I LOVE Radio Imaging
While I’ve been full time in voice over since 2015, I did not discover Radio Imaging as a genre or my passion for it until 2017. As a professional female voice talent, I had been booking a lot of commercials and loved my commercial work. I was researching and trying to figure out what else was like commercial work to see what I might be good at. When I found radio imaging, I loved the genre right away because of the energy. In other genres of VO, I often have to dial down my energy and contain my exuberance. I have always found this quite ironic, because authentic is a big buzz word right now in voice over, and I authentically am bursting with energy. So when I found radio imaging, it seemed like the perfect fit and I began actively pursuing radio stations to add to my client roster. I love working with radio stations, regardless of market size, and do my best to meet all budget needs.
This Station Reached Out
About a week ago I got an email through my website from Brandon at Ozarks Work Mix Radio. He was looking for a new female voice for his station. He needed both liners/sweepers and station IDs or stingers as he calls them. He was used to working with a male talent for quite a while who had provided him with packages. Brandon made it easy from the start. He was transparent about what he needed and what budget he was starting with. He even sent a link to his prior provider which made it so easy for me to be as helpful as possible. I was confident my team and I could present him with high quality, upbeat, fun liners, sweepers, and station IDs to compliment what was playing currently on the station. Brandon explained that the station was created so that there is a great mix and something for everyone. He explained that this blend of 70s, 80s, 90s, and today was a clean, upbeat mix so that whether you were at work or on a road trip you could just keep listening. They play a fun blend of pop, rock, and country. Who doesn’t love that?? I was so excited to be working with them. After all, this is my kind of music!
Presenting it On Their Terms
Brandon was used to getting packages from his male imaging provider, cluster in lines of 5 or 10. I had not previously done this, as all the other stations I’ve worked with had priced imaging per page, which is much more standard across the industry. Still, this is what the client wanted and I wanted to make it easy for him even if my rates were not the same. I spoke with several excellent producers who were all available to produce the sweepers and stingers for OWMR, and presented a chart of the different options, comparing them to the client’s current pricing in the top row, so that he could compare apples to apples. It also occurred to me when preparing the data for the station that other small stations like Ozarks Work Mix Radio might be looking for the same type of pricing, and now I have this to offer future prospect as well.
Getting It DONE!
Brandon reviewed the options and selected what fit his needs best. The prices I had quoted him included production and voiceover. To be clear, while the prices were not high, they worked for all parties involved. What was new to me, was that he needed copy writing for his imaging content as well. I had not initially understood that the previous provided’s prices also included the copy. Frankly, I was thrilled to work with him on this as well. I haven been doing copy writing for years, and I love adding copy writing clients. I immediately started writing the scripts. The next morning I recorded, and that morning they were sent to the different producers. Half of the spots have come back already and are live and on the air, half will be back at the end of the next work week.
Takeaways From the Experience
The station is happy. They are extremely pleased and I made it easy for them to get what they wanted and needed. I had a blast working with industry partners doing what I love. For me, even if a station is small, there is still a lot of value in providing them service. My hope it that they will now come back to me as they need more sweepers and station promos. It’s not just providing them quality content that has great meaning to me, but also getting to know my clients and building a strong relationship over time. So while I made them happy with this first go around, now the work of building a lasting relationship so that I can serve them even better begins. With taking feedback, introspection, and hard work, I hope to continue to provide them with outstanding radio imaging for years to come.
They sent me the script and asked for my rate. They needed a RUSH turn around, but I was not charging them an extra fee for that. Since they were a repeat client and I was available I didn’t want to nickel and dime them. Anyway, I made a mistake almost right away. The voice over job I did for them was for an explainer video with usage limited only to their website. I assumed, again, I assumed that this was the same. I assumed this because the top of the script was labeled in bold font “VIDEO SCRIPT.” I initially quoted the job based on the last, recent voiceover work I did for them and the assumption that it was a video.
On the call, it was great to catch up with the client. As a full-time, professional female voice over actor, building client relationships means a lot to me, and phone calls like this always provide an opportunity not only to better understand my client’s unique and specific needs, but also to get to know them. How better to build a relationship than to actually speak?
Now, these questions should have been asked in my initial reply email when they were casting me. I should have asked them before I threw any numbers into the air. And as a long established professional voice talent, I should have know better.
I will never be in such a hurry, even when I tell myself it’s for the client, that I skip major parts of the information gathering process. The point of having years of experience in the industry is not only to serve the clients well and to provide an outstanding level of service, but is also for precisely these scenarios, when years in the industry should teach us to take a breath, pause, and look at what we are dealing with. I realize that if I could make this basic mistake, anyone can. So do yourself a favor, ask questions. Enjoy the dialogue and back and forth. Don’t be afraid to hop on the phone and clarify a few details. I realize the clients in this scenario could just as easily have been inflexible about the budget, and that would have led to a very different blog today.
As a working mom I try hard to exhibit good coping for my twins Emma and Jack, so laying curled up in a ball on the sofa all day is not a good longterm strategy for a chronic problem. When I’m “lucky,” and believe me I am using that word loosely, my migraines will come on a weekend and I can sleep them off. Often they come as they like as they are triggered by all sorts of things: stress, lack of sleep, my cycle, the weather, so in short- life triggers them. When they come on a week day I try to take the medicine as early as I can. I tend to be a heavy sleeper and wake up confused, but if I can actually get the medication in me early, that helps. I try to always have both coffee and ginger ale in the house as they help. My strategy then changes. Daily routines will be completed, but anything extra gets pushed to another day. Nothing fun will happen on a migraine day. I try to give myself a break and only do what is essential. Booked work will be recorded. Auditions will likely be skipped. All emails will be replied to. I will likely defer any direct marketing. In terms of mom tasks, if I can ask Harlan to help with anything, I do!
Yes, I wish my migraines would stop and never come back. But, I do think they have changed me. I have so much more understanding of what people with much more serious chronic illnesses go through. I am much more patient. I am genuinely thankful for every non-migraine day. I am very sympathetic when others have to reschedule and are under the weather.
Today, I see my children sprawled across their bed surrounded by multiple devices. They read a lot but they only read books when a teacher gives them an actual book. Instead they read on many devices, seemingly at once. They will have their phone out, their computer out, and an iPad out, and they will be working on multiple screens getting input from all of them. To say that I am both baffled and simultaneously concerned about them getting cancer from all of the electronics is one thing, but the point is, as someone who deals with eLearning content all of the time, that this generation absorbs content differently than Gen-Xers.
A few years ago I started to notice a big shift to mobile learning. I attended an eLearning Guild conference in San Diego in June of 2017 and the entire focus of the conference was on everything mobile! Now companies could train the employees anywhere, anytime, and why not have fun in the process. Gamification became a big buzzword. At that point, we went from just being narrators as voiceover actors, to really giving the content creators and instructional designers the characters for the roles that they needed.
Even though I work full time, as a mom of teenage twins, I am in the car A LOT. My SUV has a great sound system, and I confess I enjoy belting it out. The other night I had a realization though: unless my four year old niece is in the car, I am typically belting it out alone. And it is not that I am not playing great music, because I can assure you that it is always a party when I drive. I think it has more to do with the personalities of my husband and kids.
Snoop Dogg. Gladys Knight. Jonas Brothers. It doesn’t matter, I’m into it! So what on earth does this have to do with voiceovers? Well, people often ask me how I got into voice over or how I started booking work. It’s a tricky question. There are a lot of talented people who do what I do. There are also a lot of people who have had access to the training that I have had. They may even have the demos that I have. So, what sets us apart? Our schtick. Our unique personality and spark. The ability to put my dignity, airs, “whatever” in the metaphorical back seat and whoop it up for the clients, is essentially what I have been practicing for years. One of my beloved coaches, Fred Frees, used to tell me if I was going to “make it” I had to be fearless in front of the microphone. This singing in the car is exactly the same thing. When you have the reckless abandon to belt it out in front of everyone, odds are you will also be fearless in front of the mic.
I did not go into voiceover because I wanted to sing. To the contrary, the jobs that involve that component are typically my hardest. The point of this is that the silly abandon that we have when playfully, often gleefully belting it out in the car whether we are alone or have an audience of 3, that is what we need to bring with us into the booth for every job. The ability to switch gears as quickly as a song changes on the radio is priceless. The ability to reinvent ourselves every two minutes is also priceless. All the professional training in the world cannot change the feeling that you have in your gut. I have been told by another coach that I “dive in” rather fast. I believe that, too, is one of my greatest assets! Whether it is a new station I am imaging for and each take on a line needs to be fresh, or a 15 second holiday spot, or an eLearning module, be the talent who is willing to shake things up and delight your client at every turn!
So, they tend to just enter the house, much like on a sitcom. We often have no idea who is coming when or how long they are staying. They just show up. Luckily they all get along really well. Next, this may give you the mis-impression that I am in some way relaxed. Quite to the contrary, I am wrapped very tight. When my twins were born, my husband and I agreed that an open-door policy was more fair to all grandparents. We didn’t want them to miss out, and so all of this craziness, is the result of said policy. So, I have had to change my behavior and learn to “go with the flow” a bit. What does that mean. Well, according to zenhabits.com, “What is going with the flow? It’s rolling with the punches. It’s accepting change without getting angry or frustrated. It’s taking what life gives you, rather than trying to mold life to be exactly as you want it to be.” So yesterday, it meant holding off for a better time to write and just enjoying my family. And you know what, I did!
I think that the reason my kids are so sweet is because they have the attention not just of their parents, both of whom work, but of their grandparents, their aunts, and their uncles, and I think it does take a village. When that village is fragmented, the kids are the ones who suffer. When you wonder how these characters end up on Jerry Springer or Dr. Phil, maybe it was those moments of choice and instead of sticking together and just being together they chose wrong over and over again. My daughter has been watching a lot of Dr. Phil recently, and when I see clips where he admonishes family like this I gather that they made one mistake after another until they stopped supporting each other.
We were worried that the pot holes would hurt their heads because they were so small. Now they will be driving in a month. I spend many hours every day alone in a padded foam booth. So, when family comes over unexpectedly, I have decided to look at it as a gift. I think sometimes it is life telling us to slow down and take it in. I do feel like hitting pause is ok. I am blogging 24 hours after I planned. I am not sure when I will work on my instagram posts. Will I get them done? Yes.