Voice Acting Resources for new VAs
Hello there fellow Voice Actor, good on you for following your dreams in this crazy world of voice acting. :-)
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If you've decided to become a serious voice actor, it is important to begin by asking yourself how much you are willing to invest in yourself because ultimately; if you want to succeed, you will need to spend some of your cash on coaching, workshops and education. Like any profession, it takes focus, dedication and hard work to become a successful voice actor.​
You'll need a strong and appropriate demo reel to showcase your skills and abilities, you'll need a website where you can showcase your talents but if you don't want a website, you can just hop on the Pay to Play sites (P2P) as a freelancer.
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There's VDC (Voices.com), Fiverr, The Voice Realm and many many more but you pay to be seen on those sites. Bear in mind that you are there with lots of other Voice Actors and, depending on your geographic location, you might be up against so many others that you aren't noticed often enough to receive a full-time income. I know that I do struggle in getting regular work from these platforms but, I do get work which keeps me on them.
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So, if you decide to have a website but you aren't confident in making your own website, you can (and should) outsource to someone who can help you. Now this is where you can go to those platforms like Upwork and Fiverr as a 'buyer' and find a freelancer who can build your site for you.
Once you have your website, you now need to advertise. The good news here is that you can advertise using social media channels either using the unpaid or paid option. Cost of advertising on these platforms can be relatively inexpensive (in the scheme of things that is).
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I recommend that you set up an account in your chosen social media avenue, e.g. Facebook, and then advertise your website via the Facebook Ad Center.
It's a really easy set up - you upload the image that you want to use to promote yourself, write your title/heading and add some text to say something about what makes your services stand out/what you offer. Then choose the amount you want to spend each day. It's pretty easy to follow.
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The good thing about FB advertising is that you can choose the length of time you want to advertise so you don't have to pay upfront for a full month of advertising.
I noticed that with Google Ads, you have to pay for a month up-front. This is probably still a good deal but from what I could see (through the Wix platform), I didn't have the option to choose to advertise for only a short period of time and I want to see how my advertising is going weekly and tweak it as I go so the fb ads work better for me at the moment.
I'm certainly not experienced with Google Ads though so if you want to find out more, have a look around for what suits your advertising needs.
Either way - it's important to advertise your service because you have something to offer but no-one will know about it unless you tell them!
Resources
Here, you will find books about voice over/voice acting. It's worth reading the reviews as these can give a good indication of what the book is like but when the option is available to you, have a read (or listen) to a sample of the book.
Please note that I will receive a minute sum of money if you click on any of my links below and make a purchase.
Here, you will find books about marketing online.
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I highly recommend learning as much as you can about online marketing because it can be extremely effective in taking your business to the next level.
Here's a link to Amazon where you can search through microphones to see what suits your budget and your voice. I have had many microphones including a TLM103 which I sold when I 'retired' from voice acting. I'm kicking myself for selling it but at least I have a trusty Rode NT1 to work with which suits me well. (Edit: I couldn't resist having another TLM103 so I went ahead and made the purchase. My NT1 is a back up now and I love having the TLM back again.)
Here's a link to Amazon where you will find acoustic foam products.
Here's a link to Amazon where you will find acoustic foam products.
Other Streams of Income
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Another option for income streams is by becoming an affiliate at websites like Amazon (but there are many). There's a lot to learn about doing this line of work though so please, don't just sign up as an affiliate without doing a lot of research beforehand.
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Some people say it's easy to make money online but, it's like everything, if you don't learn and research and trial different ways of working, you probably won't go far. Well, you might but it's unlikely.
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