Dave Courvoisier - More Than Just a Voice: The REAL Secret to Voiceover Success

Copyright 2014 by Dave Courvoisier

Smashwords Edition

The voice-acting community is thegivingest bunch of people Ive ever met. From my earliest days ofstumbling into the voice-over business, to the present day, itbecame clear to me that voice-actors would seemingly fall over eachother to help whoever had a need. This book stems from theirenabling mindset, and is dedicated to each and every one who hascommented, supported, and responded to my blog.

Some deserve to be named:

Bob Souer and Jeffrey Kafer spurred me tobegin blogging with their encouragements .

Paul Strikwerda, my brother in blogging, hasinspired me in more ways than even he knows .

Web Development expert Brett Bumeter ofSoftduit Media is the genius behind the mechanism of my onlinepresence .

Many of the members of the VO-BB were thecatalyst to my exploring a talent I didnt know I had: writing.

John Florian of VoiceOverXtra has supportedme from the start, and reprinted many of my articles, giving me analways-greater audience .

To anyone who has commented on my articles,my gracious thanks.

Diana Soloman, the literary, editorial, andorganizational force behind this book, is surely one of the topVirtual Assistants in the known universe. Her steady hand can beseen on every page.

Most of all, I dedicate this book to mywife, Victoria, who has witnessed me hunched over a keyboard nightafter night to compose articles.Dubious... thenaccepting... and finally a cheerleader formy writing; her support surely makes this book possible in everysense.

Investing in your dreams and building abusiness is a tender adventure. Folks looking to launch a seriousjourney of self-discovery and entrepreneurship deserve curatedWho-What-Where news from a respectable fellow traveler with acritical eye and killer crib notes .

Web searches, while immediate in theirreturns, have their liabilities. Cold Google-ing and ElectronicNews Gathering can risk truffle-ing up information by sellers ofshenanigans who have manipulated search engines to goose optimalrankings. Advice in YouTweetFace platforms are often scribed bystrangers of undetermined expertise. Crowdsourced factoids fromsome Jolly Fats Wehawkin organization? Dubious at best.

Enter Emmy Award winning newsman, bloggerextraordinaire and Magna-Cum-Indefatigable graduate of my privateVoiceover coursework, Dave Courvoisier. Dave is a true industryinsider. He has taken every class, smartly reviewed the bestlearning modules, interviewed casting pioneers, hosted the topconferences, been welcomed by every hot shot, and, with his blogswide reach and deep influence, graciously helped scores ofbeginners .

True to his pledge asa journalist, he gets the story as well as the angle, but in hotdebate, kindly keeps his objective cool where the advice-givingwriter of this Foreword often cannot. Above all else, Dave is fairand wherever approbation flows, his is never false or influenced bypersonal agenda.

Ultimately, anyone desiring the richpersonal growth and serious revenue available in a Voiceover careerwill need to leap off the pier, find the right coach, learn thecraft of performance and procure the skills necessary to positionthemselves as a service-providing, profit generating business.Mamet said, "One is not going to learn to swim until one gets inthe water - at which point the only 'theory' which is going to beuseful is that which keeps one's head up."

With this book, Dave offers you his waterwings, flippers, and snorkel.

Oblata arripe

Nancy Wolfson, Coach, Casting Director, Producer

BrainTracksAudio.com

TABLE OFCONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Foreword

Introduction

PART ONE: So,You Wanna Be a Voice Over Actor?

PART TWO: Keep onLearning

PART THREE: TheBusiness of the VO Business

PART FOUR: What onEarth Do I Charge?

PART FIVE: The ManyVoice Over Niches

PART SIX: Resourcesfor the Voice Over Artist

About the Author

Introduction

A career in broadcasttelevision taught me one thing: there is always an appetite for thenext new thing... or news. When I beganapplying energy and resources to my 2nd career of voiceacting, I found that my talents as a newsman served me well as ablogger... and that voice actors loved voiceover news as much as those in any other profession.

I began writing a voice-over blog in 2007,and determined that I would consistently pursue this medium, that Iwould pay it forward to my colleagues and peers, and that therewould be value to my readers in every single post. From the start,the discipline of writing fresh content five days-a-week brought meto a new level of writing competence. I realized I was learning asmuch as my readers.

As blog subscribers grew over time, so didmy appreciation for the value of a blog to my online person mymarketing efforts, and my developing relationships to other voiceactors. All that made me want to do it better.

In the years of blogging, then, some 2600articles brought forth a focus on topics of social media,technology, marketing, interviews with newsmakers, and trendingonline resources that facilitate the community of voice actors.

For this book, I collated scores of thesearticles, dealing with the nuts n bolts of running a voice actingbusiness: tips for dealing with challenges, ideas for stayingafloat, helping those new to the challenges of VO, reminders,lists, and just generally sharing my walk in this business. Itsall here in the form of the chapters of this book. Originally, eachone was a blog article.

Ive added links to various resourcesthroughout the book, and filtered through each chapter again tomake sure the links are viable, and that the information isup-to-date.

To stay up with the news, though, youllhave to continue to visit my blog at Courvo.com/blog . Maybeafter another 2600 blogs, therell be another book!

Courvo.comCourvo.com/blog

Lets start with a fewrealities...

We Are all NewbsOnce

At least once a week I get an e-mail or phone callfrom a total stranger. But this is someone who is no stranger to asimilar feeling I had seven or eight years ago: the feeling thatmaking oodles of money in Voice over work was gonna be a cinch...Practically effortless.

I guess it's a good thing that my VO reputationprecedes me, but their query is getting predictable:

"Hi, I'm Bill, and all my life people have toldme I have an incredible voice. Right now I'm a __________(mechanic, accountant, DJ), but I want to do voice over work. I ranacross your name, and was wondering if you could help me?"