The New Voice123 Is Out

Hello All!

The new Voice123 has been released and the system brings tons of new features. Check out Voice123.com to see them for yourself. The most innovative feature is Voice123 SmartCast. Many talents have asked questions about it and how it will change their experience with Voice123. We have written this article, so that you’ll know what to expect.

Increased Audition to Booking Ratio
Voice123 SmartCast will, in most cases, increase the audition to booking ratio of talents and voice producers. The New Voice123 allows Voice Seekers to determine how many auditions/proposals they want. Voice123 SmartCast has been designed so that it will no longer be the quickest talents or voice producers who are able to audition, and then the limit is met. Instead, Voice123 SmartCast will invite the best matching talents first, and give them time to audition; invite a few more, give them time to audition; and so on, until the desired amount of auditions has been received. One of the factors we keep in mind is the amount of auditions the talents have been sending during the past six months (the counter starts July 7, 2007). If a talent has submitted less auditions/proposals, on average, than the other matching talents, he or she may be invited first.

Fewer, But Better Invitations
In order to increase the audition to booking ratio, the amount of auditions each talent can submit will, of course, decrease. If you properly tune up your profile, and submit well-written auditions and proposals, Voice123 SmartCast will invite you to the projects where you may have better chances of being hired.

A Fairer Marketplace
The Voice123 Marketplace had an issue. Twenty-four percent of talents and voice producers would submit 80% of the auditions to public projects. Why? There are many reasons: many talents do not work full time, other talents didn't like the fierce competition the old system allowed. Voice123 SmartCast will now give the chance to the many talents who didn't formerly submit auditions/proposals to public projects. Talents and voice producers that used to submit way more auditions/proposals than average will see a significant decrease in invitations.

Less Competition
During the past six months almost half of the projects posted looking for American-English voices, received more than 100 auditions/proposals. Many of them received more than 400. The new system will significantly reduce that amount and increase your chances of being heard and booked by the voice seeker whenever you submit an audition or proposal.

You Can Now Get Feedback
The New Voice123 allows you to know when your auditions/proposals have been opened and how the voice seeker rated them, along with all others, on the same projects. You can use this information to improve the auditions and proposals you submit. We are aware that one rating may not be fair, but, statistically speaking, if you constantly get good ratings, you can assume you are doing a good job. If, on the other hand, you constantly get bad ratings, then the New Voice123 may not be the place for you.
Voice123 SmartCast takes into account these ratings. Please note that SmartCast takes into account MANY factors. This is just one of them, and it is not the most important.

We Are Just Getting Started
Since we are VERY busy answering all of the questions our users have submitted, we have stopped most of our marketing efforts so that we can handle the volume of questions. This, of course, means that fewer projects than usual will be posted this week. We should resume all of our marketing efforts soon. Also, since Voice123 SmartCast invites talents systematically, it may take a few days for you to be invited to projects that have been posted.

As a Talent, How Do You Measure Your Success With Voice123?
If you are a talent or voice producer, your success with Voice123 should be measured in return of investment. If you get more $ than what you paid for your premium subscription, then you have a positive return of investment. This usually means getting jobs. The New Voice123 will better distribute the jobs that pass through it.

If you are measuring your success based on the amount of "leads" you get or the amount of auditions you submit, then the New Voice123, unfortunately, won't make you happy.

We Are Offering Pro-rated Refund to Talents and Voice Producers
We are confident in our system and in the fact that most people will benefit from it. If you are a Premium Subscriber that paid for your subscription before July 7th, and you think the New Voice123 is not the place for you, please let us know. We will issue a pro-rated refund.

Thank you all for your feedback, patience, and support. Thanks as well to all of you that are willing to give the New Voice123 a chance. We created it for you, and will continue to improve it for you.


Regards,

Alex Torrenegra
Leader and Co-founder

The New Voice123 Upgrade Starts Tomorrow Night

As you may already know, this weekend we will be upgrading our system for the official launch of the new version of Voice123. There are two special considerations for you to keep in mind:

• Our authentication system has been revamped. Therefore, starting Monday, July 9th, you will be prompted to sign in using your password if you have been away from the system too long, so please make sure you know your password. If you don’t remember it, click here and we will send it to you by email.


• Since this is a major system upgrade, please note that Voice123’s website will not be available as of Friday, July 6th at 10:00 pm ET, and it may be under maintenance until Monday, July 9th at 5:00 am ET. During this upgrade, the site will not be accessible, you won’t be able to answer leads or access your profile.

See you in the New Voice123!

The Wait Is Over: The New Voice123 Will Be Released July 9th!

We are very happy to announce that the release date for the New Voice123 has been set: Monday, July 9th!

Development on this new version started more than one year ago after receiving feedback from talents, voice producers, and voice seekers; analyzing our various options; and choosing the best possible solutions to address the new features. In March of this year we reached alpha, where all the major features and improvements of the new Voice123 have been coded. By mid-June, the system was stable enough to invite talents and seekers to do beta testing of the platform. This was a very important milestone in the development process, and we received extremely valuable feedback from many of you, for which we are thankful, as you are helping to build the most advanced voice casting system ever built.

This version is the biggest release we have ever published, and we expect it will bring major benefits to all our talents, including a superior interface, improved audio quality, enhanced project workflow, and better audition-to-booking ratio. To read more details about SmartCast® and the new features here.

IMPORTANT: Since this is a major system upgrade, please note that Voice123’s website will not be available from Friday, July 6th at 10:00 pm ET until Monday, July 9th at 5:00 am ET. During this upgrade, the site will not be accessible; you will not be able to answer leads or access your profile. Therefore, please plan ahead if you need to use the system around those dates.

Google Audio Ads and Bid4Spots: The Radio Ads Marketplace War

A few months ago, Google announced a new tool for advertisers; it is called Google Audio Ads. It is an extension of AdWords, and connects radio stations to advertisers.

Earlier this month eBay said it had closed a partnership deal with Voice123’s fellow company, Bid4Spots, to start selling radio advertising as a marketplace on the Internet, eBay Media Marketplace.

In similar ways, both marketplaces allow advertisers to place budgets on radio spots through an automated system. Advertisers can choose from hundreds of stations in different regions and cities country-wide. Stations are classified by the kind of programs they broadcast and advertisers can target their campaigns to specific geographic areas, type of listeners, date and time of the day. On the other side are the stations who do the actual bidding like a reverse auction, and the lowest CPM wins the auction.

This makes it so easy for small and medium sized businesses to start advertising on radio, and for advertisers to reach new markets in such an easy way that you can find a voice talent and producer via Voice123, have your radio spot ready in a matter of hours, and then use any of these services to broadcast your radio spot to the desired audience, and all this without stepping away from your desk!

Both say they are currently testing their systems, and although Google started in December, Bid4Spots’ platform is more mature, since they were the pioneers as the first online radio ads marketplace. They just now partnered with eBay.

The war is just starting, and both systems are gearing up to compete for advertisers’ money. Time will tell who will come out victorious, or if there is space for both, as the differences between them attract different customers.

The New Voice123 Will Open to Beta Testers June 15th!

What does this mean to you? This means that you will get to experience the new Voice123, including all of its new features and improvements, in a few weeks. We will notify you via email when the release date is defined.

What is "beta testing"? Beta testing is the last stage of testing for a software product like Voice123. It was preceded by "alpha testing". During alpha testing, members of the Voice123 Team performed thousands of quality assurance tests in the new Voice123. We did it in such a rigorous way, that we expect the beta testing phase to be over quickly.

We will encourage beta testers to publicly share their experiences with the new Voice123 in the VoiceOverSavvy Forums. Check it out after June 15th, so that you can learn more about the New Voice123, even if you are not a beta tester. By the way, you can still apply to become a beta tester. Instructions on how to apply can be found here: http://voiceoversavvy.com/ftopic987.html

We are very happy about making this announcement, as this means that we are one step closer to offering you a better experience! Some of us are also closer to taking a long-expected vacation break!

How Much Are Talents and Voice Producers Charging for Non-Union Work?

Voice123 is the marketplace where union and non-union projects find their best talent. The voice seeker and the talent or voice producer always work together to reach an agreement in terms of the price. Union projects can base their rates on the guides provided by the unions: (AFTRA - USA , SAG - USA, British Equity, ACTRA - Canada, etc), but non-union projects are different. Many voice seekers, talents, and voice producers have asked us to provide them with market information so that they know how to budget their projects. We listened and took action.

Last moth we sent a voluntary worldwide survey to approximately 3,600 active voice over talents and voice producers registered with Voice123. The survey asked for base rates in several different areas (TV, Radio, non-broadcast, local, regional, etc.), and different pricing methodologies (per spot, per minute, per word, and per hour of work). We then crunched the numbers and came up with pricing stats that you can use in helping to determine the budget or price for a voice project. You can access these stats by clicking here.

Check Out These Great Topics On The Voice Over Savvy Forum

We want to express our sincere gratitude to all of those who have helped the forums become what they are - a great gathering place where we all can learn, get help, gain support, or just post what’s on our minds.

Thank you!

Here are some statistics from Voice Over Savvy Forum with all of you, these reflect the amazing growth experienced by this wonderful community.

The forums were born on Monday October 09, 2006 at 10:04 am. Up to now, we have 1,370 users, 19,835 posts, 1,482 topics, and an average of 96.73 posts per day.

The amount and quality of the information and participants in the forum are what make it a necessary stop for those interested in any level of the industry.

Check out these great topics:

My Head is in a Vice Uncle Fester
"Breaths are natural. If you are doing a piece of copy that should sound natural, then breaths should be there, but not overly loud..."
- Read more and comment at
http://voiceoversavvy.com/ftopic1549.html

What to Say??
"I currently just have something along the lines of Thank you for taking the time, I have quick turn around, I pride myself on great customer service, look forward to working with you blah blah blah..."
- Read more and comment at
http://voiceoversavvy.com/ftopic1613.html

I Don't Know What to Say. PLEASE HELP
"Let this be a lesson to all. You have to use the "KISS" method. Noooo, I don't mean KEEP-IT-SIMPLE-STUPID...I mean you have to KISS their..."
- Read more and comment at
http://voiceoversavvy.com/ftopic1604.html

Hot Tea with Honey vs…….
"Thought I'd ask if anybody else knows of ways to pamper your voice or care for a raspy one other than the old stand-by Hot Tea with honey?..."
- Read more and comment at
http://voiceoversavvy.com/ftopic1594.html

Let's Share Good Stuff
"Okay, I've been thinking about all the cool stuff we can pass on to each other via this forum. Things like great movie recommendations, how to get glue out of carpet, cheap nights out with the spouse, great vacation spots, and so on..."
- Read more and comment at
http://voiceoversavvy.com/ftopic1599.html

Update on the New Voice123

Two months ago we reached the alpha milestone of the New Voice123. We are now getting close to reaching the beta milestone. Most of the bugs and corrections we found before the alpha milestone was reached have been fixed, and are now being tested. As a matter of fact, almost half of the new systems and features of the New Voice123 have been already approved for beta. Reaching beta means that the system is ready to be tested by many of you. A couple of weeks after beta, the system will be published for all of you to use.

The New Voice123 is full of nice surprises. Here are some we have never before mentioned:

> The New Voice123 will have an improved sign-in mechanism with improved
password protection.

> The new audition inbox will allow to quickly add individual comments or tags to each audition or proposal you get.

>The New Voice123 will allow you to store your auditions or proposals for an unlimited amount of time.

You may experience the New Voice123 before most people do. Simply apply to become a beta tester for the New Voice123. You can find more info at
http://voiceoversavvy.com/viewtopic.php?t=987

Apologies

Monday we published the article "Should I hire a union or a non-union talent?" In this article, we used the name of a major voice over celebrity with the objective of explaining to inexperienced voice seekers that there ARE voice over talents that can charge a lot of money because they are highly experienced, very popular, and people like to listen to them.

Some people thought that the phrase was a misrepresentation, though the phrase was written unwisely, we did not publish it with any negative intention. We have since corrected the article. We are sorry about the misunderstanding it may have caused.

I wanted to publicly apologize, in the name of the entire Voice123 team, for the misunderstanding. We try hard to interact with the community as much as we can; we have blogs, forums, newsletters, etc. Having such an open door policy means that our chances of saying stuff that can be taken out of context skyrockets. This is no excuse, though, and we have taken measures to try to avoid similar situations from happening in the future.

I want you to know where Voice123 stands: We are in favor of helping the talents unionize so that industry rates go higher. We support, honor, and respect widely known talents - They are models for many of us, because of their skills, experience, and competence. We want talents to get better paid (if you are interested in knowing what Voice123 is doing to help talents receive a better compensation for their work, please check this article). We are here for the duration with the purpose of helping the voice community.

What is Voice123 doing to help talents get better pay? What can you do?

Many would argue that supply and demand should drive the rates of the market. Unions help as well, significantly, by making sure rates are fair. So, why should Voice123 get involved? Voice123 started because of a dream Tania Isabel, my wife, and I had. She was a voice over and she wanted to make a better living. As a result, we consider one of our goals to work hard to help all voice over talents receive better pay. We try to achieve that on several fronts:

• Finding Voice Seekers. Along with our goal of seeking higher pay on each job, it’s necessary to have a large market to drive up the rates and in turn get more jobs! We work hard at finding more and more voice seekers to use Voice123 so that talents bill more hours per day and at a higher rate than ever before.

• Voice Seeker Screening. Every project posted on Voice123 gets approved after a tight screening process. We try to make sure the voice seeker is a legitimate and serious business. Every day we discard dozens of projects that do not meet our basic requirements.

• Voice Seeker Education. We split our Customer Service Team so that one group of people focuses specifically on voice seekers. This group has now developed techniques to make sure voice seekers understand how rates work and what a fair price may be. For example: we attempt to call every new voice seeker registered in Voice123 and, if needed, we work at increasing the budget they have for their projects. We have also extended our customer service hours so that we can make direct contact with all new voice seekers.

• A New Voice123. We are working on a new version of Voice123 that will improve the experience of both the talent and the voice seeker. Voice seekers will have more information on hand to determine what a proper budget is.

• Voice123 SmartCast. The new Voice123 will feature Voice123 SmartCast. It will help drive rates higher by intelligently reducing the amount of auditions each project gets, thus reducing competition, and increasing the rates talents and voice producers can charge.

• Project Rating. The new Voice123 will allow talents to rate several areas of a project, including its budget. In the near future, when you rate a project, you will teach Voice123 and the rest of the community how you feel about the budget for each project. We will be able to use that information to teach new voice overs and new voice seekers if their rates are good or not. Those who are now undercharging and driving down rates will hopefully learn to work for the proper amount of pay, and voice seekers will not find it so easy to hire talent for less than the standard rate.

• More Information. In some instances, the name of the voice seeker is not displayed when they post a project because, unfortunately, some talents used to take the voice seeker’s name, Google it, and then do direct solicitation. Voice seekers value their privacy, and by allowing them to protect their contact information, they come back to Voice123. The new Voice123 will provide more detailed information about the rating record that each voice seeker has earned within Voice123. Talents and voice producers will get to know details about the voice seeker like when it registered, how many projects he/she has posted, percentage of auditions listened to, etc. Talents and voice producers will be able to use this information to determine how serious a voice seeker may be,and adjust their rates and payment agreements accordingly. This, of course, goes hand in hand with our screening process.

• Better Matching. The new Voice123 will be able to track if a talent or voice producer submits proposals with high or low prices when compared to other proposals. Eventually, Voice123 SmartCast will be able to match higher paying jobs with talents that charge higher rates. This will motivate talents to charge more, instead of less.

• Special Categories. Some of the low budgets we get are for non-profit organizations, student projects, etc. A few months after the new Voice123 is released, we will create special categories for these projects so that only talents that want to help these voice seekers get matched by Voice123 SmartCast.

• Working with the Unions. We are working with unions such as SAG and AFTRA, to help voice over talents take advantage of the many benefits unions offer. We know that the more talents join the unions, the higher the overall rates of the market. We are ALL for that!

• A New Rate Guide. We are working on a new rate guide for non-union projects. The rate guide will showcase recommended minimums, and will be determined by surveying all premium talents in Voice123. You, the talent, will decide how much fair pay is.

• Voice123 Talkback. Voice123 screens dozens of projects every day. Sometimes we make mistakes, and a few get through that are not what we want on our site soliciting the help of our talents. We are working to alleviate this problem. We would also like to hear your ideas to keep this from happening and to better our service to you. That is why we have created a section in the VoiceOverSavvy.com forums to get feedback from the community.

• And Much More! We are also working on some other areas that will help, you, the talents to increase your income. Stay tuned!

What Can You Do?

You can do a lot! It is ultimately in your hands to drive the prices higher:

• Don’t submit auditions to projects that you consider are below budget; that will teach voice seekers they will have to pay more if they want to get good talents or voice producers. If you get invited by Voice123 to participate in a project that is below your desired rate, you can simply disregard the invitation. This will actually help you get more invitations in the near future (when Voice123 SmartCast is released), as the system will know that you are selective when submitting auditions. If, in the other hand, you get invited by a voice seeker directly, and you consider his/her budget to be low, you should reply explaining your rate requirements to the voice seeker. By doing this, you can help teach voice seekers what fair prices are.

• Answer the rate guide survey whenever you get it (we are planning to send it periodically).

• Support the unions and help make them better. You have more power within the unions than you may think. Speak out and make them what you want

• If you find Voice123 made a mistake screening the budget of a project, please let us know in Voice123 Talkback, at the VoiceOverSavvy.com forums.

• Spread the word and teach other talents that their support is needed.

• And finally, please have some patience – We are working very hard to get the
new Voice123 online. Your kind words motivate our development team. Your harsh words hurt them. We are humans trying to do our best, and we’re here to serve your needs.