a buffer on their production schedule, and clearly laid out which days they worked and which they didn’t.
What went wrong? This story is about a huge failure in communication and what happens when you fall very short of your promises to a new client. There was no contact initiated by the client after receiving my money, and if I hadn’t been following up with the progress it’s possible my order fell through the cracks and was completed but never prepped to ship, and that error might not have been caught for a while. The feelings upon opening the delivered package were bittersweet – relief that it actually arrived, but cynical anxiety about what was going to be wrong with it. They failed to deliver on all of their promises earlier, so why wouldn’t that mean the product wasn’t as good as I was expecting? Over-promising and under-delivering directly impacted my impression of the company’s quality. Their terrible communication and lackadaisical sense of urgency or regret for failing to ship out even close to the day promised via email are why I won’t be recommending others to use them and won’t become a repeat customer. It’s a shame, the item I ordered is actually made really well.

The Patio Door: The door to our patio sucked. The rails that the screen door slid on had been destroyed and instead it was digging into the wood frame. The heavy glass door never slid easily no matter how we greased the track. It was original to our home and the original owners didn’t do such a great job taking care of things, and this thing had to go. Andy and I consulted with our neighbor, a contractor who owns Luxury Home Builders, and he gave us a recommendation for a Pella vinyl door that would work nicely. We got the door from Lowes, and one of their staff loaded it into the rental truck and we drove home. Upon unloading it, we realized he loaded the door upside down, so that the entire handle was scratched down to the metal. A few iPhone photos later and upon returning to the store we were issued a small credit towards replacing the handle. Our neighbor subcontracted a crew and they came out to install the door the following Friday. We were told their hourly rate, what they’d need to purchase to finish framing it out, that we’d need to paint the trim ourselves, and to expect them to work in our home for 4-8 hours.

The guys arrived and they definitely knew what they were doing, but they didn’t (and we didn’t) know what we were in for. To make a long story short, they realized that there was a structural problem with the purchased door itself, and after working in our home for about 3 hours they brought the door back to Lowes and swapped it out. The 2nd door was then installed in placec, and while it was an improvement over the first door, it was still oddly bowed. They kept Andy appraised of the situation the whole time, and our neighbor was overseeing this project and problem and updated us that they would stay until it was fixed. That extended their time in our home to 10 hours before it was agreed that this problem was something they couldn’t fix by adjusting the tracks, but their work would not end there. Our contractor spoke with a rep at Lowes and their local Pella representative. It turns out that she knew there were 10-12 defective doors in that Lowes store, and they just hadn’t been pulled from inventory. Pella would be issuing us a credit towards the overtime worked on installing the door that would have to be removed/replaced. Our contractor also spoke with the subcontracting company’s owners, who agreed that it’s a bad situation that we had a brand new, defective door installed and we already had 10 hours into the project. They agreed that once we settle on a new door that the guys will come back out and take out this one and install the new one at no additional cost. Our contractor also talked with a manager at Lowes who agreed that this should never had happened, and they’ve ordered a new (even nicer!) door for us at no extra cost to replace the defective one and make good on causing us such hassle.

What did they do right? Everything, as far as I can tell. They set clear guidelines for cost, time and parts needed. They were on track to beat that deadline when the door we purchased became the problem. They communicated the challenge and change and we were in the loop on everything else going forward. Then there’s service after the sale. It’s not just about having a door installed and trimmed out – it’s about having a door that works and is safe installed right.
What went wrong? The problem was out of the hands of our subcontractors, but as Mike Holmes would say, they wanted to “make it right,” and the error wasn’t even their fault. Lowes also stepped up to take responsibility for their error and even though the problem itself was out of their hands, they were going to take care of their customer and make sure that we would come back to them in the future. Everyone could have abandoned ship, but instead they took care of the situation.

As a voice actor, this is how I run my business. I strive to deliver in advance of promised deadlines, and will email the client at every important step and definitely at the first sign of trouble. As a whole, most voiceover jobs that come to me with a script that are under an hour long can be completed within 24 hours if I don’t have any other pressing matters. However, I know that life happens, I have other clients and projects and even a life outside of my studio and I need to build in a buffer to accommodate for the expected and unexpected in life and my workload. I typically quote 36-48 hours turnaround on that size project, and 90% of the time I’m able to turn in audio the same day, beating expectations. Finally, upon agreeing to a rate and accepting the final script, I communicate my deadline in concrete terms – “I’ll have your audio uploaded via my FTP site by first thing Thursday morning EST,” or “I’ll send you a sample read of the first 3 minutes shortly, and once you approve my read then I’ll have all your files prepared no later than 2 days after you approve the sample.” I think it’s very important to guarantee a delivery time upfront, knowing that you have some wiggle room if you happen to wake up with sinus congestion or spend all day trying to get an appointment with a Mac Genius to restore your system, or on the positive side maybe a friend is stuck in town for an unexpected layover and you’d love to have some free time to catch up.

The point is, life happens, and you can’t plan for all the variables. Maybe you do finally catch that cold going around, and not only will you miss your (buffered/under-promised) deadline, your voice is probably shot for a few days. I don’t think you should email a client in panic at the first sign of a cough, but you should know yourself well enough to recognize when you’re going to need more time to complete a project or your ability to meet a deadline has changed. The client would surely like to know to expect a delay and they may be more flexible than you think. I know I would have been grateful for an update on my custom order and would have chalked it up to that good work takes time and my project isn’t being forgotten. Sometimes the problem starts on the client’s side – like if the writer has a persistent error in the script and your direct contact only realized it upon reviewing the audio. While you may hold up your end of the bargain by delivering your audio on time, you’re leaving your client with a big problem by not seeing if you can work with them on this error. I’m not saying it’s a free fix, but the voiceover job isn’t done if what I’ve provided can’t serve the purpose its intended for. Be understanding of your client and they may be more understanding if something comes up for you. Under promise to being with, over deliver whenever you can, and communicate and update so your client has no doubt that their project is receiving personal attention.

I voiced my first audiobook, and it was quite an experience. I created over 33 different voices for the 11.5 hour book and honed my process to become significantly more streamlined by the end. I feel that what I learned by doing my first book can’t be explained as easily as it is heard. I also understand why some audiobook publishers won’t hire a narrator until they’ve completed their first book – I’m sure some people are scared off after working on one! I started this project as a shiny new audiobook narrator, and came out of it now a bit more battle-weary but knowing first-hand what it takes and that I can do it and enjoy the process.

There are hundreds more experienced narrators out there to give tips and tricks and tell you how to do it, and since I’ve only done one I really can’t contribute much to that conversation at this point. There were a few things though that were SUPER helpful to me that I think are worth sharing. The most important of those things was the training I had to prepare me for audiobooks. That credit goes to Pat Fraley. I took his Billion $ Read Audiobook workshop in L.A. 2 years ago. He taught more than just skill, he taught the mechanics of the audiobook industry and how to find your place in it. But I’m not dismissing the skill part, no! I’ve studied with him in person 3 times in the 2 past years (so glad Phoenix is on his occasional travel list!) and have worked on audiobook selections each time, and every time my read is elevated by his coaching and perspective. I’m sure I’ve mentioned him on my blog before, but he is the person I refer any interested voiceover talent to check out, contact, and learn from. When you study with Pat, you may also be able to benefit from other amazing talent and producers who drop in for part or all of his workshop – my L.A. workshop included Hillary Huber, Scott Brick, Stefan Rudnicki and Kathe Mazur.

So, go study with Pat. He’s amazing and is the most generous teacher and among the most generous people I’ve met in my entire life. If I’m not convincing enough, here’s a 15 minute video from Pat where he gives away some bigger concepts and lays out some of the workshop content you’ll get in detail when it comes to audiobooks.

The next thing I wanted to share about is way off in a different area. So coaching and having training to be able to approach an audiobook is definitely the most important thing for audiobooks. Next up, I’d say is what’s in your actual studio to help you get the job done. Of all the pieces of my setup or mic chain, I found my iPhone to be invaluable. Remember I said there were over 33 characters that I created different voices for? Well, the iPhone (and I’m sure most smartphones have an equivalent) has an app called Voice Memos. I’d recorded about 10-15 seconds of dialogue from each character – something good, telling, revealing, very true to the character – and renamed the file for the character’s name, and that’s it. That’s how I kept my characters separate. I know that there are a lot of narrators who choose to not make such distinct choices with their character voices, but for this book it seemed appropriate. It won’t be appropriate for every book, and could even be distracting in others, but my choice meant I had to really know what Ramsey sounded like versus the other 15-18 year old boy characters who came in and out of the book. Voice Memo was great in helping refresh my memory as I started a chapter and found who would be showing up in it.

Many publishers will provide researchers, audio proofers, editors, or even their own equipment for you to work from. This situation, I was responsible for everything except the final mastering, done to the publisher’s requirements by their hired engineer who I sent all my raw .wav audio files. So, here’s a little about my process for the book.
1) Read the book, mark it up for emphasis or make notes to clarify scenes; take notes on my characters and their relationships
2) Contact the author with questions – pronunciations, any parts of the book that don’t seem clear
3) Prepare my character voices before recording each chapter – like I said, for some books bold differences would be a distraction, this is something that I did as I prepared to record each chapter. Only rarely did I have to spend a significant amount of time researching a particular dialect or accent, but I did when I felt it needed to be more exact
4) Record!!! I became better about not critiquing every line as I worked through the first 2-3 chapters, and as it wasn’t my first time through the book, my markings in it were helpful guides
5) Send chapters off for review – My very patient, long time friend Kristin happily volunteered for this unpaid position, and she painstakingly listened to my audio while following along in the book
6) Corrections – this happened simultaneously while I continued to record more in the book. Kristin would tell me if I swapped out words, misread something, where and what page, or if something sounded ‘off’ to her as a listener. Having her ears on my first book was invaluable, and she was much more confident in my storytelling ability than I was! It was so nerve wracking to email off those first few chapters and not know what kind of feedback I’d get, but as my friend for over 10 years she’d be able to tell me if I needed to overhaul my read. She said she always enjoyed listening, even though she was ‘working’ at the same time.
7) Edit in corrections – pre-roll is your friend in ProTools, I used a 3 second pre-roll at every stage of audiobook work and it helps edits fit in perfectly
8) Bounce out my audio and upload! Here, I’m a huge fan of Dropbox, since we’re working with at times 45 or 50 minute wav files, the file size can get out of hand.

It really was the marathon of voice overs that others say it is, and this book was recorded mostly in the evening and on the weekends. I’m happy with how it turned out, and don’t feel I could have done any better for my first book. From my experience, if you are even daydreaming about recording an audiobook, I strongly suggest you do your research and at the least check out Pat Fraley’s videos on youtube and free audio on his website to get more insight into what is required of you as a narrator and the skills you’ll need to make it happen. And no, I don’t get kickbacks from referring you, but I wouldn’t feel this good about my first book without what he taught me.

If you’d like to check out the audiobook itself, there’s a short excerpt from the Prologue and a handy link if you’d like to download it at Crossroad Press’ website. The book is Blood Angel by author Justine Musk.

My first audiobook is now available for download! It was self-directed, self-produced in my home studio, checked for accuracy by a very generous friend, and finally mastered by Jeff Kafer.