voiceofgeorge_

I hoped this would be the first question, because I think the people in the industry don't answer it straight. Everyone is trying to make money off you with coaching so they sell that as the only way.

In reality even after spending $10k on coaching sessions, you'll need huge amounts of practise with actual jobs. But it's a catch-22 because you won't be good enough to book proper jobs. So..

I started on Fiverr, even though it's a dirty word in the business. I was rubbish when I started, but it helped me get experience and feedback, whilst getting paid (a very small amount), which allowed me to upgrade my equipment and improve my recording space without risk. I have done some coaching back in the day, and it helped for sure, but without the constant practise from lowly paid jobs I wouldn't have progressed far.

I've been off Fiverr for ages now, as I've moved up the ladder but it's a necessary part of the ecosystem imo, to keep things accessible to everyone regardless of whether you were privileged enough to have a theatrical education.

Bit obsessed with designing themed playing cards the moment, currently working on a Mistborn set. Other than that, Gym and Badminton! Nothing really related to the work at all, ha. Suggest something fun for me to try, I need to mix life up a bit.

hahahhahahahaha the commitment, I love it

YES I CAN HEAR YOU CLEM FANDANGO

First off, no disrespect or dig at all but a radio voice is basically the opposite of what people are after these days.

Doesn't mean you can't make it work, but you need to temper your expectations, and perhaps work on relaxing into a more casual voice to give some options for your clients.

Make a profile on Fiverr and see who bites, invest maybe £100 in a setup to start. That should be enough to see if you can make it work.

Agents.. I have a few, but it's not how it used to be.. i.e in the old days, an agent had a few clients they are actively trying to win work for, it's now more that the agency has a big roster and the clients scroll through it and picks a voice out.

I'd say 95% of my work comes from my direct relationships, which are the golden goose. Really nice people as well, and you don't get that connection working through a 3rd party.

I was making £40,000 a year on Fiverr in the final days, I decided to beat my country's median wage before I went solo. Then made about £12k the first year post-fiverr-account-deletion, working purely directly, and now my last tax return was somewhere about £50k.

Most of these clients are word of mouth, as I really struggle with the sales aspect of the job, I just don't gel at all with the idea of cold calling people and demanding their time. It's something I am working on slowly!

the unfortunate way of the world, it's a broken system at its core

A few LEGO adverts, a Peppa Pig commercial and a Manscaped promo are probably the most mainstream. Couple of Car adverts too. Mostly it's corporate/explainer videos and training work, stuff that blends into the background but is very very consistent. Keeping 'grey' reads engaging and human is probably my niche, if I had one.

Due to the amount of working voiceovers, if you focus on landing adverts you are leaning into the feast and famine side of the industry.

Corporate stuff pays the mortgage, Commercials pay for the fun stuff!