Another example now of the value of Google Alerts (I don’t know how many times I am going to have to remind you people!) 😉 is the alert I saw featuring the blog for Oregon Voice Over Talent. This seems to be a group of voice talents (in Oregon…imagine that) who have conjoined their marketing strength into a supersonic, lalapoloooza web site and blog.

Because of social media, some of the names seem familiar to me, especially Vicki Amorose. I’m surprised they haven’t connected yet with their newest VO resident, my friend and the great voice talent Dan Nachtrab, who now enjoys a close personal relationship with actress Julia Roberts.

At any rate, now I am a subscriber to their blog and I hope you will be too.

Tags: voice actors, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover advice by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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If you’ve ever been to Voice Talent Production’s NYC Voiceover Mixer, you know it’s either like being tailed by the paparazzi or being in a high school photography class. There are flash bulbs everywhere with people taking pictures with and of their new and old friends. It’s quite fun.

So here are links to the Facebook photo albums I have found so you can sift though them at your leisure. If you see I am missing one or two, please let me know and I will add them. Thanks.

> The NYC 2010 Voiceover Mixer Photo Album of voice talent Trish Basanyi

> The NYC 2010 Voiceover Mixer Photo Album of voice talent Michael Schoen

> The NYC 2010 Voiceover Mixer Photo Album of voice talent Connie Terwilliger

> The NYC 2010 Voiceover Mixer Photo Album of voice talent Joe Rodriguez

> The NYC 2010 Voiceover Mixer Photo Album of voice talent Linda Ristig

> The NYC 2010 Voiceover Mixer Photo Album of voice talent Peter K. O’Connell

Tags: commentary, ny, voice actors, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover meet-ups by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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The VOBB in New York - From Left to right going around the table Tom Dheere, Caryn Clark, Peter K. O'Connell, Darren Altman, Trish Basanyi, Philip Banks, Elisa Canas, Liz deNesnera and Melissa Exelberth PHOTO COURTESY of Connie Terwilliger

My head is kinda spinning from the whirlwind activity of this past weekend in New York City where Erik Sheppard of Voice Talent Productions held his annual New York City Voice Talent Mixer at Tonic on Seventh Avenue.

I believe this is the third annual and its my second time attending and I liked it better than last year (and I had a really good time last year).

The question with these events always is: are you doing this to be social or are you doing this for business. As much as I like my voice over friends, I do it for business contacts.

I can NEVER say for certain where business opportunities may come from nor can I say for sure who I am going to meet at these kind of networking events…but I know I’ll have a guaranteed success rate of not meeting any new possible contacts if I don’t go.

But on the social side, it was great spending time with my old VO friends and making some new ones…certainly seeing from familiar faces from VOICE 2010 was an added benefit as well.

The smartest thing I did versus last year, though, was to go into the city on Friday night. Last year I went in on Saturday morning and left on Sunday morning…it was too much. Coming in on Friday, I got to grab dinner and then Saturday lunch with VO friends from the VO-BB and have some great voice over conversations.

One never knows where such conversations are going to go and I picked up some real business nuggets by talking a little and listening a lot. These meals were a bit like what I think Faffcon is like (and I will see you there in February).

At any rate, my thanks to LindZ Reiss and Erik who put it all together and everyone who allowed me to spend a little time with them over this weekend. It renewed my faith in this business and the people who make it special.

The Private Room at Ted's Montana Grill on 51st with Rachel Rauch, Elaine Singer, Marian Massaro, Elisa Canas, Philip Banks, Liz deNesnera, Melissa Exelberth, Trish Basanyi and Caryn Clark

A quick visit to Edge Studios to say hi

As you might tell from the picture, this was about as close as I could be bothered to get to the Christmas Tree at Rockefeller Center

Another angle of the some of the lunch table at Mustang Harry's - more folks would soon joing us

At the mixer with Voiceover Thespian Joe Rodriguez

Voice Talents from Around the Globe - U.S. Voice Talent Peter K. O'Connell, Canadian Voice Talent Elaine Singer and UK Voice Talent Darren Altman

Male Voice Talents Tom Dheere and Peter K. O'Connell

Voice Talents Peter K. O'Connell, Randye Kaye and Paul Strikwerda

Three women and a baby - wait, that's not right - Liz deNesnera, Peter K. O'Connell, Linda Ristig and Amy Taylor

Ho, Ho VO! Ron -Santa- Levine and Peter K. O'Connell

Voice Talents Peter K. O'Connell and the great Bobbi Owens

Male Voice Over Talents Peter K. O'Connell and Chris Mezzolesta

Voice Over Talents Peter K. O'Connell and Trish Basanyi

Great Dinner Pals - Voice Talents Peter K. O'Connell, Connie Terwilliger, Diane Dimond and Michael Schoen PHOTO COURTESY of Lee Gordon

Tags: commentary, ny, voice actors, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover meet-ups by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
5 Comments »

I can’t remember when I first signed up with Voices.com but I think it was 2004….pretty early into their creation. I tried it for a couple of years and then went back to my free listing. I wonder if they will be starting an old timers or founding members club soon? 6 years is like 60 years in web years.

All along the way, the company has always worked hard on their customer service. And über-web geek David Ciccarelli (co-owner of the company with his wife Stephanie) has always tweaked and improved the site.

But alas, the software program they were using had conniption fits if I tried to use an apostrophe in my last name or my company name on a title page (some computers and web browsers even today show a diamond with a question mark where apostophes should go…makes me think no Irishmen or Italians were involved at the start of the internet). David himself some years ago tried a work around with me on that challenge but no go with that software version.

Instead of O’Connell, it might be listed as the very inelegant OConnell or even worse Oconnell (ugh!). And did you ever watch somebody try to pronounce audioconnell? As audio’connell they seem to have a better time with it. Certainly not end-of-the-world stuff, all this, but it still makes you wonder whose alphabet and symbols these early web lords were using when they started the interweb? Oy!

Well I was on the Voices.com site recently and low and behold I saw some O’Connells WITH apostrophes in their names! As I am not a paid subscriber I wouldn’t expect to know of any such updates when ever they happened (maybe they themselves missed that minor update tweak) but I did get on the phone to Voices.com make sure I could make the update with no problems.

I had the good fortune to speak with Scott at Voices.com who (true to company form) was very helpful in making sure there wouldn’t be any computer glitches. He could not have been nicer.

So NOW when you search Peter O’Connell on Voices.com I’m the first listing. When you search O’Connell on Voices.com I am the LAST listing (although I am ((puff, puff)) the most often listened to of all the Voices.com O’Connells) but I think my last place listing there is because mine’s just a free listing which is understandable.

I even tried using the K. as in Peter K. O’Connell in the listing change with Scott, which is what I use professionally, but we went back to just Peter O’Connell in the page title because the upgraded software evidently didn’t like middle initials or periods and dropped my search results way down in both types of searches.

Whoa is the poor period! Flummoxed is the lonely middle initial! What ARE the Peter K. O’Connells, the Michael J. Fox’s and other short, middle aged voice actors to do?!

Work around it like we always do! But at least I got my apostrophe. Alls right with the world.

Tags: branding, commentary, voice talent, voiceover, voices.com by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
6 Comments »

Female Voice Talent and Voice Over Coach Deb Munro

I got a message from Deb Munro on Facebook that her Double Diva Voice Over Seminar December 4 & 5 (2010) in Toronto is ALMOST sold-out.

Two spots left…and she left me this message a couple of days ago.

So you better get on line to see if there’s still room for you.

Also it turns out that Elley Ray Hennessy is casting for a Disney feature during the seminar. There will also be a mixer Saturday night and i don’t think you have to be a part of the seminar to attend…but check anyway because I don’t know where they are having it.

All the details can be found by emailing Ms. Munro: workshops@micnme.com

Tags: commentary, voice actors, voice casting, voice over training, voice talent, voiceover by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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Evidently great minds think alike…and sometimes so do I!

It seems to be marketing and branding review time in VO land.

I think you’ve probably seen my post on redesigning my business cards. I didn’t believe it would garner that much interest but John Florian now has it up on Voiceover Xtra!

“So I got that goin’ for me…which is nice.”

But I was not the only person redoing their voice over business cards.

My pal Connie Terwilliger also posted about updating her business cards too, making a point to leave space on the backside so people could write notes if they like (ah, white space is going to be so “in” in 2011).

Then I caught a post by the lovely and talented Anthony Mendez who just did a blog about the nicely done refresh on his logo.

Anybody else out there cleaning up their branding act for the new year?

Tags: branding, commentary, logo design, marketing, voice talent, voiceover by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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