I was pinged this morning (and I think we all know painful that can be – ba-dum-bump) by David Ciccarelli who, with his wife Stephanie, own Voices.com. David asked if I would review, post and comment on his annual “Report on The Voice Over Industry 2009”.

OK then, a review with some general perspective and information upfront.

• While I am not a fan of the pay-for-play voice over model upon which Voices.com, Voice 123 and others have built their business, I have stated that if I were to choose one service of that ilk it would be Voices.com because even before I knew the Ciccarellis personally, the customer service and responsiveness their Voices.com offered me when I was an early member was better than any competitor.
• This is at least the second if not third year David has done this report and I give him great credit for seeing an opening for information sharing and promotion of his own business and going for it.
• I also give him credit for daring to ask the opinion of a loud mouth putz like me ’cause he knows I pull no punches on industry issues or in reviews. He and I must ascribe to the same theory that some publicity is better than none at all.
• Over the years I have become friends with David and Stephanie and know them to be honest people whose opinions and talents I respect. Others in their business, not so much.

So enough preamble, on to the meat-

The 23 page report is more PowerPoint than e-book with each slide offering one or two nuggets of information ranging from various market overviews to drilldowns on pertinent business segments.

My likes:

• I like that David’s established an annual tome that summarizes the industry. It adds credibility to the business but to be taken seriously it needs some additional info (see dislikes).
• I have seen “state of the industry reports” or prognostications from Voices.com’s competitors and comparably this is the most credible and informative of all of them at this moment in time.
• Information like $4.05 for the ad word voice over on Google is good to know (a stupidly high price to pay when its competitors who do most of the clicking on such ads but let’s not kill the messenger here)
• I like the format for both conveying information and for its readability.

My dislikes:

• The content has only a few bits of information that I think are new or enlightening to the industry. To become a must read it has to reveal trends and statistics that offer more insight for voice talents and producers. That requires a great deal more research which this document does not have and it shows rather clearly.
• Some topics struck me as grossly self-serving: a report on Social Networks conveniently notes the growth of a Voice.com sponsored group on Facebook and the Time Spent Online chart had Voices.com’s site crushing Voice 123’s statistically and visually while also noting most industry players spend most of their time on Voices.com. This smacks a bit more like a sales presentation than a industry report.
• The salary statistics chart – probably the most important page for both talent and producers – had no quoted sources for the stated figures (which were much too broad) and was only one page (versus three pages on podcasting). This was a big miss.
• The Touch Graph tool wasn’t simplistic enough or easy enough to immediately digest key information (like a good graph should). As just one (possibly self-serving in keeping here with a developing theme) example this graph had the audio’connell web site listed on the web site graph on “voiceovers” and on the same graph an Oxford biography link to Peter O’Connell who I think is a professor or a Bishop but sure ain’t me (no, I do not believe there are any other Peter O’Connell voice overs but me). The graph was gimmicky and not informative.

In summary, I believe that this report reads more like a sophomore’s term paper rather than a senior thesis. What it can, should and I truly hope will be in the future is a report that has a lot more facts in it, much more pertinent data and more information to help talent and producers manage their businesses. It will take much more time and research from Voices.com to make this annual report a widely respected annual state of the industry. Today, the report is not yet there but there is a foundation of a good idea.

We need that “stuff” as well as the promise of what this report could someday be.

Tags: audio'connell voice over talent, commentary, facebook, google, internet, social media, voice 123, voice over podcast, voice talent, voiceover, voices.com by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
6 Comments »

Usually I’ve not subscribed to the theory that if all the other kids are doing it, I should be doing it too.

As examples I never smoked, drank or did drugs. I’m not better than anyone who does those things (although I think its a rare case where I may be considered smarter) but I just never felt the need to fit in socially with such crutches. My obnoxious personality has always seen me through.

But lately as I have been studying Twitter, I did develop a case of wallpaper envy. You see for some reason (and for the life of me I cannot figure out why this happened) I clicked on CC Chapman’s Twitter home page and saw his very attractive wallpaper that he obviously created (you have to sign in to see it).

It occurred to me that this might be yet another example of a fad or trend that I had been completely oblivious to so I checked Chris Brogan’s, Leesa Barnes’ and Christopher S. Penn’s pages.

Yup, fancy, cool, well branded wallpapers on all of them.

I was yet again late for lunch; I had missed the bus, I was an east coaster working on Central time. Action had to be taken.

Well I slogged through about 20 me-made designs that technically and artistically looked like crap (clearly all the aforementioned have Macs) before I yelled “uncle” and called Ann Hackett over at aHa designs to bail me out of my pathetic state. She did.

OK, so I’m “me too” on this one. But doesn’t the page look subtle and smashing? Why, it’s Twitterific!

Tags: advertising, branding, commentary, marketing, social media, social networking, twitter by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
1 Comment »

My thanks to my fellow voice over talent Doc Phillips who has taken his Speak Easy blog one step further by publishing his favorite motivational and education blog posts from other voice over blogs, including voxmarketising.

Check out his post here to also read great blog posts from Dave Courvoisier, Bob Souer, Liz de Nesnera, Bobbin Beam, Willie Edwards, Elaine Singer and Bryan Cox.

It’s an honor for this blog to be recognized in such a way and especially to be included with such great voice and writing talents. Thank you for your efforts Doc!

Tags: blogs, commentary, community, social media, voice talent, voiceover advice by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
3 Comments »

Facebook has been on my mind this weekend as certain audio’connell siblings have dipped their toe into the water, took a look around the platform, drank a bit of the Facebook kool-aid – whatever.

So in my early morning reading, I came across this fine and evolving tutorial on using Facebook from my friends at Social Media Universe – Global. Now, they don’t know they are my friends but as a subscriber, I feel I get to call them names and that’s the one I chose.

Anyway, if you want to learn about Facebook and its many uses under the radar, so that you can appear to be an instant expert to friends who won’t know your educational secret (as it that one of the more fun aspects of the web) this page may be of interest to you. No doubt there are other pages on the web like this but these guys get the attention here today.

And if you’d like to friend me up, here’s the place to start.

(Ed. Note – No, there will be no “go out and vote” posting today. After this ridiculous long and expensive 2 year election cycle (and yes, I made money off it) if you’re so out of it that you need a reminder from ME to get out and cast your vote, then you are probably too “out of it” to be trusted with such an important task anyway.)

Tags: audio'connell voice over talent, blogs, commentary, facebook, social media, social networking by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
2 Comments »

If you hadn’t heard, Pepsi (my primary drink of choice) is going through a rebranding process.

The change, across all the soda’s brands, was leaked last week. If you caught my post on Twitter, I forewarned you.

There’s been a boatload of money thrown at this change, believe it.

It’s um, not good.

Now while I don’t care for the re-design, I do heart how they are tying in the digital world to promote it. This is a good use of public relations and social media. And no I am no offended that as a life long dedicated Pepsi drinker I didn’t get this Pepsi Care package. I know my place in the social media world (2nd from the bottom) and I’m cool with it.

Oh and Pepsi, who also owns Tropicana Orange Juice, is completely re-branding that line as well (this I like a bit better). Look for the new designs on a store shelf near you soon.

Full details from Brand New on Pepsi and Tropicana.

UPDATE:
Here is a video highlighting the old looks and the new looks. The side by side comparisons make the new design look even worse to me.

Tags: advertising, branding, commentary, logo design, social media by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
1 Comment »

No, as far as I know the service isn’t going out of business but it has lost its position as part of my social media mix. I closed my account.

I’m not mad at them nor was there any kind of dust up between us. My Space didn’t meet my needs. My peers and prospects didn’t use it and I actually felt awkward navigating through it. It really is a much younger skewing service.

I tried My Space because to me Social Media channels need to be experienced to be judged…assessing them without participating in them leaves a lot of room for error. Even though I knew My Space skewed younger from the outset, I also knew that at one time Facebook was a younger skewing service. It evolved into something much more purposeful for my professional and personal life.

My Space didn’t fit me. That’s OK. Every Social Media channel is not for every person and that’s the key take away here, especially if you are new to the scene. Social Media is an ever evolving space and the multitude of its channels, through which we all participate, also evolve.

Each of us who participate in Social Media need to occasionally step back, review our usage and either add or delete to our Social Media mix as we see fit. And as for the channel’s themselves, the fittest will survive.

There are still plenty of places where we can get together – I hope you’ll join me on:

Linked In

Facebook

FriendFeed

Twitter

Naymz

Tags: commentary, internet, social media, social networking by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
2 Comments »