Marketing & Promoting Your Voice Over Skills
Great! You’ve built yourself a studio, made a great demo and are ready to enter the UK-London voice over market. Now comes one the most tedious and difficult parts imaginable –– marketing and promoting yourself.
Just like any other business, you must advertise to get customers. How can they hire you as a UK voiceover master if they don’t know you exist? The London voice over industry, which of course includes narrator gurus and announcer pros, isn’t like other businesses. You will not be effective advertising your services in a newspaper, the Yellow Pages, or even on TV or Radio. Aside from getting yourself a good agent (hard to find!), direct marketing and Internet promotion are pretty much the only way to go.
First, build your advertising campaign around your UK voice over demo. Your demo is the ONLY thing that will get you noticed. It is the single most important part of getting clients. Make CD copies and snail-mail them (or make an MP3 and email it) to ad agencies, TV/Radio stations, and video/film production companies. Start small. Just hit those in your area at first so you can get the feel for how to do it. Then follow-up on those you’ve sent your London voice over demo to. This is key! Most managers and supervisors are so busy, they’ll often just throw that stuff in the trash when they get it, so you’ll need to call or email them a week or so later to make sure they’ve heard your UK voice talent work.
Prepare for rejection. You’re really trying to compete with the numbers if you're a London voice talent. Most likely, you won’t get but a scant few offers if any at all, depending on how many announcer demos you send out. Don’t get discouraged. This is normal. After you’ve sent your UK voice-over demo to local outlets, then start expanding to potential clients elsewhere.
Get yourself a website for your London voice over services. You can hire a professional to do it, or you can secure a low-cost host, such as StartLogic or GoDaddy. Many web hosting companies such as those mentioned have a built-in program that allows you to build your site on your own. If you have the funding, you can pay to have your site optimized for search engines so that you’ll have a good ranking as a UK voice talent and more people will see your website.
Sign up with Voice 1-2-3, Voiceover Directory or many of the other Internet-based UK voice over directories. Many potential clients surf these sites in search of a good narrator, announcer or London voice talent.
Send your demo to talent agencies in your area that feature voice over professionals. If your demo is good enough, an agent will pick you up. Good luck!
