Career Advice

A famous slogan from a famous company and also very good advice for all who have their own business. As Jay H. Heyman points out, if you wait long enough, it won’t matter any more whether you do or don’t do whatever it was that you were thinking about. So, even if it seems like a stupid idea, just get in motion and do the thing that’s in front of you.

The late, great, football coach Vince Lombardi once began a practice session (or at least so the story goes) with his team of professional football players by holding up an object and saying “Gentlemen, this is a football.” I mention that story because, whether it’s true or not, it’s a great reminder that sometimes it’s really important to remember even the most basic stuff.

So, regardless of where you are in your marketing efforts for your voiceover business right now, take a moment to click through to the blog post called Creature comfort? at Drew’s Marketing Minute. You’ll be glad you did.

(My thanks to my manager and friend, Stacey Stahl, for sending the link to this post.

(edited to fix typo)

Take a few minutes to look at Seth Godin’s blog for some thought provoking comments about risk and reward. Well worth your time today.

Dan O’Day’s International Radio Creative and Production Summit is a fabulous annual event in Los Angeles that I’m attending this year for the 13th time. I haven’t missed a single time since I starting going the second year it was held in 1997. I highly recommend this event to anyone serious about improving skills in voiceover, copy writing or production. All 3 elements are part of every year and everyone, regardless of specialization will benefit from what’s taught in every segment.

Today is a really good day to register, if you haven’t all ready done so, because the registration fee goes up tomorrow. Registation and full details are on the Summit pages at Dan O’Day’s web site.

If you decide to register, and you put my name in the comment box at the bottom of the registration page, I’ll receive a commission. Or if you don’t want me to get the commission, don’t put my name in the comment box. Either way, your registration price is the same. Of course, I’d be grateful if you would. And I hope you’ll take a moment to say “hello” while we’re there.

Dave Foxx is doing a teleseminar with Dan O’Day on radio imaging. Registration closes tomorrow evening so if you do or want to do radio imaging voiceover work and/or production, you might want to click through to the official registration page to sign up sometime today.

Kevin Delaney has recorded a new audio post on his Voiceover Ninja blog about the difference between earning big money and small money.

One step at a time. Set Godin provides the road map. Just one other question. Which road are you taking?

I’v written here before about how for me the voiceover business can often be compared to farming. We need to plant, nurture and harvest the work opportunities effectively to grow our business. Today I noticed an interesting blog post from Seth Godin in which he too draws on the farm metaphor. How big is your farm? Good stuff. Well worth a couple of minutes of your time.

Many years ago I made a comment to a supervisor about how I was trying to find the most efficient way to get something done. He paused and looked me for a few minutes and then gently pointed out that sometimes “efficient” isn’t the right goal. More often, “excellence” is the right goal, even if it’s not the most “efficient” path. Seth Godin makes a similiar point today in his blog post called Circles of Convenience.

Oh how easy it is for me to make the convenient choice, even though much of the time it’s not the best choice. Or, for that matter, even just one of the better choices. Pursuing excellence in your voiceover work means not taking the convenient option much of the time.

My thanks to Stacey Stahl, my manager and more importantly my friend, for sending the link to Seth’s blog post today.

Kristine Oller is a brilliant organization consultant. She’s also a recovering networking wall-flower, rather farther along on that recovery journey than I am. So I heartily recommend you visit Kristine Can Help Me and sign up for her free networking lessons.

With thanks to my friend Jeffrey Kafer for re-tweeting about this article, and to @WaxwingSlain for the original tweet, you’ll find a bunch of valuable insights about your voiceover business in this post on called Hiring Insights From Someone Who Doesn’t Hire Often.