General

Quite often in fact, I get questions about what it’s like to study privately with Nancy Wolfson, given that she’s in Los Angeles, CA and I’m in Charlotte, NC. Here are a couple of recent examples.

Johnny George wrote me a few days ago to ask:

Hi Bob,

I am interested in working with Nancy. I‘ve done a couple of Webinars with her and Anna and I’m trying to budget some $$ this summer for coaching with her. Please elaborate on her style, her caliber and any particulars that would help me in making the decision and how I can best get my most bang for my buck.

I appreciate your time and insight.

Here’s my reply:

Johnny,

Nancy is one of the most out-going, expressive and vivacious people I’ve ever encountered. At the same time, she’s very real and direct. Even though she has lived many years in California, Nancy is one of the most honest and unpretentious people I know.

So, if you want to study with someone who will tell you the truth, consistently; while filling your brain with almost too much information to process in one sitting, she’s the person for you. On the other hand, if you need to work with someone who will treat you with much gentleness and move through things very slowly, she’s probably not for you.

The other thing to know is that Nancy’s coaching is totally based in reality and practicality…stuff you can put to use now…not someday by and by when you’ve managed to internalize it enough.

While I don’t live in Southern California, I am friends with a number of working actors, voiceover folks and other professional talent out there. I know that among those (at least those I know) she has a sterling reputation as one of the very top of her field.

In my view, while I wish I could study with her in person, I’m thrilled with the phone patch experience. It’s worked great for me.

I hope that helps answer your questions. If you wish to send some follow-ups, please feel free.

And Cookie Colletti wrote to ask:

Bob:

Could you tell me more about studying with Nancy? Does she do classes over the internet? What exactly does she teach? I live in So. Florida and we have a “superstar” v/o artist/teacher here…but she’s very hard to get to commit to classes. I’ve studied with her on and off and she even produced my commercial demo, but I really want to learn more…including branding, what’s right for me, marketing myself, etc…..Anything you provide would be helpful. Thanks alot.

And my reply to Cookie:

Cookie,

I live in North Carolina and Nancy is in Los Angeles so we work over the phone. Here’s what studying with Nancy is like, at least for me:

She provides some copy and concepts a few days in advance of each time we’ve scheduled a class. Then, I call her at the appointment time and we talk through what she’s provided. Sometimes she wants me to work on the copy. Sometimes we spend more of our time talking through the specific concepts and ideas.

Nancy is a ball of energy and a wonderfully encouraging person. I’ve been a working voiceover professional since 1983, but she has helped me tremendously with practical, immediately useful ideas that I’ve been able to incorporate in the way I approach auditions and work from the very first lesson.

You can get a lot of good information at her website: http://www.braintracksaudio.com
Please let me know if you have additional questions.

I hope these questions and responses are helpful to you. And please remember, if you tell Nancy that you decided to study with her because I recommended her here, I get a free lesson from her. Whether you mention anything or not is, of course, entirely up to you.

I’m making my first ever trip to Upstate New York this weekend, to attend what promises to be a fabulous day-long voiceover marketing conference in Albany, New York and sponsored by Voicecoaches. These folks run a first class operation, and I’m honored to be here and to have been invited to take part in the closing panel discussion this afternoon (Saturday, June 2nd), though the title of the panel should be several experts and one guy who wandered up here from Charlotte!

In any case, I know I’m going to learn a great deal from everyone here, including the presenters and the folks attending. We had a mixer this evening at which I had a chance to meet several of the attendees. It was great fun interacting with folks of various backgrounds, but all of whom have a strong desire to pursue voiceover work.
I’ll update this post after the event is done with some further reflections. But, I can already tell that I’m very glad I have Voicecoaches on my blog roll under Career. They work with folks here in the Northeast directly as well as over the phone with people all over.

First update: We’re on a lunch break now, half-way through the day at the Marketing Conference sponsored by Voicecoaches. I’m deeply impressed with the quality of the presentations. I’m very glad I came because I’ve picked up several valuable ideas on how to continue to grow my voiceover business.

The top ideas were:

1. A brilliant presentation from Jay Silverman about how to prepare an introductory letter when sending your demo to a potential new client, a letter that doesn’t read like everyone else’s but stands out as something fresh and original. (Stephanie has posted her usual superb notes about Jay’s presentation over at

Vox Daily

1. .)

1. Some excellent insights from Stacey Nooney and Warren Garling (Warren, I sure hope I got your name right) about networking organizations and opportunities I’d never thought about.

1. A tremendous presentation about marketing voiceovers in the Google era from David and Stephanie Ciccarelli of

Voices.com

. As I was listening to them speak I finally put together an idea of how to do some pay-per-click marketing of my voiceover business that I think may work.

I’m so glad I’m here. And I look forward to everything that’s still ahead this afternoon. More updates later.

Second update: The afternoon kicked off with a brilliant presentation on graphics, design and a solid dose of branding advice from Dan and Phil from OveritMedia. I was very impressed with the focused approach these guys demonstrated, and equally impressed with their passion for staying current and adapting to the winds of change that continue to blow through the voiceover business.

We then heard some of the life story of Billy Serow, commercial voiceover agent with Abrams Artist Agency in New York. (The agency has an office in Los Angeles as well.) As Stephanie Ciccarelli posted on Vox Daily, Billy is that rare sort of agent, a person with a genuine heart for people. It was a sheer delight to hear some of his life’s journey and especially how he feels about developing promising talent.

I made an uncharacteristically bold move during both of these presentations when the time came for questions, I asked Dan (President of OveritMedia) and Billy if they ever worked with guys outside their local markets (Albany, NY for Dan and NYC, NY for Billy) and they both responded with “yes.” So, being even more uncharacteristically bold, I asked each of them during their respective presentations if I could give them a business card. Again they each said “yes” so I got up from my seat near the back of the room, walked up and handed over one of my cards. Honestly, I surprised myself a bit when I did this, because I’m normally too shy to do something like that; but I think some of what I’d learned earlier in the day about marketing and networking actually penetrated my thick skull, so it was easier to step up and make a move like this when the opportunity presented itself.

The final session of the day was a panel featuring a number of brilliant contributors, including David Ciccarelli and Billy Serow, as well as actor and television personality Evan Farmer, Heather Frenz (a very talented actress and voiceover talent working full-time in Albany), Jim Sciancalepore of Media Logic, David Bourgeois (president of Voicecoaches) and me. We spent over an hour and a half answering questions from the 60 or so in attendance. It was great fun. I’m so very glad I was invited to be a part of this excellent day.