First Time Hiring a Professional Voice Actor?
So you are working on a creative project and thinking about how voice will be incorporated. Maybe you have never incorporated voice and you are thinking now is a good time. Perhaps you have had the opportunity to utilize voice over for a project and the voice was of someone on your project team, someone in another department or even a friend who has a good voice as the voice over for your project and it has worked out pretty well.
Whatever your reason, congrats!
You are at a place where you are ready to level up and look into hiring a professional voice actor.
As a voice actor, getting to work with first-time clients is exciting! It is especially so rewarding to see a project elevate by adding a captivating audio experience that truly brings projects to life. With all of the contributors on a creative team, there are many elements moving in parallel as the project moves along in its development. A multi-functional team of experts can include writers, illustrators, animators, graphic designers, marketing professionals, instructional designers, production teams as well as professional voice actors.
Read on for some important things to consider, to ensure you are well-informed and prepared to hire a professional voice actor for the first time.
Define Your Voice Over Project Needs: Have a clear understanding of your project's scope, target audience, and the type of voice you think you need. These things will help you articulate in the casting process to bring you the closest match to what you are envisioning for this project. As a voice actor, having a clear understanding of the project is critical. Without clarity, I cannot even consider putting my name in the hat as a talent to be considered because the desired “voice” just may not be in my wheelhouse. I would rather walk away from an opportunity that I am unqualified or uncomfortable performing and stick to the categories I AM able to align my strengths as a voice talent. As the client, it is equally important for you to align with the right talent. Good communication about the project, up front, will help you find a voice actor who matches your project requirements. A good way to communicate this is to simply share what you are hearing in your head. For example: We are looking for a female narrator who sounds like she is in her late 30’s to mid-40s; someone in the prime of their career, with a gravitas and confidence without being condescending. We imagine the voice providing a moment of empathy and confident assurance for the viewer. Looking for a voice that isn’t breathy or too dramatic about the problem and solution.
Establish a Budget for Voice: Project engagement rates vary based on the type of project, use of the audio, voice over genre and, length of the script. Rates are aligned with industry standards for voice over professionals and can vary. Since this is likely your first time investing in a professional, how do you know if you can afford one? Start with an initial conversation to discuss the details of this project with your prospects and ask them to provide you a quote. You will likely learn some new bits of information from our point of view to better understand our part in the project. From there you can have discussion to align on an agreed upon rate while managing your overall project budget.
Trust… yes, you CAN align with the right talent within the project budget!
Review Talent Portfolio's and Demo Reels: It is standard for a professional voice actor to have a portfolio of work to demonstrate their talent. Commonly referred to in the voice actor world as a ‘demo reel’. This is a great resource for you as a prospective client because this gives you an opportunity to hear how my particular voice sounds incorporated into a creative project before you move forward with hiring me for your job. We undergo professional training, coaching and professional development to be able to create a demo reel that highlights our unique skills. As you begin to search for talent, take a moment to visit their professional website. This is a good place to learn about us, understand the voice genre's in which we work (ie medical narration, documentaries, audiobooks, eLearning, commercials, etc.) and will be a place for you to find recent, completed projects where you can hear our voice in a finished project. There are also online casting sites specific to find voice talent such as Voice123, Voices.com and Bodalgo, which will have lots of voice samples for you to hear. Take the time to review and assess vocal range, versatility and previous projects to give you an idea of the suitability for your project.
Consider Casting with Auditions: Before jumping into working with someone……. who's voice you seem to like hearing the sound of, you can absolutely conduct auditions, also known as casting, to shortlist candidates utilizing your actual script. For you, this process can be essential to the project outcome as you will get to hear how a prospective talent can interpret your script and bring YOUR project to life. So, go ahead and grab some copy related to your content and use that as the script to provide to the candidates.
Do you have a script ready to share? If not, no worries!
You can use a transcript from an already completed project, copy from your website, etc. The copy doesn't need to be real….. It just needs to simulate the tone of your project as a means to find the right voice talent. Do you have technical words that need to be well articulated and sound effortless? Put technical words into the copy! Do you want someone who can read copy with humor? You need a serious tone while also sounding friendly and approachable? Focus on providing copy that will allow you to hear your talking points, tone, pronunciations of important words and more as a part of your audition evaluation. Once you create a short script, you can provide to the prospective talent to record custom auditions to submit for review by you and your project team. This is such an exciting time because you get to hear different voices read your content with your language. You get to hear your brand name spoken. And within this process, you get a feel for what really resonates. Sometimes the voice you are hearing in your head, is not the same voice you, ultimately, move forward with for the project and that is okay!
As you move forward in the process just be mindful of the timelines and project benchmarks to achieve success. Be prepared to discuss the turnaround time with the voice actor to make sure they can deliver within your project's timeline. Many times we can turn a project around the same day or within 24 hours if needed. However, when working with a voice actor for the first time, it will likely be a better engagement for everyone if there is buffer time to discuss any questions about the project and deliverables before ever hitting the record button. I hope these points of consideration are helpful as you embark on the journey of working with professional voice talent.
