5 qualities you need as a voiceover artist

Confidence.

Confidence is something every voiceover artist needs. You will be working for yourself and need to have the confidence to sell yourself and your skills to potential clients. You will also need the confidence to put yourself out there in the first place and know that you have a great voice, a great studio environment and a great sound as a result. It’s also crucial to know your worth when quoting for projects and negotiating. This then, I think, gives you the confidence to say when things aren’t right and even walk away from projects/clients.

Resilience.

Every day, you will be taking constructive advice (and sometimes criticism) from directors, mentors, and other VO artists (if you’re in groups). You need to be able to accept and apply that advice (if you think it’s right!) to your processes and work. This can be tough, especially at the beginning of your career, but is vital to ensure you grow as a professional.

You will also need to have resilience to cope with not winning jobs, being ghosted by potential clients, and chasing payments (such a bore, but necessary!). You must accept that not every day will bring easy success and often it feels like a roller-coaster ride.

A desire to learn and grow.

Being a voiceover artist is a constant learning curve. You are always learning new techniques, growing your repertoire of styles and accents, learning about how to create a good environment to record in, improving your editing skills, researching equipment… And these are just a few examples.

Organisational skills.

You need to keep track of a lot of things when you’re up and running as a VO artist. For example invoicing, general bookkeeping, the progress of multiple projects, enquiries, what’s working for you and what’s not. Getting some good organisational processes in place will make life a lot easier and streamline your business.

It also helps to have a methodical process set up so you can audition easily and regularly. This means you are ready and set up to audition throughout the day and even at weekends, with all audio files easily stored and ready to send to clients. Plus, being the first person heard by a producer can make a massive difference to your chances and can even win you the job.

Good people skills.

You really need to be easy to work with; flexible and happy to jump straight into projects at the last minute and receptive to client requests. Being efficient and getting back to enquires quickly can make the difference between winning and losing jobs. Plus, being prepared to turn things around quickly stands you in very good stead.

Good communication is key – being able to listen to direction; taking it onboard and actioning it; sharing your thoughts on projects and being clear about YOUR ways of working. Also, maintaining those relationships goes a long way to getting more work (a big part of my workload is from repeat clients!).

What other qualities do you think are needed when working as a voiceover artist? Let me know…