VO BOSS

BOSSes Anne Ganguzza and Tom Dheere, your "real bosses" and co-hosts, connect to dive deep into the critical world of online security and scam prevention for voiceover professionals. They unpack Tom's recent harrowing experience with an AI voice cloning scam, offering a candid look into the crucial insights needed to navigate digital threats and build a truly secure business in today's landscape. Listeners will discover the essential role of vigilance and proactive measures in protecting their assets, gain an understanding of emerging scam tactics, and appreciate the power of community in safeguarding their careers. Anne and Tom also discuss practical pathways for secure transactions and the evolving nature of digital defense.   00:01 - Anne (Host) Hey guys, it's Anne from VO BOSS here.  00:04 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) And it's George the Tech. We're excited to tell you about the VO BOSS. Vip membership, now with even more benefits.  00:10 - Anne (Host) So not only do you get access to exclusive workshops and industry insights, but with our VIP plus tech tier, you'll enjoy specialized tech support from none other than George himself.  00:22 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) You got it. I'll help you tackle all those tricky tech issues so you can focus on what you do best Voice acting. It's tech support tailored for voiceover professionals like you.  00:32 - Anne (Host) Join us guys at VO BOSS and let's make your voiceover career soar. Visit voboss.com slash VIP-membership to sign up today.  00:45 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a boss, a VO boss. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza. Hey, hey, everyone, welcome to the VO BOSS Podcast.  01:04 - Anne (Host) I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza. Hey, hey everyone, welcome to the VO BOSS Podcast. I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza, and I'm here with my real boss, Tom Deere. I had to think about that, Tom. We've been together so long. I was like what is our subtitle here? We are real bosses.  01:20 - Tom (Host) Yeah, we're real bosses. Thanks for having me back, Anne.  01:23 - Anne (Host) How are you doing, Tom, my real boss? Co-host.  01:26 - Tom (Host) All things considered, I'm doing okay, I had a weird experience recently which it seems like a lot of voice actors are experiencing. I got an email from someone expressing interest in wanting to cast me for a voiceover project. Oh yes, I looked at it and it was this long-form project, something like 9,000 and change words. And I looked at it and I'm like and you know I was reading the ins and outs of it and I'm like, huh, like my spider sense was tingling a little bit, but I'm looking at, I'm like this one is worth replying to and getting some information about.  02:00 So there was a little bit of back and forth about it.  02:03 - Anne (Host) So you did reply, and then there was.  02:05 - Tom (Host) There was more conversation.  02:06 - Anne (Host) Yeah, there was more conversation, which is what I always do when I'm trying to find out more information about a job to make sure it's legit.  02:12 - Tom (Host) Right Now, around the same time, maybe a couple of days after that, someone posted on a Facebook group hey, I got this email. It was saying this and this Did anyone else get it? Does it seem legit? And it looked like it was the same email that I had gotten, so I was following that it turns out.  02:28 It was posted by our friend, bridget Real, who is the co-founder of VA for VO, the virtual assistant site that helps voice actors, and we talked about it a little bit and we're both like, yeah, we're going to keep digging a little bit and see what's going on. And then her business partner, lynn, also got the email and I was getting ready to accept it just to see what would happen. And that morning I got a message from her saying hey, did you accept this project? Yet I'm like no, why? And she said because both of us accepted the project. We both got cast for the same exact project. We both got the same exact script. They sent me the script.  03:00 So then I did this. I went to Gemini, google Gemini, which is my AI bot of choice, and I did the prompts. I said you are an expert at detecting scams. Please analyze this script and let me know if you think that this script could be used to harvest a voice actor's voice to clone it. A voice actor's voice to clone it. And it did its analysis and I've got like the 2.5 advanced. So it takes a little time. And it wrote back oh, yes, it does. And here are all the reasons why this, this, this, this, this, this and this. And then I sent that information to Bridget and Lynn and they're like we knew it. We knew it. So then she created a wonderful post on LinkedIn talking about it. And then I wrote a blog with all the information and, like what happened, it was the most read blog I've had in like three years or something like that.  03:52 Yeah, it was crazy.  03:53 - Anne (Host) What's so interesting is it could have been a legit job, like for payment. You would have done it, they would have paid you for it, but they would have used your voice as an AI voice.  04:05 And so therefore, legally right in the end. Right, if you found out later on they could say, oh no, no, no, we paid you. I mean, it was a job that we paid you for and there was no extenuating circumstances or contracts to be signed which, by the way, I'm going to bring up Nava and the AI writer For all your jobs. You should be attaching that AI writer so that your voice is not going to be used as an AI voice, for sure, for sure.  04:37 - Tom (Host) So, to let everybody know, the website was GigLumin G-I-G-L-U-M-I-N. And if you do a Google search of GigLumin and this is what Bridget had figured out is that the website was only a month or two old. And there's these scam websites that you can enter the URL of a website in and it can tell you how likely that's a scam. It checked every red flag, every box, every single box.  04:56 - Anne (Host) So, yes, vo people, bosses, beware, right. So beware of emails. And you know, it's funny because it's lately, just because of the whole AI thing. Anytime I get an email with a job from someone that I don't know, right, that is just out of the blue, that I didn't audition for, where they have large amounts of words, the hairs on the back of my neck kind of stand up and I immediately, immediately check into it. And I think this really warrants a discussion, bosses, because it's very timely that you want to make sure that these jobs are legitimate. So the more research you can do. And I love, Tom Dheere, how you used AI to fight AI Again.  05:37 We had our previous episode on tools that we use. I mean, we are utilizing it as a tool to help us in our day-to-day jobs, and so I think, being aware of possible scams out there, we absolutely have to be, and I'll tell you if it's somebody that I've never heard of and they don't have a signature file. I've gotten to the point where I don't even like and it's not like from a company.com. I don't even literally take it seriously anymore. I don't know about you, Tom, what do you think?  06:05 - Tom (Host) Yes, I'm equally skeptical these days but, I, really like what you said about when you receive the email, check to see if there is a signature at the Tom of it with the company logo, website and contact information. That is one of many red flags and I don't know how much you've noticed lately, Anne, but since I would say about early April, there has been an explosion of scam attempts going on in the voiceover industry. We've had the overpayment scam. That's been going on for at least 10 or 15 years.  06:37 - Anne (Host) Gosh, at least, and bosses. If you haven't heard about it, Tom, let's talk about the overpayment scam for just a minute. Yeah, yeah, Okay so what happens is it's very common.  06:45 - Tom (Host) It's very common. It's been going on for a really long time. So basically they email you and say hey, we've got a project for you, da-da-da-da-da-da. The classic one was the game show host voiceover.  06:55 - Anne (Host) It has since evolved.  06:56 - Tom (Host) And basically they say that we've booked a studio in the area nearby. We're going to get paid or pay for the studio and then send us back the difference and something like that. And it's never a gig.  07:12 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) All they're trying to do is get you to cash that check and send them money, which is fraudulent, by the way.  07:18 - Anne (Host) And, by the way, I've gotten to the point where, if I have a new client, the only way they can really pay me is electronically.  07:25 And I figure, if you don't have electronic means to pay me immediately before the job and it's even in my terms and I've done this for years, Tom, I always have payment in full prior to job start is appreciated and other options available upon request.  07:39 But if it's a new client, I'll take that out because I must have that money in my bank account before I will even consider finishing that job or sending a file. And I'll tell you what, Tom for all of my career it's worked for me Because if people are serious about hiring you, they know that you're a professional, they know that you're going to get the job done. Of course they have to put their faith in you. But in reality and I'll even say because you're a new client I require payment up front electronically. And here are the ways that you can pay me. And so I'll send them, like a QuickBooks invoice, or I'll give them a PayPal account or however that works, and I expect that money in the account and I wait for that money and I make sure that I have the money and then I'll proceed with the job.  08:21 - Tom (Host) That's a really good idea. There's nothing wrong with even asking for 50% or 25% or just some percentage of it. The fact that they're actually going to fork over money with no expectation of an overpayment or getting it back or disputing the payment or anything like that.  08:37 Once it clears, you know that they're serious. And there's a bunch of like. I use Wave apps, for example. That's a great way to do it and I'm pretty sure they can do a partial payment. Or you can just make one invoice just for the deposit and then issue another invoice for the balance If they're a legitimate client that actually has money that they're planning on paying you with, they would have no problem with paying at least a portion of it up front.  08:59 - Anne (Host) Yeah, a lot of my clients nowadays the larger clients that used to like work off of purchase orders, and then it would be like 90 days after the job has been submitted. We'd have to wait for that check, they'd have to generate the PO and everything. You'd sign contracts like vendor contracts and that sort of thing, which I've done a lot, and so if they've got a contract for you to sign, that's vendor, nda, that sort of thing, and you know the company. It's like a well-known company. They're on the web. They've been on the web for years. I mean you can pretty much trust in that where I'll do the job and then I'll get paid. If I've worked with them before, I know that's typically how larger companies work and so that's when I'll accept a check. But even now most of those companies they're going to electronic deposit, like ACH they call it.  09:42 ACH, yeah, so it's direct deposit to your bank and most of the companies I know will do that and that's a form of payment that I trust and that would be a client that I would trust. So if it's a larger company that I know they exist on the web and they talk about, well, you're going to have to do the job first and then we'll be able to pay you once the purchase order is created, blah, blah, blah, blah, and you sign these contracts. I feel fairly good about that and I don't have to think, oh, this is a scam. But whenever I get an email without an actual signature file that comes from an address that isn't companycom, right, if it's a Gmail or a Yahoo or whatever, even a Microsoft what is the free Microsoft one?  10:20 Hotmail, hotmail, yeah, even if it's Microsoftcom, I feel like there's some sort of free sort of Microsoft. You know what I mean Like email that says that I just don't trust it and I'll immediately. The first thing I'll do is look for a website and when I get to the website I'll look for a phone number and then I'll actually try to call that phone number. What are the steps that you take, Tom, to ensure that your job is legit?  10:41 - Tom (Host) Everything that you just said. I also, by the way, I do love the ACH direct deposit because there's no fee. When PayPal, there is a fee, or wire transfer. That's really nice. Here's one thing that I've been doing lately is, if I get a we'll call it a solicitation, for lack of a better term from a company saying hey, and it'll most often be we found you on Google, we found you on Voice123 or some other front-facing thing. You know what's an interesting thing to do? Go look for them on LinkedIn.  11:11 Look for them on LinkedIn. Look for the company and look for the individual and see if you have any mutual connections. I mean, it could be anybody, whether it's a voice actor or somebody in some other profession, and you can reach out on LinkedIn and say, hey, I got an email from this company and you have a connection with them on LinkedIn. What's your experience with them? And that could give you some really quick insight. Sometimes it's just like, oh, I've been working with them for years, or it's oh, they're a huge scam. I forgot to disconnect with them. Run, run, run. Or I'd sent a rando invite, or they sent a rando invite and I don't have any information for you. But it could increase your chance of vetting them a little bit better. Another thing is that I keep an eye out, for is if they ask me to send them a W-9, the more likely that they are legitimate.  12:00 Yeah, yeah, absolutely, which I find interesting because if they were a real, true scam artist, they would want that W-9, because now they would have your social security number and now they can steal your identity too.  12:11 - Anne (Host) Well, oh my gosh, Tom, and that's scary actually, but that's why you don't put your social security number. You put your EIN number, because you're a company right, and you don't have to give up your EIN number, which is, by the way, one thing. I'm glad you mentioned that like we should all be having an EIN number. I'm glad you mentioned that, like we should all be having an EIN number.  12:30 - Tom (Host) Yes, it's very, very simple to get. It takes very, very little time. So it's a very easy get. I just reminded myself and we just talked about identity theft is that I almost had my identity stolen yesterday.  12:43 - Anne (Host) Whoa, that's scary. Yes.  12:45 - Tom (Host) How do you?  12:46 - Anne (Host) know like what happened.  12:51 - Tom (Host) Okay, so it was about a little after 10 am yesterday is when things started happening, so within a few minutes of each other, I got an email from Credit Karma, norton which, because I have my Norton 360 antivirus software package, I pay a subscription through that and Experian. For those of you who don't know, there are three major credit bureaus there's Experian, there's TransUnion and there's Equifax. I have a free account with Experian and I have a free account with Credit Karma. All three of them, within a few minutes of each other, messaged me and said that there was a hard inquiry.  13:30 - Anne (Host) Yeah.  13:30 - Tom (Host) So what that means is if you are applying for a loan, a mortgage, a credit card or something like that, the company that you're applying to will do a credit check. So they will check your credit and see if you are a safe credit risk to make the loan or to get the credit card, for this was a hard inquiry. If you get enough hard inquiries on your credit, your credit will go down.  13:55 - Anne (Host) Yeah, absolutely. I know that because I'm a stickler about my credit.  13:59 - Tom (Host) Me too. My credit rating, oh my gosh. If mine isn't at least 800, something I freak out, oh my gosh.  14:04 - Anne (Host) Yeah, no, mine has to be like almost close to perfect, and when it goes down like two points, I'm like wait why? Why did that happen? Right? And it's just because you put a charge on it for a few hundred dollars, and then you pay it off next week and then everything's fine, so that's normal.  14:18 - Tom (Host) So all three of them told me at roughly the same time that there was a hard inquiry. So I clicked on all the emails and all three of them said that somebody was applying for a Discover credit card, I think in Salt Lake City, and someone was applying for a Capital One credit card in Delaware, and I was in New York City neither applying for a Discover credit card or a Capital One credit card. I certainly wasn't in Salt Lake City or Delaware at the same exact time.  14:49 - Anne (Host) You know, what's so interesting, Tom, is that, like I don't know, a few months ago I don't know if there was a discussion circulating or maybe I got an email but somebody said, and like I should have done this years ago, I mean you can freeze your account so that if you don't open up a credit card every other day which I'm certainly not right Because again, it affects my credit rating and I'm anal about that and so I'm like well, I don't need to apply for any other credit cards, so you can go and freeze that, so that you can actually reduce the risk of somebody trying to open up credit cards or identity theft.  15:19 So and it's super simple to do it, as I said, everybody should have that free account. You should log in, you should check your credit scores regularly I think they allow you once a month, I think even my credit cards. My American Express will tell me oh, your FICO score has changed, right, so they're monitoring it too, and so literally, I get lots of notifications when that rating goes up and down. But I know that I've reduced my chances of identity theft, which is a very scary thing, by freezing those accounts and it's very simple to unfreeze. So, if you know you want to apply for a credit card. You just got to go and unfreeze it for a certain amount of time so you can apply for it and then freeze it back up again. So that way it reduces the risk.  15:57 - Tom (Host) And all those emails that I got, all those notifications did give me the option to do that. I was also able to say this because it, literally, when Norton 360 popped up and it took me to their website, it literally said is this you and you can check yes or no? And I wrote no and then the whole screen turned red saying okay, we know this is a problem, we will look into it.  16:17 It did it with all those and then I called Capital One Bank. It took me a few people. It had to get escalated a couple of times to the credit card fraud department.  16:25 - Anne (Host) Well, don't you say, they give you a special number, right?  16:27 - Tom (Host) They say call this number if it's not you, or you can call this number. I just called the general number because all that was on the notification, I think, was the Capital One in Salt Lake City or something like that. So I called directly and said please state your problem. I'm like I think I'm getting my identity stolen. And then it got up there and then they manually rejected the credit card application at least for the Capital One.  16:50 And then this morning I got another Credit Karma email saying that there was a check on my Equifax report not the Experian one and I looked at the date of it. It also said yesterday. So that means Credit Karma had my back twice and Experian had my back and Norton had my back twice. Right, right, and Experian had my back and Norton had my back and everybody bosses. This is the takeaway. Creditkarmacom is free, having an account with Experian is free, it doesn't cost you a nickel.  17:18 - Anne (Host) All of them TransUnion, they're all free TransUnion, Equifax, they're all free.  17:23 Exactly and you can check your scores and, like I said, a lot of banks and a lot of credit cards are actually adding that on as like a value add kind of service, but you don't have to pay anything for it. I think there's a lot of it going on, Tom, which is kind of scary. We got to be careful about scammers, that's for sure. And anytime, even in your email, right, if you get like again, if I find something that doesn't have a signature and then they have an attachment like PayPal has been well-known scams where you get like oh, you've got a PayPal invoice, right, and you have to pay this amount and it looks legit. I mean, they've got like the PayPal logo. I've gotten quite a few of those over the last six months.  18:01 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) And.  18:01 - Anne (Host) I just ignore anything. Just remember that most financial institutions will never email you for information and they'll never text you necessarily for that information either, and you should also, Tom. We should have a big discussion on having multi-factor authentication.  18:19 - Tom (Host) Yes.  18:19 - Anne (Host) This is extremely important.  18:21 - Tom (Host) It's annoying as hell or two-factor, two-factor authentication For every account that you have, especially the financial ones, you should have two-factor authentication, which means either they send you a text message and you just click on the link and you're good to go, or it sends you an email and it'll usually give you a passcode of some sort and then you go to the website. When you're trying to log on, you enter that passcode and then it'll let you do it, and most of them are only good. Some of them are only good for 30 days. Sometimes you can check a box saying this is my private computer. It's okay for a certain amount of time, or they make you do it every single time, which isn't the worst thing in the world. Yes, it's annoying.  18:55 - Anne (Host) You know what I just thought about. It is annoying but it keeps you safe. It's funny how much like value you put in that number, that phone number, in this phone which, by the way, I just got a new phone but in this number for the two-factor authentication, right Like text me at this number. So think of the power that these phone companies have right, and that is scary. I mean it used to be a thing where I always thought like the large scale communication companies were a little bit of a monopoly, depending on the area that you're in. I mean, when I lived in the East Coast it was always Verizon right, verizon everything, verizon this, verizon that. Out here it's a couple of different companies but still, if you think about it, I mean I'm glad to have the two-factor authentication and it's super convenient on the phone.  19:39 But, it's interesting to know that you wouldn't want the hackers to get smart right and then start really infiltrating the phone, you know, and impersonating a phone number.  19:50 - Tom (Host) There's a couple of things about that is that, when it comes to authentication, when you're logging on your phone, I've got it set up where I just use my thumbprint for a lot of it.  19:59 - Anne (Host) I love that, or Face ID yeah the Face ID is a great one.  20:05 - Tom (Host) There's also a thing for a lot of the websites where I have a personal PIN that has nothing to do with the PIN or the password to access the site itself. If I am using my phone to log in somewhere, I can enter a four-digit PIN that's different from everything else, so it also increases the chance of having a secure whatever. Also, just as a rule, I don't do anything financial on my phone, with the exception of like Venmo Well, I have mobile banking If I'm like sending money if, like me, and the guys are having pizza, you know what I mean.  20:31 - Anne (Host) I have mobile banking and I do have Apple Pay.  20:35 - Tom (Host) Well, I have GPay too.  20:36 - Anne (Host) Yeah, so.  20:36 - Tom (Host) I'm a Google guy but like I will unless to my bank accounts online or Wave app or Wise or PayPal on the phone, unless I absolutely have to.  20:49 - Anne (Host) Interesting. I go to them quite a bit. Actually, you're probably fine because of all the precautions that you're taking, but I'm just a little extra neurotic about it. Oh, it's constantly got multi-factor authentication, but I get that. I totally get that. Wow, yeah, being careful, and you know what.  21:02 What's interesting is, back in the day and I'm going to date myself when I was working at the school and we had text-based email okay, and text-based email, I could have something and it was all based on like the Unix systems and so like hacking into a text-based, like I don't know how to say this, but hacking into a system like that, like a Unix system, and reading your email with text-based, you didn't always have like the conditions of people attaching things that could be viral, loading a virus on your computer. So I was always proud to say that I used text-based email and I used something called a PGP signature, which was a digital signature at the time, which meant that when I sent mail out, my PGP signature, it would actually negotiate and verify with the person that I would send it to so that it could be a verified digital signature. That indeed, yes, this mail did come from me, and I think that Norton probably has something like that now right. Is that with your email or no?  21:59 - Tom (Host) Yeah, it has all kinds of functions.  22:01 And it works on my desktop and it works on my laptop and it works on my phone. The most important function that it has is when I'm not home and I'm on my phone or my laptop or my tablet is the VPN when you can turn it on to make sure that if you're using Wi-Fi at a cafe or something like that, that it's secure, because apparently there are people who just like sitting around at a Panera or a Starbucks with their laptop and just waiting for someone to have an insecure Wi-Fi connection and they can just steal their life right there through their own laptop.  22:31 - Anne (Host) Well, it's funny how this conversation has turned into a big security conversation, starting off with scamming. Which guys you got to be aware? It's one of the reasons why, for all of my years and because of my years working in technology, I like wired connections. I mean Wi-Fi. I mean it's a wonderful technology and it's convenient as anything. However, it's not as secure as a wired connection, because a wired connection is basically, you know, your digital numbers flowing back and forth along a wire, versus all this information out in the air where, if somebody is sitting outside of my home, they can possibly hack into my wireless network and then they can run some sort of a tracer to see and to actually get my passwords, which is something that you don't really want that to happen. So you should really be cautious, guys, and I think it's always a good idea that, if you are working from home, if you have the opportunity to have a wired connection to your router, I think that that's better rather than using Wi-Fi. Number one it's more stable, right, it's faster and it's also more secure.  23:32 - Tom (Host) I agree. If you have a desktop at home and you are doing any kind of recording or you're doing basically anything, you should have an ethernet connection. That yellow wire with the big old phone jack that plugs right into the back of your computer and plugs into your Wi-Fi router.  23:47 - Anne (Host) And it sounds old school, but it's still the most secure method of data transfer.  23:51 - Tom (Host) Without question so if you are recording from home. If you're doing whatever from home, you have a desktop ethernet. If you have a laptop, I are recording from home. If you're doing whatever from home, you have a desktop Ethernet. If you have a laptop, I think the newer laptops don't even have an Ethernet connection. I have to think about my laptop and whether I even have one anymore, and here's the simple reason.  24:06 - Anne (Host) Think about it. It's a wire, guys. It's a wire. It's not like data floating around in the air which people can listen to. Somehow the frequency of the data traveling in the air right? Wi-fi works on frequencies when your data is traveling via a wire like a physical cable, unless somebody like I don't even know, unless they tap into that wire, right, somehow.  24:26 I don't know how they do that, and we're talking about your wire in your house going from your computer to your router. Right, that's as secure as it gets, right, unless somebody's coming into your house and hacking into the wire and tapping into it.  24:38 - Tom (Host) You've got some foreign embassy bugging your home.  24:41 - Anne (Host) Yeah, yeah, doing some fancy work, you're not going to have to worry about your data being transferred. So if you're working on the internet right, at least the data that's transferring from your house to your router is absolutely secure. And then it's up to your internet provider right on the router, to their routers, to make sure that things are encrypted, things are secure and for the most part I mean that's been handled right. I mean there are hackers out there that they can hack into networks. They can hack into things like that, but you want to be as safe as you possibly can, so wired is best.  25:14 - Tom (Host) Yes, it's fascinating. We talk about hard security and soft security, yes, that's hard security, that's hard security.  25:20 - Anne (Host) So, if we go back to talking about the scams that are floating around these days, one thing I wanted to mention is I think one of the best applications for groups, facebook groups and social media groups and discussion groups is for that thing, so that you and Bridget were talking to one another about this job that you both got, and then it's really wonderful that we can come together as a community and protect each other right and say, hey, look, watch out for the scam. So it is one of the best advantages, I would say, of being a part of the social media groups in that way. Otherwise, we've talked about how it's hard to sometimes they're toxic, sometimes it's really hard to be on social media. But I would say one of the best reasons to be on social media, in those groups and in those forums, would be because of the protection that you're getting of us banding together and saying, hey, watch out, this is a scam.  26:09 - Tom (Host) Absolutely, it's one of the most important things. Community is more than just about you know rah rah and whoop whoop and you know we support you and feel better if you're feeling down, but like just actual education, along with inspiration and commiseration can literally save your identity Absolutely.  26:27 - Anne (Host) Wow, what a great conversation, Tom. So bosses out there, be aware of scams. Be cautious. Research, research. Take a look at those signatures when you get emails coming in, when you get something that's asking for lots of words and a good price and it seems too good to be true, guess what it might be. So make sure that you're communicating with the community as well, checking those jobs out and attach that AI rider to every one of your jobs. Now, it's simple. It's there at NAVA and it's free. You can attach that rider to every job. If you have a new client, make sure you're very careful with the payment options. You know we spoke about that. I always make sure I get money up front, or partial money up front, first to make sure that it's a legit client. What else did I miss, Tom, in this recap?  27:14 - Tom (Host) Hardware and software VPNs.  27:16 - Anne (Host) EINs yes.  27:19 - Tom (Host) Oh yeah, VPNs, EINs, Two-factor authentication.  27:20 - Anne (Host) I love it. Yeah, Make sure you guys are implementing all of that to keep yourself safe and secure. So great topic, Tom. I like geeking out like this.  27:30 - Tom (Host) Yeah, it's fun and helpful.  27:31 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I'm going to give a great big shout out to my sponsor, IPDTL. You too can connect and network like real bosses. Find out more at IPDTL.com. Guys have an amazing week and we'll see you next week.  27:52 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) Bye. Join us next week for another edition of VO BOSS with your host, Anne Ganguzza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at voboss.com and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution, with permission. Coast-to-coast connectivity via IPDTL.   

BOSSes Anne Ganguzza and Jennifer Sims, a voice actor, coach, and self-proclaimed "100% certified smarty pants," connect to explore the intricate layers of the voiceover industry. Listen in as we unpack Jennifer's unique journey, shaped by diverse experiences in acting, producing, and voiceover, offering a candid look into the crucial insights needed to navigate challenges and build a truly thriving business in today's landscape. Listeners will discover the essential role of professionalism and adaptability in connecting with clients, gain understanding of the industry's evolving demands, and appreciate the power of a well-rounded skill set.    00:01 - Anne (Host) Hey, guys, it's Anne from VO BOSS here. 00:04 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) And it's George the Tech. We're excited to tell you about the VO BOSS VIP membership, now with even more benefits. 00:10 - Anne (Host) So, not only do you get access to exclusive workshops and industry insights, but with our VIP Plus Tech tier, you'll enjoy specialized tech support from none other than George himself. 00:21 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) You got it. I'll help you tackle all those tricky tech issues so you can focus on what you do best: voice acting. It's tech support tailored for voiceover professionals like you. 00:32 - Anne (Host) Join us, guys, at VO BOSS and let's make your voiceover career soar. Visit voboss.com/vip-membership to sign up today. 00:45 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a boss, a VO BOSS. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza. Hey everyone, welcome to the VO Boss Podcast. 01:04 - Anne (Host) I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza. Hey everyone, welcome to the VO Boss Podcast. I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza, and today I have the pleasure and honor of being with a very special guest, Jennifer Sims. Jennifer, yay! Hi, hi. 01:17 For those bosses who do not know Jennifer, she is a voice actor coach and 100% certified smarty pants. I'm so jealous, so jealous of that branding. She's known for her authentic, conversational, confident, and playful delivery and has a unique perspective from both sides of the glass, and works for clients such as Hyundai, Wells Fargo, CVS, Vons—the list goes on and on and on. She honed her quirky sense of humor studying comedy and improv, which is always so important, I think, for us as voice actors, at the Upright Citizens Brigade and The Groundlings, and that helped her to land on-camera commercials for Uber, Snapchat, and WebMD. She began her acting career out of high school and basically was on her own for a short period of time in LA as a very young girl, which is great, and also as a producer, has had the pleasure of collaborating on hundreds of radio, television, and promo spots and has worked with some amazing talent along the way. And what haven't you done, Jennifer Sims? 02:18 - Jennifer (Host) I'm telling you, so much, so much. Thank you, Anne. That was lovely. Not as much as I'd like, and hopefully more. Yeah, thank you. It's great to be here. Thanks for having me. 02:28 - Anne (Host) Yeah, absolutely. Well, I met you—well, I met you not like physically, but I met you through our VIP room and I was so, so impressed with your background and your wisdom and everything. So I wanted to make sure that I had an opportunity to have you on the show and so our bosses could also get to know you. So let's talk a little bit about your varied career, because I think it's super important in terms of why you're so successful now and how you started off with acting and then as a producer. Talk about that for a little bit and tell us how it's helped you become successful in your voiceover career. 03:06 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, that's been very, like, it informs most of my career, certainly in the beginning, because when I decided to leave my director of broadcast job, I was working for an ad agency here in Los Angeles as the director of broadcast and I was bringing in a lot of voice actors for promo and commercials, etc. You know how it is when you see somebody and you're like, "Boo, why do they get to do it? I want to do it too!" But as I started my career, realizing that we're a part of the process, voice actors are part of a process, particularly in commercial, since that was my area, and when I was bringing in voice actors to record them, it comes very late in the process. Recording the voice actor for a commercial is one of the last things we do as a process in creating a commercial. 03:52 So, knowing that we're just—not just, I shouldn't say this, but we're part of a collaborative team, we're now brought into the team. We're problem solvers, we're creatives, along with the creative director, copywriter, and understanding why the copy is the way it is. I know a lot of us will—problem solvers, we're creatives, along with the creative director, copywriter, and understanding why the copy is the way it is. I know a lot of us will go, "Oh, this copy is terrible. It's poorly written," and, like, you don't know where that copy has gone. 04:12 - Anne (Host) Isn't that the truth? I love that you just opened up with that perspective because, honestly, like the nuggets of wisdom that people get out of listening—you brought them right at the front when people get for listening to a podcast or being educated. I love the fact that we are part of a process and you brought that to our attention because I think a lot of times we're in our bubble in our studios here and we forget that it's not just all about our voice, but it's part of a process and there's reasons for so many things. Right? There's reasons, and you're so absolutely right. 04:46 How many times have you gotten a piece of copy and I've heard my students, "Oh my God, this copy sucks!" Or I've read on some forum where people are like, "Oh my God, the copy sucks," and "Why does the copy suck?" But I think it's important to know that, yeah, we are part of a collaborative process and it doesn't begin and end with us, and that's an important part to understand so that we know where we fit in. And the more that I think we can predict how we can fit in best to complete the process, I think will really help us as actors. 05:13 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, exactly, really well said and so true. It's like, how do we fit into this process? Because we do, and even now, as an actor working on my, I will sort of forget that there's a lot going on and that when I get copy and I'm like, "Oh, well, I don't know how many R&D, research and development meetings they had on this copy. I don't know what focus groups might have said about this copy." Like, big companies spend a lot of time and money making sure that their copy is delivering a message that they want, money making sure that their copy is delivering a message that they want, and a lot of things. On the ad agency side, we're looking at things—that copy, and I'm like, "Well, legal says we can't say that." 05:51 Right, or legal says we have to say this. So, you know, when we're sort of like, "Boo, the copy couldn't be you," it's like, "Well, you don't know why." Yeah, it may be a legal thing. 06:06 - Anne (Host) It may be a client directive, it may be, who knows. I always try to remember that because, like somebody, somewhere was paid money to write this copy, and they know that product, or there's an intent with that product, or there's an intent with that copy that we are not necessarily aware of, nor do they tell us, but it's something that I think that we, as actors, we need to create that story, even if they're not telling us what it is. We need to create that story so that we can connect as much as possible to that copy and fit into like what they hear in their head. Right? We need to fit that spec there. 06:34 - Jennifer (Host) Exactly, and I think it also goes to the idea of given a level playing field of extremely talented actors. Most often, I only needed one person to do the job to solve the problem of whatever problem we were trying to solve creatively. And so I think it's easy to start to feel like, "Oh, I got rejected. I don't book this kind of work." It's like, given a level playing field, just assume that somebody got selected. But it—a level playing field, just assume that somebody got selected, but it doesn't mean that everyone else was rejected. Honestly, as I was listening to actors, I'm like, I wouldn't get in all my auditions for, say, a television commercial voiceover, and I would maybe listen to 50, a hundred, and then call it down to present to my boss, my creative director and client, maybe 10. And any one of those people could have booked it. Somebody got selected, that's all. 07:27 - Anne (Host) It's just a matter of selection, and the thing of it is is that you're at the beginning of that process, listening to all of those auditions. You would narrow it down to a particular amount of people, but then, ultimately, the decision is not necessarily yours. So I think, voice actors, we forget that, that it can go to your boss and your boss is not. Maybe a casting director doesn't have an ear for it, or just this is what he had—he or she had in mind. And so the pick from then. I don't think it's always necessarily based on your acting skills. It's just like a feeling, maybe, that they have. "Oh, yeah, this sounds right." 08:02 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, it's very subjective. Yeah, it's very subjective. 08:05 - Anne (Host) And I think we forget that. 08:07 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, and I know that, being that it's so subjective, if you sound just not quite what they want. I had a creative director. I was presenting talent. This woman was extremely talented. I was advocating for her. He's like, "Eh, she sounds a lot like..." I forget if it was his cousin or his ex-wife or somebody. He's like, "And I don't like that person." So she just reminded him vocally of somebody in his world that he's like, "Don't like." She was very good, like perfect for the role, and, subjectively, my creative director was like, "Nope, reminds me of someone, and I don't like that person. Bye." And I'm like, "All right. Well, that's how that's going to go." Or we get replaced. I was the voice of a promo for a really, really long time. It was a great recurring gig and somebody new came in at the top. The client switched positions, new client, and they're like, "No, I want to pick the voiceover," and so, like, I was out. They felt like that was the prior stamp. 09:06 And now they wanted to stamp it with their own. 09:09 - Anne (Host) That's such a good point because a lot of times, like companies change directors, companies change in departments, and a lot of times you may be the indirect result of that or not like being let go because of things like that that you have absolutely no control over. And so that is also a big part of the process in our heads as actors. We need to remember that on any given day, that it's not always—I think that if you can come into your audition with the skills that you need—the actor skills. Everybody says, "What's trending? What's trending these days? What's the sound these days?" And I'm like, "I think just be an actor, have good acting skills." 09:48 Maybe have good acting skills, because I feel like if you have good acting skills and the person, like say you, right, that is at the initial level of listening to all of the auditions, right, you're going to be able to hear that from the get-go, from the first few words. You're going to hear, "Okay, here's an actor. Now, what I like about this actor is that I can work with this actor." So maybe they didn't give the precise read that you were looking for at the time, but you know that they're an actor and that they'll be able to be directed. Exactly. And I think that's so important—best that you can come in with in your audition, to be armed with your acting skills, to showcase those acting skills, because all the other stuff we just have no control over. 10:25 - Jennifer (Host) Exactly. Control what you can. You know, getting auditions in a timely—Anne, naming them properly, file naming. I always talk about like naming those. 10:34 - Anne (Host) Like, why is that so difficult? I don't know. I come from a technology background. It always amazes me how many times people like don't understand how to name files when here's the convention and yet somehow. Right, just copy and paste it and then write your name. 10:50 - Jennifer (Host) I don't know why, but I don't think actors realize that if they mislabel a file, it's going in the trash. That'll piss off somebody. 10:57 - Anne (Host) I mean, like me, especially somebody that I'm handling a lot of files, right, and especially like if I have control over it, like you're not hired, and if you're going to argue with me about the name of that file, or if I gave you a confusing—no. I mean, sorry, just follow the following instructions. 11:12 - Jennifer (Host) But yeah, I think that actors may not realize that if you are missing those little details, like not following the spec, or because you're just like running and gunning and just like, "I'm in a hurry, I'll just read the copy," or not connecting to the copy, or mislabeling the file, it's like that's going to get you booted out of the mix because there's just not enough time and people don't understand. "Oh, so I put my name before the client's name." It's like if you're in casting or you're producing, you're not just casting one thing. So if you put your name first before the client's name, I don't know what to do with this file. Or usually it goes into a database and so the database is just going to go, "I don't know what to do with this. Garbage." I think people just realizing like why it's so important could be helpful. So people just slow down a little bit and go, "Oh, what's the file convention?" That's it. That's my TED Talk on file name. 12:03 - Anne (Host) There you go. I like that. Well, I'm right there with you on the file—I'm on the file name, I know, because you're dealing with hundreds of files, I know, right? I mean. So I touched upon this a little bit in your bio, which I think is so interesting, is that you studied comedy. Talk to us. And improv, of course, everybody always says, "Yes, improv, improv," yes, and improv, of course, is so important. But I also think comedy, too, is important, because this is just my outside looking in perspective, right? When we're listening, right, we need to command the attention of the audience. Right? Whether we're voicing a commercial or a corporate narration or whatever it is, we need to engage the attention of the listener and that is important. And I feel like comedy is absolutely one of those techniques that can be used to get people's attention and keep it, and I think it's important that if you have comedy in your script, that you can find it and you can execute it. So talk to us a little bit about that and the importance of comedy and improv. 12:58 - Jennifer (Host) Definitely. Have you been seeing a lot of scripts or a lot of castings where it's like we want people with comedy and improv, even though they may not ask you to necessarily be super hilarious or improv, they're listening for a nuance? A nuance, exactly. Comedy is like very subtle, I think, in voiceover, because when I was producing on the agency side back in the day, comedy in commercials was a lot more prevalent. We had double copy. We very rarely have two characters talking anymore, so it was a little more like in your face kind of comedy. 13:33 Yeah, back and forth kind of. Yeah, back and forth, you could riff off the other person. Now we're pretty much just doing one person voiceover, so that comedy has to be layered in, but never steal from the actual hero—our product or our client. And I think a lot of times when we're newer as voice actors, we're going for the "yucks" like, and it's like, "No, that's going to get you also noticed for all the wrong reasons." So I think I agree with you entirely. It's got to be layered, it's got to be nuanced, and you have to be able to find it. Sometimes people when I'm coaching, they miss the joke. I'm like, "Do you see that there's like a little pithy wit here?" 14:10 - Anne (Host) They're like, "No." I'm like, "Great." Or a play on words. And here's the thing too, you know, in writing scripts for demos and for my students, comedy is tough to execute in a certain time, like comedy is tough, especially if you're doing comedy writing in a demo. It's very tough to execute without sounding like a one-liner dad joke, right? Yeah, oh gosh, so true. And especially if you need to execute that time and just in a 30-second, 15-second commercial, to execute comedy and a sale at the same time is tough. 14:38 It's tough to do, it's really tough and so it does become very nuanced, right? And corporate, like when you get into like something longer, like corporate narration, you're not going to necessarily find too much humor, unless the brand itself doesn't mind making fun of itself, right? There's not many corporate—not many companies, I know, that make fun of themselves unless they have quirky products, right? If that's our corporate culture, great, but a lot of corporate is like, "No, very straightforward." 15:02 But they might have a nuance, right, and so I love the fact that, yes, if they're looking for that nuance and that is something that is it's maybe a nuance, right, and so I love the fact that, yes, if they're looking for that nuance and that is something that is it's maybe a note, it's a wink, it's a point of view that I think if you can execute and it only needs to happen like a little instant, then that to me, I can hear it right away and people can hear it right away. 15:23 They might not put their finger on it and say, "Oh, that was funny, like ha ha, knee slapping funny," yeah, but the execution of it is really it's key, and I think that comedy and improv is wonderful for people to have as a background in their acting skills. Yeah, I agree, comedy's tough. Did you perform like stand-up comedy? 15:42 - Jennifer (Host) No, I actually took a couple. I'm like, "No, I'm a smart-ass," but that was tough. So I took—a friend of mine was teaching. She is a comic and she taught classes and I did two of her classes, and after the first class, she's like, "Okay, and you know, as you know, we're going to an open mic," and it was torture. It was brutal. Just a bar room full of people going, "Make me laugh," and I'm like, "This is hard." 16:11 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I can't imagine. I have a friend who did stand-up in Burbank. Right? Everybody's at Flappers. Everybody's at Flappers and, "Come see my show at Flappers," and if you want to feel challenged, I mean stand-up at a mic in front of an audience. That's like, "All right." 16:26 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, like just staring at you and you're sitting with the mic going. 16:29 - Anne (Host) Make me laugh. But there's where I think, like the thinking fast on your feet is going to help you, and I think it's going to help you no matter what. I mean those of us who aren't necessarily doing comedy like stand-up comedy, but here we are in our booths and we're doing auditions, right? I think, if you have the time to evaluate and analyze your script and find the humor—I mean we have the luxury of some time of finding that humor and being able to execute upon that. I think if you can do that, if it's there in the copy, that's what you try to put up front and showcase. 17:02 - Jennifer (Host) I always say I'm going to zag. If everyone else is going to zig, I'm at least going to zag appropriately, because they also don't want to be the actors like. "Well, I remember her for the reason that she went off the rails." It has to make sense. 17:15 - Anne (Host) It has to make sense for the copy, right? And so I feel like that improv also, when I ask my students to create the scene, right? Be actors for a corporate narration that might be talking about investments or something that might sound dry. What is that story? Who are you talking to? Why does it matter? 17:31 You've got to be able to have that quick, like, let me create the scene and let me respond to it, right, and that just helps to enhance your script analysis, the speed at which you do that, and also if you're being asked live, like, "Give me an AB of that," or an "ABC of that." 17:45 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, how are we going to do that if you haven't created exactly scenario? I always think about how, in scene work and acting, we think about the moment before. Yes, and it's always because you'll hear actors, or I've heard this in auditions lots, where I'm listening to an audition, particularly when I was producing, it's like, "I don't even know why." I hear them saying the script. Why are they saying those words? Why are you even talking? It feels like you just sort of like dropped in cold and started talking, but I don't know why. Yeah, and I always can hear an actor who's a little bit more connected to the copy. Yeah, absolutely, and that's because they created some reason for talking in the first place. 18:21 - Anne (Host) Yeah, they created a reason to say those first words. There's got to be a response or a reaction. I say that even for corporate copy, definitely. 18:29 - Jennifer (Host) Even for e-learning. 18:30 - Anne (Host) You know what I mean. Like you've got a student that just asked you a question and so otherwise, it sounds like to me, I'm always telling my students, it sounds like once upon a time I started a monologue. 18:39 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Yeah. 18:40 - Anne (Host) And it just became like, "Oh, I picked this thought out of the air and I just started saying it." 18:44 - Jennifer (Host) And there's no reason for it, and so it's weird how we can hear that, isn't that weird? It's like the microphone, sort of like picking up your thoughts, sort of like the camera records thought. That's why you've got to have something going on behind your eyes. 18:55 - Anne (Host) I think it's like you can hear somebody reading, right, because there's a certain melody and—and I know there's got to be scientific evidence, right? There's a melody that we have when we read words and I know it very well because I'm always telling people to stop reading. Start talking. 19:08 - Jennifer (Host) Stop reading. You sound like you're reading. 19:11 - Anne (Host) And so there's a melody to just reading the words, and it seems to start at the same pitch, like, "Hi, I'm Anne, I started here once upon a time." I've heard casting talk about this. 19:21 - Jennifer (Host) Voice casting agents will talk about this all the time. It's like, again, given a level playing field, the first people we're going to boot out of the running are people who sound like they're reading as opposed to talking, and it's a challenging skill set because we are literally reading scripts, but we're interpreting written speech into spoken speech, and it's a skill set. So it takes time. And I was thinking about how, whenever I'm auditioning for something, I think, well, I'd love to book it, of course, but I always think I'm not auditioning for this one, I'm auditioning for the next one, because, let's say, you know, I don't get selected for this one. I want you to remember me for the next one. So, something I do in this audition, I want to spark a little like, "Well, let's keep her in mind for something else down the road," because that's all I can control, absolutely, absolutely. 20:13 - Anne (Host) Speaking of auditioning and being an active voice actor and a woman of a certain age, and I say that, you look amazing. 20:19 - Jennifer (Host) Well, thank you, but let's face it. We've been in the business for a while, not a teenager. 20:25 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I cannot sound millennial, no matter what. 20:27 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) I do, even though I have a younger sounding voice. 20:29 - Anne (Host) No, it's mostly in the attitude. But let's talk a little bit about having been in the community and been in the industry for a while. What's it like these days being a little bit older in this industry? How are you finding work? Is it plentiful? Are you finding? 20:42 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, I mean it's plentiful, but I still think that in general we're youth-oriented. 20:49 So if you're over a certain age, 40 or beyond. Oh, let's face it, I haven't seen 40 in a minute. Yeah, me either. And look at us, we're thriving. There we go. The voiceover industry is definitely very inclusive. It's getting more diverse all the time. Like when I was producing commercials, you most definitely had to sound a certain way, be of a certain demographic, and now we're hearing all sorts of wonderful, diverse voices. I still think there's room for us to include more voices that are definitely over 40. I'm still hearing people on the air where I'm like, "You don't sound old enough to tell me about retirement or having a baby." 21:27 - Anne (Host) You sound like a kid. I always try to tell people I start with the product, because I feel like companies are going to promote their products to the demographic they can sell to. 21:38 So it starts there, right? So what sort of a product would you sell to a demographic of females over 40 or females over 50? And I feel like that's where it starts. I feel like the younger sounding. I think it's because the company is trying to expand their demographic to make more sales. I think that's where it starts anyways, because I'm always saying, "Well, the trend right now is a little bit towards more millennial, and that's just the way it is." But I feel like there are certain products that a millennial does not sound realistic. 22:04 - Jennifer (Host) Talking about like Depends, right, or retirement or certain financial instruments or mortgages or things where it's like wouldn't you have to be a little older to be getting? An elder millennial, at least to talk about that. 22:17 - Anne (Host) Go you elder millennials. It's hard to believe. I know that in automotive that was a big thing because with Uber and bosses out there, if you study like it's not hard to study, like demographics and marketing, right? I mean during the pandemic nobody was buying cars and younger people were not buying cars because they were really reliant on Uber and Lyft and the rideshare stuff. 22:38 And so car companies started really marketing hard towards younger people and that changes who they hire right to do their voiceovers, and so I think it's something, bosses, that you need to really like spend a few minutes every day studying the market that you want to sell into. Really, it's not hard, it's Google. 22:57 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, it's iSpot, Google. And. 23:00 - Anne (Host) Google says that honestly, like you can just type in, like, you know, demographic, automotive demographics or, you know, trends, it's easy to find that out and that can help inform you educationally what you might be auditioning for, how you would respond to an audition, right? What is the company? 23:18 - Jennifer (Host) Who are they targeting their sales to, or who you're, if you're doing direct marketing, which I think every voice actor should be doing, if you're directly marketing yourself to a client. It's like, do you vibe with that client? Are you appropriate for that client? So that's basically how I'm represented. I have talent agents across the country and it's very clear to me that my reps are very good about knowing what my wheelhouse is. So I do get a lot of healthcare, insurance, tech, things like that—healthcare, insurance, tech, things like that, because that's who I vocally appeal to. 23:53 It makes sense, and women have an enormous buying power because we make most of the household buying decisions in most households, and so, even though I still think the guys are doing about 60% of the commercial voiceover work, we're at 40%, so we're catching up, but I think companies are starting to realize that women's voices are appropriate for their products and they want to market to us. So I think we're doing better all the time. So, yeah, there's a lot of content out there. 24:22 - Anne (Host) So I would say that, with all our wisdom, with all your wisdom—with our collective wisdom, with all our—no, with your wisdom. What would be your best tip for people that are just starting out today? Because the industry has evolved over the years and it has definitely changed. So today, if somebody's interested in pursuing voice acting, what do you say to? 24:41 - Jennifer (Host) Them? Brand spanking new, I'd say, and I know people are like, "But you all are coaches, so of course you're going to say this," but I would say this even if I didn't coach it: it is a skill set. And so I think you've got to start with good training, and I tell my students this all the time: Get involved in the voiceover community, get your squad together, get an accountability group, a voiceover workout group. You and I were just at the Nava Gala. Is it Gala or Gala? 25:07 - Anne (Host) Gala. 25:09 - Jennifer (Host) I think Gala. 25:09 - Anne (Host) Gala sounds more elegant. 25:11 - Jennifer (Host) Nava Gala. 25:12 - Anne (Host) We're the Nava Gala. 25:13 - Jennifer (Host) And it's just, it's a constant reminder that when we're so isolated and working on our own, if we don't have community around us, this job is hard. It is. I love the voiceover community so much, and so we have a community around us. We're learning things, we're sharing things, and so I always suggest to people, they're like, "Oh, I don't know what to do. How do I help myself in this career?" I'm like, "Well, get good training and get involved in the community so that you're constantly learning from your peers." Or at least, because we're working by ourselves, it can feel a little lonely and isolating. 25:47 - Anne (Host) Get some VO pals and get lifted up and listen to podcasts like the VO Boss podcast. 25:52 - Jennifer (Host) Yes, please. Listen to VO Boss, listen to VO Boss, guys. I've been doing this for eight years now. 25:59 - Anne (Host) Oh my gosh, it seems so forever. Eight years, amazing, every week. 26:03 - Jennifer (Host) I love it. Oh, my goodness. 26:04 - Anne (Host) Wow. 26:16 - Jennifer (Host) So if bosses want to find out more about you, where can they find out more about you? 26:18 - Anne (Host) I'm a busy kitty on the Instagram at Sims, my website, Sims. I'm busy there too, so, yeah, awesome, come see me. Well, Jennifer, it has been so much fun. I think we could probably talk for another hour or hours. 26:27 - Jennifer (Host) It would be a delight, but I know you're booked and busy, so we'll get on to other things. 26:31 - Anne (Host) But I thank you so much for spending your morning with me and bosses, make sure you look up Jen. Can I call you Jen? Jen? 26:40 - Jennifer (Host) Yeah, go by Jen. Look up Jen. I want to say Jennifer. Jen. 26:42 - Anne (Host) Check out Jen's website and check her out on her socials. Jen, check out Jen's website and check her out on her socials. Yes, please, bosses. 26:49 - Jennifer (Host) Yes, absolutely. 26:56 - Anne (Host) Thanks again, I'm going to give a great big shout out to our sponsor, IPDTL. You too can connect and network like bosses. Find out more at IPDTL.com. You guys have an amazing week and we will see you next week. Bye, bosses, you're the best. 27:06 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) Join us next week for another edition of VO Boss with your host, Anne Ganguzza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at voboss.com and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies, and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution with permission. Coast to coast connectivity via IPDTL.

Are you looking to take control of your financial destiny as a voiceover artist and business owner? In this insightful episode of the VO BOSS Podcast, Bosses Anne Ganguzza and the lovely Danielle Famble delve into the critical importance of understanding your hourly rate across all your income streams. They share practical strategies for calculating your worth, optimizing your schedule, and confidently negotiating your fees to build a thriving and sustainable voiceover business. 00:03 - Speaker 1 (Announcement) There's a voice revolution going on between podcasts, smart speakers, voice assistants, social audio. All these things are here to stay and there's more to come. What VO BOSS recognizes are the shifts in the industry, and they always get experts on to explain what's next and how talents can stand out. 00:25 - Anne (Host) Hi, guys, Anne Ganguzza here. Are you looking to discover true happiness and fulfillment? My coaching services are here to help you find joy, overcome challenges, and live your best life. Let's take that first step towards happiness today. Visit anneganguzza.com to get started. 00:45 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a boss, a VO BOSS. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza. 01:04 - Anne (Host) Hey, hey everyone. Welcome to the VO BOSS Podcast and the Boss Money Talk Series. I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza, and I am here again with the lovely Danielle Famble. Hey. 01:15 - Danielle (Guest) Anne, so happy to be back. How are you? 01:18 - Anne (Host) Oh, I'm doing good, Danielle. What are we talking about this morning? I have no clue. 01:24 - Danielle (Guest) Honestly, same. I really have no clue, but we look good and we are here to talk about money, so we can figure it out. 01:32 - Anne (Host) There we go. Well, you know, it's so interesting because if I don't schedule it in my calendar, right, it just, at this point, my calendar, I live by my calendar. I know I've mentioned that to you before, like, literally hourly. I schedule my time hourly, and it's funny because sometimes I have my students that want to get in coaching sessions with me and they get frustrated because my schedule is booked up, but if I don't put it on my schedule, like, it just doesn't get done. 01:57 And interestingly enough, my schedule has a lot to do with the hours I work and the amount of money I make per hour, and I think that it's so important because I can only schedule my coaching services for a certain amount of time a week. 02:12 - Danielle (Guest) Right. 02:12 - Anne (Host) Because at other times, I have to make sure I'm allocating that to my other income streams, right, and so I think it's always important to know, as a voice talent and as a business owner, what is your time worth per hour? Like, what is your hourly rate? How much money are you making per hour? Because that can tell you like, oh, I should spend a certain amount of time coaching and a certain amount doing voiceover, hopefully, because that's the value that we don't know. Like, that's not standard, we can't depend on that. There we go. 02:39 - Danielle (Guest) When you know, like, your hourly rate, like what you're charging for, what you're bringing in, then you actually can figure out how you can grow it. So maybe you grow it by increasing your rate, or maybe you grow it by shifting your focus in those higher hourly buckets. So if it's a different genre or things that you're doing, maybe your day job pays you more per hour than a particular side hustle that you have. 03:02 - Anne (Host) Oh, good point, yeah. 03:02 - Danielle (Guest) You know how to spend your time. I am also very guilty of being the person who always needs to look at my calendar to figure out what I'm doing, because if it is not on my calendar, it's probably not getting done and probably got lost somewhere in the shuffle. But yeah, I mean, knowing how much your time is worth and how much you should be getting paid for working an hour is so helpful to be able to financially plan for what it is that you're wanting to do and how much money you're trying to bring in. 03:33 - Anne (Host) Yeah, and as we entered into this podcast, going, hmm, what are we going to talk about? Had I not scheduled that time into deciding? Here's my schedule, right? So I need to schedule time to prepare my schedule, or to prepare, like, the topics we're talking about. Luckily, though, Danielle, you're just so easy to talk to. We can figure it out on the fly. 03:50 We can just spin off on, yeah, which is really good. But yeah, I found that it's so important. What are your highest paying income streams? Right, and so for me, voiceover, right, voiceover, depending, but what type of voiceover, right, exactly, it can be genre specific. 04:04 So that would be like voiceover commercial, right, it's the shortest amount of time that pays the highest. Next in line voiceover wise might be medical narration, right, because I have a higher rate. But then you've got to figure out, well, what's the frequency? Now, wouldn't it be great? I think a lot of times when people first get into this industry, they think, oh yeah, I want to do commercial work because I get paid the most doing that, or whatever it might be. But it's not every day that you're booking eight national commercials, if only, so you have to figure out the frequency at which that happens. 04:35 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) Yeah. 04:35 - Anne (Host) And then schedule accordingly. Like, what do I get paid per hour coaching? What do I get paid per hour doing a demo? So I think that really understanding what your time is worth on an hourly basis and then being able to assemble, right, the optimal schedule that can get you the most. 04:53 - Danielle (Guest) And also building in times when maybe you're not going for the most amount of money in that time. 05:00 - Anne (Host) Maybe you're building in rest that I tend to like forget about. It's funny because I will forget to schedule or block a day, like, after a day of travel, right? Because I know that after a day of travel, my time clock is going to be all screwed up, especially in a creative sort of a way. I mean, yes, if a client says to me, can you do a voiceover right now? Yeah, I'll do everything I can to do that. However, getting that rest in so that I can mentally refresh to be the very best version and be more efficient with my time, yes, is absolutely something that you need to take into consideration is scheduling that time and scheduling, believe it or not, travel time. I'm always forgetting about travel time, especially when you have calendar systems that work for you. You can build in your buffer. Like, in between students, I build in a buffer of 10 minutes because, God forbid, once in a while I have to go to the bathroom. 06:20 - Danielle (Guest) Or like drink a little bit of water, or stand up, or like walk around. You know, you got to be a human being. 06:26 - Anne (Host) Yeah, exactly. So you have to schedule that time. But I found that I've had to do that and I'm always like, these days it's when I forgot to schedule in time to do this or travel time, or I forgot to schedule a few minutes for me to get back from Pilates class, right? Now, I've actually scheduled time for my health, which I think is so important. My Friday mornings I take two Pilates classes in a row and I can't start my day until a certain time. 06:52 - Danielle (Guest) Two in a row is wild, and good for you, because, well, one's a stretch class. One is a stretch class. 06:58 - Anne (Host) So I start off with like an actual Pilates class and the other is a Pilates stretch class, but it's stretching, by the way, can be very painful. 07:04 - Danielle (Guest) It's really important. It's really important, as you get older, you have to move your body and stretch your body. 07:09 - Anne (Host) And it's a workout too. 07:10 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, that's a hack, by the way, for those of y'all listening, make sure as you're getting older, don't forget to stretch. 07:17 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I think it's so important that you do physical things and you're physically fit to be your best in the booth too, because that requires mental and physical, believe it or not. I mean, especially when I talk. We've got to talk with our hands, we've got to be in the scene, and so there's a physical element to it. And darn it all, if these booths don't get hot for the most part, unless you've got that booth that has that quiet air conditioning system, which is like, I think that's something that we all as voice actors are like, ah, it's like, if only we could have, you know, and I have a nice ventilation system. 07:50 However, depending on the type of voiceover that I'm doing, I work in a certain size space and I talk, right, and that's energy that's creating, and there has to be an exhaust, right, and if you have an exhaust, then that's like a hole that external noises can come in. So there's always that delicate balance. But I digressed on that tangent. But being fit, I don't get as hot, so it helps me because I can maintain. That's a whole other podcast. But being fit can help you in all aspects of your business. 08:22 - Danielle (Guest) That's a really important point, because this year I, due to health circumstances, made sure to buffer my time and put into my calendar more time for physical fitness, for going out, just leaving the booth, leaving my apartment, even for walks in the evening, whatever it is. 08:43 I for a long time did not make sure to prioritize that and my health started to suffer. And then my work started to suffer because I wasn't resting. I wasn't able to really show up and be the VO BOSS in the booth that I was wanting to be, because I hadn't prioritized other things that maybe were not bringing in as much financial benefits, but were having huge ramifications in my business, because I had not put the time and the energy into making sure that physically I could stay in tip-top shape. So it's not always about blocking out the time for what's bringing in the money. It's also for making sure that the instrument that we use, our body, our mind, our voice, our instrument, can be as great as it can be, because we have done other things that are not necessarily bringing in financial benefits, but we are taking the time to really like, pour into our instrument and pour into ourselves. 09:38 - Anne (Host) Well, that's our product, right? So our product, because it's such a personal part of us, I mean, we're not making a physical product necessarily. Obviously, our voice is our product and so everything that goes into having a good voice and being mentally and physically prepared counts. That's got to be put into your hourly time clock for what that is, and I really believe scheduling that time is important. So then, with the hours that you have left, right, what is it that brings you a certain amount of money per hour? And then what is it that you need? So really, I think, if you sit down with like a schedule, right, and just say, all right, here I'm doing auditions, so is auditioning bringing me in money? Right, but maybe booking is bringing me money, and so it's really interesting to figure out, like, what your worth is on an hourly rate when you're deciding upon, should I invest that time in auditioning or should I invest that time in pursuing my coaching, or should I pursue my dream genre? How much time should I allocate to that? 10:39 - Danielle (Guest) Oh, I love that. I love that because you're making decisions based on data. You're making decisions based on hard numbers, and that makes it a little bit clearer, instead of what you think you should be doing or what you're hearing that other people are doing, you are making decisions, data-based decisions, which is exactly what a VO BOSS, what an entrepreneur, should be doing. 10:58 - Anne (Host) Yeah, absolutely. So you've got to take the numbers that are certainty, right, and you can guesstimate, like, if you receive jobs, like, I think that's the biggest thing that is out of our control. If we get a job, or you know what I mean, if we book the job, then we need to dedicate the time to do that. So maybe, in terms of how you're growing your business, are you going to do something else on the side, right? How much money will that bring in? It amazes me the amount of students that are coming to me part-time, right, they have a full-time job, that don't know their hourly rate, don't know their hourly rate that they get paid at their corporate job, and I'm like, you really should figure that out, because when you're trying to make those decisions, should I do this full-time, part-time? I mean, there's going to be that transition time where you're going to have to start building up business, building up repeat customers, because those would be the customers that you can depend on. Okay, this income is coming in, so my hourly rate will change for that. 11:50 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, and your hourly rate. We've already said this a little bit, but it can be genre specific. Yes, so Maria Pendolino likes to call it your pick up the mic fee. So whatever is like your baseline of what you will go into your studio, turn on your computer and like, do the work. What is that minimum? So you know, actually, if they're falling below your personal minimum pick up the mic fee, then it may not be worth your time. Maybe you can do other things like rest or doing physical fitness, or spending time with your family, or marketing or auditioning or whatever else that you need to be doing. You know the minimum amount that you would like to make her job or just at any moment to bring you into the booth. You know that minimum and then that actually helps you be able to say yes or no to projects as they come along. 12:39 But they are going to be genre specific. The amount of money that I make doing a 15 second national commercial is not going to be the same amount of money that I make when I'm doing an e-learning project, but I do know that the minimum to bring me into this booth to close the door and to like start talking and do what I need to do is X, and if it's not hitting X, then the answer for me probably is going to be no, or I know that I'm saying yes to it given other circumstances, and that's totally fine too. 13:10 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I may be different right now for you bosses out there that are only concentrating on voiceover, but when you have different avenues and you have different income streams, like, for example, everybody knows, I have the VO BOSS podcast because I'm on it. There's an income stream for VO BOSS, there's an income stream for VO Peeps, which I also run, and there's an income stream for Anne Ganguzza Voice Productions. 13:28 And so I know, for an event that I put on for VO Peeps, I want to make a certain amount of profit, and so, therefore, I have to determine what am I going to pay my guest director, what am I going to pay to my assistants to promote it, right, on social media? So there's a cost for all of that. And then so there's a number that I want to hit. There's amount of sales that I want to hit so that I can make a profit, or I can make the profit that I want to make for my monthly goal. So I literally have that, and those are actually easy to calculate, because those numbers are like, well, I know I need to make this. Now, how am I going to sell that many tickets, right? Well, I need to pay my assistants to help me market it through email, through social media, and so you just kind of run it down that way. 14:10 And then for VO BOSS, right? So I pay out a lot of money to produce this podcast, right? What do I need in order to support? You know what it costs on a yearly basis to host it on its own website? What do I need to pay my assistants to create the webpages that do the show notes? What do I pay the monthly subscription fee for, believe it or not, Riverside, which is how I record it, and Riverside does some transcripts for me. It does some YouTube shorts for me automatically. 14:39 So all of that stuff is calculatable, and so I love being able to have the different avenues of income and streams of income, because those are ones I can depend on and they're more concrete than getting a voiceover job, because that's the unknown, right? So I have a certain amount of time that I'm spending trying to acquire that voiceover job. I'm marketing, I'm doing direct marketing, I'm auditioning, and then I don't know if I get it. Then, believe it or not, that takes precedence over everything. I mean, voiceover is my highest paying per hour, and so, yeah, ultimately, if I didn't want to do all these other things like coaching and my VO BOSS podcast, I would spend all of my time marketing and dedicating myself to voiceover, because that's my highest paying per hour rate, and so that to me makes sense. However, I like to have multiple avenues in case there are those fluctuations in the market, which there are. 15:29 - Danielle (Guest) What I like about what you just said was you basically are able to reverse engineer your hourly based on numbers you are able to look at. Okay, this is how much I need to make. So therefore, I need to sell this number of seats to an event, or I need to have this much in sponsorships for the podcast, or what have you. I love that, because then it takes away from, oh well, I'm not really sure, or I'll go to this rate guide and use this number that was provided for me, because it may or may not be the right number for you, using the rate guide for an example. 16:07 It is a guide. It may be that the numbers that you see there may align with what your number needs to be that you can hit. What you can do is you can look at a lot of your expenses. You can look at what does it cost to run the business of you on a monthly or annual basis, and then you can actually calculate, okay, I want to spend this much time in the booth, or I want to spend this much time doing auditions, and you can actually calculate what you need so that that number is specific to you and then you know it. It doesn't necessarily need to be something that you put on your website, but when someone asks you how much would you quote for X, you are able to calculate your time, because your time has a lot of value, what is generally acceptable in the market, and then you can kind of give the number that is right for you and your business and your life. 16:57 - Anne (Host) Absolutely. And you know, I know that I kind of opened up that part of the discussion by saying, well, maybe I'm different, but in reality, we're all entrepreneurs. I mean, I love the different individual income streams that I have, and I encourage you, as bosses, to have those multiple income streams because, I mean, I'm not special. I mean, I literally just said, oh, I want to do this, and so, therefore, how am I going to be making money of this? If I wasn't making money off of, let's say, my other brands, then I would reconsider, well, are they worth it, right, are they worth it for me to continue? And how will I move forward from this point on? And so, bosses, man, I mean, the world is your oyster. 17:35 I mean, you are entrepreneurs. You can have any other income stream you want and really reverse engineer it just the same way I did. I mean, you could literally be like, okay, my first love is voiceover, and I want to do that. But also, you know what, I actually love shopping, like, I love grocery shopping, so I'll do Instacart, so that might be another income stream, right, or whatever other things that you love and you're interested in doing. Figure out, okay, maybe being an Uber driver is something. I know a lot of people that do that for money and they love it because they love driving, and so you can listen to lots of podcasts while you're driving, by the way, and so you could be doing double duty, like, educating yourself by listening to Danielle and I on your route. So figure out, like, okay, what am I making per hour for my Uber, right, services, and what am I making per hour for whatever my Instacart or whatever else you're doing? It doesn't have to just be voiceover. 18:23 Mine just happened to be voiceover related because they were things I wanted to do. I literally just said, oh, I want to be on the radio. You know what? The closest thing to that is a podcast. Yeah, let me see what that takes, right? And now I said, wow, it cost me money for this podcast, much more than I originally thought. How can I make some of that investment back? Right, how can I do that? And so I came up with the VO BOSS Blast. I came up with sponsorship options, I came up with ads that play, and so ultimately, it becomes a marketing venue for me. So lots of different ways, bosses, that you can work in your hourly rate and figure out what it is that you're making, and if you get so many rides from Uber, you know how much money you're making. I mean, that's concrete, it's there. 19:06 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, that's. The great thing about numbers is that it is concrete and you know how much that you can expect to make, and then you can figure out what to do with that money. Maybe it is staying within voiceover, but maybe it's looking at different genres that you're not usually working in, and you can calculate a higher hourly rate for a different genre and then use it that way to scale your business. So there's so many different ways to do it. I do love that you said to be creative and figure it out, because it doesn't have to be what you are seeing everybody else do. Your business is yours and you can make these decisions and you can choose how much you are getting paid. There's a lot of power in that. When you've taken the reins and said, okay, this is my floor, you can make so much more money in deciding how you want to diversify your time and diversify your hourly rate with maybe different genres or different ways to bring in money. I love that. 20:01 - Anne (Host) And how exciting is that? 20:03 - Danielle (Guest) Danielle, it's incredibly exciting. 20:04 - Anne (Host) Right. You said like, literally it's you, you're in control. Yeah, bosses, I want you to just sit there with that for a minute. You are in control of your business, of your destiny. Yeah, and so many people get so preoccupied with what other people are doing. This is your business. How exciting is that? You have, literally, you can do anything you want. I mean, really. I mean, if you're going to sit back in an intelligent and figure out, okay, I really would like to do this, how can I achieve income? How can I? 20:29 - Danielle (Guest) How can I achieve income? How can I? That's a really important question to ask yourself, because when you ask yourself, how can I do it, you, as a creative, will probably be able to figure it out, and you're not waiting for somebody else to give it to you. 20:43 - Anne (Host) It's so empowering. It's so empowering. I often say, having worked in corporate before and in education, honestly, like, I could never go back to working for someone again. To be quite honest, I mean, outside of working for a client for a brief amount of time, in which point I do it and they pay me and I'm out, I'm in, I'm out, I get paid. I love that. So what would be your recommendations on somebody, like, what would be their steps to sit down and figure out their hourly rate? What would you suggest they do first? 21:14 - Danielle (Guest) I would look at what you're currently working on, because again, it's probably going to be genre specific. So if you're doing a lot of non-broadcast narration, for example, you're talking about corporate narration or medical narration, figure out how much of that work you're actually currently doing and how much are you typically charging for that, so you know your non-broadcast hourly rates. And then you can also take a look and see if you're doing commercials, for example, if you're doing like TV and radio commercials, how much are you typically getting for that? And then what can you do to affect those numbers? You can raise your rates if it's non-broadcast. You can start doing more direct marketing, for example, maybe to find and bring in more clients. You can streamline your process. Maybe that is bringing in an editor. That's going to cost you money, but then you can kind of buffer and build that in. 22:08 But look at what you're currently doing, look at how much you're currently charging, and figure out what you can do about it. The easiest thing, it's not easy, easy, but it is something that you can do pretty quickly is increasing your rates. I mean, it's the end of the year. Rate increases are pretty normal for a lot of businesses. So take a look and see. Have you increased your rates in the last year, two, three years? If not, now's the time to do that. Maybe it's your cost per word for e-learning, something, anything, and you can make incremental changes that way, which will have huge benefits for your business. 22:42 - Anne (Host) Yeah, there's something to be said for the whole end of year, increasing your rates, even in times of hardship and bad economy. Right, you've also got to take that into effect, like what's the market rate, but you can increase your rate in a way that's not like obscene or it's not like a big jolt to your client. And a lot of times I'll preface, I have not raised my rates for five years and so I'm happy to have you continue as a client. However, I need to raise my rates. That is like a whole bold move, but it is something that you can absolutely do, because people raise their rates. I mean, companies raise their rates all the time. I see it, they raise their prices, and so you can do that. Just be careful, you don't want to make it too much of a price change so that it will jolt your customers into saying, I can't afford that. And even if they do say that, the cool thing about working with clients is that you can always like negotiate. 23:34 You can always backtrack and say, you know what, I've always loved working with you. Perhaps we can come to an agreement. And sometimes you do have to like. I mean, I've had it where a client says, I absolutely cannot pay any more than I am right now, and I'll say, you know what, I really love working with you, and I'll make that decision whether it's going to be worth my hourly rate to continue working with them or if it's time to say goodbye. And there have been times that I have said goodbye, and it's okay because it allows me my time back so that I can make more money per hour. 24:03 - Danielle (Guest) And if you bring in a new client that is paying this higher rate, then it kind of becomes like self-cleaning, in a way. And that's really great. It's a great way to increase your rates as time goes on. Another really great way to increase your rates is to get really comfortable with negotiating and understanding how to negotiate effectively. 24:22 - Anne (Host) Can I say that enough? 24:24 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, that's a really great way. And then you can figure out what your new hourly rate would be and you can negotiate based on what you know that to be, or, as Maria said, your pick up the mic fee. You can just make sure that you're hitting that standard minimum every single time. 24:39 - Anne (Host) Absolutely. And, like I said, concrete data is great data to reverse engineer, to understand that hourly worth. So, for example, like as I mentioned to you, commercial work for me is my highest paying work. Right after that comes medical narration, after that comes corporate narration and e-learning, because I charge the same. So I have a rate guide that I have a base knowledge of. Here's what I charge, right? And of course, I always promote GVAA rate guide and the rate guides that are out there to go for benchmarks and know that they're just benchmarks. 25:08 You can always adjust and, knowing this, saying, okay, I make the most of my money for non-broadcast narration on medical, perhaps I want to up my marketing in that genre, right, how can I get in front of the people who can hire me so that I can make that money? And so that might be. You're going to have to figure that into. Well, I might have to spend an extra hour marketing, and again, I can sacrifice that because I have my Uber on the side, which is bringing in money so that I can do that, or I can increase my Uber hours if I can't, or I can maybe rely less on one and then increase the other. So it's constantly, I think a balancing act, Danielle, it is. Right. 25:47 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) In terms of. 25:47 - Anne (Host) Okay, how can I do this? And so you should, first of all, have an idea of what you're worth. You should establish that number, right? So figure out what it is that you're getting paid the most for, and so, like, I'll do, like, a per hour rate of $1,500 to $1,700 for a medical, non-broadcast narration, right? Breaking that down, that's a pretty high yield, right? So then what is my coaching rate? Okay, so my coaching rate is $200 per hour, or you know what I mean. So how much coaching do I need to do per week? Or how much do I need to do to bring in? I usually like to think of it in terms of monthly, because I know that I have a certain figure that I like to achieve at the end of the year. Break it down to the monthly and then break it down to weekly, and sometimes weekly is tough because of the uncertainty of VO jobs, the cyclical nature of how things go, yeah. 26:33 Yeah, but then there are certain things that I know that every month, I do an event for VO Peeps and I'm going to make this amount of profit, right? Every month I have a subscription to this and so that's going to cost me this much, or I have people sending me money for a subscription, and so maybe I need to increase my marketing to get my subscriptions up, right, people subscribing to VO Peeps, that kind of a thing. So there's so many things that are good and concrete, and repeat clients are also. They're better than non-repeat clients, aren't they? 27:01 Because we can almost rely on them, we know what rate we're getting from them, and so it's easier to kind of juggle those numbers around. And then there's the uncertainty of the audition. Are we going to get the gig? And if we get the gig, do we have a client? Can we turn that client into a return client? So there's all the uncertainties. So you leave a certain amount of hours to handle that, right, to handle that. And if that's not happening in those hours, then you work towards maybe increasing your marketing to that, so it's not just like, I'm making the money. You got to have, I think, a certain amount of hours where you're spending the time working on always marketing or auditioning, trying to achieve those numbers. 27:40 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, I love that because it gives you a machine that's kind of like bringing in the next client and then you know what to do when it goes through your pipeline of actually booking or onboarding that client or trying to find more clients like the ones that you're currently working with. It gives you something that's like always working in the background and then what you're currently doing, and you can figure out how to tune your rates to maximize whatever is coming through that pipeline. That's right. 28:08 - Anne (Host) Good stuff, good stuff, Danielle, yeah. All right. Bosses, go out there and figure out what you're doing, figure out how much you're making per hour, depending on what division of your company that you're working in. So what are you making in commercial, what are you making in non-broadcast narration, what are you working in other income streams? And then plan accordingly and negotiate, yeah, and negotiate, absolutely. All right. Big shout out to our sponsor, ipDTL. Find out more at IPDTL.com. We love ipDTL. 28:41 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) You guys have an amazing week, and we will see you next week. Bye. Join us next week for another edition of VO BOSS with your host, Anne Ganguzza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at voboss.com and receive exclusive content, industry-revolutionizing tips and strategies, and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution, with permission. Coast-to-coast connectivity via ipDTL.

  BOSSes Anne Ganguzza and Lau Lapides dive into how to cultivate hope and resilience in the ever-evolving voiceover industry. Their inspiring conversation explores discovering your strengths, overcoming challenges, and taking action to achieve your dreams. They emphasize the importance of self-love, nurturing your community, and understanding your true purpose to remain joyful and hopeful. Anne and Lau share practical strategies for educating yourself on industry trends, adapting your marketing approaches to reach diverse clients, and even exploring self-production to build your skills and discover new passions. By embracing change and leveraging your entrepreneurial spirit, they empower voice actors to not just survive, but truly thrive and build the best year ever in their careers.   00:02 - Anne (Host) Hey, are you looking to unlock a better you? My Life Transformation Coaching Services are here to help. We'll work together to discover your strengths, overcome your challenges, and achieve your dreams. Let's take that first step towards your best self today. Visit anneganguzza.com to get started. 00:23 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a boss, a VO Boss. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza. 00:42 - Anne (Host) Hey everyone, welcome to the VO Boss Podcast and the Boss Superpower Series. I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza, and I am here with my absolutely wonderful friend and lovely co-host, Lau Lapides. Hey, Annie. Hello, I'm excited to be back. Hello Lau. I love chit-chatting, and you know what, it's been so long. I know, and we're here at the top of another year. Well, actually, a few months into another year, and I'll tell you what, it's been a little turbulent in a lot of ways. Gosh, I've had a lot of friends who have had some health issues. It's a new administration out there. The voiceover industry is still fighting against synthetic voices and AI, and I think let's talk about what's happening in the industry and what maybe our predictions are for this year, because I am determined and committed to have the best year ever. 01:33 - Lau (Guest) Oh, I love that. I mean, I just went to see a theater show, a professional theater show, in Connecticut. That was a big topic of conversation: how do we have hope? How do we still have hope in what we do as people in the world and also in our professions, and really coming in with that mindset, despite all odds, despite what's happening, despite whatever oppression you're feeling and moving through, how do we find hope in what we do? I'd love to hear, you know, start out with some of those mechanics of like how do I wake up and get hopeful about our profession? I love that. 02:10 - Anne (Host) What a great way to start. I love that. So I think that, now more than ever, we need self-love, right? We need self-love, we need to find the things that we're grateful for in our lives, and we need to have our community, and that, I think, is going to help us continue to have hope. I mean, I feel like those are the three necessary things that I need for me to remain joyful and be hopeful and continue to see progress in everything that I do and have a purpose, right? I really think that understanding what is your true purpose in life, finding your true purpose—which I think might be a lifelong search—but I have a good idea of what I think my purpose is and what I want to do in my lifetime, and I try to keep my eye on that mission, and that keeps me, along with people who I love and who love me, and that keeps me hopeful. 03:06 - Lau (Guest) That's great. I also feel like the next step for me is to start with that and then to take action. Because for me, I'm very much an action-based, execution-based person. So I wouldn't be happy staying in a zone where I have a thought, I'm excited about the thought, or I'm connected to something larger than myself. I'm really investigating that thought, but now I want to do something. 03:34 - Anne (Host) Yeah, and in that action, now you have to execute. Now you have to execute. I love that. I think that's a natural progression for anybody that wants to realize their goals is that you can write them down. All you want, right, but you've got to take steps and have action. You've got to take steps. 03:49 - Lau (Guest) So in our industry, that is the question: how do I go ahead and take a step every single day, whatever is going on in the industry? We see a lot of moves and changes in the industry. How do I take a step every day towards being hopeful and towards being optimistic and towards really something that's action-based? That's the question of the day. 04:12 - Anne (Host) Well, I think number one, if we step back and we take a look and we realize that we are indeed not just creatives, but we are entrepreneurs, we are business builders. First of all, take solace and give yourself props and be prideful in the fact that you are a business entrepreneur. And bar none, if the voiceover industry dropped tomorrow, right, you are an entrepreneur, you are a business owner, you know how to take something from nothing and build it, right? Because that's what you're doing now, building your voice acting career. And wherever you are in the journey, you just have to realize what an entrepreneur you are. And so, no matter what it is that you do, right, you can build your business and move forward in it, or move forward in it. There are always choices. 04:59 And so that's number one: stepping back and looking at it, I think, from the larger perspective and the fact that we have built skills, not just in our voices, not just in acting, but in our business acumen, and that is helpful, right? And so if voice acting kind of takes a dip, right—and I don't honestly, it's not—I really believe that, I don't think that it's going anywhere, I think it's right where it always has been and might even be more important this year. But for whatever reason, we always have to have like what's our plan B? I mean, this is why I always like to have like my different side hustles, side gigs. We've talked about that multiple times. So looking at that picture and there's my hope, right, I've got skills beyond voice acting that can help me to survive no matter what happens, right? 05:46 No matter what happens, no one can take that away from me. No one can take away my education, no one can take away my intelligence, no one can take away my work ethic, right? And that, to me, gives me hope. 06:00 - Lau (Guest) You go, girl. I love that, my resilience. You know, I think you're talking about too, Annie, something that's really important, and that is when we hone in and we GPS into our career. I think we do forget that we're whole people. Yeah, we're whole people that have a lot of skills. 06:16 - Anne (Host) We don't just have one skill. A lot of craft, no, no, no, we can do an awful lot of things. Now. 06:25 - Lau (Guest) We love to call it side hustle, but it may not be a side hustle. It may be an integral part of your life, your business, your world, that makes you feel whole, that makes you feel stabilized. You know, oftentimes with actors, we'll call it a survival job, but it may not be that. It may be something that helps you build your world. So I think that's important. I also think you should be looking at the market. You and I are always like, what's happening? 06:46 What's competition doing? What's this one doing? What's happening here? What are the trends? 06:51 - Anne (Host) Right, very important. 06:53 - Lau (Guest) But what's important about doing that, besides the logistical stuff, is to inspire yourself, sure. 07:01 - Anne (Host) If. 07:01 - Lau (Guest) I can't think of anything else. Like I am really out of thoughts today. I feel burned out, which is very common now. Entrepreneurial burnout. I don't have any more to give. I've been doing this a long time. I don't know what's going on. Ah, let me go into the world and let me see what others are doing to inspire me. 07:17 - Anne (Host) Oh yeah, I love that. Get outside my bubble. 07:19 - Lau (Guest) Goodness, there's. So not to be a copycat, but to feel like there's a lot of options, there's a lot of ways of thinking about what we do. I'm just stuck like a writer. A writer gets writers, they get stuck, writer's block, writer's block, right, and they have no more ideas, or so they think. And then some action gets them unstuck and opens up the floodgates. 07:40 - Anne (Host) Absolutely. Go on a vacation, go people-watch in New York City or, you know, that kind of—I used to do that all the time—to step outside of your bubble, and that will help you to really get that mind going. So I'm going to say that number one, there's so many things that we can do for ourselves to continually see success and find fulfillment in what we do. Continually see success and find fulfillment in what we do, and I think if voice acting is it for you, right, don't forget about continually building up your business skills and don't forget about, like as we just talked about, educating yourself and really going out there and understanding what the trends are. Now there's been a big shift in the administration, right? How is that going to affect sales of companies? How is that going to affect advertising? There's so much we can go out there and learn, right, and we don't know it all right away. I don't know it all right away, but I can certainly see that there's probably going to be trends. 08:34 Now, depending on what we're talking about, in the corporate world, we're going to be talking slightly differently. A few years ago, what was a big trend was DEI, and no matter what you think about DEI—diversity, equity, inclusion—how are people going to be talking about that today? How are people in the energy industry going to be talking? Is it going to be sustainability these days? Is it going to be alternative energy or is it going to be fracking? And again, like I'm saying, understanding—you don't always have to be in agreement with these things—but understanding where the trends are going and how companies are speaking. 09:08 If you want to work in that world, right, you have to at least be educated on how that world wants to talk to its clients or potential clients, because you will be representing that world with your voice. 09:21 And so, again, I'm not suggesting that you have to agree with any of it. But again, that's also like what is your moral compass? Would you work for a company that maybe is no longer concerned about sustainability or that's not in their agenda? I mean, there's so many people going back and forth on different companies that, based upon their policies, right, "Oh, I don't want to buy from this company anymore because they no longer support this particular idea or this particular policy," and so that's okay. I've had so many people are like, "I don't want to look, I can't," and they want to like shy away, but I'm going to tell you, look enough so that you can be educated, right, because you got to survive. You got to survive in this world, and I'm very, very confident that you will be able to survive in this world. But you have to remain educated and informed. 10:04 - Lau (Guest) Great advice, Annie, great advice. And you know, it's interesting, I had a talent I was coaching the other day and she said, "I'm very interested in medical, I want to do medical work, I'm interested in that, I have a background." I said, "Great!" I simply hopped on Google with her. I hopped on Google with her and I looked up and, sure enough, and she said, "I can't get into it. It's very hard to get into. I've been trying to knock down the doors. I don't know how to direct market. I'm stuck." Now. That is not my forte. And I was honest with her. I said that's not my forte. But let's have fun together, let's go on Google. We looked it up and what did we find? We found two sites, sort of like an Indeed ZipRecruiter-type site, specifically for voiceover, for medical narration. And she started in that rabbit hole and she went down. She said, "Oh, my goodness, that was like the simplest thing to do and I had already self-talked myself out of it before I even tried the most basic things." And she got into it and it was a casting site and da-da-da, da-da-da. And then that opened up her whole world to potential clients. 11:08 So why not go for a genre that you want to be going for and take new angles to how you find your information out? Don't go the same route you go every day. Try a new route. That's the feng shui of the soul, isn't it? They say if you drive to work this way, take a new route so that you can feel differently. If you drive to work, or you drive anywhere, take a new route. Well, this is the same thing. If I'm marketing and I tend to do the same thing all the time because I know it and I'm comfortable, go a different route. 11:37 - Anne (Host) And shameless plug, because medical is one of my specialties. There are ways that you've got to be seen by the people who can hire you, people who can hire you, and I do have a VO Boss Blast that has specific lists that can cater just for agencies and companies that work in healthcare and in pharmaceuticals. So there are lots of ways that can help and so just I'm throwing that out there. So if anybody's interested in medical and wants to find out how to market to them, I can absolutely chit-chat about you. 12:03 - Lau (Guest) And right, but I think the point is is like yes, you found a new way, Google. 12:08 - Anne (Host) I love Google, and I'll tell you what. I will be completely—a Chat GPT, sorry, Chat GPT, is a great answer of hey, tell me what's trending, but you have to have a professional version because it's now up to date or it can be as close up to date, so it's becoming a search engine. But Google is wonderful. 12:32 - Lau (Guest) Again, that's why they call me Anne Gang Google. You can Google anything. 12:33 - Anne (Host) I didn't know. They called you that. That's funny, Anne Gang Google, that's great. 12:35 - Lau (Guest) I love it. 12:35 - Anne (Host) So that's a wonderful thing. So, yeah, make sure that you educate yourself and stay informed. Don't stay in your little bubble, because that's going to help you. I mean, long ago, when I worked in technology, it was one of the things that you had to just be out there educating yourself on all different styles of technology, whether you like them or not, or thought they worked or not. It just was something. So it's always good to be more educated. So, so, absolutely, so important. That's the one thing that I have when you say to me, "Okay, Anne, when you've lost all hope, what do you have?" Well, I have my community. Lost all hope. What do you have? Well, I have my community, I have my family, I have love, and I have me, I have my intelligence and I have my desire to want to know more and to learn more, and that nobody can take away from me, right? 13:15 - Lau (Guest) And there's one more thing that's important, and I always bring this up. Mama always brings this up. You got to work your fanny off. Yes, because I'm tired of hearing people whining and complaining and being victims like, "I'm not getting anything and there's enough work." I'm like, no, you're not working hard enough, because there's plenty of work out there. You got to find it, you got to get it. You got to work at it, right, Annie? You have to go after it. They're not going to come after you. You have to go after it. 13:44 - Anne (Host) And the stories you tell yourself also. They're a big deal. "I can't, I just can't. I'm not, I'm not enough, or I'm not good enough, or I don't know where to look, or I can't." All that negative self-talk does not help you at all, believe it or not. I mean? 13:59 - Lau (Guest) And what if you are on Annie Gang Google's search site and you look up voiceover talent in your area or not? Either way is fine, and they are in your range. Maybe they're female, they're in a certain age range, and you look at them and you see what they're doing and you see who their clients are, because you can go right to their websites and you're going to go and you're going to go, "Oh, I want to do that, I want to work in that. I never would have sat here and thought that up on my own, but now I see this fabulous woman that I found somewhere in Texas is doing all the things that I want to do," and then you make a list of all the companies she's worked with, and then you create a fabulous letter for those companies. And then you look up all the email addresses at that company, and then you send that fabulous letter to that company. What are the chances that someone from that company may ping you back and say, "Hey, yeah, we kind of work with voiceover talent. Who are you?" 14:56 - Anne (Host) Absolutely. Well, and I know, marketing is never an easy task, guys. It just isn't, and again, remember. 15:03 Remember, there are multiple ways. How is marketing changing this year, right? And it's funny, because I did a lecture for a college class the other day and I said to them, "How do you like to communicate? If you were in voiceover today and you had a business, how would you like to find your potential clients? Or how would you communicate or reach out to your potential clients?" Not one of them. They said, "Well, we hate email, text." And I'm like, "Okay, that's fine for you and maybe everybody else. 15:28 Your age, however, you got to realize where are these potential clients? Some of them are older than you. Some of them have different methods of communication that they prefer. I mean, ultimately, in 20, 30 years, you'll all be the same age and you'll all—we'll all evolve to that method of communication. 15:43 But right now, if you're trying to get work in the corporate world and you're trying to get in with a company that has someone who might be, you know, in their 60s managing the company, they might prefer email. 15:56 They might prefer a method of communication that's not just text or pick up the phone are something that I think that every voice actor needs to understand and get on board with, that you are dealing with people in business who are very different. 16:15 There's lots of people that, yes, they do a lot of work via text, but a lot of people do work via groups, Microsoft Teams, Zoom meetings. There's so many ways. 16:25 Pick up the phone, talk to somebody, and, really, if you are uncomfortable with one method and you want to work in an area where you might be working with people from all different ages, all different styles, you need to get familiar with those methods and that, I think, is important again for you to stay afloat this year to be able to communicate with all different types of people, with all different styles of communication and hiring, really, and hiring methods, and so that is something that if you're not on board with, if you're like, "Nah, I don't want to email," or "I hate email and I think it's stupid," honestly, there's a bunch of people that still use email quite a bit, and especially now that maybe social media is kind of scattered everywhere. 17:12 Now it may not be as easy now on social media. Remember, we lost TikTok for less than 24 hours and the world panicked, right? All these people who had put all their eggs in one basket. So don't put all your eggs in the texting basket if you're young, right, as a means of communication or getting work, right? There's multiple ways that you can get work, multiple ways you can communicate and make your product known to people. 17:36 - Lau (Guest) That's great advice. It's so client-centered, which I love about it, and I think whole generations of people need to keep that aware of that. The mode of communication you need to keep open, whether it's a telephone, a text, an email, a DM. You need to keep that open and what your client or your rep is comfortable with is ultimately what you have to get comfortable with, and most agents do not want you texting them. They're going to work on email. 18:01 If you don't want to work on email, you're not going to be able to get reps. It's as simple as that, right? If you don't check your email. 18:07 - Anne (Host) You could lose out on jobs. If you don't check your voicemail, believe it or not. I mean, I have people that leave me voicemail still, and it's one of those things. I'm like, "We've gotten so much. We've been bombarded." Email, voicemail, text, and spam, right, because people are trying to get in touch with us, and so make sure you're checking your spam as well to make sure somebody hasn't reached out to you that wants a potential connection to maybe offer you a job, and not only that, but if you don't like email, you're really in trouble, because agents will expect you to answer within a reasonable amount of time, which is a matter of hours, not days, on email, so you can miss out on that job. 18:55 And you have to be adept at utilizing technology when you're submitting auditions. You have to make sure that you understand how to submit an audition. We've run our audition demolition multiple times. I'm running now a scholarship submission where people are like, "I don't know how to submit," and I'm like, "Well, you've got to read the instructions." So, guys, get yourself familiar with all different styles and ways of communicating and handling files and audio and that sort of thing. Now, Lau, we talked about first of all, like making sure that we're educated on different styles, on different trends. What do you think is going to be big this year? Is there a genre that's going to stand out? Are they all going to be similar to how they were last year? What do you think? 19:34 - Lau (Guest) That's a really good question. I think one of the things that I've seen more and more of as a commercial agent is I've seen more and more really fun and creative advertising campaigns that have come in the last, even in the last couple of years, that I would gather are going to come this year as well. Like, for instance, I've seen more animation. I've seen more of that character style come into the commercial world, which is really interesting because it's so oppositional to what we've been saying about be real, be relatable, be this, be that, which is predominantly, yes, still there, but we're also seeing these characters come in. 20:10 Like, if you notice, watch commercials, you'll see a lot of animals, tons and tons and tons and tons of animals. In commercials, the animals typically have personas of people, have personas of people, and whether they're speaking in their natural, everyday voice or whether they're doing a character sound, there's just a lot of it. There's more of it. So what's coming across my desk is just more character and more animation. Even in the pharmaceutical world, we're seeing a lot more exciting, dancey, musical animation, moving stuff, colorful stuff. 20:45 - Anne (Host) They're vying for our attention in the pharmaceutical. They're vying for our attention, so we want actors. 20:50 - Lau (Guest) I'll use that word, actors. We want actors that can shift from just a real, down-to-earth sound to playing that duck or playing that pigeon. 21:00 - Anne (Host) Well, I'm going to say, medically speaking, because medical is one of my favorite genres, is, I also feel like, because there are changes this year with administration and how they're dealing with healthcare funding—a lot of it—and so I think that healthcare companies, which have always been very traditionally corporate America, money-centric, I think, are going to be vying for our business, and so I do feel like there's going to be a lot of competition between hospitals and medical products that are looking to get us as consumers to buy into it, because their funding might be less than it was and I think for a while it's going to make them compete more with each other to get the business and the money that they are used to having. Where they might have gotten some money in funding before, now they might, who knows? I'm not even going to speculate about prices, but I feel like, because it's going to be more competitive, it might work to our advantage for a little bit. It may not be regulated. I mean, I would hope it's somewhat regulated, but as a breast cancer survivor, I will say that I don't love the fact that it's been defunded or that kind of a thing. 22:08 I feel like certain things are important to be funded in this, but without getting political, but just know that, right, I happen to know that is one of the things that I have been hearing, so I'm like, "Okay, so how is that going to affect those companies that ultimately relied on that funding to operate?" 22:25 Right, are they going to now transition into healthcare and so maybe there'll be more demand in hospitals, right, so hospitals can get that money easier? So now maybe the context and the content of what we're going to be talking about will be slightly different or more centric on hospitals versus organizations, slightly different or more centric on hospitals versus organizations. So that's just something to be aware of and to know. And, again, like I say, I try to remain a little bit neutral on it because, again, if you want to work in those genres and you want to work for a company that is going to be in America in the next years, right, figure out how things are changing for them and then figure out how your voice and how their voice brand is going to change and then evolve with that or not. Choose to not evolve with that if you don't agree with it, yeah, and I don't know. 23:11 - Lau (Guest) I can't really predict, Annie, what's going to happen in the pharmaceutical market, because that's a really, really moving and shaking industry right now and everything is being shaken up with that. But there was a time that I remember that it was not legal to advertise on TV pharmaceutical products. 23:27 I remember that when that came in, that that was passed, that it was legal. Suddenly, we saw 24/7 advertising of pharmaceuticals, which is a very controversial issue for many people, but I'm just going to speak on the side of our industry and talent. It was a virtual candy land. It was a Disneyland of opportunities for both actors and voice talent that they were and still are auditioning for pharmaceuticals all the time. Will that change? I don't know. It could. 23:55 - Anne (Host) And will there be more? I mean, in the pharmaceutical side, yes, the commercial aspect of things, that corporate side, but there's also the educational side, right? Again. How is that going to evolve? How is that going to change? And so, keep your eyes open. That's I think my best advice would be for talent, to keep your eyes open and to really be as educated as you can, without suffering consequences of maybe getting too much division or toxicity from your news source or your social media, wherever you get that from, but make sure that you're educated and I think that, honestly, if you can again prove to yourself. It's like when the pandemic hit, right? How did we evolve as businesses? Here we are with another large kind of transition or, you know, maybe change that might be happening that can affect our industry. How can you, as a business, evolve along with that? 24:46 And I think you'll be fine. I mean, I really believe there's still a necessity. Nobody's saying that voiceover is illegal. 24:53 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) I'm just going to say it like voiceover is not illegal, so therefore the opportunities are endless, right? 25:00 - Anne (Host) Just if you step back and kind of look at the humorous part of it. It's not illegal to do voiceover, right? So guess what, the opportunities are what we make of them, right? We can create as many opportunities as we want, right? Again, it's up to us. We are the entrepreneurs, we are the creators of our businesses and of our destiny. I can't lose hope in that. 25:21 - Lau (Guest) And, of course, we're always going to need human beings. We're always going to need human voices. It may shift and pivot in different directions, but the industry does that anyway. It really has done that the whole way through. And I want to throw in one more before we wrap, Annie, I want to talk about self-producing. I think it's very important that people feel empowered to self-produce their own work. Like maybe you say, "I always wanted to do this. I haven't gotten hired." Well, produce your own, write a script, create it, clean it up, throw some music in, put it on YouTube, put it on your channel, make it known that you want to do this work by doing the work, right? That's the power of a demo. The demo is demonstrating the kind of work that you want to do. 26:05 - Anne (Host) But I am going to say, as a demo producer, Lau, that again, you've got to be careful, you've got to be really careful. I mean, yes, you can create samples, you have to be careful. 26:13 - Lau (Guest) But I'm not saying to create a full demo. I'm saying if I want to do animation and I have no work under my belt and no one's going to be looking at me, I want to say, "Hey, I want to do a 15-second spot," and produce that and see what that's like. 26:28 - Anne (Host) But make sure that you have the license for the music, make sure that everything is legal on that end of things, because, again, there's a lot of DIY going on in the animation world and there's a lot of again. Remember, what you do speaks volumes. Yes, right, and yes, DIY is great for education, absolutely. I don't think there's anything wrong with that and I think you can learn a lot by doing that and, as a matter of fact, it's probably a great way to get to know better what you want. Ultimately, when you have the money to invest in a professionally produced sample or demo. 27:06 - Lau (Guest) So if you do it yourself, you know what's involved in it. Yes, and that is so great that you brought that up, because I'm seeing so many talent getting into audiobooks, which is fantastic because it's such a wonderful world, but I see so many talent getting out of audiobooks because, guess what? They're doing it and many of them don't want to do it and they don't realize they don't want to do it until they do it, until they do it. And then others do it and they say, "I have fallen in love, this is it. I didn't even know how wonderful this is." Absolutely, and this is really my calling. So the point is, I think what I'm trying to say is, of course, work under qualified coaches, work with demo teams. Of course, what I'm saying is dabble your toes in water of doing the work to see how you feel about it. 27:47 You know, the idea is different than the reality. 27:50 - Anne (Host) Agreed, agreed, and I don't think there's anything wrong with a DIY that educates you. Yeah, really, always, because, like I always try to learn from when I create videos, I'm trying to learn my video editing software. Does it mean that I'm a video editor for reals? Right, I mean, but I want to be able to know the steps and what's required so that I can direct somebody else that can maybe do it for me, right? 28:11 - Lau (Guest) So yeah, there it is. There it is. There's a plethora of actions you can take and go with the trends and pay attention and see what your competition is doing and see where it leads, but also create your own path. 28:23 - Anne (Host) Pioneer your own way. 28:25 - Lau (Guest) That's the best entrepreneur, isn't it? 28:28 - Anne (Host) The future is bright and I'll tell you what, I'm excited. And again, I am excited for evolving, I'm excited for changing if I need to, and I'm excited to see. I mean, honestly, you have to embrace the change. You have to embrace evolving along with change and allow it to be something that ignites you and excites you. And I have all sorts of positive thoughts about this year and for you guys, for bosses out there, positive thoughts. Absolutely. All right. Thumbs up, big shout out to our sponsor, IPDTL. You too, can connect, network like bosses, and move your businesses forward. Find out more at IPDTL.com. You guys have an amazing week. Lau, thank you so much. We'll see you next week, guys, see you next time. 29:13 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Join us next week for another edition of VO Boss with your host, Anne Ganguza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at voboss.com and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies, and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution with permission. Coast-to-coast connectivity via IPDTL.

BOSSes Anne Ganguzza and Tom Dheere dive into the essential digital toolkit for today's voiceover professionals. Their lively conversation spotlights practical solutions for safeguarding valuable audio, effortlessly showcasing your work, and leveraging the power of AI to streamline your workflow. They unveil their go-to platforms for reliable cloud backups, easy video conversion for portfolio building, and AI assistants that can help with everything from crafting professional communications to generating content ideas. By sharing their tried-and-true tech arsenal, Anne and Tom empower voice actors to work smarter, not harder, and confidently navigate the ever-evolving digital landscape of the voiceover industry. 00:02 - Anne (Host) Hey, if you're looking to take your podcast to the next level, my podcast consultation coaching services teach you how to sound more authentic, develop smart strategies, and market your show effectively. Let's elevate your podcast together. Visit anneganguzza.com to get started. 00:22 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level: the BOSS level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like1 a BOSS—a VO BOSS. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza.2 00:42 - Anne (Host) Hey, hey everyone, welcome to the VO BOSS Podcast and the Real BOSS Series. I'm here, Anne Ganguzza, with my good friend, Mr. Tom Dheere. Hello, Tom Dheere, how are you today? 00:53 - Tom (Guest) I am good. Anne Ganguzza, how are you? 00:56 - Anne (Host) I am relieved. 00:58 - Tom (Guest) Relieved? Want to know why? Yes, why? 01:01 - Anne (Host) Well, I had a scare this week where I all of a sudden went to go access one of my audio files to send to my client, and it said, "No, there's no drive." And I went, "Oh my God, I lost my drive!" And that's one of those things—I don't know if you're on an Apple Mac or any kind of computer—when all of a sudden the drive doesn't show up, you're like, "Oh my God, let me unplug it, let me replug it, let me unplug it, replug it," and you wait to hear it spin up. And back in the day, when I used to work in technology, it was a thing. Like your backup plan had to be solid because you could not lose any data, and it used to be very complex where you would have RAID systems and you would have dual backup systems, and you'd pay a lot of money to have systems backing up to other things. And I'll tell you what I got. 01:45 So, paranoid, I unplugged my drive, plugged it back in. Nothing. Same thing, did it multiple times, unplugged it from the cord, I rebooted my computer. Nothing happened. But I'll tell you, I was saved by my favorite tool in the world, which is called Backblaze, which backs up all of my data onto a cloud, and I was able to restore the data that I needed to send to my client to another external drive that I have and do it within the next couple hours. It was actually a few terabytes, right, because my drive... I put everything, Tom, and I think we can talk about this—I have, since I worked in technology, I put everything that's important on an external drive, and that drive gets backed up multiple times. And that way I don't ever have to worry about like, "Oh gosh, if I need to update my..." I never put anything important on my main computer drive, always on an external drive that gets backed up. 02:36 - Tom (Guest) Because it's easy. I think this leads into an extremely important lesson that we could just start right off with. For all you BOSSES out there: do not be 100% cloud-dependent with your data, and do not be 100% external hard drive or internal hard drive-dependent with your data. But back them up, back them up. 02:54 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Make sure that they are backing each other up. 02:57 - Tom (Guest) What I have is I have Norton 360, which is generally... Norton is known for its antivirus software, and Norton 360 does that. But what it also does is it backs up my hard drive every single day up to one terabyte. And, like you, I have very little actual data on the hard drive of my desktop computer itself. I also use Google Drive's Google Workspace. 03:22 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) If you have a Gmail account or a Gmail address. 03:23 - Anne (Host) Same thing. Yep, you can use Dropbox as well. 03:25 - Tom (Guest) Yep, you can use Dropbox as well. 03:27 You can use OneDrive, you could use Box, you could use CrashPlan, you could use Carbonite. I used to use Carbonite for a very long time, and I was very happy with it, and then I realized I had Carbonite, Box, Dropbox, OneDrive, and Google Drive, and I realized it was so redundant. So my primary cloud-based data storage is a combination of Google Drive with Google Workspace and Norton 360, and I also have an external hard drive which I will actually occasionally hook up and physically back everything up and put it away. So I've got like three—two cloud-based and one drive external hard drive-based—home base for all of my data, in case something bad happens with one or, heaven forbid, two of them. 04:17 - Anne (Host) It's been a lifesaver, I'll tell you what. So Backblaze—just my favorite. By the way, I'm an affiliate, guys. I'm going to put a link for you. What I love about Backblaze is that basically, you just set it to work and it works seamlessly in the background. It will always... it backs up every minute of the day. It backs up, and it doesn't take a lot of resources on your system. So every time you create a file, it's just going to be backing it up to the cloud, and then you just... it's really simple. You go to your account on the cloud and you restore it, and it basically just keeps the most current backup. 04:45 You can keep different versions of backups. If you have version one of a file, version two of a file, you can keep all the versions of your backups for up to a year. It just really depends, and it is super reasonable. I think I pay $99 a year. So I use that in combination with Dropbox. I have like three terabytes for Dropbox, and I keep all my student data on that, and that way I can share my drive with my clients and my students, and that is my Dropbox, which is always backed up, so I don't have to worry about that data either. So I use the combination, and I also have a Google Drive. So those are my cloud-based: Dropbox and Google, and then my Backblaze, which is my backup for all my drives that I have on my computer, and I only put important stuff on my external drives. That way if I need to update my operating system, I don't have to worry about restoring all the other data onto that main drive on my computer. 05:36 And you can... even with Backblaze, you can order, like I had, a four-terabyte drive or a five-terabyte drive. If the entire drive goes—which drives do, I mean, they have a lifespan—you can actually just order a replacement drive, and it ships out within two to three days. It's an encrypted drive that you can actually just plug in via USB, and then ultimately you have that mirrored drive so that you don't have to restore the data through the cloud, because sometimes if you do have five terabytes of data—let's say if you have video—it could take an awfully long time to restore through the online version, and so you can just order a drive, and I've done that two times. So that's one of my favorite tools, Tom. So what are some of your other favorite tools that you have to run your business? 06:18 - Tom (Guest) Like I said, I do use Google Drive regularly. If you have a Gmail account, I think you already get 15 gigs of storage space, but with Google Workspace, you get two terabytes for like $15 a month, and I also use it to synchronize my email. Actually, that's really exciting—the ability to synchronize my email in Gmail with my phone, my desktop, my laptop, and my tablet, so I can access my emails anytime I want. But other tools that I've really been enjoying lately: this is something that comes up a lot. Voice actors of all parts of their journey desperately want to get their hands on the finished product, which is, most of the time, the finished video of a voiceover that they did, most of the time commercials or explainer videos or things like that. 07:07 So I have a two-pronged system. Number one, I go to YouTube once a month. I'm on YouTube every day, who am I kidding? But I mean, for this exercise, I go to YouTube, and I have a list of all the voiceover jobs that I did in the previous quarter or previous month, and I look at all the front-facing stuff, all of the commercials and explainers, the things that would be normally exposed to the public—not like the e-learning modules and the internal corporate stuff—stuff that has been published publicly. 07:34 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Published publicly, exactly. 07:34 - Tom (Guest) And then what I'll do is I'll find all of them, find the ones that I can. I will save them to a playlist in YouTube, and I have a playlist for every genre of voiceover that... 07:46 - Anne (Host) I've done. Yeah, me too. 07:46 - Tom (Guest) But this is where the tool comes in. I download the YouTube video. There is a specific software that I use called Any Video Converter. We'll put the link down there. It's absolutely free. I think it's just anyvideoconverter.com. And then you download that free software, and all you do is paste the YouTube link in, and then it says, "Do you want audio only, video only, or audio and video?" You download it, and it downloads it to your computer, and then you can save it. And this is why this is really important. It's important for two reasons. Number one, a lot of us want to use professional samples of stuff that we've done to add to our demos. Yes, and we want to use it to add to our online casting site profiles, our sample lists and playlists on Voice123 and other places. But here's the other thing: YouTube videos don't necessarily stay there forever. 08:45 - Anne (Host) They're not necessarily evergreen. 08:47 - Tom (Guest) I have had multiple videos over the years where I went to go look at it, and it was gone. 08:52 Or it was linked to my website, tomdheere.com, and the video was just not there. There's just gray static, or "this video is no longer there." So what you can do is that if you keep that video by downloading it using Any Video Converter or any software of your choice, you can then upload it back to your website, right, or maybe even upload it back onto YouTube and continue to have it as part of your portfolio. 09:15 - Anne (Host) I just want to make sure that it's noted that you have permission and that it's public-facing to begin with. So make sure that it's public-facing. Sometimes, if you don't have permission from the company, it's always nice. I mean, I always, as part of my, "Thank you so much, it's been wonderful working with you," I always say, "If you have a link to the final video, I would really appreciate it. I'd love to see the final product. It was so great working with you." But a lot of times people are busy, and that doesn't happen. 09:40 And so, yeah, if it ultimately shows up on a YouTube, then ultimately it's public-facing. 09:45 And then I am assuming that it's public-facing, it's public property, and that I can take that Any Video Converter and download it. And, yeah, now you own it; you can put it back up on YouTube if you want. It's a video that's not going to disappear all of a sudden off your website if you happen to embed it. But yeah, that's a great tool, and it's wonderful to be able to show not only your demos but work that you've done, and you want that work to exist. So, yeah, that's a great. 10:08 I love that, Tom, because you actually go and actively seek it out, because sometimes I lose track of the jobs that I do, and then it's like, "Oh darn, I wish I had that job to showcase, right? Here's an example of what my voice sounds like in this particular job," or "here on this website." And I used to actually post the link or embed the YouTube link from their site onto my website, but, you're right, it disappeared from mine after a while. Sometimes people just don't keep those videos up on their YouTube, so having it for your own is a wonderful, wonderful tool, and that Any Video Converter, yeah. 10:42 - Tom (Guest) Definitely, and that task is on my monthly action plan. 10:46 - Anne (Host) It is one of the things that... 10:47 - Tom (Guest) I do every single month. It's in the tools section of my monthly action plan: "Download new YouTube videos and save to playlists." 10:54 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Wow. 10:55 - Tom (Guest) This also applies to Vimeo as well, so you could also look around, because there are some clients that prefer Vimeo over YouTube, which—it's a great platform. I love Vimeo, but YouTube just has so much more SEO clout. Well... 11:06 - Anne (Host) I love Vimeo because I use Vimeo. I have a Vimeo account as well as YouTube, but I have a Vimeo account because if you want to password protect, you can do that on Vimeo. So that helps me when I do my VO Peeps events, and people are requiring access to the videos. I password protect them. 11:23 - Tom (Guest) Well, I'll bounce the ball back to you, Anne: what is another tool that you enjoy using? 11:27 - Anne (Host) Oh my gosh, there are so many. Let's see. I'm going to say I'm going to go the AI route, and I'm going to say I have a couple of AI tools that really, really help me in crafting emails to my clients that are super fast and efficient. And they help me just... First of all, I have a professional version of ChatGPT, which I think is well worth the 20 bucks a month, and I also have CopyAI, which I pay for on a yearly basis. It uses ChatGPT, but it also has different features kind of built in. So, depending on what I want to do, it has a little more marketing aspect to it, so it can create more marketing funnels for me. If I want ChatGPT, I can ask it just about anything. But again, both of them are the premium versions, and I use it for—gosh, I use it for anything. 12:09 Sometimes I'll just ask questions and I'll say, "Hey, craft an email response to my client that includes the following points," or I'll have started a particular email, and I'm like, "You know, I just don't have the time to word this professionally." So let me cut and paste it, and I'll say, "Just reword this professionally and in my voice." So you can train your little ChatGPT AI bot to have your voice in it. And so I use it constantly for crafting professional emails and basically doing a lot of web writing that I might have to do. If I want to craft my bio, I need to create a nice bulleted course list here and that sort of thing. I'll say, "Go to this webpage and tell me what are the major points, what are the summary points of this particular course that I can then utilize." So it's just training your robot, like training your dragon, is really a wonderful thing. 12:58 - Tom (Guest) Cool. Well, I also have two favorite AI tools, both of which are parallel to the ones that you just recommended. You're a paid user for ChatGPT. I am a Gemini fan myself. Gemini is the Google-powered version of OpenAI's ChatGPT. You do need to pay for it, but if you have a Google Workspace account, like I just talked about a few minutes ago, that I use to get more drive space and synchronize all of my emails and all of my devices, you also get access to Gemini. I've been using it very heavily for the past three, four months or so. And what do you use it for? What sorts of things? I use it professionally and personally. I ask it all kinds of questions, looking for statistics or data, potential voiceover leads. And what happened was, a few months ago, I'm here in New York City. I was invited by a Google Wix co-production talking about Google Gemini and then how to use Google Gemini to write blogs in Wix—not necessarily write them for you, but like to just kind of help you come up with ideas. 14:08 Spark ideas, maybe give you some outlines, and then you can put your own creative flair and writing style in it. I will give a quick AI prompt tip. Two things. Number one, always tell your AI who they are before you ask the question. So like, if you have a question about social media, you always say, "You are a social media expert." Then you ask the question. I don't pretend to understand how any of this works, but I do know that if you kind of put them in the, for lack of a better term, "frame of mind," it will give you more accurate answers. 14:43 - Anne (Host) Give me a more professional answer, give me a friendlier, give me more conversational. Yeah, you can absolutely, and... 14:50 - Tom (Guest) Oh, I refine them constantly. What's nice about Gemini is on the left side, it has a link to every single conversation that I've had, and I refer back to them regularly. The other tip is always say please and thank you. For some weird reason, they have noticed that—and this may be a little scary—that the nicer you are when you're asking questions, the better quality you're going to get. I know that's a little creepy. 15:15 - Anne (Host) Well, yeah, you don't want to be angry. I mean, a lot of times people are like, "No, that's the wrong, you stupid idiot." You know what I mean. You should not talk to Alexa that way either, by the way. Just saying. 15:24 - Tom (Guest) Right, no, you don't want to do that either. 15:25 - Anne (Host) No, because you want them to treat you right. 15:57 - Tom (Guest) I believe there are different tiers, like there are with a lot of these programs. I just started my affiliate partnership with them, so I'm exploring all the wonderful things that it can do, but Warmy.io—that's my other favorite AI tool. Wow. 16:07 - Anne (Host) I've got one more. 16:08 - Tom (Guest) I've got one more that I use, and that's Podium. For a long time... 16:11 - Anne (Host) I've used Podium for a good year or two now, I think. Podium takes my VO BOSS podcasts and it crafts out my notes, it crafts out my show notes, it crafts out takeaways, and I found that that works the best. I mean, I can put anything into ChatGPT, but the cool thing about Podium is I can feed it an MP3. So I can take a final MP3 of my episode and I can say, "Craft out 10 takeaways from this." And ultimately I do have to go through everything. I think it's always advisable, no matter what. 16:39 If you're working with AI, you always have to go through it. You always need the human touch, right? You need to like... sometimes it'll come up with some weird things, but for the most part, it does the best summaries, and it's the only one that I have that will take an MP3 or a video and transcribe it, and then it can create a blog out of it as well, which is super powerful, because once you can get from there to the blog, then you can tweak the blog. So it really has done a lot to help me. And so that's Podium, and yes, I'm an affiliate of Podium too. 17:08 So, guys, BOSSES out there, if you find tools that you like, you can always create a little affiliate membership with that, because, I mean, even if it's a few cents a month, it's a few cents a month, and I have people who follow me that I don't steer them wrong. I'm not going to be an affiliate of a product that I don't love and that I wouldn't recommend. And so that's the way I really feel that I've gotten people who follow me that trust my recommendations and these tools that Tom and I love. I mean, we recommend them wholeheartedly. It's not something because affiliate memberships don't, I don't think, make you enough money to... you know. I mean, I'm not just going to sign up for everything and become an affiliate. 17:42 It's only going to be the stuff that I absolutely love and the stuff that I'm going to talk about. And I actually got a little key fob the other day so that people can scan the key fob, and I can become an affiliate of that, so that they can scan the key fob and go get all my contact information, go to every website that I have, and it's really a lot of fun, and I'll be testing that out at VO Atlanta, so that's going to be really cool too. So all these tools that Tom and I are talking about are stuff that we've tested and stuff that we recommend. And so, BOSSES, that's another part of your income journey really, is thinking about products you love and maybe thinking about becoming affiliates of them. Any other tools, Tom, and I've got one more that I'm going to talk about that I love. 18:21 - Tom (Guest) It's funny because I wanted to... 18:23 - Anne (Host) It might be the same one. 18:23 - Tom (Guest) Well, I wanted to say that we are recording this right now using a fabulous tool called Riverside. Yes, and I've been guest hosting on the VO BOSS for a couple of years now, and she's been using Riverside, and I think it's a fantastic program. The one that I use when I have guests, when I am doing recorded video chats, is I use StreamYard. 18:43 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) They're both very similar. 18:44 - Tom (Guest) They have their own sets of bells and whistles. Both of them are fantastic. So if you're looking to start a podcast or if you just want to record conversations, Riverside or StreamYard—both of them are fantastic. 18:55 - Anne (Host) And here's one that I think we both have in common, Tom, I know that you use it, and it is... it is my graphic wonder, Canva. 19:03 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Ah, Canva! I love Canva. 19:04 - Anne (Host) Canva changed the game, I'll tell you what. And I'm not saying that I'm a graphic artist, because nothing would ever replace my web designer, because my web designer is an amazing graphic artist. There's something about being able to see and visualize graphics and where they go and putting them together and making them look good. But if you're just a beginner and you need to do a few social media graphics, you need to do certain things like remove a background. You cannot go wrong with Canva. I've been using Canva for years. It is an absolute favorite tool of mine. 19:33 - Tom (Guest) I use it constantly. I mean, for those of you who have watched any of my how-to videos or have been in a workshop with me where I'm doing a presentation, I use Canva, I'm pretty sure. 19:43 - Anne (Host) Anne, you also have the... 19:44 - Anne (Host) Canva Pro. You have the paid version, Canva Pro. I do. 19:48 - Tom (Guest) So do I. I mean, it's got so many functions. You'd be shocked at the amount of things that it can make. I mean, I primarily use it for my how-to videos and presentations, but I also use it for making thumbnails for my YouTube videos. 20:01 - Anne (Host) Social media graphics. 20:03 - Tom (Guest) Yep, it's got a great library of content, and you can upload all of your content as well. 20:07 - Anne (Host) And also, I'm going to give myself one other plug. 20:09 - Tom (Guest) I'm going to give myself one other plug. There are a bunch of apps that you can have called up on the left side of your Canva. There is one which is to add an AI voice to your presentations, and one of my AI voices is one of those voices. So, yes, you could actually click on that. You could have me voicing your content. 20:27 - Anne (Host) Tom, I'm going to add you to my next presentation. I'm going to add Tom Dheere voice to my next presentation. But that's awesome. I love Canva and the Canva Pro. And remember, Tom, back in the day when you were creating, let's say, a website or a social media graphic and you would subscribe to these places where you could buy the rights to the graphics? Because you need to be legal about these things. You can't just be stealing graphics and downloading graphics. Canva has a great—and the Canva Pro version has a great—amount of graphics that you can use that are built within it and licensed. So you don't have to pay for another tool to get your graphics. So you can get professional graphics. If you need, like a studio graphic to put in the background of one of your social media posts, you can download it from Canva, and the license is there, and you're clear. 21:13 - Tom (Guest) Yeah, what's very interesting is that you can just run searches in their library to find graphics and stuff like that. And then, if you have the Canva Pro account—I don't know if you've noticed this, Anne—is when you click on stuff and you use it, it'll say, "You just saved this amount of money." 21:27 - Anne (Host) Oh, yeah, right. 21:28 - Tom (Guest) Right, because if you didn't have a Canva Pro account, you would have had to pay à la carte for all of these graphics, but as part of the Canva annual fee, you can get access to all of those graphics for free, and you are using them legally and lawfully. 21:40 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I love it. I love it. I love knowing that I'm using them legally and lawfully, because that used to be a worry for me. I mean, I used to be like, "Oh my God," and each graphic I would pay. Even sometimes I'd go to those websites. I think I had an Envato Elements account that, you know, I could go and get the graphics and use those for my social media. And it's just nice because it's built into Canva already, and everything that you use these days has AI built into it. 22:04 Guys, there's really not much that I think you're going to be using tool-wise that isn't going to have some sort of AI built into it. So, again, it's one of those things where I know we need to be careful of it for our voices, and we need to make sure that we're getting compensated. Make sure that any tool that you're using that has AI built into it, that you're within the confines of your own ethical thoughts and what you think is right and fair compensation. And, Tom, you're getting paid for that voice that you have in the middle of Canva, so that's good. And so tools that are ethically sourced, right, that are using AI, I think it's just going to be so embedded into a lot of our tools these days that we're not even going to notice anymore, and it's going to be like... you know, I always tell people with Voice over IP, back in the day I used to install Voice over IP phone systems, and people were like, "Oh no, it'll never work." 22:52 But honestly, that's all we use these days. There's not one phone call you make that isn't going over an internet or a network, a data line, and there are no more POTS lines that are installed. Back in the day, they were Plain Old Telephone POTS lines, P-O-T-S. And so nowadays, all of your communication goes over data lines, and that is Voice over IP. Really, same thing with AI. It's going to be embedded in just about everything that we do. So just be careful and be thoughtful. But these tools are something that I can't live without now. I mean, really. 23:23 - Tom (Guest) Me too. I don't know where I'd be without Canva and all the tools we just talked about today. 23:27 - Anne (Host) I don't know where I would be without my Alexa telling me how many ounces are in a tablespoon or how many... you know, when I need to do some simple conversion. I mean, we're talking like everyday life. So yeah, these are just some of our favorite tools. Tom, I'd love to do another episode in a few months from now to see if we've come up with any other favorite tools. 23:44 But I love sharing tech, geeky gadgets, because you're kind of a tech girl. I think we've come up with a really great list, and, guys, we'll list all of that in the show notes for you today. And thank you so much, Tom, for yet another wonderful, enlightening episode. 23:59 - Tom (Guest) Thank you, always glad to be here. 24:01 - Anne (Host) Big shout out to our sponsor, IPDTL, which I use every single day, by the way, guys. IPDTL, I use for all of my student communications. I love it. It's wonderful, people can record, it's super easy, and you can find out more at IPDTL.com. Guys, have an amazing week, and we'll see you next week. Bye. 24:21 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Join us next week for another edition of VO BOSS with your host, Anne Ganguzza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at voboss.com and receive exclusive content, industry-revolutionizing tips and strategies, and new ways to rock your business like a3 BOSS. Redistribution with permission. Coast-to-coast connectivity via4 IPDTL.

BOSSes Anne Ganguzza and George the Tech unveil a powerful collaboration designed to equip voiceover professionals with essential technical prowess. Their discussion highlights the evolution of VO BOSS to include comprehensive tech support, recognizing that pristine audio and a smoothly running studio are fundamental pillars of your voiceover business success. They introduce the new VIP + Tech membership tiers, which offer direct access to George's expertise through monthly meetups, personalized sound checks, and an innovative AI-powered knowledge base, the "George the Tech Bot." By democratizing access to top-tier technical guidance, Anne and George empower voice actors to overcome studio hurdles, optimize their sound, and ultimately elevate their professional presence, ensuring they can confidently navigate the technical landscape of the voiceover industry.   00:04 - Anne (Host) Hey guys, it's Anne from VOBOSS here. 00:06 - George (Guest) And it's George the Tech. We're excited to tell you about the VOBOSS VIP membership, now with even more benefits. 00:13 - Anne (Host) So not only do you get access to exclusive workshops and industry insights, but with our VIP plus tech tier, you'll enjoy specialized tech support from none other than George himself. Enjoy specialized tech support from none other than George himself. 00:27 - George (Guest) You got it. I'll help you tackle all those tricky tech issues so you can focus on what you do best: voice acting. It's tech support tailored for voiceover professionals like you. 00:35 - Anne (Host) Join us, guys, at VO Boss and let's make your voiceover career soar. Visit VOBOSS.com/VIP-membership to sign up today. 00:46 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent1 today. Rock your business like a boss, a VO boss. Now2 let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza. 01:10 - Anne (Host) Hey, hey everyone. Welcome to the VO Boss podcast. I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza, and I am so excited today to have one of my favorite human beings on the planet here with me, and that is George the Tech, George Whittam. George, thank you so much for being with us today. 01:23 - George (Guest) Oh, it's great to be here. It must be the East Coast vibes or something, you know. We're from the same sort of corner of the country. 01:30 - Anne (Host) I think so. I think so. Gosh, bosses, if you are not familiar with George, you should be, number one. I'm so excited to talk to George today because we have come together in a collaborative effort, so to speak, and we're excited to kind of talk about that and talk about how you can boss up your tech and your audio in your studio and in your business. So, for those people that don't know George, gosh, since 2005, George has dedicated, and in George's bio it says that you've dedicated your career to serving the technical needs of voice actors, podcasters, and recording studio owners. 02:08 Guys, actually, George has dedicated probably his life, not just his career. I mean, since I've been in voiceover, George has helped me umpteen billion times, and he has been the audio engineer technician to the stars, to all of my voiceover heroes. And literally, if you've got a tech issue, George can solve it. And so I'm just excited that he's here to talk to us about things that we can do to boss up our studios and boss up our audio. And in 2017, you launched georgethetech.com, which expanded your business like a boss, from just yourself to an entire team of people which can assist anybody with training, studio design, audio processing, stacks—anything you can think about it. You're a '97 graduate from Virginia Tech, woo-hoo, East Coast, with a bachelor's degree in music and audio technology and a minor in communications, and that's pretty darn awesome, because not only are you a geek, but you can talk to people about it. 03:15 - George (Guest) I can communicate, that's right, that's right. 03:18 - Anne (Host) And gosh, if you haven't ever heard of... well, it was E-Webs and then it was VOBS, the voiceover body shop, George and Dan Leonard. For 13 years now, I've had a podcast for gosh, going on nine now, but 13 years they ran their podcast and video. Actually, what did we call it back then? 03:39 - George (Guest) It was a podcast, but it was a vlog, podcast, live stream, live stream. Yeah, it was all of it. 03:45 - Anne (Host) But all of that amazing content is still on YouTube. And now you are the co-host and producer of the Pro Audio Suite, which is wherever your favorite podcasts are located, right next to VO Boss. So after that long-winded introduction, George, I am so glad to have you. Thank you so much for taking the time to be with us. 04:10 - George (Guest) Absolutely, and believe it or don't, that was definitely the abridged version. There are very, very long-winded versions of that that I've described on many podcasts if you want to hear more about all of the background. 04:24 - Anne (Host) But yeah, it's just so much. 04:26 - George (Guest) I mean, yeah, you're my people. Voice actors are my people. I love working with creative talent, and I have found that, through a test that I took not so long ago, that I'm exactly split left and right brain. 04:37 - Anne (Host) Oh my gosh, I'm right down the center. That's why we get along, I'm quite sure, because I feel that I'm left and right brain too, 50-50. 04:44 - George (Guest) Yeah, yeah, so there's this ability to balance those two worlds, and you know, we brand ourselves as performer-friendly techs because we feel we get actors and performers and that we're not here to talk directly to tech engineers. We have helped engineers solve problems, but that's not our main tribe. Our main tribe are creatives, actors, podcasters—well, creators, people that have to deal with technology to do what they do, and we just enjoy working with folks like that. You are our people. 05:18 - Anne (Host) Well, I like being your people. So, George, let's talk a little bit about your business right now, George the Tech, and what it is that you do. And I mean, obviously you serve the voice acting community, but you also serve anybody that has an audio need or a tech need. Tell us a little bit about your business. 05:38 - George (Guest) Yeah, George the Tech is framed around supporting voice actors, and now we've added into that tribe. We've brought in the tent to now really include content creators and podcasters, because we've been dealing with more and more podcast-specific studios. But how we do that is in many different ways, from one-on-one consulting time with me, which is really kind of like—I wouldn't say the first place to start, because it's the most expensive to work with me one-on-one, but because it's going to be always the most expensive to work with the CEO—we have a tremendous number of services at much more friendly price points, down to the most popular and, I would say, best value bang for your buck service, which is called a soundcheck. And so soundchecks are where we listen to the audio. Oh, really, me? I'm still hoarding all the soundchecks. 06:29 I don't let anybody else do the soundchecks. I personally listen to every sample that comes in and I give notes. I'll look at your pictures of your studio. I'll even look at a video of how your room is set up. I want to see you at your microphone. I want a selfie of you at the mic so I know exactly what you're doing with your mic, and I evaluate all of that stuff with you. There we go. Selfies! Need a selfie on the mic, it's really important. Selfie on the mic. 06:53 And I don't mean a selfie like cheesing at the camera like this. I mean, I want you to be on mic and I want you to send me a picture of you at the mic in the position you read your scripts. It's so critical, and I'll look at all that. I'll listen to the audio, and I'll even listen to your processed audio if you do that in the production workflow as well. I'll take all of that and give back my notes about how you're doing and what could be improved, and if everything's great, I'll tell you everything's great, and all that under one price. Great, I'll tell you everything is great, and all that under one price. So that is now something that our members that we're going to talk about are going to get access to, among many other things. So we provide sound checks, and then from there we have more technical services like processing presets. So when you're doing an audition and you want that audio to sound a little more polished, it's the perfect nail polish, it's the French tip, it's just the right smoky eyes. 07:48 - Anne (Host) Now you're talking my language there, George, I love it. Oh my gosh, I must have it now. 07:56 - George (Guest) It's having just the right touch of all those things for the kind of work that you're doing. That's appropriate for the kind of work you're doing. I like to say you don't want to show up in theater makeup for your first date unless you're dating another theater actor. 08:10 But otherwise, you want to show up appropriately, and so these processing settings are very much custom to your voice. They're not cookie cutter, they're not templates. They become a template you can use, but of those templates to your voice, the sound of your room and your studio, and the style and genre of voiceover that you're actually working. So the kind of processing I'll do in an audiobook is going to be very different from the processing I'm going to do on a commercial. So that's what the processing presets are all about. 08:44 - Anne (Host) I love that. I'm going to add to your story here. So back in, I'm going to say 2010, maybe it was, maybe it was 2009. George, my father had built me a studio. I had moved to the West Coast and my father had built me a studio, and at the time we didn't really know anything about what was required in building a good sound studio. So we did what we could and it was passable. But I needed to upgrade and I needed it to sound better, and so I found George, and George paid a visit to me back in Irvine, California, and really helped me to level up my studio with a lot of things. And I ended up after your assessment, and we took your advice and we put everything together, literally. I had engineers that were like, they were like, "Oh my God, your studio sound is just amazing," and I had so many compliments on that studio, which basically was my father's studio. But then it was blessed by George and enhanced by George, it was juiced. 09:47 - George (Guest) It was juiced. 09:48 - Anne (Host) With, like you did, the French tip. So it's like we added acoustic panels, we added a bunch of things. We had, I remember, the studio clouds, and so all those things made my sound so good that I for years after that would have people complimenting me, asking me if I had like a studio brick studio or—because this was before—asking me if I had like a Studio Bricks studio or because this was before. 10:07 - George (Guest) Some fancy brand name. 10:08 - Anne (Host) Yeah, this was actually before those were even a thing. 10:12 And not only did you help me with my physical studio, but you helped me with stacks, and I remember I think I wrote you a testimonial back in the day, like you saved me like 50% of my editing time just by those stacks that you created for me, because I was able to take those and process my audio that I was sending to my clients and literally half of my work was done for me already, like a little bit of EQ, some compression, getting rid of some of the breaths, and that was back in 2010. 10:41 And so literally, George, I still have—like, I have a new studio and I got one more set from you, but literally I used those for years. I was in the same studio, had the same mic, and honestly, like they just worked amazingly well for years. And so they're very, very valuable, those sound checks and the stacks that you created and any sort of help. And it amazed me because, even though you came to see me in Irvine, when I then moved and then created a new studio, you could do everything remotely. I mean, what you can do remotely is really wonderful, like you can listen to somebody's audio and then you can make recommendations based on that. And you said you want selfies of "where's your mic, what does your studio look like," and so, based upon all that, you can actually just do consulting from remote. 11:28 You don't have to actually be on site, although you could be if it was local, right? And I guess, if the client wanted you to just come and do a full-scale like build of studios... yeah, once in a while we do that. 11:39 - George (Guest) Yeah, once in a while it happens. 11:40 - Anne (Host) So I mean, I firsthand have had George for the longest time helping me with my audio, and also back in the day, and this goes into what we're going to be collaborating with. When I started VOPeeps, bosses, I don't know if you've heard of VOPeeps—hopefully you have—but I've run VOPeeps since 2010. And in 2010, I created a networking group that was physical, like people came to my house. 12:03 - George (Guest) Can you imagine? 12:04 - Anne (Host) Yeah, people came to my house for meetups, for meetups, and ultimately first it was just a bunch of voiceover actors and, you know, it was a get-together and we kind of like—we either had a little potluck and then it turned into something a little more extravagant where my husband would start making food and kind of catered it for us, and ultimately it was like-minded people getting together. And then I decided that I wanted to branch out and make it even bigger, and so I started inviting all my heroes, all my VO heroes, and I would interview them in my living room. I would interview mine in the living room, and ultimately people would come to the house and it would be a really cool local networking meetup. 12:44 - George (Guest) I remember helping to figure out some of the tech and stuff to make that work. It was quite an adventure. 12:50 - Anne (Host) I started streaming back in... 12:52 I want to say 2010 for sure, when streaming technology was just beginning, and I had had some experience working in technology from my previous job, and so I first started streaming those meetups live on the internet from my laptop computer on my coffee table with a blue snowball microphone and a little, I think it was a Logitech webcam. But the cool thing was is that I now went from a local meetup to a global meetup. And then, as we grew and I did these gosh, once a month for almost six years, and as we grew, I said, "Who's the person that can help me to really make this stand out and have great audio and stream my networking meetups over the internet?" Well, who better than George? So I hired George to come stream my meetups on the internet and take care of all the video recording and the audio. And it was great because you came with all your equipment and I had equipment. You helped set it up, and gosh, we had a good time, didn't we? We did. 14:00 - George (Guest) We did. It was such great memories. 14:02 - Anne (Host) Yeah, they grew and grew, and so that's pretty much my VO peeps. I have lots of great memories of it being physically in my house, and I think in 2017—was it 2016 or 2017—was when, finally, once a month, it became a lot because they grew. I had up to 55 people in my home that my husband was making themed meals. It was packed. 14:23 - George (Guest) It was sold out all the time. Themed drinks. 14:25 - Anne (Host) We started selling tickets to it, and gosh, we would definitely stream it live. We would have Zoom. We would have people working out via Zoom, and so we would actually have them piped in, piped in. We have Zoom piped in to my TV. 14:40 - George (Guest) It was sophisticated, it really was back in the day. I mean, you know, it was the closest to like having hybrid training where you've got people in the room and you've got people online, all at the same time. Yeah, it was very, very ahead of its time. 14:53 - Anne (Host) All across the globe. And so George was that tech geek that was there to like, put it together and help me. And I'd be like, "I want to do this." And George would be like, "Okay, let's—we can do this, we can do this." And so if you guys need outside of just audio—I mean George, the tech, right—any kind of tech, and I know bosses, as

BOSSes Anne Ganguzza and Danielle Famble tackle the often-overlooked financial realities of building a successful voiceover career. Their candid conversation reveals that achieving "overnight success" is typically the result of years of dedicated work and strategic sacrifices. They emphasize that time is a crucial financial asset and discuss the importance of making deliberate choices about where to invest it, alongside monetary resources. Anne and Danielle share personal experiences of delaying immediate wants to prioritize long-term business growth, highlighting the need for patience and a willingness to explore various income streams, even those outside one's primary passion. Ultimately, they empower voiceover professionals to take control of their financial journey by making informed sacrifices and defining their own path to sustainable success in the voiceover industry. 00:02 - Speaker 1 (Caller) Hi Anne, this is Jen Keefe from Real Women's Work Podcast. I just wanted to come on and say thank you, thank you, thank you for the series you're doing on AI and voice. I've listened to VO Boss Podcast for a few years now and it's always been informative and helpful, and not only is this series not an exception to that, but it is just the cherry on top. It has been so comforting and helpful to learn about this industry and I just thank you for taking all of the time you must have taken to research and understand, to know what questions to ask so that we're all better informed. It is just awesome, awesome, awesome. I feel excited and confident going forward into the future in the VO industry, all because of this series that you're doing. So thank you.  00:46 - Anne (Host) Hey guys, it's that season again. Are you feeling that tickle in your throat? Don't let a cold or flu slow you down. Combat your symptoms early with Vocal Immunity Blast, a simple and natural remedy designed to get you back to 100% fast. With certified therapeutic grade oils like lemon to support respiratory function, oregano for immune boosting power and a protective blend that shields against environmental threats, your vocal health is in good hands. Take charge of your health with Vocal Immunity Blast. Visit anganguzza.com to shop. 01:31 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a boss, a VO boss. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza of.  01:45 VO Boss. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza. 01:47 - Anne (Host) Hey guys, welcome to the VO Boss podcast and the Boss Money Talk series. I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza, and I am so excited to be back with special guest co-host Danielle Famble. Danielle, yay, hey, glad to be back, Danielle, it's been a while.  02:03 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, it has.  02:04 - Anne (Host) And you've been traveling.  02:05 - Danielle (Guest) I have. I have been traveling. Me too, I just got back from the JMC Euro Retreat in Dublin, which was amazing. I went a couple days early to go shopping and had a really great time Speaking of shopping, I really like your shirt.  02:22 - Anne (Host) Oh my gosh, Well, thank you. I really really resonated with your shirt. Oh my gosh, Well, thank you. I really really resonated with the shirt. I also happen to be traveling in Europe and happen to go back to Amsterdam, which I absolutely love that town, and I saw this in the store no sacrifice, no success and it just had all these really positive, like motivating messages on it and I said, wow, I just really resonate with that and I must have it, and so I bought it and I wanted to wear it it.  02:44 And I said, wow, I just really resonate with that and I must have it. And so I bought it and I wanted to wear it today, and I think there's a message for all of us bosses. No sacrifice no success. Let's talk about sacrificing as it relates to the Money Talk series and financials.  03:00 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, no, that's a huge part of financial success is sacrificing, sacrificing for your business, sacrificing the short term for your financial goals that are probably long term. That's a huge part of it. And I think that on the other side of that sacrifice, as your shirt says there is some level of success, because you need to be able to delay gratification sometimes to be able to get to success in what you're hoping to achieve in life.  03:27 - Anne (Host) Yeah, that's an interesting point that you bring up delaying gratification. You're absolutely right like I want this and I want it now because I feel like it's that kind of a I don't know. I feel like we're in that kind of culture these days where things are coming at us fast and we want things fast and a lot of times success does not come fast and so we need to kind of step it through. I was actually talking to one of my students the other day about like the steps I took to ultimately achieve my overnight success which, as I've said before on the podcast, took how many years.  03:59 I mean it took close to 10 years for that quote unquote overnight success.  04:05 But it took a lot of sacrifices, and not just financial, I mean. I know that this is the money talks, but financial can also mean your time, because your time is in essence money, especially when you're talking about your business.  04:17 - Danielle (Guest) Oh for sure, when you're talking about your business, there's parts of it that you just need to sort of stair step up.  04:23 So, you're probably front loading a lot of the education in the very beginning and that's a lot of time and it could be a lot of money, but it's mostly time intensive. And then from there then you can kind of take what you've been learning in that education phase and then implement it. But if you want to go from new to pro and you want it to happen quickly, if you try to go for like speed, you're going to be missing some things along the way. So the sacrifice is probably going to be sacrificing your time, it's probably going to be sacrificing your money and it's going to be making some difficult decisions. I mean, even with our business.  05:01 When I first started, I wanted a really expensive booth. I wanted the booth that I saw everybody else had on Zoom, and at that time I did not have that booth money. I just didn't. My business was not bringing in that much income and instead of just going after what it is that I wanted immediately, I chose to stair-step it and I chose to sacrifice what I wanted at that moment for the greater good of spending the money on coaching and spending the money on demos and things like that. And through that, for me success has come and I can afford that booth at some point. But now my goals have changed and the booth is not really the main thing that I'm wanting now. I'm wanting more education, maybe buying different mics or computers or peripherals to bring into the booth. So once you delay that, then you can kind of give yourself the time to recalibrate and readjust in your business.  06:00 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I love that you talked about like you're evolving, like because it does you stair-step it, but then your goals change and so even myself, I mean it's always, I think, an ever-growing, especially if you want to grow your business. Because I find myself I'm looking to diversify and to get into other things. As you know, everybody knows, I'm like a serial entrepreneur, but I like getting into other aspects of the voiceover business or other genres, getting into other aspects of the voiceover business or other genres, and so I've been actually spending a lot of time of which I don't have a ton studying and educating myself and taking classes.  06:31 And it was funny because, like last weekend, I literally I wasn't recording a VO Boss episode which is really odd for me because typically I do that on Saturdays but I found myself spending the entire day learning a new software so that I could see what were the capabilities, how could I implement this in the next step of growing my business. And that required me to sacrifice my entire Saturday and, of course, my happy hour and everybody's like you work so much. But I'm like, honestly, I really believe that doing the work now and getting the education and doing it during the times when I have available, I think it's going to and then commit to what they're going to do to get to those goals and figure out what sacrifices they're willing to make to get to those goals.  07:33 - Danielle (Guest) That's kind of the part of building and growing your business and scaling the business is that you're probably going to be making a lot of turns along the way, and are you okay with that and are you okay with the sacrifices that you're going to need to make in order to achieve those goals? So for you last week it was a sacrifice of time, but that time sacrifice is going to reap huge dividends later on when you know how to use that software. So really was the time sacrifice like that much of a sacrifice for you, or?  08:02 - Anne (Host) Is it something that was?  08:02 - Danielle (Guest) Really just an investment into your future.  08:05 - Anne (Host) And, interestingly enough, it was an investment into software, which I don't anticipate doing myself. I was looking into a new video editing software so I can create more content to get out right, so that I can again, like, get my brand out there. And so will I ultimately be spending all my time creating or editing videos? No, ultimately I'm going to be hiring somebody to direct them, but I want to know enough about this software to be able to intelligently direct them. And I think also, it's something to mention that, like you spoke about in the very beginning, we have to take sacrifices and maybe not get everything that we want immediately. Like our ultimate goal, I think, in voiceover is let's do something that brings us joy and let's make money at that. And ultimately, I think, along the way of achieving that goal, you might have to do things that may not bring you joy but will bring you income while you are trying to achieve that growth.  08:59 So I know for a fact when I was getting into voiceover and I went full time and I think I think I really speak to the people who are like they're part-time, maybe considering full-time, or they're part-time, considering dedicating more time to it that maybe they don't have and they've got a full-time job and they really hate their full-time job and they don't ever want to do anything like it again.  09:19 Well, I'll tell you what those skills are, what you have in order to ultimately, right, possibly, bring income in on a steady basis. So there might be an interim time where you might have to do consulting in something that you're really good at right. That can maybe help people so that you can bring in enough money to continually like reinvest that money into the growth of your career. And so I wanted to just say it may not be immediate gratification, like the society I think is these days, like I know myself, like I want it right away. I'm impatient, but I do believe that those steps to success and financially and when we talk financially we talk investing your money, having the money to invest as well as your time, which ends up turning into being money for you- oh, for sure, I always think that you need to follow the dollars and do whatever you can to get to your next dollar in business.  10:14 - Danielle (Guest) And if that is education, then follow that. If that is consulting, so that you can have additional money coming in, so that you can use that to channel into your business, then do it. Figure out how you can bring in resources and revenue so that you can use that to then grow your business. And I've said it before, I'll say it again it is totally okay to have your side hustle be what can fund your main hustle until it's time Like that's totally, totally fine, because there's no glory in being a starving artist.  10:52 I really don't think that that's the way that is going to be a long-term measurement of success for you to sort of take away from your current in the hopes of a possibility of a future when you could be doing things along the way to help like infuse capital into your life and your business to help keep you going for longer.  11:12 - Anne (Host) Absolutely. I mean, when you've got a family that might depend on that income, right, so it becomes more than just I mean really depends on where you're at in your life and who's depending on income coming in to pay a mortgage or to support a family. And so in reality, I'm always when my students are asking me should I go full-time into voiceover and they have a family and children, I'm like, well, you've got to really think about this because you need to be able to secure steady income coming in to be able to support, and it's wonderful and I get it. I mean, I think we all get to this point, or a lot of us get to this point, when we've been in a corporate job for a long time and we just it becomes toxic, we hate it and we're like we just want to do what we love full time.  11:55 Well, that may not be achievable within a day, obviously, or even a week, or even a year, because, as I mentioned before, it took me a good oh, I'm going to say maybe eight years before I really got a return on my investment when I went full-time. And so make sure you have that financial cushion to be able to support whatever it is that you need to support yourself, other family members, and it doesn't matter if you're an Uber driver or maybe you're taking the skills that you have during your day job and creating a side hustle business out of that in order to make the extra income. And I always try to say, well, let's make my side hustle. Something I love to do Doesn't necessarily have to be voiceover, and so I love podcasting, so I'm looking to expand my podcasting, consulting that kind of a thing. So how can I do that effectively? Right, how can I get the message out? And, gosh Danielle, after I figure out, like, how I want to grow, guess what comes next? I've got to market myself.  12:53 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, and there's probably going to be more sacrifice in order to get to where you're going and also the sacrifice is looking at what is and figuring out what is or isn't working. So you're looking at your business, the landscape of your business now, and voiceover is working. The other things that you're doing are working, the podcasting is working, and so you're thinking, all right, well, all of these things are working, what else can I do and how else can I build it? And that's great. But also, if something's not working, then you really should look at that and say, all right, well, do I need to keep going down this path? That isn't working.  13:30 Maybe it is keeping a day job that you don't love and don't feel fulfilled with, but maybe you still need to be bringing in an income because you've got people to support and yourself to support.  13:40 Maybe it's just finding a different job that can help bring in income while you're working toward growing your voiceover business. Maybe there are certain genres that you really like, but you're not making a lot of money in and so maybe it's looking at all right, I do enjoy this particular genre, but I'm making a ton more money in a different genre. Let me keep cultivating that, but have the passion working in this genre that I love. That maybe isn't paying as much. Those kinds of hard questions are really the sacrifices I think that we're talking about here, not necessarily just financial, but understanding that to get to the level of success that you're wanting to get, whatever your measure of success is looking at the decisions that need to be made and making the hard choices and making those sacrifices, be it financial or otherwise, to then get you to where you're trying to go in your version of success.  14:35 - Anne (Host) I love how you brought up the different genres too, because it's something else to look at. When you're doing a genre, there's so many people that want to do, let's say, character voices or animation or promo, and it's something to be said that, while you're working toward that goal right, you can also financially invest yourself and your time into other genres that can be bringing you money in. While that happens and of course, that happens to be one of my specialties happens to be the corporate market, and I'm always trying to explain to people that it may not be the most glamorous and it may not be the one that brings you the most joy. However, when you talk about market share, you've literally got so many opportunities for corporate narration compared to maybe, let's say, animation, because there's only so many animated shows out there. However, I upped my number, I've now researched and my number is now 33.2 million registered companies.  15:28 It used to be 30.4. Now it's 33.2 million companies that are registered with the SBA in the United States, and so that's just a lot of opportunities, a lot of potential opportunities, because you've got those companies that probably have a website and they probably have a YouTube channel and they need a voice at one point or another to be able to talk about those products and services.  15:48 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, that's a really great point, because there's part of this industry that can be purely just economics. It can just purely be about what pays the bills. And then there's other parts of it as actors, but figuring out what it is that you can do that pays the bills and also fills your soul. And it may not be the same thing, but how can you put your time and your energy and your efforts into creating as much money and fulfillment as possible in your day, in your life, in your business?  16:31 - Anne (Host) Yeah, absolutely. And it's so funny because I'm always like with corporate narration, people just think it's so boring and a lot of people just think it's so boring and I'm like, wow, I completely don't think that, because to me it's just challenging. It's challenging to be able to find the story in some of the corporate copy. It's not that it's necessarily to me boring, but I love the challenge. As an artist, I love the challenge of where is the story here and how can I tell it in the most interesting way. And also, just again, looking at the absolute size of the market that is out there and also understanding and keeping my eye on all sorts of other things happening in the industry. And so, while I have my eye on that, making sure that if I love being an entrepreneur and I love being a boss, how am I going to continue to bring in money when, let's say, maybe times are slow in the industry, Like there are also slow points in the marketplace Right now? Certain genres I think are busier than ever, like political.  17:33 And of course anybody that's doing commercials for the holidays, right? I mean, they've been busy. But maybe during the holidays there are certain other genres that aren't as busy, right? Maybe corporate narration isn't quite as busy, maybe e-learning is not quite as busy during that time. But understanding the fluctuations in the market and when those happen, for you I have the genre I always want to do character work, and so I'm continually working towards that. But to supplement my financial income, I'm going to do some corporate or I'm going to do some e-learning, or I'm going to do some telephony, whatever that is. And then understanding where the fluctuations are in the marketplace, and so if there is just no work coming in, then invest your time in figuring out how you're going to grow that business. And again, which translates to your time is money.  18:18 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, and that is the measure of entrepreneurship, that is the measure of being the VO boss. That's what it means to look at. Okay, what's going on in the industry, what's going on with the things that I do well or genres that I would like to do well in, and how can I maneuver myself to be able to take advantage of all of it? Maybe not at the same time, but be able to move laterally into and out of genres when they're at their high points, or maybe moving out of something if there's a strike, for example. You know that's happening right now. Or figuring out, like, what's going on in the market and how you can maneuver your business to be the best positioned that it possibly can be. Like that's the name of the game. It's not just about what you do and how you show up in front of your mic. It's really about figuring out how you can position your business to win, no matter what the circumstances are as much as they say.  19:17 - Anne (Host) This is not a competitive industry, because every voice is unique. In reality, I'm competing against myself so that I can continually progress forward and win. I love it that you said win, because, danielle, I'm not competitive at all, right Me either.  19:32 - Danielle (Guest) I'm not competitive at all.  19:34 - Anne (Host) Not at all, but yeah, but really yeah, how can you win? How can you win? And, like you were mentioning earlier, what is your definition of success? Because there are some people that financial is not necessarily the definition of success and I know that we're going to actually have an episode coming up on like determining what is your hourly rate, like what is your hourly worth? Right In trying to determine what's working and what's not. How are you determining? Okay, I'm spending an hour learning this and what is that time worth? Versus if I get a commercial, I can make this amount of money. How does that translate into my hourly rate? If I do a corporate narration and I get paid once, how does that translate into my hourly rate? If I do a corporate narration and I get paid once, how does that translate? So you can kind of decide how you can move forward in your business and what you should work on, maybe what you should focus on or what goals you can set for the next level.  20:24 - Danielle (Guest) For sure I love that.  20:25 I think, then, that also brings a lot of ability to the individual voice actor to be the person who is choosing what winning and success looks like, and it's got nothing to do with what you're seeing in these Facebook groups or how other people are running their business.  20:40 It's got everything to do with what you have chosen, what you've decided, and it gives you something to do. I feel like sometimes it feels like so many things are out of your control. When it comes to running a business, when it comes to being a VO boss, it really is like, okay, well, I did this audition, did someone choose it or not? Have I been chosen? Are all these people, these gatekeepers out there? Is it working in my favor or not? But when you have something that you personally can do and you can take ownership of how you are running your business, it's empowering and really what you were just talking about is the individual business owner and entrepreneur and VO boss being able to empower themselves and choose what is your definition of success and what can you do to make sure that you get there. And then it's got nothing to do with anyone else choosing you or not choosing you. It's got everything to do with what you've done to make yourself the most successful that you can possibly be.  21:38 - Anne (Host) I love that. I feel like that could be a completely separate episode too, talking about what is it that you own, right? What is it that you own? There are things that we don't control, like do we get picked, do I get feedback? And that's the stuff I think a lot of voice actors get preoccupied with, like oh okay, so why am I not getting picked? Or I audition, but I never hear back, and so they spend all their time worrying about that.  22:02 But I think what you said is just absolutely on point, like what is it that you can do to control right? That you take control of what it is that you can control and that's going to be what moves you forward and that's what's going to keep you, I'm going to say, out of the mindset of self-sabotage or imposter syndrome. And so I can't control whether somebody picks me or not necessarily for my audition, because there are so many elements that aren't in my control. But I can control my performance. I can control how good I am right. I can control my performance. I can control how good I am right. I can control getting coaching if I need more. I can control marketing in my business, right. I can control researching what's happening and what trends are happening now. So those are things I can do.  22:44 - Danielle (Guest) You can control your audio quality. You can control how much money you're saving and reinvesting in your business. You can control who you work with. You can say no to working with certain clients and certain jobs if it doesn't serve you or the rate doesn't serve you or the subject matter does not serve you. There are so many things that are in your control that owning that and really living in the peace of the ownership of that really can be what helps you feel like you're actually doing a little bit more every single day to be the VO boss that you ultimately want to be.  23:20 - Anne (Host) Yeah, and your mention of how empowering that is, I mean that is so empowering. I mean I know that, me the control freak. Maybe that's why I'm a serial entrepreneur, I have no idea because I can control that, I can control the education, I can control the direction that I'm moving and if it's not necessarily moving the way I want it to or expect it to, I can move it again and I can change it again. And so that keeps me the control freak, which it can be a good thing, it can also be a bad thing, but I think for me, I utilize that personality trait that I have of always wanting to have control in a positive way to help me grow and then still understanding that I have these things under my control and then understanding, almost more importantly, what it is that is not under my control and not allowing that to affect me in any way in terms of my mental state.  24:06 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.  24:09 - Anne (Host) Wow, what a great conversation. So yeah guys, no sacrifice, no success. I am a big believer in really taking the ownership, making the sacrifices that you need, and that sacrifice doesn't necessarily need to be money. It could be your time, your dedication, your effort, your spirit, right, all of that. Whatever, it takes that kind of go-get-em sort of boss attitude that just goes for it and just tries things. If it doesn't work, try it another way, right, and really tries not to allow any of that to get in the way, or even yourself to get in the way.  24:45 - Danielle (Guest) Yeah, I love it.  24:45 - Anne (Host) Danielle, I love it. Great, great conversation. I'm going to give a great big shout out to our sponsor, ipdtl. You too can connect and network like bosses. Find out more at IPDTL.com and, guys, you have an amazing week. Go out there and make those sacrifices, because we know you guys are going to be great successes. So have a good one, guys, and we'll see you next week. See you later, bye.  25:13 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) Join us next week for another edition of VO Boss with your host, Anne Ganguzza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at vobosscom and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution with permission. Coast-to-coast connectivity via IPDTL.   

BOSSes Anne Ganguzza and Lau Lapides delve into the expanding role of on-camera presence for voice actors. Their conversation highlights how versatility across different media is increasingly vital in the entertainment industry. They explore the shift from on-camera work being a side hustle to becoming a fundamental aspect of a successful voiceover career. Anne and Lau emphasize the power of authentic connection, both vocally and visually, and discuss the importance of building supportive online communities. They also touch on practical aspects of self-presentation, including beauty, fashion, and the impact of confidence, ultimately encouraging voice actors to embrace their full presence to thrive professionally and personally.   00:02 - Anne (Host) Hey, bosses want to be that well-rounded talent that's always in demand. I offer coaching in a variety of genres, including commercials that grab attention, medical narrations that educate, corporate scripts that inspire and e-learning modules that engage. Find out more at anganguzza.com.  00:24 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a boss a VO boss. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguzza.  00:43 - Anne (Host) Hey, hey everyone. Welcome to the VO Boss Podcast and the Boss Superpower Series. I am here with my lovely host co-host. I don't know Host and co-host. Look at you, Lau, I called you my host.  00:57 - Lau (Guest) I could be called first things. I'll tell you what, right yeah.  01:01 - Anne (Host) I'm here with my lovely co-host, Lau Lapides. So wonderful to see you. It's been a little bit it has.  01:08 - Lau (Guest) It's awesome to be back. I'm excited 2025.  01:11 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I apologize. I was a little bit late, Lau, because, as you know, I had to do the hair and the makeup because we do video things now I'm so glad.  01:20 - Lau (Guest) I'm so glad you finally took the time to look appropriate. I'm so glad.  01:22 - Anne (Host) I'm so glad you finally took the time to look appropriate for camera. I'm always such a slob on camera, oh we're divas.  01:27 - Lau (Guest) You know that we're divas, we're fashionistas.  01:31 - Anne (Host) Well, it did take us five minutes prior to pressing record to finish putting our lipstick on. I think what's so interesting, Lau, is that there's like all sorts of parallel careers with on-camera and influencer marketing that can complement your voice acting career.  01:50 - Lau (Guest) And that is amazing because I never thought of it and I know a lot of listeners may not have thought of it, but you're actually involved with it and this is like something we have to talk about today is your on-camera appeal as a voiceover talent. I think it's been a long time that we haven't really faced that. No pun intended, we really have to face our face.  02:12 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I mean, I agree and I'll tell you what I know.  02:15 We had an episode prior to this where we talked about on-camera and how it was a great additional side hustle, but not really, it's not even really a side hustle, right, there's a lot of agents out there that really look for people that can be on camera as well as do the voice acting, and I think that, besides the traditional on camera, slash, theater, slash voice acting, I think there's also this whole other world of I hate to say, influencer marketing, but there's essentially your presence online that can help to get you and your brand known, and some of it may be influencer, some of it just may be.  02:54 You're creating those videos that other people see, and I'm kind of for this year, because social media is a little bit chaotic and I know there's a lot of people who are kind of fleeing social media, but I think that at some point here's my prediction right my prediction is that people will still form those safe communities, and those safe communities because we've been globally connecting with one another, especially in our industry, right, because we don't have an office, we all go into and meet and talk by the water cooler.  03:23 We are all online, and so I think we're all going to be in our communities wherever they may be, whatever platform they may be, and maybe not even on a platform, maybe just our own Zoom meetings, our Zoom water coolers where we can work with one another and talk with one another and also work with our clients and potential clients, and so I think it's important to talk about what's involved in kind of preparing yourself for this, because for so many years there have been people who want to be voice actors have always thought, well, I don't want to be on camera and that's why I want to be behind the mic, and that's what I love about that. But I think that we really need to kind of open our minds to thinking about our on-camera presence.  04:04 - Lau (Guest) Gosh, there's just so much to unpack about what you just said. We're going to break that up into segments. I think the first one is, of course, as an agent. The first thing I'm thinking about is and I just work with voiceover talent but I'm thinking about do you do on-camera work? Do you also do on-camera work? Because whether you're facing a boutique agency or you're up for representation in one of the bigger hubs, that's one of the first things on their mind is what do you do across the board? Do you do print work? Do you do modeling? Do you do on-camera ads? Do you do, of course, voiceover?  04:36 No longer are we compartmentalized into just being a voiceover talent. Now we're going to work with clients and reps that really want to know wow, could you be the face of this product, like you are? Could you be the model for what we're putting out there? And I'm being unafraid because I hear oftentimes and I know you do too oh, I got a face for radio and you know it isn't even funny anymore, because it's far from truth, it's far from accurate. We don't want you hiding behind a microphone. We don't want to not see you, we want to see you.  05:09 - Anne (Host) Yeah, it also plays into again, guys. I know that, like I said, we covered a lot of this in another episode, but I think it's really relevant and timely that we talk about it again today, because you know, we're talking about people wanting, needing that human connection right Again. We've got chaos right now, social media division everywhere and I think that human connection with like minds and I think that that's so important, that we establish that and on camera, helps that. It totally helps that, that we are representing ourselves as the human beings who have a voice, and not just a voice but a face as well, and we're real. We're real and we want that real connection.  05:53 - Lau (Guest) And we know that in the entertainment industry, seven out of ten jobs are going to go to real people, real looking people, real sounding people, real, authentic personalities Like. We know this for a fact. If you don't believe us, turn on media, go to a movie, listen to the radio, you'll hear what we mean. Right, we just don't hear as many announcers. We don't see as many announcers unless we watch the Super Bowl. So we really want to kind of be aware that, as real people, we're getting a lot more work these days. Real people were getting a lot more work. These days. They're super gorgeous, super model, super of what we think we should be on camera. But that's not accurate. For what today's market?  06:32 - Anne (Host)  Exactly and like even though we kind of were kidding around Lau and talking about putting our lipstick on for you know, for five minutes, that for me it's something that I love, that for me, five minutes, that for me, it's something that I I love, that For me, that's something that I am so passionate about. For myself, anyways, it's certainly not a requirement. I mean, my gosh, look at the celebrities out there that are beautiful without makeup, without the filters. I mean, that's a whole vibe, that's a whole thing.  06:59 So it's not necessarily, guys, that you have to put makeup on it's all about representing yourself and who you are, and I happen to find a very creative artistry in makeup. It's like a newfound passion of mine after so long of when I was behind the mic and not necessarily going out so much, where I didn't really think about it, but now it's like you know what, let me just get a little zhuzhed up for the camera, and I find that I really enjoy it. However, one thing that I have to say, and this is because, guys, I am dabbling a little bit in influencer marketing. I mean, I don't like to call myself an influencer, but I do work with a few brands where I will talk about the brands and put myself on camera and display the product and tell people what I think about that product, and so there's a certain presence and I have to prepare for that. That is something that doesn't come. I'd like to say, it came naturally to me, but there's practice involved and there's preparation time involved in that.  07:58 And it's funny because I do a lot of things Lau and this is like yet another thing on my plate and people are like, well, what are you influencing now? And I'm like, well, not really, I'm just basically doing something I'm passionate about and, yeah, I'm getting paid. I mean, hey, if I can get paid for it, that would be fabulous. And so I am working with a few select brands that I love, and so, because I can be real and human and tell people how much I love them, I can get a little kickback. It's like affiliate marketing. I'm very much on board with that. So I've been doing that and I'm excited to say that I'm on a couple different platforms now. And no, I'm not giving up voice acting. No, I'm not giving up my coaching or demo production business, but it's something I do on the weekends. But Lau, it takes me, like for me to get ready before I present on camera. I mean, it's an event.  08:44 This hair is an event.  08:46 People that have seen me at VO Atlanta. Know, I mean, I love hiring makeup and hair for VIO Atlanta. For me it's like going to the spa, but it is an event, so you have to really put your time in and it's also a different way of marketing yourself. And so there's a whole different world, a whole different way of doing it, and I have to educate myself on how to do that.  09:05 - Lau (Guest) And I'll tell you, you do this brilliantly. I think you need to move yourself forward, whether you're a male or a female, in a very unapologetic way. So if that is part of your jam, and that's what you do, and that's what you love, or that's what you want to get into the fashionista side of our industry, then go for it. There shouldn't be any explanation.  09:25 There shouldn't be any exposition about why you're doing it, or are you leaving, right? You just love it, right? So that's how we're motivating people to be thinking about this. I also want to talk about Annie. I want to talk about the regular people, the real people who get up, they get into their booth, they're behind their mic all day.  09:43 - Anne (Host) I'm a regular person.  09:45 - Lau (Guest) But I mean someone who authentically does not want to be in front of the camera. They don't like dressing up, they don't want to put on makeup. I get that.  10:01 That's probably most people to be honest with you and I'll tell you something. But that's also very real and very engaging and very like. It's like reality TV. Yes, I just want to say a shout out to those people because we love you, we appreciate you, we do. All we're saying is show up as the best you that you can put forward. And if you we just had a conversation about this last night In corporate it's very much the same way.  10:18 If you have a meeting in corporate on WebEx, half the people show up. They don't even turn their videos on in, they don't Show up. Turn on your video, Feel good about the way you look, Feel good about how you're presenting, Own your little square Right. Or if you're going into an office, come in and command the space and feel at home. Feel good about that. That's going to change your physical presence, right. And it's amazing when we look at actors, especially on-camera actors, and we say this actor isn't a particularly aesthetically beautiful person. But boy, are they sexy. Yeah, right, why are they so sexy? In fact, Hollywood always had a name for that. They call it sexy ugly people.  11:01 - Anne (Host) Because they have a confidence.  11:03 - Lau (Guest) They were just real people, regular people, but they were so confident. This is me, you know, yeah absolutely yeah, and they just come in and be like, yeah, this is me and that's you, and I'm excited, we're here, right, let's do some stuff. And that is the beauty of the mind, right? The aesthetics of the spirit that is coming along along with your gorgeous makeup color and your hair, and whatever you choose to do to embellish whether you do that or not, it's got to come from the inside. It's something internal, right?  11:35 - Anne (Host) It's all in how we talk to ourselves, right, it's all in the stories that we tell ourselves. And it's interesting and here's a shameless plug, Lau, I don't know if you're aware, but I did launch a new podcast in January called the Myth of you Self-Awareness in a Digital Age, and we talk about common myths that you might believe about yourself and we talk about the hero's journey. Believe about yourself and we talk about the hero's journey and we talk about how your experiences and how you can learn from your experiences and how you can rewrite your story. You can choose to tell yourself that you're beautiful, whether you feel that or not, and then ultimately really hopefully progress and move forward and be happy, successful.  12:11 All that good stuff and the fact is is that your mind is such a powerful, powerful tool, how you speak to yourself, and we talk a lot about those things. And I'm just so ecstatic to kind of delve more into that area because we've talked about it here as well, because being an actor, being a voice actor, it's very much a mental game, it's very much self-sabotage, the imposter syndrome. All of that is very real and this is such a cool podcast where we really explore that even further. You really need to talk to yourself. And it's funny even in my Pilates class the other day in my head we were doing center and balance class and of course we were on the BOSU ball and I was completely off balance because I feel like I don't know what happened to my balance as I got older.  12:51 But in my head.  12:52 I was going God, I suck at this. And at the time that I said that in my head, I swear to God, my Pilates instructor said now, guys, you may think that you're not good at this, but it's all in what you say in your mind. So remember that if you continually say I suck at something, right, I suck at balance, she goes. Don't say that to yourself. You need to manifest that you're good at balance.  13:13 You're good at center and balance.  13:15 - Lau (Guest) And ultimately your body will follow. And when someone says I don't look good or I'm not excited about getting on camera or I don't really want to offer, you know.  13:26 What are they really saying, like there's a subtext there. Yeah, they're really saying I'm not ready to show up and be present, I'm not ready to put forward who I am, and that's different than what you do. I think a lot of us work so hard and so much, annie, that we self-identify as our work, as our business, which isn't a bad thing, but we lose the sense of the separate self, and a separate self has to feel good about just being and showing up and being present.  13:57 - Anne (Host) Well, how interesting is that? Because when we talk about voice acting right and we're always talking about bringing yourself to your acting, to your read that is really allowing yourself to show up and be present, because, human to human, I connect. Well, I connect to you because of your personality, because of who you are, not because I think you look pretty or I think you sound good. Exactly.  14:15 It's all about bringing your personality, and that's what I try to tell people in. Voice acting it's not so much about how you sound really at all, I mean. How many times can we say that?  14:25 - Lau (Guest) I mean I feel like every coach in the world forevermore will be like voice acting really isn't about how you sound, I mean it's about the connection Right and if you can get out of yourself of your way to the other right to really pay attention and to be curious, to be authentically inquisitive like a child. Like what is that? What is she saying, what is she doing? Why is she? That is what is sexy and attractive and compelling to an audience, is an audience wants to be taken in by curiosity.  15:01 They want to feel that they're interesting. Right, if you can make someone feel that they're interesting because you're interesting. Make someone feel right Make someone feel right.  15:12 - Anne (Host) Isn't that like what it's?  15:12 all about Make someone feel Make someone feel.  15:14 - Lau (Guest) That's the reason why I listen or watch or pay attention to anything, really Okay so, listen, how do we connect this now to this base of your fashion, your branding, your look, your feel? When you get up in the morning, annie, and you think, okay, I'm going to get dressed, I'm going to do my makeup, I'm going to do my hair, I'm going to do my ritual, how do you select, how do you choose where you want to go with that, based on what is going to unfold in your day?  15:40 - Anne (Host) Well, honestly, I mean I just make sure that I get up and do things for myself that are going to make me feel good. Because if I can feel good, right, feel awake, feel healthy, feel alive, yeah, and feel like I've cared for myself, like self-love is not selfish at all, and I've learned that a lot in the past few years, especially because when I had gone through a lot and gained a lot of weight, I'd lost a lot of my confidence. I had a lot of inner dialogue that was not good, and now I said I need to make sure that I make the time to have self-care, because self-care for me really sets the tone, sets the day for everything that happens next, whether I am working with a student, whether I am working with a client. If I feel good about myself, then I can feel good and portray and project that in everything that I do and to everyone that I'm with.  16:38 - Lau (Guest) So, in essence, what you do as your choice, certain things aren't your choice, Like our age, is not our choice. It just happens and that's natural and we move through it. But our choice in everything else we do and how we put ourselves together. Our choice then ricochets and affects other people's choices because their perception of you shifts based on your choice. That's really powerful when you think about that, how much empowerment you have within you, but how much power it has for someone else's potential change for their future, absolutely.  17:14 - Anne (Host) And everything that you say to yourself and do for yourself is a choice. Right, there's always a choice. You always have a choice. Like I just took a great course on happiness. Happiness is a choice. Happiness, joy is a choice. And if you choose joy which I'm always talking about choose joy, do something that makes you joyful, then that will ultimately not only help you but also affect everyone that you are in contact with in every thing that you do, work-wise, personal-wise.  17:42 - Lau (Guest) It's a domino effect.  17:44 It's a domino. So how does someone let's say we take someone who's not accustomed to this way of thinking and just kind of gets up, grabs a coffee and goes to work or does what they need to do, gets up, grabs a coffee and goes to work or does what they need to do? What are some of the steps that we can offer? To revisit and again, I'm not just talking about your business brand, I'm not just talking about your persona in your business, I'm also talking about your personality and persona in your life how do they go about re-envisioning that and making new moves in that direction?  18:17 - Anne (Host) Well, first of all, as we were chatting about earlier, get enough sleep. That's part of self-care right.  18:22 Get enough sleep because.  18:23 I was recently very, very tired I'm kind of recovering from a cold, you can hear that and I had quite a few sleepless nights, while my husband also had a cold and was coughing, and I just was jolted awake multiple times a lot of times because I was worried. But anyways, running on little to no sleep does not help anything when you're trying to start your day out right. So I would say that, and again, it's got to be like how can you start the day? I know a lot of people say this, but I will say honestly what are you grateful for? How can you start your day on a positive note? Because when I was overtired, any little thing could go wrong and I just let it upset me Like I ended up being angry, I ended up crying, I ended up eating more. It was horrible. It was like this cascading sort of trauma.  19:09 - Lau (Guest) Bad choice. Yeah, it was a bad choice fondue.  19:12 - Anne (Host) Yeah, right. So if you can again start the day with figuring out what are you grateful for, what are you happy for? I mean, I know it's been a tough start to the year. I know a lot of people have suffered health issues, it's been chaotic out there in social media and politically, and turbulent in the world, and I think that we need to have our safe spaces where we can still acknowledge and no one can take that away from you by the way.  19:34 - Lau (Guest) I love that, no matter what. I love it.  19:36 - Anne (Host) No one can take your joy away from you. No one can take your inner state right and your choice of joy and gratefulness away from you.  19:46 - Lau (Guest) Yes, yes, amen, sister. And we know this Again my tattoo that says resilience, resilience. So many people live in horrors, yeah, horrors, yeah. So many people live in horrors, horrors, but still make the choice to have joy in their daily life.  19:58 - Anne (Host) Yeah, absolutely Because joy is small.  20:00 - Lau (Guest) It's very, very minute. It's a minutia choice to see things in a joyous way. I'm all for that. I'm going to give a practical and pragmatic one. Sure, okay, in the morning look at your closet. If you have more than one, go to your different closets. Look at your closet and make a concerted effort to choose something you haven't worn in the last six months and it's going to feel very uncomfortable to you because a lot of those clothes in there I guarantee you are for when you get thinner, are for when you feel younger are for that special occasion, or for when you feel younger, or for that special occasion or da-da-da-da-da, but you refuse to get rid of it because you've got some hopes and dreams and memories connected to it.  20:41 - Anne (Host) I have a sparkly shirt, mom, I'm going to challenge you.  20:43 - Lau (Guest) I love it. I'm going to challenge you. I got up and wore the sparkly shirt. Choose one of those. And here's the challenge. If you're not willing to choose it, I need you to give it away.  20:52 - Anne (Host) Oh yeah.  20:53 I need you to give it away I like that Because it's actually holding back your joy.  20:57 - Lau (Guest) It's holding back your beauty. It's holding back your full measure of confidence, Because there's something in there that says oh, someday I'll wear it, Someday I'll look good in it. Someday. It sounds small, doesn't it? But that's like a huge feng shui move. Oh absolutely.  21:11 - Anne (Host) There's like a whole science behind cleaning your closet. A whole science? Yeah, absolutely, and I'm that person that you know. I had clothes of every size in my closet Small for when I lost the weight, and large, and it's funny because after this last round of losing weight, I literally took everything that was sized larger than I was at the time and I said that's it, I'm donating it.  21:35 - Lau (Guest) That's right, let someone else enjoy it, Let someone else live in it and appreciate it and have a life in it, and it's not yours anymore, right?  21:44 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Annie, it's not yours anymore.  21:45 - Lau (Guest) I got another one. Go to anywhere Go to Sephora, go to Mac, go online, go anywhere you like and get a new palette for yourself of color. It could be makeup, it could be wardrobe I love that. It could be hair accessories, it could be props whatever you want it to be. If you're a man, you might choose something that you're going to carry every day. Whatever. What's important about that is it's fresh, it reflects you today and it's hopeful. There's optimism in that right, that little moment of re-envisioning they used to have. They don't have as many now, but they remember Annie, the days where they had a lot of makeover shows Like every show was the makeover show.  22:26 They don't have as many of those anymore, but I mean, the idea of makeover is something I think internally that as human beings we need a couple times a year. We need to make ourselves re-envision, reinvent, so that we don't get static and held down and stale by the past.  22:44 - Anne (Host) Well, we don't want to talk about my makeup collection.  22:48 - Lau (Guest) I kind of do because you have the best makeup. It is large, I kind of do. It is a large collection. Build-a-beans we want to know, annie. It is a large collection.  22:56 - Anne (Host) Still the beans we want to know, annie, it is a large collection which I actually have to go through because they tell you, you know, after six months you need to dispose of your lipsticks your eyeshadows, tell the truth.  23:03 - Lau (Guest) I have a ton. How many?  23:03 - Anne (Host) closets? Do you have full of makeup? Well, I don't have closets, but I have lots of drawers.  23:12 - Lau (Guest) Wait, let me guess I'm going to say six.  23:15 - Anne (Host) At least three, but they're big drawers. They're big, they're like double-sized drawers. Don't believe her, it's got to be six. But there's a point, though, when you can't have too much and you've got to go purge, and so when you purge, that also is a wonderful feng shui cleansing ritual. But I like the fact that I have every color palette in the world, I feel. But then it's funny, because if I watch somebody like a video on Instagram and I see somebody with a different color, I'm like, ooh, I like that color, and so it's something new. It doesn't even have to be a makeup color. It can be like maybe just like a new product, and the product does not have to be expensive. I kid around about my Chanel lipsticks, but honestly, I have found much more cost-effective lipsticks lately in different colors that are amazing.  23:57 - Lau (Guest) Okay, Now I'm going to come from the real world too, because the real world would say, okay, that's fantastic and those are great products, good quality products too. But let's say I don't want them, I can't afford them, they're not for me. I might go over to the dollar store. Oh, absolutely.  24:11 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) I might go over to CVS In fact I might go over to CVS.  24:12 - Lau (Guest) In fact I might go online, so there's a lot of places you can get very similar.  24:17 - Anne (Host) Just watch your ingredients right, Make sure you don't have allergies that you're going to break out. Oh, there's a brand that I use. That's very drugstore cheap for facial products I mean. I used to buy it. Can you say what it is? Can you tell us ELF, elf.  24:32 - Lau (Guest) We love Elf.  24:33 - Anne (Host) I mean, it's good stuff, and I've been actually I replaced my entire. I do a lot of makeup from them and I also do skincare as well. I love it. I love it, so I'm not spending a ton of money on it either, and so you don't have to spend a lot of money.  24:47 - Lau (Guest) And again, it doesn't have to be makeup, but if it makes you feel good, absolutely I think you need to move it out too within a certain amount of time, just for, like, cleanliness and bacteria. Yeah, absolutely that, if you are using it within what is it, annie? Six to eight months, or something you're supposed to get rid of it?  25:03 And the other thing, too, is we all know don't double dip, right. So get your one-time applicators whether it's your eyes or very sensitive areas Don't double dip, because then all the bacteria is going into your makeup. These are things like that a lot of folks don't think of, they don't know that are so, so helpful, right what?  25:22 - Anne (Host) other tips? What other? Okay, so what sort of tips can we give for people that are not wanting to wear makeup? Let's say, maybe it's not makeup related, All right, I got one.  25:30 - Lau (Guest) I got one. This is for everyone, but men love this and you're seeing this more with aesthetics lines is taking care of your skin. So at any age, it's really important to hydrate, to exfoliate, to stay out of the sun or get a little vitamin D but not too much and really be careful with your skin, not just because of skin cancer and those types of things, but also because you want to have this inner radiant feel. You don't want to feel like a saddlebag, you don't want to feel like you know you've been worn down.  26:01 - Anne (Host) You know what I?  26:02 - Lau (Guest) mean Like someone's going to sit on you on a horse. You know what I mean. Like you want to feel fresh. You know? One of the things I love is I love humidifiers and a manicure pedicure can help anybody, I don't care who you are.  26:15 - Anne (Host) Thank you, can I? Tell you how many times my husband will be like, hey, do you want to come with me? Just to like keep me company. And oh, he'll be like, well, okay, but I know he enjoys it. Are you kidding me? How can you?  26:25 - Lau (Guest) not, I mean it's incredible, you know it's incredible.  26:31 - Anne (Host) What about a facial Massage?  26:33 - Lau (Guest) Oh my gosh, get a massage.  26:35 - Anne (Host) I am a big believer in massage. I feel like it moves fluids and it gets rid of toxins. Big believer in that.  26:42 - Lau (Guest) Now what about changing out one piece of your wardrobe? Because we all get comfortable. We have comfy clothes. We tend to wear them every day. You and I do similar things with the glasses. We tend to switch out our glasses just because we get tired of wearing the same glasses. It's part of the fashion, it's part of how you feel, it's part of how you look on camera. That's a very simple thing to do. To have I wear cheaters. I'm not into prescription just yet. I need the prescription.  27:10 No, I don't mind saying to people, I'll go to the dollar store, I'll get 10 pairs of glasses. I'll put them in all different places that I know I need to use them. I just went up. I think I'm like a 2.0 right now, or 2.5 or whatever it is, and that's enough for me. I don't need any stronger than that. And that way, every time I put them on, I have a slightly different feel, because it maybe matches the outfit or maybe matches the occasion. Maybe it just feels differently to me.  27:36 - Anne (Host) Right, let's see One there. You go Right here in my two. Wait there you go. I have three different pairs of glasses right here, so like I've got a tortoise shell.  27:46 - Lau (Guest) I love and I love your glasses. I've got black. I love your glasses. One more thing I want to mention too. I think I've got a red in here too. Who doesn't? I mean, red is the best, red is a power color.  27:57 - Anne (Host) This is my original boss glasses. They're gorgeous, Gosh.  28:00 - Lau (Guest) I love them. What about? Let's talk about jewelry for a second.  28:03 - Anne (Host) Oh, I love jewelry.  28:04 - Lau (Guest) So now a lot of folks might say I don't wear jewelry or it's too expensive, it breaks. I'm telling you go costume, go costume, oh God yeah. And think about how that jewelry reflects a piece of who you are. For instance, it might be culturally based, it might be a particular designer that you like, where they're from internationally. It might have a symbol that you care about. It might be a locket with a photo in it.  28:33 - Anne (Host) There's so many ways you can wear jewelry right. Amazon has a lot of great costume jewelry.  28:36 - Lau (Guest) That is reasonably priced. Just saying I wear costume a lot more than I wear the real thing.  28:41 - Anne (Host) A lot of this is Amazon costume yeah.  28:45 - Lau (Guest) Yeah, I wear a lot of beads. I really just am in love with beads because they break. You give it a little wish and a prayer and then you go on. I don't worry about it at all. You just don't worry like you'd worry about a very expensive piece. It's just fun. There's a fun in wearing different watches.  29:02 - Anne (Host) Well, it's kind of like I wear a lot of bling and it's funny because a lot of this is like vintage, a lot of it is my mother's and people will be like, well, wow, you're wearing a lot of diamonds there and I'm like, well, here's the deal. If they're not on my finger, they're in a safe and it doesn't make me feel close to my mother.  29:17 It's not that I'm trying to like say, oh, look at all the diamonds or look how sparkly. I mean I just want to feel close to my mother, and so that to me. I made that decision a few years ago. I said you know what? I am not going to the time, annie, with actors.  29:30 - Lau (Guest) Figure out your hair already. You know what I mean. Like a lot of people, are like well, I'm going white and I don't know if I want to go white. I've got red in it and then I'm like listen, it's fun, it's fashion, you can change it. It shouldn't be something that you feel married to or that you hate.  29:53 - Anne (Host) Yeah, I've never felt married to my hair, although lately, I mean, I have long hair. Should I cut?  29:58 - Lau (Guest) it. Can I take your hair? I love your hair. I'd like to see what I look like with long blonde locks.  30:03 - Anne (Host) But it's funny because I for a very long time had very short hair and so it really just depends. Oh, I didn't know that, oh yeah. When I was growing up I had very short hair. I had kind of like that pixie cut, and so I never had long hair until later on when I decided to let it grow and then it was just the thing, and then sometimes a little bit of it fell out when I was sick.  30:26 So then it grows back. Hair does grow back, that's right.  30:29 However, it is just hair and gosh Lau. There's always a wig, I know Right, there's always a wig. I know Right, there's always a wig.  30:37 - Lau (Guest) As we started this conversation by saying most things are choices, most, not all. My age is not my choice. It is what it is and I work with it, but most other things are my choice. My height is not my choice.  30:49 - Anne (Host) right, right, my voice is not my choice either. No, but as you train your voice. Yes, exactly, is not my choice either.  30:56 - Lau (Guest) No, but as you train your voice and you find different ways you can find different shades of your voice, then that's a nice choice to make is what can I do with my voice and where can it go? That does become a choice. So, wow, this conversation could go on and on, couldn't it?  31:09 - Anne (Host) I feel like we need to have more coffee and chit chat about makeup. I know, Bosses believe it or not, this does have a lot of relevance to you and, even though we were talking about fashion and makeup and influencing it, really, guys, get yourself out there because and show your humanness, show who you are in all aspects of your career. Really, I think that's one thing that's going to keep us moving forward in turbulent times and keep joy in our hearts and really, I mean, help us to maybe even propel our businesses.  31:38 - Lau (Guest) I love it and I'll leave everyone on this. Don't forget to smile, because we use that as a technical tool in voiceover but aside from that, it makes you feel good and younger and connected and happy and joyous, and so that is just your little technical tool for the day. And a lot of people say you look nicer, prettier, more warmer, younger, like all those fun stuff we love to hear just by smiling.  32:04 - Anne (Host) Well, great conversation, Lau. Thank you so much. It was wonderful to get back together with you and I'll give a great big shout out to our sponsor, ipdtl. A great big shout out to our sponsor IPDTL. You, too, can connect and chit chat about cool things like makeup and hair and fashion and voiceover and on camera things. Find out more at IPDTLcom. You guys have an amazing week and we'll see you next week. Bye.  32:30 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Join us next week for another edition of VO Boss with your host, Anne Ganguzza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at vobosscom and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution with permission. Coast to coast connectivity via IPDTL.   

BOSSes Anne Ganguza and Tom Dheere examine the state of the voiceover industry a few months into 2025. They discuss the direct impact of political and economic events on booking trends and content. The conversation explores how corporate messaging is adapting to cultural and policy changes, the ongoing role of authenticity, and the evolving, perhaps less threatening, landscape of AI. Ultimately, they offer a message of adaptation, education, and resilience for voice actors navigating the current climate.   00:03 - Anne (Host) Hey bosses, are you new to voiceover and not sure where to start? Join the VOPeeps VI Peeps membership and get access to over 350 hours of pre-recorded classes, a 15% discount on all VOPeeps, guest workshops and free monthly workouts. This membership is perfect for those wanting to get started in the industry. Find out more at vopeeps.com. Slash join dash now.  00:32 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. And successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today Rock your business like a boss a VO boss.  00:54 - Anne (Host) Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguza. Hey everyone, welcome to the VO Boss Podcast and the Real Boss Series. I'm your host, Anne Ganguza, and I'm here with the one and only Mr Tom Dheere. Hello, hello, hello, hi, tom. Oh goodness, tom, we're a few months into 2025, and it's been quite a year so far, wouldn't you say I would say yes, it has.  01:13 Lots of disruption going on in the world in so many ways I would say economically, socially, I mean. It's a new administration and I know that we spoke earlier about setting your goals and starting off on the right foot for 2025 and finding out who you are. Now that we're a few months in, I think we should go back and readdress what's happening. What's going on? How are you feeling about the state of things? Let's maybe open it up with the state of our industry, the voiceover industry. How are you feeling the state of voiceover is a few months into 2025?  01:49 - Tom What's interesting about it, Anne, is that your emotional state when you are watching the news or doom scrolling on social media is going to make you feel a certain way about how everything is going and, depending on your political inclination, you may think everything is going wonderfully or you may think everything is going terribly.  02:12 But then there's that pesky little thing called reality, which is the reality of how many auditions am I getting, how often am I booking, how much money am I making? Where are those voiceover bookings coming from? And, based on what's going on in the world, how much of that is directly or indirectly affecting our individual voiceover businesses?  02:39 - Anne (Host) Absolutely, and because we're service-based right. It affects us very much. Right, it affects us because companies are hiring us to, for the most part, entertain or sell. Right, and, depending on how the companies are feeling and companies are reacting to the issues that are going on in the world today, may have a direct impact on our business.  03:01 - Tom Yeah, so just as a point of reference, let's look at 2024. Our business? Yeah, so just as a point of reference, let's look at 2024. One of the major things that happened that had a huge impact on voiceover work was the presidential election, because, distressingly late in 2024, we weren't sure who was running for president on either side of the aisle, much less who their running mates were. That had a massive effect on corporations when it came to advertising budgets and what the content of the advertising would be. So last summer, 2024, july August there was a huge dip in voiceover work across the board because companies didn't know where to put their money.  03:46 - Anne (Host) Except in political maybe.  03:47 - Tom  Except in political.  03:48 And then when September, October, hit, the political campaigns all went crazy and a lot of the advertising got stopped up because so much ad space was being taken up by political advertising.  04:02 There was a noticeable drop in commercials for television and radio because all the political ad buys were taking up all the real estate. So that is one pretty clear, direct example about how what's going on in the real world affected what was going on in the voiceover industry. So let's look at spring of 2025 of what's going on right now is since there's virtually no political ads, as in campaign ads. I mean, there's a smattering of them here and there and a smattering of issue ads, but I didn't notice any more than there usually has been, which means the void that the political ads left got immediately taken up by commercials, left got immediately taken up by commercials. So there seems to be as much work as there was at any given time in recent voiceover history. I agree with you there. But the question is, what is the content and context of the ads and other voiceover genres and what are the casting demands and what are the performance demands for?  05:09 - Anne (Host)  Now also, we're thinking, I think, right now, commercial broadcast style voiceover. When we think about that, I agree with you that, yes, there's as much work, I think, as there ever has been. However, it's the content that might be changing and the context. You're absolutely right, but also there might be in terms of industrial content, like the industries that are advertising, the industries that are hiring voice talent that may or may not be broadcast. Maybe we're talking e-learning, we're talking corporate, we're talking all the different non-broadcast style voiceover. I think, in that realm where I'm seeing I'm not seeing a drop necessarily, but I'm seeing companies looking very carefully at what they're saying and what they want their brand message to be.  05:54 - Tom Yes.  05:54 - Anne (Host) And that is very key for somebody like myself if I produce demos, to make sure that the content is reflective of the culture and the society of the times.  06:06 - Tom Yes, culture definitely has an influence on advertising broadcast and it also has an influence on internal content, e-learning content, corporate industrial content. Actually, I just realized last year I had narrated an app for a large governmental organization, let's just say, and it was about harassment in the workplace and it was a big project and I did it all and the client was thrilled and I got paid and everything was great. Just a few days ago, the client wrote me and said hey, as a result of all of these executive orders that have been stripping away DEI policies and verbiage, I had to record a decent chunk of it all over again with the new policies and whatever we'll call it, awareness of it in mind.  07:01 - Anne (Host) Yeah, that's the biggest thing that I am seeing and, again, we're not here to be political. However, the two of us need to take a realistic look as to okay, so what are companies having to do to maybe adhere to policies? Because companies that maybe depended on support from the government may have to rewrite some policies. They may have to rethink how they're speaking, and that directly impacts a lot of the corporate work that I've done and also corporate training as well I do. The majority of my work in the e-learning aspect is through corporate.  07:34 I do some educational, which I think that also can be touched, but not in such a direct manner Like, let's say, dei or I'm just trying to think like, what other types of topics and support and safety and environmental. Let's think about environmental changes. Right Before, in a lot of corporate, there was a lot of talk about sustainability, talk about climate change. There was a lot of talk about sustainability, talk about climate change. Companies wanted their audiences to hear that they were supporting these things, because that's what mattered to the majority of people, that they wanted to be on board with them. Now, is that a thing when we're talking about alternative energy right, alternate energy are we going to now be talking about drilling and fracking versus, you know, solar power or those types of things.  08:18 - Tom  Yeah, absolutely, and top-down policies are going to have a trickle-down effect, but also, as in if federal laws are changing or being enacted or being repealed, that's going to have a big effect on a lot of the policies of the companies, because they have to be compliant with local, state and federal law to be able to run their business legally and effectively. So, yeah, it will definitely have a top-down effect. The other thing is economic.  08:47 - Anne (Host) Yes, we always have to look at the economics.  08:49 - Tom You always have to look at the economics of it, and we're still seeing what the full effect of all of these tariffs are going to be on multiple countries, which is going to the majority of economics say, regardless of your political bent, that this is going to create an increase in prices of many, many items. Or some items just may not be available in the United States to be imported and there's some based on reciprocal tariffs. There may be items that the United States manufacturers that cannot be exported.  09:23 - Anne (Host) Well, absolutely, and in terms of hiring, and in terms of hiring. In terms of hiring. I do know that I heard from one of my students, canadian students, that is it favorable now to be an American voicing a Canadian brand at this point?  09:38 Or vice versa, or vice versa, and so we have to think about that or any global brand. So it's interesting to really see. I think a lot of us are so in our studio bubbles that we forget how this impacts the industry, and it impacts our jobs. It can directly affect our jobs, and so it's something that we need to keep our eyes open to. And even though I know a lot of people are like I'm off social media or I you know, it's just sometimes it's difficult for people to watch the news I do think that we have to keep ourselves in touch enough to understand where the trends are going and what things are happening if we want to keep our businesses afloat. And now I guess the next question, Tom, is are we doom-scrolling our voiceover industry at this point? I mean?  10:27 - Tom How do you feel about it? There's a lot of hysteria and confusion and frustration and fear and anger on every social media platform that I have seen. Some of it is a healthy discourse, some of it is fear and hate-mongering. Some of it is a healthy discourse. Some of it is fear and hate mongering. Some of it is a cry for desperation and comfort and commiseration. It's a combination of all of those things.  10:44 So the question is do you shut off all of your social media and go take a walk? Sometimes that's a very, very good idea. But, just exactly to your point, anne, we need to keep an eye on what's going on. Also, all of the social media groups that we're on, they're national or international, so we can keep an eye on what's going on in other parts of the country and other parts of the industry and how it may or may not affect us. Like, for example, I just saw recently a social media post Somebody was talking about well, what happens if there's a recession? How is that going to affect the voiceover industry? Now, I don't know if you remember, but 2008, 2009, the great recession oh, I do. I did not remember and I went back and I looked at my numbers. I didn't notice any effect, noticeable effect, on it.  11:29 When COVID hit March of 2020, there was a noticeable dip, but then April it went right back up and 2020 was a pretty good year for me. But paying attention to things like that and you know, instead of being in your own little bubble, about being terrified about everything, but when you're actually doing your own research off of social media and looking for intelligent discourse on social media to find actual facts, and listening to people who've been around the block a few times, like you or I, who was like, yeah, no, the recession was not a big deal and oh, yeah, covid, things bounced back really quickly and, like I said, last year's, well, the strikes, the SAG-AFTRA strikes, the interactive strike, which is still ongoing, unfortunately, but hopefully they'll be able to fight for their rights and protect all of us. When it comes to AI and other bad practices, the voiceover industry seems to be relatively pliant and relatively resilient. Yes, because, no matter what, people are still trying to sell things. People are still trying to buy things.  12:28 I love that. You said that People still need to teach things. You know what I mean.  12:31 - Anne (Host) I mean, we are a company ourselves, right, we want to stay afloat.  12:34 We're right now looking at and if you aren't, you need to be right Always, you need to be looking at how are you going to stay afloat, how is your business going to continue to show progress, move forward, be successful?  12:46 And it just basically comes down to we're evolving. We're evolving with the times, right, and I think that I agree with you wholeheartedly that I don't think there's going to be any less of a demand for voiceover because, as you mentioned, companies still want to exist, they still want to sell a product, and so part of that sell is including a voice to speak the brand and to communicate that sell to others. And so I don't think it's doom scrolling, but I do believe that we need to educate ourselves on what the trends are, and not just the trends on the style of voiceover, although I think that it's good to understand, like, what's out there? How is that message being told? I always maintain that the best performance trend, the best voiceover performance trend to follow, is just be an actor, be a damn actor, right, because if you're an actor, you evolve, you can evolve and change, just like you need to do with your business.  13:44 And I think that you kind of touched on synthetic voices and AI Again, if we were to talk about how do you feel that that's affecting the industry these days? I can tell you, in my opinion, right now, I think that things are working themselves out, hopefully on a more positive note, and I don't think that the fascination is there for me. I'm not seeing the fascination there with voiceover jobs being stolen by AI. I believe that more of the focus needs to be on let's just protect our voices so that they're not being used without our permission and being developed into a synthetic voice. Or, if we have a synthetic voice, make sure that we're getting compensated for it. What are your thoughts?  14:22 - Tom  I generally agree, because everyone who decided that AI is the devil and decided not to get involved in any level of critical thinking or investigating about it, they have not changed their minds. The people that jumped in with both feet are probably still jumping in with both feet. What I think to your point you're saying is that everybody that wanted to give it a sniff, that wanted to try it out, test the water, has done it not just once, but maybe twice, because ChatGPT rolled out November 2022 and now we're in mid 2025. So I think there's been like At least from my observation, there's been like two rounds of companies giving AI a try. The first one was just to, oh, let's see what this is all about.  15:03 And then some were like, oh, this is great, this is perfect. Others are like, no, this is awful. And then there's others who, a year or so later, is like you know what? It's probably gotten two years better. Let's give it another try. And then same thing happens. Some thought, oh, okay, it's good enough now, or it's not good enough now, or making whatever decision. But yeah, the fervor from the consumer end, I think, has settled.  15:26 I think so too, and I think the terror from the voiceover end I think for the most part is settled. There's still questions about it.  15:33 - Anne (Host) Sure, and we've got great organizations fighting for us as well. Nava has been doing a phenomenal job in that regard, and if you're a business and you're not using AI in some capacity to manage your data, you're missing out. You're missing out on the boat, and we did talk about that previously in an episode, tom, you and I. It's just getting better and better at that, but it's not necessarily getting better at speaking your voice synthetically. But data management, I think, is just leaps and bounds and it's integrated in a lot of the products we're using and you may not even know it. It's kind of like.  16:07 I think I mentioned this to you before Back in the day I installed voice over IP phone systems when they first came out and people just said oh my God, they sucked, They'll never work, They'll never last, and ultimately, that's what we do today. I mean, it's all voice over IP. Everything that we're doing is we're communicating, Our phone lines are over data internet lines and it's just that's what's happening. Now. We have voice over IP and we don't even know it. It's seamless. So I believe that the AI data management is being built in seamlessly into things that we use like Google or I think you're using Google Workspace.  16:36 - Tom  I am using Google Workspace and Google Gemini is my favorite AI, google Gemini.  16:39 - Anne (Host) I have ChatGPT. I have a couple other products that do some automated things for me that are under the ChatGPT, and I continually look for tools that can help me to run my business more efficiently. So I don't think that in the voice realm of things. Oh my God. I just said a company.  16:54 - Tom  Naughty, naughty.  16:54 - Anne (Host) I didn't even know In the voiceover world. I don't know if synthetic voices are quite the terror and the scare that they were in the last couple of years.  17:03 - Tom  I still think the same thing is exactly what you and Andy said on that wonderful narratorlife interview that you did, which you said garbage in, garbage out. Good actors are going to make good AIs, bad actors are going to make bad AI are going to make bad AI. And the relevance gap I still think is growing, of people that are lacking in talent or training storytelling training, that are trying to enter the world of voiceover, are just not going to be able to get in. So I think that still stands.  17:28 - Anne (Host) And everybody I talk to we're talking about. Like anything today, if you want to capture someone's attention, right, marketing, wise, right it's all about authenticity. It's all about authenticity. It's all about give the human aspect to you. Even when I write a newsletter, it's like give somebody that vulnerable part of yourself that talks directly to them and doesn't just try to sell them or doesn't just try to, like, promote things. And give that authenticity. And I really believe that, as humans, that's who we are and that's what we have and that is just our strength. And when we are performing voiceover and we are voice actors, I think the more that we can be authentic in whatever genre we are voicing, the better off we are and the more successful we will be.  18:08 - Tom I agree. I had another thought about. Something that we were talking about a little earlier is that unemployment seems to be rising because of all of these federal layoffs.  18:19 Layoffs, yeah, and then as a result of tariffs.  18:20 if prices are going up, they have to maintain profit margins, so sometimes they need to cut labor. So what's been interesting in voiceover is that, as a result of AI, there has been less of the entry-level, lowest budget voiceover work, which means there's less opportunities for people who are entering the voiceover industry, and that may mean some people are not able to have a sustainable voiceover business model, so they're leaving the voiceover industry. However, if employment does keep going up the way that it does, does that mean more people are going to come back who want?  18:55 - Anne (Host) to give voiceover a shot. Yeah, exactly that was my experience when COVID happened.  19:01 And people, how many of my coaching business, I mean I had like tripled business with people who were using the time to learn voiceover and to get into voiceover and to utilize their voice for something good. I mean, I think that's still like. The desire of most people that get into this industry is they want to use their voice to do something good and, of course, make some money. Sure, that's always a key element to be successful in voiceover business. But what other aspects, tom, have we not covered here in this few months, now that we're in 2025? We've talked about, I mean, really, how dependent our industry is on the economy and the message that is out there, the brand that is out there.  19:50 - Tom Right. Yeah, it's dependent and it's independent at the same time, when we are getting into what seems to be a very interesting year on a sociological, social, cultural, political, economic level, what can we as voice actors do? So what should us bosses do? It's the same answer all the time, anne Right.  20:11 - Anne (Host) What do we do? Keep training, keep learning.  20:13 - Tom Keep growing, keep marketing, keep marketing. Keep following industry trends. Continue to have conversations with fellow voice actors. Continue to have conversations with your current and potential clients. Pay attention to what's going on on social media, but don't get sucked in by it. But pay attention, learn, grow, adapt, evolve and educate Educate yourself and educate each other.  20:33 - Anne (Host) Educate, adapt, evolve. I love that. Educate, adapt, evolve. I think that really should be our mantra for this year Educate, adapt, evolve and I think everything will be absolutely fine in this voiceover industry. And also just one thing that I want to make mention is that during those lean times where you may not be finding work or work slows down, it's always important to kind of go back and listen to other voiceover podcast episodes that I've had with Tom, of course, about your business and how to build your business and be successful, as well, as I've had a money series with Daniel Fambul, which talks about the fact that if times are lean for me or I'm considering investing more in my business, which would mean maybe I'm going to get coaching, maybe I'm going to get a new demo, maybe I'm going to get a new website which, by the way, I've done all those things and I've had to make a lot of investments this year, and so it's important to have the mindset right, the mindset of being willing to invest.  21:32 I think that's important being willing to invest in this career If you love this career and this is what you want to do and you want to grow, having the mindset of being willing to invest, and I, right now, in my own business, I've transitioned over to a new website, I'm doing a lot of new things that are on the scary side of things for me. I mean, I think if you're not scared every day, you're not taking a risk every day. And, by the way, this risk is not just a risk performance-wise or strategy-wise, it is a risk financially-wise, because I'm investing in a part of my business that I want to grow, and so it's not easy and it's scary, but it's something that I believe every boss needs to really take a look at and be willing to take a little bit of a risk. Take a look at and be willing to take a little bit of a risk, and I'm thankful that and, tom, we've talked about this I'm thankful that I have a little bit of a nest egg that I can make these investments yeah.  22:26 - Tom So my new mantra will now be if you're not taking risks, you're not trying, and if you're not scared you're not trying hard enough.  22:33 - Anne (Host) Oh, I like that a lot. Yeah, Tom. So I admit that I'm scared. Are you scared? Are you scared every?  22:39 - Tom  day. Am I conscious? Yes, of course I'm scared.  22:41 - Anne (Host) Yeah, what things scare you? I'm just curious what things scare you in running your business?  22:46 - Tom Well, I mean just as a basic normal, semi-normal neurotic human. I still have my imposter syndrome. I hear you I still have my FOMO.  22:55 I'm still afraid that 30 years later, that clients are just going to be like well we don't just like his face anymore and they're just not going to book me and they come back. They all come back, as in you know, most of them come back for all good reasons and other people don't come back for whatever other reason. 99% of the time has absolutely nothing to do with me. But my biggest fear is the fear of being irrelevant, and I've had a couple of times in my voiceover career where I, as a result of very poor business decision-making, I made myself less relevant.  23:28 The jumping off of Voice123 in 2013 and then being off it for seven years made me less relevant as a voice actor because I wasn't paying attention to what was going on in the industry. I was up my own you-know-what about it and making decisions based on fear, ego, insecurity and arrogance and ignorance.  23:47 - Anne (Host) Oh, my God, I just love that. You just you were so authentic with that. That's really wonderful. I mean, I love that you're sharing that with us because that's something that I think everybody can take and really learn from myself included taking these risks that have not always worked out and, yeah, a lot of it is because I was stubborn. I have a little bit of a stubborn streak. I'll admit to you that mine would be stubborn in feeling like what I was doing was the way and there was not another way to do.  24:18 It was the way and there was not another way to do it. And that stubbornness and not allowing myself to open my eyes, especially when because I hire a team of people right, and trying to do everything myself, thinking I was the only person that could do it, being that kind of a person, that control freak which I am that held me back. It was scary to me. I was scared that if I didn't control it myself, that I would lose control and that I wouldn't be able to grow the business. But quite the opposite happened. After all, that, when I allowed myself to be open to collaborating and working with others and it's one of the reasons why I love to collaborate with you, tom, because there's so much power in collaboration together and that is one of the basis is for when you want to run a strong business. I'll never forget Gary Vaynerchuk said hire people who are better than you to do those things and don't be afraid of that. Don't be scared of that and treat them right, because that's going to help you all grow and move forward.  25:07 - Tom Absolutely Surround yourself with smart people who disagree with you is another mantra that I've heard over the years, and it's really really true.  25:14 - Anne (Host) Yeah, yeah, I love it, tom. Thank you so much. I think that last nugget was the best of all out of this episode. I really love talking with you in these podcasts, so thanks again. I'm going to give a great big shout out to our sponsor, ipdtl. You too can connect and network like real bosses. You can find out more at IPDTL.com. Bosses have an amazing week and we'll see you next week. Bye.  25:41 - Speaker 2 (Announcement) Join us next week for another edition of VO Boss with your host, Anne Ganguza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at voboss.com and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution with permission. Coast to coast connectivity via IPDTL.   

BOSSes Anne Ganguza and Tolulope Kolade, a leading voice from Nigeria's vibrant voiceover scene, connect to explore the sonic tapestry of Africa's storytelling. They unpack Tolulope experiences building a career and community within a dynamic market, offering a window into the unique challenges and triumphs of voice acting on the continent. Listeners will discover the crucial role of genuine expression in connecting with audiences, gain understanding of the industry's growth in Africa, and appreciate the power of shared narratives across borders. Anne and Tolulope also discuss practical pathways for aspiring voice talent and the evolving nature of the global voice landscape.   00:01 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) Anne changed my life a few years ago while coaching me for my commercial demo. Since then, I've been traveling throughout Europe and the UK and I never miss a VO Boss podcast. It's just how I start my Wednesday, no matter what country I'm in. I love that I can stay connected with her and continue to learn about VO even from across the pond. Love you, Anne.  00:23 - Speaker 4 (Ad) Hey guys, it's that season again. Are you feeling that tickle in your throat? Don't let a cold or flu slow you down. Combat your symptoms early with Vocal Immunity Blast, a simple and natural remedy designed to get you back to 100% fast. With certified therapeutic grade oils like lemon to support respiratory function, oregano for immune-boosting power and a protective blend that shields against environmental threats, your vocal health is in good hands. Take charge of your health with Vocal Immunity Blast. Visit anganguza.com to shop.  01:00 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level. These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business like a boss a VO boss. Now let's welcome your host, Anne Ganguza.  01:22 - Anne (Host) Hey, hey guys, welcome to the VO Boss podcast. I'm your host, Anne Ganguza, and today I am honored to have a very special guest with me today, all the way from Nigeria, Tolulope Kolade, also known as T-Code, which is such a cool, I love that name. He is a Nigerian voiceover artist, podcaster and coach, and a 2024 Sova's Award nominee for Outstanding Commercial Best African Voiceover. As the creator of Nigeria's first voiceover podcast, Everything Voiceover's, the African Perspective, and the creative partner of the Association of African Podcasters and Voice Artists, APVA, T-Code champions the African voiceover industry, mentoring new talents and collaborating with top brands to bring impactful storytelling to life. I love that. I love that so much. T-code, it is so nice to have you on the show. Finally.  02:13 - Tolulope (Guest) Finally, Thank you so much.  02:15 Anne.  02:16 It's been years of listening to you over the seas and I can't express how excited I am right now to share the same podcast with you being a guest. Oh my God, I feel so great.  02:29 - Anne (Host) Well, I'll tell you what. You sent me, oh my gosh, years ago, a really lovely audio testimonial about my podcast. And I just recently if obviously you've been listening to the podcast, you know that I never really did any ads or anything and I finally decided, gosh, I should do some ads for my own podcast for however many years. And so I started featuring some of the audio testimonials from people, and I featured yours and then, all of a sudden, I got flagged in this amazing video that you created for me and bosses out there, if you ever want to do a testimonial that will get the attention of a potential client right, this is a very boss move. I love this .T-code Create a lovely video that does a nice shout out, that expresses gratitude, and it was a lovely video and I was so touched that you took the time to create a video and, by the way, the production value was just amazing.  03:20  kudos on the production value of that. I mean it was insane, and I was just so excited that you were excited and I wanted to talk to you. I mean, with all these accomplishments, you are quite a VO boss, and so I was only too happy to ask if you would be on the show, and my apologies because bosses out there. I don't know about this time zone slash day but I completely messed up the first time that we were supposed to get together, so I'm just so glad that we're finally here.  03:48 So glad to have you on the show.  03:50 - Tolulope (Guest) Thank you so much.  03:51 - Anne (Host) Yeah, so let's talk about your start in voiceover, because I think a lot of bosses here we know what happens in our own little bubble here, but it's difficult to really find out what's going on in other countries. And how is voiceover? How is it doing in Africa? And you're championing it. So I think it's a wonderful start to talk about how you got started.  04:14 - Tolulope (Guest) Okay, so I'm going to talk about how I got started and then we talk about the industry in Africa. I got started officially in 20. So there was the 2016 version of me getting into voiceovers and there was the 2016 version of me getting into voiceovers and there was the 2020 version of me getting into voiceovers In 2016. It was more of broadcasting. As a broadcaster, I worked on radio and that was where I got introduced to the world of recording audio.  04:40 Prior to that time, well, even while I was in university because I graduated from the university in 2015, I did a bit of radio stuff and that was actually the first time that I would do a voiceover. I wasn't a presenter at the time, but someone heard my voice and said, oh, would you like to come to the university radio station? Which I said okay, yes, I did. And I got there and they said oh, said oh, okay, what stuff have you got? So the radio station's name was something around Versity Radio at the time and I just said you're listening to Versity Radio, something around that, and they were like whoa, that was great and they allowed me do the voiceovers for the radio station, the audio branding and all of that at the time, but then I wasn't schooled about voiceover. I didn't really know what it was, so I continued my radio journey.  05:29 2016. I would go to other radio stations and do the same thing for the radio stations and the presenters on the radio. Then, 2017, I started understanding what voiceover was because I was officially working on radio at this time.  05:43 - Anne (Host) Did you have your own radio  at this time, and did you have your own shows at that time? 05:47 - Tolulope (Guest) Yeah, I had a show on radio, but I was more on tv because the establishment was a tv and radio station combined. Okay, so I was doing more of tv, but they would call me to do some of the promos for some radio and tv shows and I would do all of those at a time. But I still didn't understand what voiceover was until fast forward to 2019. I was working in another radio station. The demand for my voice had increased and some money started coming in, but very little at the time. So I started getting curious to how the industry in voiceover was at the time. So I started asking questions, I took online courses and 2020 was when I got into voiceover officially. So there were different versions of that.  06:40 But late 2019, I took a bold step to find anybody who would need my voice on the internet. So I went on youtube and I found some youtube channels by africans who were doing voiceovers on their youtube channel as to narrate stories on the youtube channel. But they weren't professional voiceover artists. But compared to what I was doing at the time, I could read better. So I would respectfully reach out to them and say Hi, I'm a radio presenter and a voiceover artist here in Nigeria and I don't know if you don't mind, I would love to record your voiceovers.  07:14 At the time I didn't have any idea of exactly how the industry worked, but I just wanted a platform somewhere to put my voice out there. So I reached out to a couple of youtubers and one of them reached back to me and was willing to offer me some stipend monthly for recording voiceovers for a channel, and that was how it started. So the moment I got to realize that I could earn a living from voiceovers and there was opportunity for me to improve and grow my skills, I took it so serious and I started looking for resources and I think it was 2020 and 2021,. I discovered your podcast and it was just a whole new height for me because I was connecting to the voiceover industry globally and that really just opened my mind to more about voiceover. So that's the story of how I got into this.  08:05 - Anne (Host) I love that. So prior to that you were full time in radio.  08:08 - Tolulope (Guest) Yes, radio and TV. I did that for about six years.  08:11 - Anne (Host) Got it. Got it Radio and TV. So where did we're going to fast forward to the podcast? Because you've been doing your podcast for a while now and now you realize that it's a labor of love. It is something that does require like a focused, like passion to creating content that goes out there on a consistent basis. Talk to me about what drew you into the podcast. Were there other podcasts, voiceover podcasts, let's say, specifically in your area, that talked about African voiceovers or voiceover in Nigeria? What prompted you?  08:43 - Tolulope (Guest) Okay, so my first foray into podcasting wasn't because I wanted to podcast at the time, and this was in 2019. So I was working on radio. I needed a medium to save my radio shows right, because people would listen. And radio is a medium yeah, radio is a medium where people just listen once and you can't rewind, you can't listen again on the go. So I had that program I was doing on radio and I wish to archive it. So I was looking for ways to do this on the internet for free, and that was how I stumbled on podcasting, because, of course, you could just upload an audio and it's there.  09:22 Right, right, right. So that was how I started I love that that's so interesting.  09:24 So that was how.  09:24 I started. I love that.  09:25 - Anne (Host) That's so interesting because I have to tell you that I wanted to get into radio but I wasn't, and so I said, well, let me create a podcast  09:32 So it's very interesting, and that was my radio. 09:36 - Tolulope (Guest) Oh yeah, it still feels like radio because I resigned from radio. In 2021 to face Voice of Us full time. Oh, okay, in 2021 to face voiceovers full time.  09:44 Oh, okay, yeah but back to the question of how the podcast came to be. So, prior to the time I was entering into the voiceover industry, there was no voiceover podcast that I had heard of. And 2020, I took a course at the voiceover workshop. That's one of the few voiceover training institutions we have in Nigeria, so I realized that there was more to this. People did this full time. There was an industry around this, so I was curious to know more. Podcasting was already getting more popular at the time, so it just made sense that there should be somebody on the internet podcasting about voiceover. So a friend shared a couple of podcasts and then I saw this article the top 10 voiceover podcasts in the world. Your podcast was a part of them, with a couple of other podcasters that I respect a lot.  10:37 - Anne (Host) Wow, I didn't even know that. That's awesome. 10:40 - Tolulope (Guest) Yeah, and then I checked it out and I just fell in love with it because the style of the presentation you were so real, so relatable. It felt like you were trying to help people, just groom them, feed them and you break down the stings. So I'd stalk to your podcast and I'd listen and listen. And I checked the African space. At the time there was only one lady from South Africa podcasting about voiceover and it was quite refreshing to find her at the time, but not in Nigeria. I didn't find anybody in Nigeria. So I wanted to start because I felt it would be so great for voiceover artists in Nigeria to share their stories.  11:22 So people can know what we're going through, because a lot of things needed to be restructured in the voiceover industry at the time, in my opinion. But there was nothing like that. So from 2020 the idea came, but I had this imposter syndrome because I was like, oh, you're just young into the industry, how do you expect to be the guy to host people and just talk about voiceovers? So I delayed the idea till 2022. And in 2022, nobody was doing it. I'm like, well, you have to do it. So I started the podcast. Prior to that time, I had the experience of podcasting. I'd worked on radio, I understood how to record a deed and put things together, upload a podcast. So I just took all of that knowledge and I started the Everything Voice of Us podcast, the African Perspective, which was for Africans, by Africans, to tell African stories.  12:16 - Anne (Host) I love that, you know. What's so interesting is that I don't know if it's a prerequisite or a requirement to be the expert if you want to start a podcast, because for me, I remember, before I started the podcast I started my VO Peeps group because I had moved across the country and I wanted to kind of get to know the people in my industry, and so I basically started to interview my heroes. I didn't necessarily present myself as the expert at anything, but I was absolutely interested in sharing resources and educating the community, and I think that that is a great way to look at any type of a podcast that you want to start out there, bosses, so that you can share and educate, and I think that is a really great angle to come upon it. And so I think for you, you do a lot of interviews in your podcast and I'm sure people are very eager to get their voices heard as well, and so it's kind of a win-win for both, for both of you?  13:15 - Tolulope (Guest) Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.  13:17 - Anne (Host) Yeah, what would you say has been your biggest I don't know your biggest takeaway from now starting and having a successful podcast. What would you say is your biggest takeaway from now starting and having a successful podcast. What would you say is your biggest takeaway?  13:29 What's your biggest gift from the podcast?  13:29 - Tolulope (Guest) That's a huge question, 13:30 - Anne (Host)  And what's the biggest challenge?  13:33 - Tolulope (Guest) Okay, so first the biggest gift from the podcast and then the biggest challenge.  13:38 I think the biggest gift from the podcast has been connecting me with the world.  13:43 Like the world is so big and there are people waiting to be heard and people wanting to hear more, so my biggest gift is that I've been able to connect with the world and share that network, or the stories that I learned across the way, with people.  14:02 Because of the podcast, a lot of people know me and because of the podcast I can also access a lot of people from different parts of Africa and even outside Africa, and it has helped me to grow such network that many prominent things happening in the voiceover and audio creative space in Africa. I am often involved in most of these things and it's just a very humbling experience for me. So the network is a powerful gift that I've gotten humbling experience for me, so the network is a powerful gift that I've gotten. I think the biggest challenge for podcasting, as you've said earlier, anne, is that it's a should I use the word thankless job, or it's a service, it's something it is. Yeah, it's a very sacrificial thing to do because literally I don't know how it works over there, but we don't get paid in Africa for podcasting.  14:52 - Anne (Host) No, we don't get paid here either, and to get sponsors is very difficult.  14:57 - Tolulope (Guest) It is. It is so. It's something that if you are not convinced, if you are not passionate and selfless, you're going to burn out real quick. So I have invested my time, my energy, my money into this. I had to create a team. I mean, for the first two seasons of the podcast, I was doing this independently and since, in theory, I took on some boss moves. To be honest, you inspired me as well on this episode you did, where you talked about podcasting and you I think it was the beginning of this year you said something about how much you spent on podcasting the previous year.  15:34 It's not cheap, was it like $15,000 or something. It was like $10,000 to $15,000,.  15:39 - Speaker 4 (Ad) Yeah, yeah, and when I heard that I'm like guy, you can do more. People at the top do a lot to get to where they are. So I decided, okay, I'm going to invest more into this. And they are. So I decided, okay, I'm going to invest more into this. And my focus was to help him build a better voice of our industry. That has always been my inspiration to doing many of the things that I do. So, yeah, that's my gift and the biggest challenge, the fact that you're just doing it on your own. But, yeah, it's still a blessing at the end of the day, Right?  16:10 - Anne (Host) Now you mentioned that you thought there needed to be restructuring or you were wanting to be active in restructuring the voiceover industry in Africa. Tell us a little bit more about that. How has it evolved and what do you want to do to restructure that?  16:24 - Tolulope (Guest) Interesting. So, interestingly enough, yesterday I had a conversation with one of the very respected voiceover artists in Nigeria top voiceover artist on my Instagram page where we talked about the evolution of voiceover in Nigeria and I see something very similar to that in Africa. Voiceover for the longest in Africa, has been heavily associated with broadcasting. I believe it's almost the same thing every other place, but the difference is that for a lot of African countries that I have observed, voiceover is still somewhat glued to broadcasting, meaning broadcasters are the ones who officially do voiceovers.  17:04 Not many people come to claim the career to be voiceover artists. It is still being viewed as a part-time side hustle, right. So when I was coming in, of course it started as a part-time stuff for me as well, but I met a few nigerian voice actors, like eric maximus, who I was just referencing, e, and a couple of people like that. These people stood out as full-time voice actors Chilu Lemba, you know, femi Bakes these are my colleagues and I was inspired and also, listening to you, I realized this was possible. So the things that I felt could be restructured is that I needed people to see this more as a business, more as an industry and, gracefully, some people as far back as 1999, 2000 in Nigeria had realized this is what we needed to do, so they created an association in Nigeria at the time called the Association of Voice Over Artists in Nigeria.  18:08 Oh, okay, yeah.  18:10 And this association has been for about 22 years. But unfortunately the growth of the association has seen a lot of challenges because technology came quicker the old era of voiceovers, where everybody had to go to physical studios with the agencies and directors and all of that had gone, but a lot of people here were stuck in that era. So the new era of having a home studio, you know, and working with international rates and how things are being done live sessions, directed ones these things were into the norm over here and I felt that we needed to do better. Our rates weren't standard, as it were, very low at the time when I came, and just the attitude of people towards voiceover is just like a side hustle. People didn't respect the craft. So these were the things that I wished could change.  19:06 Also, if you look at the American space, you had organizations that would fight for voiceover artists and you had resources for voiceover artists the coaches. There were people who had written books, there were award shows and things like that. We didn't have so much of those here. You hardly would find any book written by anybody about voiceover If you go to the internet, any book written by anybody about voiceover. If you go to the internet. There were no like very scanty.  19:35 So I felt like people needed to own this craft, people needed to build the industry, and I had to do what I had to do. There were a few companies, like training institutions that existed already at the time, so I just had had to contribute. I joined the association, joined another association called the African Association of Podcasters and Voice Actors, and together we started forming the policies and the building blocks, creating resources for voiceover artists, for podcasters in Africa, creating events like award shows. So we have the APVA Awards, we have webinars. We started creating these things and I must say it's been an interesting journey, a challenging one as well, but quite an interesting one since then.  20:17 - Anne (Host) Yeah, absolutely.  20:18 It's kind of like you're building it from the ground up, which I think is really amazing, and that is something that having knowledge of building things, being a kind of a pioneer in building things as the technology evolves and as our space voiceover industry grows.  20:33 It's a lot of thankless things, a lot of donation of your time, and so I think it's wonderful that you have really kind of gotten in on the ground floor so that you can help to develop policies and guidelines and then also you have a platform that's able to broadcast that out to the world.  20:51 And what I love is, and what I'm hoping, is that our connection here can also help you to be even more globally known, because that, of course, as I mentioned multiple times on my show, the podcast actually cost me money, but it also gives me a lot back in terms of people know who I am, lot back in terms of people know who I am, and so I think we know, and I think you must also know, that that is one of the most important things when you're trying to get your voice out there and when you're trying to become known as a business as well, so that you can survive full-time on voiceover.  21:23 Would you say that you are able to survive full-time on voiceover now, or is it still something that you are building? I know that it took me a few years to do that and you've been working already at it for a few years. Is it something that is a realistic goal for, let's say, I have been thriving as a voiceover artist full-time and I have colleagues who are also doing the same full-time, but we're not so many compared to the US, and the reason for?  22:01 - Tolulope (Guest) If you look at those of us who are doing voiceovers full-time, we are multi-skilled. We are able to record, we're able to edit and produce, we understand acoustics, we have learned about voiceover, we understand marketing as well. So it takes all of the skills to be able to stand and say, oh, I'll do voiceovers full-time, but majority aren't able to do that. Also, looking at the economic challenges and the reality surrounding what it takes to be a full-time voiceover artist, where in a country and largely in many parts of the continent, we don't have stable electricity, so you could be working and you run out of power, and that affects your work, especially if you're In your livelihood.  22:48 Exactly Right. So there's also the challenge of being able to erect or build a home studio for yourself, and also the fact that the equipment could be very expensive. Looking at our exchange rate, when we convert this equipment that costs some maybe $500 or $200 into Naira, whatever currency, it's a lot. So it's very challenging to decide to go full-time into voiceover, but for the few of us who are able to do it, it's also rewarding, especially and I must say, the fact that we get to work with clients out of Nigeria, especially clients from the us, using platforms like voice one, two, three and other pay-to-play sites. They open us up to opportunities with foreign clients and getting paid in dollars has its own advantage. So, yes, it's quite rewarding to work as a full-time voiceover artist, but it's also very challenging for a lot of us.  23:48 - Anne (Host) So what would be your best advice? That you would give aspiring voiceover talents in Nigeria Africa if they're looking to get into the industry. 23:57 - Tolulope (Guest) All right. So for people who are looking to get into the industry, the first thing that I recommend they do is to acquire knowledge. A lot of people still think, oh, you could just record voiceovers on your phone and I'm like, no, it doesn't work that way. So you need to learn, and I'm grateful that we have voiceover institutions in Nigeria and also other parts of Africa. We've got one in South Africa. That's the South Africa Voiceover Academy. In Nigeria, we have Voiceover Workshop Voiceover Academy. There are a couple of them and they've been able to come together to gather the body of knowledge needed for young voice artists to start. So I recommend. Second thing I recommend is podcasts. Listening to podcasts helps to develop the required skill in a sense, because you're listening to experts in the field. Now, I've been learning from you for many years and we had never met and it's been free, so that's the beautiful thing about podcasts.  25:01 It is a beautiful thing, isn't it? Yeah, it's absolutely free.  25:05 So I encourage people because you might not be able to afford hundreds of dollars to have Anganguza or any other top voiceover artists, so listen to podcasts. I recommend that as well. The third thing is to practice and take the big step, because I've also been coaching people in voiceover for a while. I realized that oftentimes they come, they train but they don't implement. There's this fear and imposter syndrome of calling yourself a voiceover artist. They hardly make the bold steps, they don't do demos and put themselves out there. They're waiting to be perfect, they're waiting to get it all figured out. So they compare themselves to someone like me or other colleagues of mine or people ahead of me and they're like I don't have what it takes, I don't sound like you just yet. So I always encourage them Start now, when nobody even really knows you so much. Make the mistakes Grow, because we all started somewhere. We didn't start perfect. So these are the things that I'll encourage them.  26:07 - Anne (Host) And I also think and this is kind of my big thing when I have students that say, well, I don't sound like I'm not there yet I'm like in reality and I think you must know, because you've had such a lengthy experience in being on camera and also in radio and podcasts when you connect with someone, nobody's really listening to how you.  26:27 I mean, yeah, we can sound good, but in reality that is only like a temporary, fleeting thing, that, okay, it sounds good, it sounds clear, I understand you, but when we connect, we connect on an emotional level and that really comes into the storytelling, that comes into that point of view that we're able to express. And I think that podcasting helps us to do that, like, especially if it's a conversation between you and I. But I use those skills in my voiceover to connect with that theoretical client and that's really where it becomes the most important. So how important would you say the connection in storytelling is for, let's say, the current trend and styles that are happening in your area? I mean because globally, I think we all need to be able to tell stories. But I'm just curious in terms of locally, when people hire you, are they hiring you for that big, deep, booming voice? Or are they also hiring you for that storytelling capability?  27:18 - Tolulope (Guest) That's a very good question, because in the continent, especially in Nigeria, I'm going to take Nigeria we have been very influenced by the Western cultures the things we see from movies in hollywood, the cartoons that we've seen growing up, so these has heavily influenced how we tell our stories in the media. There's still a lot of true storytelling, I must say, but when people think about voiceover, a lot of young people think about Disney, they think about all the Cartoon Network stuff and what that affects is the accent. So they're tempted to want to sound like the kids they watched growing up. They think that's what voiceover is. And it doesn't mean that's not what voiceover isn't. It just means the people you see on your screens.  28:14 They're telling stories that are relatable to them. It's their local stories. The animation you watch, even though it's fiction, but the communication, the nuances, you know all of those expressions. They're very akin to wherever they come from. Over here there's a way we tell our stories, the way we crack our jokes, the lingua. It's very local. So it's a lot of work to try to explain to upcoming talents that see, your accent is good enough yourself.  28:50 The way you sound is good enough. It's good enough you are enough.  28:54 You don't have to sound like barbie. You don't have to sound like right.  28:58 - Anne (Host) I'm so glad that you like this. It gets me emotional actually. I'm so glad that you like this. It gets me emotional actually, because I'm so glad that you said that, because it's important for not just locally you, it's important for us, it's important for the world to hear those stories. Right, it's important for us to understand you and how you tell stories, because it may be different than how I tell the story, but it's certainly very interesting to me.  29:19 You know what I mean.  29:25 And it's something that I feel I could benefit from hearing and I could enjoy it and it could be educational, it can be entertaining and I think just getting that experience and that culture and that storytelling is so important to a global audience.  29:35 Yes, absolutely, which I?  29:36 think is important to your business, which?  29:38 is so important to your business, so I think for anyone and I love how you talk about the imposter syndrome, which I think we all have.  29:44 I think that's a global thing, right? Everybody has imposter syndrome I still think, at the very heart of it, the fact that we can share and that we can communicate and we can connect with one another, that is something that is very much wanted and desired.  30:03 It may not be, as, let's say, marketable in certain places yet. Right, because even in America there's a lot of places that say they want the conversational connection, but yet a lot of times what you hear on television turns out to be something different because of whoever's directing you, whoever is hiring what they hear in their head. Right, Because they could have grown up with those kind of announcer kind of broadcast sort of sound and that's who ended up directing you and that's how the commercial sounds or that's how whatever it is that you're doing sounds. But I do believe that when it comes to people that really want that connection, that engagement with their brand, that they're going to hopefully continually go more and more into the storytelling aspect and it becomes less about your voice and more about how you can reach that person that's listening to you at the other end of the mic in reality.  30:52 So, yeah, I think it's all about the connection. So let's talk a little bit about any type of, let's say, memorable story or project that showcased your unique storytelling. Is there anything that you can talk about that is out there on a global level that can really speak to your unique storytelling?  31:14 - Tolulope (Guest) Now that you say memorable, I've done a couple of voiceovers for different brand. I think the most recent that I did was for coca-cola. So I've done a couple of voiceovers for different brands. I think the most recent that I did was for Coca-Cola, so I've done a couple of them. I think the two most memorable would be getting cast on one of the biggest animations to come out of Nigeria, which would actually be out next year, 2025. And that animation is called Iyanu. It's going to be on Cartoon Network on.  31:42 Showmatch in Africa. So I'm one of the cast and it was such an honor to be on that because it's not just a cartoon for the world to enjoy, but it captures African stories. The entire cast were Nigerian, so we spoke the true Nigerian accent. It was quite a mix of traditional and youth, friendly and young. You know all of that, so I'm happy to be on that. I play a character called Shiju, which people would come to find out much more about later. Then the other one would be.  32:16 Recently I did a voiceover for a friend. She started this podcast and I recorded the voiceover and I just something about that voiceover stood out for me. It's on a podcast anyway, so, um, it's memorable to me personally. It's not like it's for a global brand of some sort, but it's just something that when I think about that particular voiceover maybe because the way I read it it was just so real and I just felt everything in that script Very powerful story, very touching experience. It's titled the First and Last Time I Saw my Parents Dance and that story was just so powerful. So, yeah, that works for me too. It's on podcasts and platforms.  33:02 - Anne (Host) Awesome. Well, I'll be connecting those links up in the show notes for any of those bosses that are looking for more information. So tell us what's next for you Any exciting projects on the way or other goals that you're working toward. Any other associations you're going to pioneer. Any other associations you're going to?  33:21 - Tolulope (Guest)  Next up for me is my youtube channel. Already I have the podcast running on youtube, but I am planning on creating a youtube channel where I talk more about voiceover extensively, particularly for Nigerians and africans my extension, so that is going to be coming up next year. I also am working on some online courses. Although right now I teach voiceovers, I mentor people one-on-one. I also teach voiceovers with other voiceover institutions of learning in Nigeria, but I realized that there's a lot of demand out there and I can't always be physically there to teach over and over and over. It's very demanding. So I'm putting together an online course that will be available, and my website is also in the works. So by January 2025, everything will be ready. So these are the things I'm working on.  34:13 - Anne (Host) Well, that's quick, that's like next month. Yeah, I love it. So tell our bosses where they can find you, where they can learn more about you. Follow you on socials.  34:25 - Tolulope (Guest) Okay, so my Instagram handle is tcode70. That's T-C-O-D-E underscore 70. My YouTube channel is I am tcode70. So you can find me on YouTube and on TikTok I'm also tcode underscore 70 TikTok. Tcode underscore 70. On X, which is formerly Twitter, my website will be out really soon will be, I mean, launched so my website is iamtcode.com Iamtcode.com.  34:57 - Anne (Host) Love it, love it. And that's coming January, January 25. So now I'm hoping that I myself am releasing a new website that is supposed to be out in January of 2025 as well. So it's just a little refresh of my brand.  35:10 So  oh my gosh, it has been so much fun chatting with you and I am keeping my fingers crossed for Sunday, which is coming up in a few days, to find out about that Sova's nomination. But the way I feel if you're nominated award nominated is just as good as award winning in my book, and actually even that is subjective. But yeah, my fingers are crossed for you and I'll be listening. I've got a couple nominations myself that I'm going to be you know. We'll see if that works out and in the meantime, it has been such a pleasure chatting with you and I want to actually check up with you next year again so that we can reconnect and see what other amazing things you've done, because you are definitely a VO boss for sure, and it's been a pleasure chatting with you today.  35:56 - Tolulope (Guest)  you so much, and it's been a pleasure chatting with you too, and thank you for inspiring me and millions of others, because, yeah, a lot of people are still going to listen to this. Podcast is a platform that people can listen to many years to come, so thank you so much, Anne.  36:12 - Anne (Host) No problem, all right, I'm going to give a great big shout out to our sponsor, ipdtl. You too can connect and network like bosses, like Tico to myself. Find out more at IPDTLcom. Bosses, have an amazing week and we'll see you next week. Bye, bye.  36:28 - Speaker 3 (Announcement) Join us next week for another edition of VO Boss with your host, Anne Ganguza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for our mailing list at VOobosscom and receive exclusive content, industry revolutionizing tips and strategies and new ways to rock your business like a boss. Redistribution with permission. Coast to coast connectivity via IPDTL.