Why I Like Voice123

[Scott Pollak]

I know, I know... how odd for me, the guy who raised holy hell during the Smartcast changeover... to be a proponent of V123 now. And they still have their warts. Their customer service needs work, and being penalized for over auditioning is inexcusable. But as we've bantered about a lot over time, some sites work for some, others work for others. But recently here's what I've noticed over the past two weeks for me personally:

Voice123:
- auditions submitted: 20
- auditions opened or listened to: 13 (On the other sites, do you know if your audition was ever even heard?)
- rankings: three "1 - likely hiring" 3 out of 20 is a good ratio, IMO. At the other site you have no idea.
- Jobs landed: 2

And there's more:
- I got contacted by a voice seeker that I auditioned for, but did not win the job. However, he liked me enough to ask me to audition for a FOLLOW UP to the same job because the client wanted a different voice than the one they choice for other spots. I know, weird, but still....
- I got about 4 direct invitations this week. I almost NEVER got any off of voices.com

So again, for me, V123 is well worth my investment. In one week I MORE than made up the year's subscription fee.

But as always, a caveat: results vary, results not typical, consult a physician, yadda yadda.

What site works best for you and why?

(BTW, they really HAVE eased up on the policing of the forums a lot there. It's still not a total democracy, but it's a lot better.)

[lanceblair]

Vee Eins Zwei Drei was the P2P where I had the most success, but I have no intentions of paying them money for their nonsense and attitude. I make more money not paying attention to them at all and focusing elsewhere. I've gotten more clients from people who said they looked at V1.2.3 but all the talents were so awful that they were glad to find me directly than from clients that I won at veeeee123.

[Claired]

I'm glad it's working out for you Scott.
It was working for me before smartcast but since it has gone downhill. My subscription is up for renewal and I've made $800 from it this year and it was all within the first months. Nothing for the last 6 months. I don't know if I will bother.
I've made a few thousands on voices.com and I pretty much never send custom auditions. I'm selling a lot from the store. So for me, it's voices.com who wins by a mile!
And I've made zero from the other sites I'm on (or it was so long ago, I've forgotten). I won't renew any of them.
Oddly, I got a really big contract off Craigs' list :-)

[Scott Pollak]

Claire, I, too made nothing off of the other sites and let my subscriptions lapse there. Everyone is jumping on the bandwagon now after V123 and voices.com got the ball rolling and now there are too many players out there.

In my original post I left out one of the BIGGEST factors of why I live V123: the limitation of how many auditions can be submitted on a lead, unlike other sites where you're literally one in hundreds.

On the 20 leads I submitted to over the past two weeks, here is the audition count:

37
90
81
40
22
64 (rated #1)
6
11 (won job)
67
61
52 (won job)
15 (didn't win, but client followed up)
100
20
48
42
25 (rated #1)
69
21
50

So on only ONE of 20 leads did the audition count run into triple digits. I simply believe your odds of being heard and chosen are higher there. At least that's been my experience.

[MiddleChild]

With me, it's real "Close, But No Cigar."

I'm #2 out of 34 talents they listened to, I'm #4 out of 19 talents they listened to.

Been on there a little over a month, audition about 200% more than everybody else (according to my stats) and I haven't landed a job yet.

But I was contacted by a guy who found me on V123 to do a job that he didn't post on the site, so I guess it's all good.

Still, if I'm to give them $300 of my hard earned, I'd expect greater returns than that.

[Thomas C. Gass]

I *do* like 123 - nevertheless I'm 50%/50% pro and co with it. I don't like the way 123 treats it's customers (I sometimes even feel guilty being a 123-customer ;-) and I don't show off at their forums 'cause they're censuring even 1% 123-critical messages (www.123.ru ;-). As a matter of fact, jobs coming directly from 123 don't make upe the money I spend on my yearly membership. I don't even have enough ratings to get a ranking...:-) A couple of months ago, I was in charge to cast various voices for a nice VO job in different languages and I decided to post an audition via 123. Gee, I was overwhelmed with the amount of incoming samples (95% of them being simply crap...) I then noticed that, as a voice seeker, it is almost impossible to "rate" every entry accordingly (I simply couldn't dare telling 95% that they deserve a "no star"....)

@Claire: I contaced you about this job, because you were my favourite candidate for the french version, but unfortunately it was right at the time when you moved to LA and didn't have ISDN yet for the live session... :-( OXOX

But I've noticed something very important: 123 can be a *very* useful marketing platform: I use Google Analytics on my website since a long time (together with Google Ads, a very useful tool as well, by the way...) - this service allows you (among other things) to see what website refers visitors (with place of origin and even IP address) to your site. So, if you have a visitor, get an e-mail with a job offer, and you can trace his appearance via Google Analytics back to your personal page on 123, this is definitely worth the membership on 123. Many new customers of mine just "lurk" on 123 to find talents and contact them directy. I must say that I received a lot of jobs not coming directly via 123, but via the link to my homepage I have on my personal 123-page - the last one: a documentary movie as German voice over together with Meryl S. as the English counterpart...

Thomas

[toddschick]

Hey Scott...

You may recall an article I wrote on (my) revenues from V123 -

Voice123 Voices.com review and summary.

.....$30.00 an hour over 6 years. Yes, I'm aware of the error that membership fees were less a few years ago, but that doesn't address those signing up now.

You know why I hate Voice123? Because they'll take money from a plumber and in doing so, have de-valued the VO service across the board. Then.....then......get this. They send me an e-mail (attached) looking for people to start up V123 franchises for other languages.


What really floored me was this:

• Tremendous drive, entrepreneurial spirit, and dedication.

To further explain the last bullet-point: You should only apply for this partnership program, if you will have the ability to work at least 8 hours per day for a full year with no salary, which is the period before we estimated time frame for these businesses to achieve profitability.

And then....there's this:


"While not required, these skills are considered highly valuable in selecting our partners:

• Documented web programming experience, with references.
• Previous knowledge of and involvement in the entertainment industry.
• Previous experience in building and running web-based businesses.
• Ability to bring additional resources, above & beyond the requirements listed above.
• Location in New York, NY, or Bogota, Colombia.

So, they want people to work for nothing (during a recession)....and will likely only select those who worked in the "entertainment" industry....but have an extensive background in code and web development......who happen to live in NYC or Columbia.

Is it just me, or do these people present as not carrying all their groceries in one bag?

And the kicker? These idiots sent this e-mail.....to ME! LOL! How stupid is that?


TS

[Scott Pollak]

Originally Posted by toddschick

you will have the ability to work at least 8 hours per day for a full year with no salary,

Yes, Todd, I remember your article quite well, and honestly, I enjoyed it.

8 hours a day for a full year with no salary????

Damn, that sounds like working in radio!!

[DKettle]

OK...I'm a newbie, but I don't think I'm a plumber.

I just recently signed up at V123, to see what it was like and, as I'm sure they do with EVERYONE after a few days or a week, the offered a free month. So I said, "Let's give it a try." Now, I'm not 'whining', just trying to make sense of something that seems a little peculiar.

Now, I will say that there are many features I LOVE about V123. The status displays top among them. As Scott said, it's nice to know that the seeker has opened your proposal and how many have been reviewed. I don't even mind getting a "Maybe" on the feedback! At least you're getting useful information, unlike the "black hole effect" at VdotC.

I also agree with Scott that nobody should be penalized for over auditioning. Especially if they are paying to be invited to the opportunities to audition. I fully understand that V123 wants to prevent 'abuse', but I think the implementation of their anti-abuse countermeasure is the "wrong execution of the right idea." My trial membership started on the 27th of July. Today is the 31st. I got no invitations yesterday and, so far, none today. I've had 14 invitations and auditioned for 4 of them. One, I only auditioned for it because they kept sending URGENT reminder emails about it; that it has only received 28% of it's target auditions etc. It wasn't a big budget gig, but it wasn't really a low-baller either. So I've tried for 4 gigs out of 14, 28% of what was offered to me. And now I'm blocked because, since the 27th I've applied for 4 where others in the match group have applied, on average for 1.1...or, in other words, SmartCast says I've applied for 260% more? Where do they get this number? I was only offered 14 in the first place. Of the 2800+ other male members of the site, how many HUNDREDS of jobs were offered in total that I didn't exactly match on SmartCast because the 'abuse' system matches only on the Language Gender, or so it seems.

Furthermore, why isn't anyone else auditioning for more than 1.1 gigs in a 2-3 day period? I think Scott said he did 20 in one week. If it's about a 5 day week, that's 4 a day! Good goin', So I did 4 in 3 days and I'm canned? Hmmmmm. Something is wrong with this. And getting back to the question at the top of the paragraph. Perhaps some of the guys aren't auditioning because:

*they decided to take a couple of days off and go to the beach with the kids? It is summer after all. Does SmartCast even know what summer it is and what it means to anyone who lives in a colder climate? (Does anyone use the vacation feature for only a couple of days away?)

*they are busy with work they've already won?

*there were too many lowballers expecting a lot for very little? (This brings up the question I saw eluded to on another post -- why doesn't V123 have a MINIMUM budget, which should reflect the pricing of the rate survey they did a couple of years ago, at least, if not adjusted for current rates, if they're up?)

*they just didn't feel they wanted most of the offered gigs?

The point is, who is auditioning and who isn't, is not, in and of itself, any indication of abuse of the system. The person who is auditioning for 60-100% of what they have been invited to might be. But relative to what others are doing makes no sense to me. The majority of the others may just be in a lazy mood the past couple of days! Or exceptionally picky! Nothing wrong with either, for the short term. And one member certainly cannot force his colleagues to audition any more than they want to or plan to to meet their own needs.

Before I start to ramble I'll wind down now. My point is...if there is one thing that will keep me from taking a paid membership at V123, this is it.

I await your guns and/or roses!

Don

[Lee Gordon]

I have no data to back it up, just personal observation, but it seems to me SmartCast doles out the invitations in much the same way a poker dealer distributes cards at the table, I think it's "here's a small batch of leads for you," then another group of people get a handful each, then another group, and so on until the "dealer" gets back around to you and dumps another load into your inbox.

I'm a little surprised they don't artificially enhance the experience for the free-trial users, in the same way that HBO and Showtime always seem to show nothing but blockbuster movies when it's "Free Preview Week" but then go back to a mix of good movies and crap when only the paying customers can watch.

In a way, I commend Voice123 for making the free trial a realistic sample of the experience. But, on the other hand, I hate the fact that they give any free trials at all. Since they send out only a limited number of invitations for any particular job, every lead that goes to a free-trial member comes at the expense of a paid member who is being deprived of it. To me that is totally unfair. If Voices.com wants to hand out free trial subscriptions, that's fine because they're not taking any leads from me to give to someone else.