Pinterest had been confusing me for a while. I couldn’t see the point in it. It seemed like a kind of electronic scrapbook that didn’t have any business application.

But being a social media lemming, I started an account anyway.

The more I started to think about this strangely popular new media tool, the more I kinda understood how it might be of benefit to my business. Again, I don’t know if there will be a direct ROI, but I think from an awareness level, Pinterest may help build my brand. I’m willing to give it a shot, anyway.

It’s a work in progress for me but here’s what I’ve learned from reading, asking questions and experimenting:

1. What’s your business purpose for being on Pintrest?
If you just want to scrapbook that’s fine but my guess is if you are a business, you’re trying to impress and get the attention (or interest) of a prospect or more specifically a type or category of prospects. This leads to the next question….

2. Have you thought about the prospects you want to attract?
Think about it…and be as specific as possible. First, look at the your most beloved (highest billing) clients. Do they have any similarities….interests, topics, images, some kind of information that these prospects would find so interesting that they’d spend time on your Pinterest site and possibly connect with you. Then think about subsets of other clients and maybe create some boards on Pinterest that they would find interesting.

For example, two audiences I want to attract are other voiceover talents (who might want to participate in my Voice Over Workshop) and advertising agency creative directors.

3. Let your Pinterest page become a resource for your prospects
So you know WHO you want to attract and WHAT they would find interesting so now you have to go about finding the stuff. The stuff these folks are looking for likely isn’t all about you and your business so making your whole Pinterest site a commercial for your business won’t be of interest to them. Instead, look at it like you are trying to help solve a problem for them or giving them interesting ideas that will help their business. They theory being that if you can help them via social media, you could probably help them in real life via your business.

So back to the examples – for the voice-over talents, I have pictures on my Pinterest page from the many voice-over meet-ups I have had over the years. I know from my blogging that these pictures (and accompanying posts are some of the most read on my blog). For my advertising prospects, they might find my logo collection interesting.

Like I said earlier, for me this is all a work in process and my Pinterest page is still evolving, but it’s a start.

So organize your thoughts on your prospects and then do some searching. You’ll not only find things that interest your clients, your research may help you better understand your clients a little better. That kind of knowledge goes a lot further than just a social media page.

I hope this helps.

If you have an interesting take on how you’re making Pintrest work for your business, please let me know below in the comments section. And of course, feel free to connect with me on any social media channel!

Tags: commentary, pinterest, social media by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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I am quite literally stunned to realize that in two weeks I will be in Charlotte, NC with 100 fellow voice-over professionals attending FaffCon 5.

Five?!

Except for the first FaffCon, which I couldn’t attend without upsetting the then pregnant Mrs. audio’connell, I have attended every FaffCon (in Atlanta, Georgia, Hershey, Pennsylvania, Ventura Beach, California and now Charlotte, NC). The people I’ve met and the things I have learned have allowed me to grow my business and advance my way of thinking about voice over. I want to focus on that last part for a second.

The voice-over business is a very solitary business with most folks working in their home studios with occasional breaks to actually talk to clients on the phone (vs. only e-mailing each other, which happens too often for my liking) or the blessed trips to a local studio where somebody else does the work and you can focus on your performance (such bliss!)

But in that kind of insular environment, we as professional voice talents sometimes found ourselves with few peers through which we could share our business, performance or technological ideas. On a lot of our business stuff we were all making it up as we went along.

With the advent of chat rooms or in my case bulletin boards (like the infamous and invaluable VO-BB) new networks of professional voice talents were formed, initial emails were exchanged and in my case, meetings were scheduled between voice-over talents who could share, learn and develop all phases of their businesses together.

The natural evolution from these types of groups was a convention, which was first put together by my friend and fellow voice talent Frank Frederick…it was called VOICE and it took place in a hotel in Las Vegas I think in 2005, maybe 2006. The first (and only) VOICE I attended was in 2010. It was a nice networking event but I didn’t feel my professional education was significantly enhanced by it. I felt a lot of what was taught (with some exceptions) was very rudimentary (and I was one of the presenters so take that into account).

But I remember seeing my friend Amy Snively at that conference as well. This particular time we were on the trade show floor by a microphone display. She shared with me her disappointment about the content of the show as well. I can’t say I knew what she was thinking at the time but sometime after that on the VO-BB a discussion was held about a different kind of conference.

In that thread, FaffCon was born. Now we are five.

Monday night I had dinner in Toronto with voice talent Jodi Krangle, a FaffCon veteran. Thursday night I had dinner with Kelly Klemolin in Green Bay, who will be attending her first FaffCon in Charlotte.

They will be roommates during FaffCon 5. Knowing both Kelly and Jodi as long as I have, I am certain their professional connection will last a long time and their likely friendship even longer.

And they have two people to thank – D.B. Cooper and her idea for the VO-BB, giving us voice talents a safe place to gather and share ideas; and Amy Snively, who’s idea for FaffCon shared on the VO-BB has built an event unlike any in our industry.

For five, I think “we” are a pretty amazing kid.

Tags: commentary, faffcon, voice over training, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover advice, voiceover meet-ups by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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Less than 30 days remain before FaffCon 5 in Charlotte, NC.

This year, I have been working with my friends Natalie Stanfield Thomas and Pam Tierney on selling sponsorships for FaffCon 5. They have been great to work with and I am very lucky to be on their team.

Last year when I worked on selling sponsorships for FaffCon 4 I was amazed how many voice-over talents bought sponsorships. This year, even more voice talents are sponsoring FaffCon 5– quite selflessly too because they don’t have much to sell to their peers, they just know that an event like FaffCon does not happen without financial support. Thanks to each of you.

We have many corporate sponsors too and we are SO grateful for them (thank you all).

If you are a voice-over talent or corporation who wants to support FaffCon 5 or get your message in front of business owners and leaders in the VO industry, please email me via my super-secret, double agent with a decoder ring code name- sponsorship at sign faffcon dot com.

There truly is NOT much time left, with art deadlines etc., looming. You can also reach me at 716-572-1800.

Thanks!

Tags: commentary, faffcon by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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So back in June my friend and fellow voice talent Doug Turkel pinged me about Twitter’s new logo. It’s nice, simple and, I thought to myself given all the different feed services and mobile devices we all use now, maybe a tad irrelevant.

Think about it.

With no scientific data to back this up (because that requires work and this is Sunday etc.) I’ll offer my “expert” (ha!) opinion: I feel with services like HootSuite and others, most of us don’t directly and visually interact with Twitter alot. So I don’t know that we’ll see the new logo too terribly much.

That got me to thinking about MY Twitter home page. As you may or may not know, Twitter allows you to customize your home page with some branding. (Here’s a link to a video if you want to see how it’s done otherwise your graphic designer can probably help you too).

Does my (or yours or anyone’s) home page on Twitter matter any more in our world of feeds or aggregators? Well, I kinda think it does for two reasons…again my “expert” (ha!) opinion.

1. When you’re a business, people expect a certain professionalism to your work. Your design not only conveys what your business does but also it’s attitude and personality. Should someone come across your Twitter page, an impression will be formed. Do you want to risk a bad impression? Probably not but if you really don’t care, I’d also ask why you’d really want a business presence on any Social Media channel.

2. It’s a free, colorful and fun way to convey your business message. It’s so simple that even if only 10 people see it a year, to me it’s money well spent.

Oh, and just in case you are completely clueless (it will be our secret) one of Twitter’s default backgrounds on your Twitter home page is the fastest way ever to publicly communicate that in your personal life you also wear plaid shirts with checked pants.

Dress nicely if you go out in public. 😉

I would love to know your thoughts on the matter.

Tags: advertising, branding, commentary, logo design, marketing, twitter by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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Diane Merritt is again doing her “Walk to End Alzheimer’s” on October 20th, in memory of her Mom.

If you can, I hope you’ll consider making a donation of any amount as she does her part to resolve this tragic challenge that affects too many of us directly or indirectly.

Thanks.

Tags: commentary by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
1 Comment »

Being that I bruised my toe pretty well Sunday (enough to get it x-rayed to make sure I didn’t break it) I had a little extra time in my Da chair with my laptop, foot iced and elevated. I was perfectly content.

One of the things I did was look at my Twitter page…not a Hoot Suite feed but the actual page.

My question for YOU involves reviewing my Twitter quote. If you can’t read it on the graphic, it reads:

Peter K. O’Connell
@audioconnell
Your friendly, neighborhood voice over talent since 1982. For a free quote, check an encyclopedia. For a quote involving you paying me cash, call 716-572-1800.

Not surprisingly, I find that quote incredibly funny, witty, sexy and tall…much like its author.

However, I know sometimes others don’t get my humor. Those are people who are usually not incredibly funny, witty or sexy. So sad.

Yet these people also have checkbooks that I want to access (i.e. them writing me checks) – therefore maybe I need to appease them. Or maybe I don’t…hence the advice from you.

So here’s the vote:

Should I:

a. Keep the quote as is because it is SO funny, witty, sexy and tall

b. Change the quote to appease those who are not so funny, witty, sexy and tall

BUT if you vote “B”, you need to make a suggestion as to what the new quote should be.

Tags: commentary, marketing, social media, twitter by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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