Success in Voice-over: What are you afraid of?

This week my friend and colleague Liz Solar and I each drove to the center of the state to meet for lunch (she from eastern Massachusetts and I from the west). I met Liz two years ago at the amazing Women in Animation workshop run by Pat Fraley and Hillary Huber, with guest Candi Milo, and we’ve kept in touch ever since.

Liz and I talked over our lunch about everything under the sun, but heavy on the voice-over of course. She mentioned she had read an article in that day’s Boston Globe about Scott Chapin, who voices promos from his New Mexico studio 10 hours a day. We talked about what kinds of sacrifices a voice talent might have to make in order to sustain that kind of schedule, and it made me wonder, how many of us in this business are ready for that level of success?

Many of us believe we would like to be so successful as voice talent that the jobs are coming in all day, every day. Or that we would like to have a regular role on an animated series, or land roles in feature films. Are you one of those people? If you aren’t there yet, are you actively engaged in bringing your dreams to reality? If not, what is holding you back? Children at home? Caring for a relative? Civic duties? Are you waiting until you “get organised”? Or until you get a killer character demo made or until you save up enough to build a better studio? If you achieve this success, what impact will it have on life as you know it?

Do you know where you want to be? Have you sat down to think seriously about how to get from where you are now, to that place? What will it take?

Perceived Value in Voice-over.

Those of us in business to offer a service are sometimes challenged by those requiring the service. “I can get it cheaper", they tell you. My previous post on setting rates addresses this question in excruciating detail for the voice-over business (without going into much numerical detail) and might serve as a resource for those of you who come up against this with your clients. The purpose of my current post is to explore a related problem: how to make sure the question doesn’t come up in the first place. Our own attitudes and convictions will go a long way towards that end.

I used to work as curator of birds at a large midwestern university with a natural history museum. My job responsibilities included 1) advising students and teaching general biology (majors and non-majors courses) and evolutionary biology, 2) research and all that that entails (obtaining government funding and writing papers), and 3) curation of the bird collections (including writing grant proposals for collection infrastructure). We had regular curators’ meetings that included all the departments within the museum – birds, mammals, insects, molluscs and so forth. One of the topics that came up repeatedly was how to defend our existence to the dean of our college, who simply didn’t understand why a natural history museum was important. She did not see its value, so the threat of reduced funding and loss of paid positions was always hanging over us. This could be demoralising. A few years ago I heard George W. Bush on the news referring to the Smithsonian Institution as “the nation’s bug collection” as he slashed funding for its programs. A "bug collection" can be a source of pride - a national treasure - or a derogatory term, depending on how it's uttered and how it's perceived.

In contrast, the American Museum of Natural History is a private institution, not subject to the budgetary whims of a president with an agenda that does not include ‘bugs”, nor a dean whose short-sightedness affects their bottom line. The museum has a charismatic leadership that understands the importance of branding and marketing, and that encourages and funds research that regularly makes the news. Some of this research may not directly affect “the human condition”, but it’s snazzy and it grabs the public’s attention. That museum is huge and it’s flourishing. Then there is the much smaller Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks in tiny Tupper Lake, New York. This museum cost millions of dollars to build, and when it opened its doors in July 2006, the Governor of New York and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton were in attendance for the ribbon cutting. The leadership of this museum certainly knew what they were doing - starting out from a position of strength, they hit the ground running with heads held high. No need to defend your existence if you don’t permit it to be called into question in the first place. It’s all about perceptions and posture - attitude.

If someone questions your value and you let such questioning corrode your own perceptions, you can start to feel that you are indeed less valuable than you really are. This sort of situation can be avoided with charismatic leadership. In the case of your business, that leadership is you.

We’ve all seen or received requests to donate our services for non-profit projects or even for producers creating commercials or other assignments “on speculation”. “No pay, but there will be lots of paid work in the future for the person who helps us now”. I’ve heard comparisons of voice-over with other professions such as the plumbing trade, like this: “install this sink for us for free, and we’ll pay you to install other sinks in the future.” Amusing, but not exactly apt. Almost everybody needs a plumber at some point, but not everybody will need a voice-over in the course of their lives. So, do we secretly feel that plumbers’ work is more valuable than our own? Not everybody can install a sink, but anybody can talk, right? Attitude! Anybody can install a sink badly, write badly, or perform a voice-over badly. If Jim Dale were indisposed while recording Harry Potter, would it be okay for one of the audio engineers at Scholastic to fill in for him? Who would be a better choice to voice a commercial for Geico, the CEO of the company, or Jake Wood? To be Bart Simpson - Nancy Cartwright or the kid up the street? Whom would you rather listen to promoting your favorite TV program – your cousin Darrell, or you? You’re not as good as Jim Dale or Jake Wood or Nancy Cartwright, you say? Maybe you are, maybe you aren’t. Maybe you aren’t yet. Read this for more thoughts on that subject. Value comes from quality in many cases, in others it’s marketing, or a combination of both. Gregor Mendel’s research on garden peas was the basis of modern genetics. His work was ignored for years before others were able to appreciate its significance fully and explain its value to the scientific community and to the public, and thus change perceptions.

Perceptions change with changing values. What’s one of the cheapest things you can buy at the grocery store? Salt. Where did the word “salt” come from? From the Latin, sal. And the word salary is rooted in the word for salt. Why? Because in ancient Rome, salt was used as payment. For a while we used gold. The paper money that represented the gold doesn’t have much value by itself. Neither, actually, does the gold. It was merely the standard. Create a need, and the thing that’s needed has value. Create value, and you've enhanced the need.

I received a newsletter last week from Marcia Yudkin of Marketing for More. She has some cogent thoughts about perceived value:

Governor Deval Patrick's proposal to eliminate tuition for Massachusetts community colleges recently received a thoughtful response from the president of Greenfield Community College, Robert Pura.

"We want to really deeply explore what the word 'free' means and conjures up" before we implement such a proposal, Pura said, suggesting that increasing financial aid might be a better way to make college more affordable.

The effective cost might be the same for state residents with both proposals, but "free tuition" might encourage "a wave of students who take their education lightly, over-enroll and drop classes without much thought," Pura told the Daily Hampshire Gazette. Beefing up financial aid communicates responsibility rather than entitlement and may encourage a more serious approach to education.

Likewise, business coach Mark Silver says an acupuncturist he worked with found her patients getting well faster when she raised her fees. It seemed that patients were more likely to do as she suggested between sessions, to get their money's worth, when they were paying more.

Because prices influence perceived value, prices also affect client behavior and their results. Marcia Yudkin, The Marketing Minute (quoted with permission).

My friend and fellow voice talent Dan Nachtrab tells a story about perceived value that remains one of my favorite voice-over anecdotes. He has given me permission to quote it:

A while back, I answered an ad for a narration. A few days go by and I get a call from the producer, who keeps going on that she really has "heard my voice before" and how she would love to have me voice her project. Unfortunately, someone else had answered the ad and said they would do it for FREE, just so they could pad their resume. This is when the sales comes in. The challenge is: How do I not only get the gig, but get her to pay me? The answer: Create value. The hook was baited when she visted my site, read the opening introduction sentence and listened to my demos. (To save you some time, it says "Most likely you have heard his voice.") She truly believed she knew who I was and that I was an established talent. (I can't verify the first, but, hey, how can I argue with the second?) Next, I had to remove the credibilty and perceived value of the talent giving away his services. So, I ventured to tell her "I already have a resume filled with many companies in your same field." Then I related a quick story of one such company, very closely related to hers. This proved I had intimate knowledge of her industry and could provide the service she desired. Now I have VALUE in her eyes. She bit the hook and asked my price. She paid full rate. Remember, we are also in sales. Even though Wal-Mart offers cheaper prices, people are still shopping at Saks.

That last line should be cross-stitched and hung over the door to all voice-over booths. Dan's got it right - he offers great value, but he also knows how to convey the perception of value - he knows how to sell.

It's a rule in voice-over that the clients who are paying the least are demanding the most. You get a few of those and you learn to avoid them like the plague. If you're a professional voice talent, quoting low prices to get the job undervalues the service you’re offering, in the eyes of your customers and, eventually, in your own. Offering a service cheaply may eventually result in loss of quality as well, as you become demoralised and fail to deliver your best work. It is not possible to perform well when you or your customers expect a $50 performance for a $300 job. Much better to give a $350 performance when you’re being paid $300. The next time you’re tempted to quote low, ask yourself why you are undercutting your own services. In effect, you’re on the road to putting yourself out of business. So I ask you - are you offering a valuable service or aren't you? If so, charge a respectable fee - a fee that shows you recognise and respect what you are offering - if you expect other people to value it as well.

Whether you're a voice talent, or a college graduate applying for a job, or a manager negotiating a raise or a corporate executive trying to win a big account, take a lesson from Dan Nachtrab, who was so (rightly) comfortable with the value of his services that he convinced a producer to hire him over the guy who offered to do the job for nothing. Or from the leadership of the Natural History Museum of the Adirondacks, who had the guts to open an expensive institution in a little town in upstate New York in a climate of "the nation's bug collection". Because of their justifiable conviction of their own value, they had the entire state of New York behind them.

Now, go out and get your clients behind you.

The path to greatness.

Last year a fascinating article appeared in Fortune Magazine entitled What it takes to be great. To sum up the article’s findings: we don’t possess natural talent, rather the way to become great is through hard work and practise. This is now very well documented, although not necessarily a popular finding since many people would like to think that if they could only find their talent, they would be great and fame and fortune would easily follow. The latter mindset leads to discouragement and heartbreak, causing individuals to waste their time wondering and dreaming rather than investing the time and work that is required to achieve success.

Where do the drive and motivation come from that lead some people to put in the amount of work that it takes to be great? Why are some people such hard workers, while others who may be more brilliant than those busy bees just can’t get motivated to put in the time? The article poses these questions, but does not provide answers since they remain a mystery. Probably an examination of the lives of great achievers would reveal early life circumstances that suggest parallel motivating factors such as extreme poverty, deprivation or other hardship; chance encounters with inspiring individuals who became mentors, or other experiences that sparked a particular interest. Motivation is one thing, since that comes from external factors; persistence and drive to pursue a certain endeavor are another. These will probably eventually be shown to be yet another of the brain’s many biochemical and neurological wonders. I have some ideas about that too.

One of the reasons this has been on my mind is that I just finished reading Lion of Hollywood – the Life and Legend of Louis B. Mayer by Scott Eyman. Although other treatments of Mayer's life have presented the man in a rather unfavorable light, Eyman’s biography is much more sympathetic and rightly returns Mayer to his place in history as one of the great executives of the 20th century. Mayer created a motion picture studio that was a symbol of quality and opulence, and one that was considered by many of Hollywood's stars to be the place to work. When he was forced out of MGM by a younger exec in 1951, the place began a steep decline, so much so that Mayer was actually asked to return several years later. He was, however, unable to do so due to declining health.

Mayer’s motivators undoubtedly stemmed from his early years of poverty as a child growing up in Saint John, New Brunswick, where his family had moved from Russia. His father was a junk dealer and the children were put to work at an early age. Mayer’s primary memory of his childhood was of being very hungry. He was nevertheless full of energy and worked very hard (much harder than his rather indolent father). A local tin dealer, John Wilson, befriended the boy and one of the things Mayer always remembered was Wilson’s advice: “When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on”. Never, ever give up. Mayer eventually moved to the U.S. and became interested in motion picture distribution, which is where most of the early movie moguls got their start, and this led to a desire to create the movies that were shown in the theatres. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was formed in 1924. Louis B. Mayer had traveled a very long way from the streets of Saint John to his white leather office in MGM’s Thalberg Building.

It’s clear from reading Eyman’s book that Mayer had tremendous energy, which I’m convinced is another hugely significant factor in an individual’s ability to be great, although it doesn’t explain everything. Charles Darwin, for example, put in long years of toil on the research that led to the publication of his On the Origin of Species in 1859, despite debilitating illness which prevented him working more than a few hours a day, and there are many other examples which I won’t detail here because this essay is already too long! But I'm sure that the more energy you have, the harder you can work. Probably the knowledge that Alfred Russel Wallace was hard at work on the same subject drove Darwin harder.

How does all of this relate to the business and practise of voice over? For those of us already in the business, the motivation is presumably already there. Setting goals provides the infrastructure to keep us on that path to greatness. These goals should include the business side of voice over as well as the use of the voice itself – for the latter, listening to other demos and broadcast commercials and narration, and choosing specific aspects of our own voice-over skills that need improvement and working on them. It helps to write the goals down in the form of daily routines, since it is daily work, not occasional, that will lead to improvement. And not least important is taking care of ourselves, physically, mentally, and spiritually, to keep energy levels high and stress levels low.

That’s my rudimentary theory on greatness and success, a blend of what I've read and what I've made up, with very little of a practical nature (after all, you have other things to do besides sit here and read my ramblings!). I would love to hear your thoughts. Also, your comments on what you do to manage energy and stress would be very welcome and of great interest.