Agents are angels.
Well, most of them are.
Some agents work miracles.
They open doors that were previously closed. They negotiate fees you could only dream of. They do the legwork so you can concentrate on your craft. And sometimes, they have to lay down the law.
Since 1990, agents Beth Allen and Linda Stopfer have been at the helm of The Take One Company. They have a nose for great talent, and that’s why they’re representing the author of this blog.
Of course Beth and Linda want their talent to be successful, but some of the folks they represent don’t make it easy. In fact, gifted (voice) actors are blowing their chances by ignoring the basics of a healthy agent-talent relationship.
As in any relationship, it is give and take.
You give and they take.
Correction. That was a joke. I didn’t really mean that. As far as I’m concerned, my agents are worth every penny and I do my very best to make their life a little easier by playing by their book.
If you want to play the game, you better learn the rules before you enter the field.
So, what’s rule number one for dealing with your agent? According to The Take One Team, it is:
RESPOND PROMPTLY
Take One: “Producers and Casting Directors who are perpetually in a time crunch often contact us after hours with bookings, avails and auditions. It’s no longer an anomaly that our work day starts very early and ends very late. Therefore, it’s imperative that you check your devices and if you haven’t traded up to a smart phone, do it now.
We have very detailed info that you are required to confirm in writing, usually during business hours. If you have questions regarding job stats, please inquire BEFORE auditioning as it is assumed your attendance confirms acceptance unless the terms are changed. And about those terms, we always endeavor to get the very best deal available because we make money only when you do!”
This brings us to rule number two:
BE ACCESSIBLE
Never leave only one number where an agent can reach you. Always give them a backup number.
Take One: “Cell phone signals are not always reliable. Some days, your carriers go off-line with technical email glitches which are very frustrating when we need you. One other thing about cell phones: if you are situated in a place (audition/recording booth, etc.) where the ring tone is inappropriate, keep your phone on vibrate.
One client almost lost out on an audition for a $15K job because he went to the movies and turned off his phone. Also, please delete messages from your voice mail when you no longer need them. It’s frustrating when we need you pronto, and your voice mail tells us it’s full and not accepting any more messages and we can’t reach you.
Please return our phone calls and/or emails within the hour. To make it easy, please enter your agent’s numbers into your cell phone so it’s handy. Email them when you are not available or out of town.”
Here’s the third rule:
BE SPECIFIC
Don’t assume you are the only person your agent is working with. Usually, they’re balancing quite a few plates in the air at the same time.
Take One: “We have many schedules to keep track of, and you only have yours, so be specific when contacting your agent about “that audition” or “that booking.” Refer to them by product name, date/time, etc. And it’s become apparent that some of you don’t travel with your day planners.
Lately, when we ask about your availability, a few are not sure and can’t confirm until they go home and look at them. Those of you need to take a copy with you when you leave the house. Again, there’s a growing insistence from the industry to confirm avails and bookings quickly, or they move on to the next person of their list. Why lose a job over something so simple?”
Number four:
KNOW THE LINGO
Take One noticed that some terminology can be confusing. I asked them to give some examples:
“Availability” (a.k.a “avail”) to record a job, means just that. It doesn’t mean you are automatically booked. Being placed “on hold” or “on avail” means you are reserving that time for that particular job.
Being placed “on first refusal” is an even stronger reservation of your time. It actually means that you agree NOT to book a different job during that time without first consulting your agent. It then becomes his or her responsibility to contact the casting director or producer, giving them the option to book or release you FIRST, before any one else. They then must book you or REFUSE to book you. Only then are you free to accept the other booking.
This availability also impacts your “other career” or survival job. After confirming, you can’t turn around and tell your agent that you’re no longer available because you have scheduled a massage/PT/exercise or business meeting. Casting directors and producers usually go ballistic when this occurs. Disregarding the established protocols usually results in serious repercussions.”
The fifth rule:
BE CAREFUL
Take One: “Please bring to all bookings the information that your agent has provided you with about payment and terms, and make sure that it matches the information on the contract should there be one for you to sign. If there are any discrepancies, DON’T SIGN IT. Once you’ve signed it, should it be incorrect, it is almost impossible to get it changed after the fact. There are three ways to handle the situation:
- call your agent immediately
- take it with you
- tell the producer to send it to your agent
Make sure you always have the check sent to your agent first, not you, so your agent can verify the correct amount. Once you’ve cashed it, you’ve acknowledged your agreement to accept that payment as correct. “
And here’s rule number six:
RESPECT CONFIDENTIALITY
Take One: “Whenever you are given a script and asked to record an audition, given a script to record at an audition, or given a script to record at a booking, this material is never to be shared with anyone due to confidentiality, especially if it’s a new product. More often now, talent are required to sign an NDA form (non disclosure agreement). This requires you to not reveal the contents of scripts.” More on confidentiality in my story “Winning an audition. Losing the job.“
STATING THE OBVIOUS?
Not every casting agency has the same policies and preferences. Nevertheless, some of you might be wondering: Why does Take One have to spell everything out? Isn’t this just plain old common sense? Are the people they represent and who call themselves professional really that oblivious?
YES they are, and increasingly so.
So, before you go on with your day, think about some simple things you can do to strengthen your connection with your agent, or even with the client you are currently working with. These relationships are the cornerstones of your business and the foundation of your success.
Be an angel. Treat them like gold.
When you look good, they look good.
And that’s what it’s all about!
Paul Strikwerda©nethervoice
In the following article, I get personal and take you to my moment of truth, after I took a good look in the mirror.

Why I Spy On You
Anyone can write a blog.
Some people are very good at it.
Others can’t even come up with an interesting tweet.
Does it matter?
If you’re on a podium and there’s no audience, what’s the point?
I count my lucky stars because I have an audience and it has grown ever since I started blogging. It’s not entirely due to luck though, because I do my very best to make your visit as enjoyable and memorable as possible.
Before I tell you about the visible and often invisible ways in which I do that, I’d like to share four goals with you that are always at the back of my mind when I blog:
1. write compelling content
2. engage my readers
3. increase my reach and readership
4. become rich and famous
As you can see, one thing leads to the other. Quality content stimulates readers to like, repost, retweet and comment. This increases my reach and grows my readership. And if I play my cards right, the world will fall in love with me and make me a wealthy man.
Yeah. Right.
Seriously, in order to accomplish all these goals there’s one thing I need to do:
I have to stop thinking about myself.
There’s only one person that really matters.
Yes, it’s YOU!
What I want to write about is not that important. It matters what you want to read. Even though I’m not a psychic, I have a pretty good idea what you are interested in. Just look at the list of Popular Posts in the upper right-hand corner. Not only does it provide some social proof; we can learn something from this list.
WHAT’S POPULAR
Based on the headlines, only 4 out of 10 articles have to do with my profession: providing voice-overs with a European sound. I often use a voice actor’s lens as a springboard to write about things that concern all kinds of freelancers. My list of popular posts proves that this is a good way to increase my reach beyond the small voice-over community.
There’s something else I monitor closely on my blog, and that’s the level of engagement. Some posts get more comments, retweets and likes than others. Look at this list:
This definitely confirms a trend because most comments have little to do with voice-over related topics. They are about freelancing, running a business, social media, marketing and money.
Not only do I know what my readers are interested in, I can tell you that most of them live in the United States, followed by Great Britain, Canada and The Netherlands. What I particularly like is that I have a nice mix of returning readers and people who stop by for the very first time. It’s great to have loyal fans and I love to welcome new friends!
I can also tell you how most people find me. Here are the results from the last few weeks:
And where do most referrals come from?
These stats are very useful, not only because they help me understand my readers better. They tell me how effective my blog promotion is, and where there’s room for improvement.
Looking at the statistics, I also learned that an increasing number of people are reading this on a portable device (mostly iPhones). Based on that, I totally redesigned my website to make it mobile responsive (see: The New Nethervoice). That alone has dramatically influenced my bounce rate.
Bounce rate is usually defined as:
It might look great on paper to have thousands of people come to your website, but if they’re gone in a few seconds, what good does that do? Currently, the bounce rate for nethervoice.com is 1.98%. For mobile users, my bounce rate is even lower: 0.34%. Get this: my old site had an average bounce rate of 40-60 percent!
Looking at the most recent numbers, I can tell you that people spend about 3 minutes and 47 seconds on my site (mobile users: 4:21). That’s pretty good, considering the fact that the average visit to a website lasts less than a minute and often no more than 10-20 seconds!
Where do I find all these factoids? I find them on Google Analytics and with the help of a number of WordPress plugins such as the Site Stats on Jetpack and SlimStat. Keep in mind that we’ve barely scratched the surface when it comes to web traffic analysis. I can drill down on individual web pages and blog posts and get a fairly good idea of what my visitors are up to. I even know what some of them do when they leave…
SHARING THE LOVE
Readers often share my content by copying and pasting it to emails and social media. How do I know? I use a nifty tool called Tynt to monitor what content anonymously leaves this site. Go ahead, copy and paste something from this page and see what happens!
Each time someone pastes content from my site, Tynt automatically adds a url-link back to the source. When that link is clicked, the user is directed to this blog and can see the original article. This increases traffic to my site.
Tynt is one more way to measure traffic and engagement. Like other analytics tools, Tynt tells me which keywords were used to bring visitors to my site and which content prompted people to take action. Thanks to Tynt I now know that most people use email and Facebook to share my stories.
The nice thing is: with all these tools at my disposal, I have a way to measure results; not just for this blog but for my entire site.
STAY WITH ME
As you just saw, most visitors spend almost four minutes on this site and something tells me this might have to do with the content. But there are other things I do to try to keep you from leaving. One simple way is to instruct WordPress how to handle outbound links.
An outbound link is a word, phrase or image that you can click on, that will take you to a new website. As you can see, if a word or a phrase appears in blue on my blog, it’s an outbound link or an internal link.
Here’s how I created the link above in WordPress:
If I don’t check the box Open a link in new window/tab, the reader will leave my website once the link is clicked, and may never come back. By ticking that box, the outbound link opens in a new window while leaving my page open, and the reader can return to it whenever he or she done.
You’ve probably also noticed that I often refer to earlier articles in this blog. Whenever I do, I make sure to create an internal link to those stories. Not only is this a service to readers who want to find out more about a certain topic, it tends to increase the time people spend on my site. And by the way, I don’t only do this for my blog. My entire site is filled with internal links.
From an SEO (Search Engine Optimization) standpoint, internal links are invaluable. They become the threads holding the spiderweb together that is nethervoice.com. Search engine robots (sometimes called spiders), use these links to find content for indexing. A web marketing specialist from Japan put it as follows:
There’s one other thing I like to do to keep you here just a bit longer. At the end of most blog posts, you’ll find a link to the next article.
Readers have told me that they stumbled upon one of my stories by accident, and then just kept on flipping the virtual pages from link to link. Every click is a YES from a visitor; a mini-endorsement increasing the site’s credibility.
Perceived credibility is one of the factors influencing the page rank of a website. Contributing to that credibility is social behavior. The more people link, like, pin, repost, and retweet a page, the more relevant search engines believe it is.
Don’t assume that your visitors will take action, though. You have to make it easy for them to share content. That’s why you find share and like buttons at the top and bottom of my stories. Secondly, it helps to ask people to take action:
Be sweet. Please retweet!
Those four words have increased the number of retweets by sixty percent!
Now, there’s a reason why I put that request at the end of a blog post, just as I added the phrase:
“If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!“
When people are finished reading a story, they’ve had an experience, and hopefully, it’s been a good one. Ideally, I want my readers to say:
“I want more of where that came from!”
or
“My friends need to read this.”
At that point they’re most likely to take action.
One of those actions can be to subscribe to this blog or to leave a comment.
HAVE YOUR SAY
If you’re a frequent visitor, you may have noticed that my blog roll is gone. In its place you’ll find the last five comments posted on this blog. There are a few reasons I made that decision.
Most importantly, very few people ever clicked on the links in the blog roll. That’s another thing Google Analytics told me. Secondly, not everybody on my blog roll was an active blogger and I didn’t feel like checking these blogs for fresh content every week.
Why link to recent comments instead? Well, I want to encourage and reward reader participation. My most active friends and fans deserve to be featured more prominently. Having a blog just isn’t enough anymore to appear on this page.
Once you post a comment, you’ll notice something else that’s new. I’m not going to tell you what it is. You’ll have to find out for yourself.
SOCIAL MEDIA INTEGRATION
The last thing you might have seen is the Find us and like us on Facebook box I added a few weeks ago. You don’t have to leave this site to like me on Facebook, and you can see the faces of other “likers” as well. It will only display those “likers” that are already in your Facebook network. This creates a sense of community, and people are more likely to click “like” if they see the faces of friends.
What I really hope is that you will click that button because you enjoy spending some time on this blog and you want to connect with me. This blog is published once a week. I update my Facebook page almost every day. It’s another place where we can be among friends and fellow-professionals and share useful information and ideas.
THE REAL SPY
As I have demonstrated, I’ve been keeping a close eye on you. Yes, I spied! But while I was writing this article, it did occur to me that the tables have turned. By sharing some of my hidden statistics with you, you were able to spy on me!
The truth is: I have no secrets. When it comes to blogging, I am an open book. In fact, that book is for sale. It’s called “Boosting Your Business with a Blog” and you can buy the unlimited PDF version right here on this website.
In it, I talk about creating compelling content, I teach you how to make your blog easy to read and I show you how to build an audience.
Please help me reach my fourth goal and buy this book today. It will be an enriching experience for both of us!
Paul Strikwerda ©nethervoice
Be sweet. Please retweet.
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