It’s All About Belief with Bill DeWees

Participant #1:
The person who hears you has to believe you. I think belief is the overarching theme. That's the umbrella. Everything falls under belief. If you don't believe me, belief is what makes you lean in. Belief is what makes you stop to pay attention. Sometimes you can't even define what it is, but you feel something. It's an emotion.

Participant #1:
Welcome to this episode of mission audition. Before we get to the auditions, let me introduce you to our amazing guests joining us here today. We welcome Bill DeWise. Bill DeWise has recorded thousands of projects for many of the world's leading brands, including Walmart, Coca Cola, Disney, Chevrolet, apple, American express, united airlines, Kellogg, and Eli Lilly. His accessible, genuine, and relatable style make him a top pick from everything from commercials to brand anthems to training and instructional narration. Bill, welcome and thanks for joining us, Vanessa. Thank you, Kyle. Thanks. What a pleasure to be with you guys. I could hardly sleep this weekend. That makes three of us, I think. I hope we captured what we can of your career in that short little 22nd sniper. I mean, listen to some of those brand names, and I think Vanessa may have almost run out of breath there trying to get through them. All right, thank you. Accumulated over a long period of time, I should add. Yeah. There you go. Now, we're very excited for today's episode, and with that said, I think it's important to give a little bit of background information on the job that we are speaking about here today. So with that said, there is some artistic direction that was posted with this job. As a 32nd ad, we'll only have these busy people's attention for just a moment on their drive home from work. The right voice for this project will be proud and professional, upbeat enough to keep their attention, but not so much so that the busy listener will change the channel halfway through. That's the artistic direction for this job posting. So let's go ahead, kind of jump right in here, listen to some of these auditions, and get to the meat of today's episode. Audition number one. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know that you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit specializedrealty.com to learn more. All right, what do you think about that one, Bill? This particular audition falls into a category that I really don't have a name for it, but it's a large category of people who audition who will always sound nice. It's always going to sound nice. There are some people, you just know you're never going to get a bad audition from them. They sound very competent. They have a nice voice, a nice flow. But what I'm lacking on this particular edition, and this is huge, is I don't feel anything from this particular voice over talent. And my formula when I'm thinking in terms if I'm coaching somebody and I say, okay, now the goal here is doing the audition, we reverse engineered. That what has to happen. Well, for you to get hired, the person who hears you has to believe you. I think belief is the overarching theme. That's the umbrella. Everything falls under belief. If you don't believe me, belief is what makes you lean in. Belief is what makes you stop to pay attention. Sometimes you can't even define what it is, but you feel something. It's an emotion. So you've got to make that the listener feel something, whether it's a sense of security, comfort, excitement, fear, whatever. But for them to feel, you've got to feel it first. I think it's spoken nicely, but I just don't feel anything. I definitely agree with that. And I'm wondering if because my original thought was that it felt like I was really trying to listen, and I originally kind of thought maybe it was a volume thing, because it does seem a little bit quiet, maybe not so much that maybe you're right in regards to it just is a little bit I'm having to force myself because I don't feel engaged. If we were to see this in a daw, to see what the levels were and how it was processed and all of that, it may be a few DB added would help, but you're right. And I think what it comes from is that there's a lack of engagement. It's not personal. I don't feel like he's sharing his opinion or his point of view. I feel like it's a little too relaxed. Is that a good word? I think it is, yeah. I think you're right on with that. Vanessa, what would be for, say, this talent in this audition? What would be something that just listening to this would be an immediate step forward that he could take in this process? There well, one thing I tell everybody is you have to make everything personal. If it's not personal, it doesn't land. It just doesn't connect. I'm not interested in hearing you read somebody else's story. I want to hear your story. So the process I would go through with someone and say, okay, when have you been in a situation where you've been? This is a classic problem solution commercial. I started my career as a commercial copywriter. I've written probably tens of thousands of commercials and promos over there. Because I'm like 200 years old, I've had lots of time to start lots of commercials and promos, and it's a classic. When you see a commercial, you're going to see probably problem solution. And so we've all experienced these kind of things. It doesn't have to necessarily be this particular topic, but when did you experience that? And I'll ask the student to tell me. Okay, tell me about it. And then as soon as I can tell they're connected to it, I'll say, now read. And as soon as they do that, I can hear and feel the frustration in their voice. And I can hear and feel the hope and the relief that they feel from the solution. So that's how I would typically direct a student through that. Right. And because they also believe right. Yeah. At that point, because it's coming from their experience. Exactly. So now I can trust you because I can tell this is coming from your experience, not from somebody else's experience. I completely agree with that. And it all circles back to as, Vanessa, and you alluded to that belief. But also, like you said, you're not reading someone else's words. Of course they are that, but the whole point is to make them not that it isn't. That the challenge of voiceover. I mean, that is what we're tasked with and it's not easy to do. And it does require really not just sounding good, because really people could care less how good you sound. What they care is, can I believe you? Exactly. Can I believe you? And sometimes that's a touchy feely thing. It's almost like it resonates with people and they can't explain it, but they know it when they hear it. Definitely. All right, so with that, let's go ahead and move to our next audition. Audition number two. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit specializedrealty.com to learn more. Awesome. So we'd love to get kind of your take on things here. I think we can go back and forth with some pointers, but yeah. What do you think, though? Well, let's start with, first of all, the audio. It's bad audio. And I often say that bad audio has probably killed more voiceover career than careers than just about anything else. It's going to be good. And when I say good audio, I'm not saying, wow, this guy needs to go and buy a better mic. Maybe. But the issue right here is the space in which he's recording. Everything is bouncing off of it's, just bouncing off the walls, the ceiling, the floor. It's coming from all directions. It's an untreated room. And it makes it sound like he's recording it on the built in microphone, which you may or may not be. Again, I can't tell because there's so much sound reflection. And so it starts. All great audio begins with a great space. It's quiet and well treated. If you don't have that, you might as well hang up your headphones and call it a day. Most definitely. And the funny thing about that is people think, oh, I need a $10,000 studio. Don't get me wrong, that is a great investment. Now, however, it doesn't have to be that. I mean, there are people on the voices platform that have been top earners, and they're still working out of a walk in closet, and it's absolutely doesn't necessarily have to be professional grade $10,000 studio. Now, with that said, you do need to put $10,000 worth of effort into it. That's the truth. And making sure that it's treated, even if it's not with acoustic sounding or clothes, moving blankets, whatever, it might be something that is going to take that tinny sound, that spacey room out of that audio, because I agree, it's just glaring, and we could go off on a whole we could do 2 hours just on this. And I get it. When you come into voiceover, the first thing people think is, well, it's my microphone and it's not your microphone. I mean, you need a good mic, but jeez, I started my career with a Marshall MXL microphone. You can buy it for $60 on ebay. I recorded national commercials with that. Nobody ever knew because the walk in closet that I was in, I was surrounded by clothing. It was well treated. And that's 90% of the equation of your audio right there. 100%. And he doesn't have that. Yeah, no. For starters, what are your thoughts on the read as well? I mean, definitely the unfortunate part is the audio is going to kill it either way, but looking more kind of directive with his read, I thought he brought energy, but I felt like it was non authentic energy. He's yelling at us. Yeah, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but it feels that way. I feel like, okay, it's like, man, you're right in front of me. You don't have to yell at me. A little aggressive. It is aggressive, but you can be aggressive, and you can be softer, but that's just loud aggression. And it sounds to me my guess is this gentleman either comes from a broadcast background, or that's the paradigm through which he's kind of seeing this whole thing where you're always playing to the back of the room. I work with a lot of theatrical actors and actresses, and they have a habit of playing to the back of the room just very briefly. I watched a Ted Talk yesterday that blew me away. It was from an attorney who's won a ton of cases in front of the Supreme Court, and he said the most important lesson he learned was he remembers his first case. He practiced in front of the brightest minds at Harvard. They're professors that deal with in the legal department, and he argued the cases, and he said they just didn't like it. It wasn't landing. They didn't believe him, they weren't buying it. So he went to an acting coach and the acting coach said, hold my hand while you read the script. And he said it went from a presentation, he went from reading to having this conversation. And I thought, wow, that's powerful. I've never done that, but I guarantee you I will be. Just get a mannequin and put it in your studio and hold their hand. You can't hold somebody's hand unless you're really angry at them. You can't really yell at them. At the same time, you're almost forced to have a conversation. And it's about context. And granted, we're in these little booths or closets and it's hard to think context, but once you do, it changes the entire dynamic. Yeah, that's a good way to look at it. Definitely. For sure. So those are the two biggie's in my mind on that. Okay, perfect. Love that. Thank you so much, Bill. All right, we're going to head into audition number three. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit specialized Realtycom to learn more. Amazing. Alrighty, Bill, lead us off here. What are your thoughts? Well, first of all, let me just say kudos on the audio. That's solid audio. It's quiet, it's well treated, there's no sound reflections, everything. There's a little bit of compression in there and enough to give it a little pop and presents, but it's not over baked, as we'd like to say. What is it? Less is more. That's the philosophy on audio processing. Again, that's another discussion. But audio is good. The only other thing I was here's my big critique on this particular read. He's operating in one gear the entire time and the paradigm is control. And so what I mean by control is everything. He's working very hard to make sure everything is paced evenly. And that's very common and we all do it to some degree. And if you're aware of it, you can kind of get out of it. But that's presentation mode is control. I want everything to sound and it goes back to sound. I want to sound good. We don't care if you sound good. We want you to feel something. Make this a personal experience to you and everything becomes it's very one dimensional. There's not even an acknowledgment of problem and solution. You have to acknowledge what's going on, even if it's slightly you should exhibit with this script, I think, a little bit of frustration. Have you ever felt this before? But if you do this, your life is going to be so much better. It's going to be amazing. And so that's me. I'd living without a script. And there was no words from the actual script in that, by the way, but that's the idea. Frustration. Oh. And solution and hope. And I didn't get any sense of that. He just sounded nice, but it was very one dimensional acknowledge what's going on. Yeah. So do you feel since it was like, in the same gear, in the same space, in that sense, it's tough to be what it's supposed to be proud and professional for this trip. Right. It becomes unfortunately and I don't say this to be cruel, but it was boring. Not because there's a lack of ability there not that at all. It's just that the focus was on the wrong thing. Right. You mentioned proud. Okay. Well, what if you felt proud? What's the thing you've done that made you feel the most proud come from that's? Don't focus on trying to sound good because what happens is you get some people might call it a flat read, but it is very one dimensional. You just tune out after three or 4 seconds because it's not going anywhere. It's just plowing straight ahead to nowhere and it comes back to that belief. Right. So that's all what it gears back to. For sure. Absolutely. Well, definitely in regards to like you said, flat was definitely the word that came to mind for myself. And we think about belief as an overarching kind of goal there. It's hard for somebody to feel an emotion when it doesn't feel authentic or real, which when you're flat and in one gear. Think about our conversation here today. Think about any conversation you have with a peer. We don't speak like that. Right. And like you said, clearly his mind frame is on trying to sound good and it takes away all your natural speech that allows you to connect with one another. And I think what you just said is really important, Kyle. If you use that kind of as the barometer, it's like, okay, you go back and listen to your audition, you say, Would I actually talk to somebody that way? And usually you have to say no. They would say, Bill, what's wrong with you? Are you okay? Yeah. Why are you talking so loud to me right now? You know what I mean? Yeah, definitely. That's a really good trick. I think we've alluded to it now in three episodes or something. Yeah. But this whole idea of going out and just recording yourself in a natural conversation, like just putting your phone down on the table next to you as you chat with a friend and kind of using that, like you said, as kind of a point of does my audition sound something like this? Of course you want it to be more polished and clean cut and sure, you want those things, but does it have some type of natural pattern to it or sound to it? Or an engaging feel to it. And when was the last time you talked to a friend where you actually thought about those things? You didn't think about any of that. Exactly. When you're in the flow, you don't think about this. All you're thinking about is, what's my experience? How do I feel about that? I just want to communicate that to you. I'm not focused on I'm not highlighting words. You know what? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that. What I'm saying is sometimes we miss the forest for the trees. We're so focused on the trees, and we're trying to control everything. Okay, let's do this. Okay, I'm going to pause a little bit here and then we'll do this. There will be a little louder here, a little slower here. And then it's like that little baby bunny that we have that we love so much. And we hold it so tight, and we just squeeze. We squeeze until it dies because we're just holding it so tight. You've got to let it go and you got to be you and to kind of bounce off that, too. It's like what you're saying, just let loose and have fun. At the end of the day, it's like, stop trying to make it more controlled, because that's just when you kind of a little bit go downhill. But yeah, absolutely. Definitely. All right, so I think that was some great tips there, and I think that leads us perfectly into the next audition here. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit Specializedrealtycom to learn more. All right, Belle, what are your thoughts on that one? Well, let's start with the audio, the space, at least some acoustic treatment. You're getting a lot of reflection and the noise floor is too loud. And sometimes actually having good acoustic treatment is going to lower the noise floor. If you've got cars and trucks going by, it's not meant to be soundproofing, but it'll just take out some of the extra the sound waves that are bouncing around. So it probably needs a little quieter as well. So that's a big thing. In addition to that, still on audio, it's a bit poppy. I'm getting some pops and microphones. Certainly pop filter can be very good for that. But if you've got good mic technique, that's going to take care of that. So she needs better mic technique. And then there's a little bit of siblings in there, meaning some of the higher frequencies are sizzling just a little bit. I don't think it was, like, awful, but you could just use an EQ. You don't even have to use special deessing software and just pull down some of those higher frequencies until it sounds right to you. So that's where I would start with the audio. I found that it was like a little shy. I don't know if that's a good word to use, but what do you think about that? Yes, there was a lack of you mentioned earlier on the directions to be proud. Proud means a sense of authority and confidence. You kind of lean into it. And she did seem a bit timid, almost like a half step back away, right? She was thinking almost like sometimes you can almost read the thought bubble above people's heads and it's like, don't screw this up. Don't screw this up. We've all done it. I get it. And that causes us, I think, to back off just a little bit. And I don't want to say back off. I don't necessarily mean physically, but almost emotionally. I don't want to make a mistake here. And then also I get the sense that she may be native Chinese and there are some pronunciation issues that pop up where the Rs are difficult. And it felt like instead of saying through classified ads, she said true classified ads. And again, I mean, we all depending on what our dialect and our accent. I give you, for instance, I do a lot of work for clients in Europe, Denmark for some reason especially, and there are some words that they say that those sounds are not even in the English language. And so if you don't grow up saying those sounds, it makes it very difficult. But if you're doing it for native speakers who will be listening to it, it's probably worth working with the dialect coach to help you to learn how to move your mouth in a way to pick up those little consonants that might be difficult otherwise. Definitely agree with that. And when she had mentioned shy and you had already mentioned Mike technique. I feel like that step back. It was metaphorically. But I feel like definitely there was some mic technique there where it sounded not only that she was in a spacey room. But I felt like her mic was allowing it to pick up a lot more with bad mic technique just because I feel like she was way back here. I mean, you can probably hear that in my voice versus being a little bit closer, allowing it to kind of resonate in focus and using, say, your gain to hone that in. Well, of course the overarching is having the acoustic room there, but I feel like as you alluded to, there's definitely some mic technique that could clean things up if she had an appropriate room that would really kind of solve a lot of our problems. And a lot of these things may sound overwhelming, especially if you're newer at this and you're just like, oh my gosh, I've got to be an audio engineer and I've got to be a talent and I've got to be a marketer. And the answer is, yeah, you do. But here's the good news. It's like anything that you look at for the first time and it seems like there's so many moving parts to it. But the reality is once you sit down with each of those pieces and you begin to learn it, it's not nearly as complicated as it sounds. And it doesn't it's not an ongoing you're not constantly having to adjust and work with audio. It's like once you get your audio set up, set up, once you learn your technique, you're good. Then you can focus on the other things and it's pieces. Right. Kind of reminds me of the saying of the Master of none. You don't necessarily have to be a full blown audio engineer, but you need to know how it's going to be incorporated in your view and you need to know the intricacies that you need to work with and much the same with setting up the studio. You don't need to be a studio engineer in designing and building studios, but you need to understand how your space is working with your acoustics and with your levels. So it's kind of that master. And you don't necessarily need to know the ins and outs of every inch of it. Right. Just enough to get by, right? Right. Yeah. I say it all the time to my students, you only need to know what you need to know. And so let's talk about those things because you guys are all over the place. You're worried about things you'll never have to experience, so don't worry about those things. And again, when you work with a coach, you'll learn those things. When it comes to audio, you don't need to know, nor do I know everything there is to know about audio. And I mean, I worked in radio for many years. We had an audio engineer. He took care of that stuff. But even as a voiceover talent, I've figured out now I know how to set great levels. I understand. And I'm a demo producer, so I've learned a lot of the nuance involved, more than I would need to know if I'm just a talent. But my point is those things are all very doable and learnable 100%. So with that said, I think we've covered some great auditions here, some great kind of improvement tips and things to really be listening for. And I want to move into a couple of auditions that I think are competitive and possibly being a winner for this posting. So with that said, let's move into our next audition. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up fillings connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit Specializedrealtycom to learn more. Okay, Bell, so we played that. And what are your thoughts on that? You're smiling. Well, as always, we start back with audio. And forgive me if I'm starting to sound like a broken record, but the audio is a thing. Very much so. And again, the space needs to be quieter. And one of the telltale signs that you can tell the difference between what it could be and what it should be is that there's a noise gate or either they're using a noise gate or they're silencing between the phrases. So what happens? A noise gate. I mean, if you think of it, it's just like a physical gate that when you speak, it opens up and lets the sound through. When you're not, it closes. But the problem, when it opens up, it not only lets the sound of your voice through, it lets everything else going on. If the TV is on in the background, there's a car all that gets through too. So you can hear the noise floor, that slight low buzz or hum in the background and then it's gone. It's silenced. And you don't want to draw attention away from the performance. And that's what's happening with that. And there's a little bit of a big plusive at the beginning that explodes on the microphone. A little trick, by the way. I've learned for that. If you just have one or two little things that you need to deal with and if it's not like a chronic problem that requires your processing to be changed. In Adobe Edition, I select the first part of a second half second of that consonant and I hit the there's a favorite called Fade in and it'll fade into that hard T or P and it softens it. So it's an easy way to fix a plosive or something that kind of splatters all over the place like that. That's a very interesting tip. I have not heard I don't even know how I figured that out. I stumbled across that one and sorry, just for any listeners at home, what dot do you use? Adobe Audition. Adobe Audition. Amazing. Yes. It's got that cool little fade in feature and I use that on almost every project. If I just feel that it's a little too aggressive on that first consonant I'll just select the very first part of it. I'll click fade in and it's almost like a reverse fade and it kind of works into the T or the S or the P, which is kind of nice. Definitely. And I think you brought up an interesting something that I almost listened past, was kind of that underground because like you said, that noise gate is working. But then once you notice it, it does almost draw attention to it because in between those sentences or words it does sound like it's a good room. But as soon. As that gate opens back up, you do notice a little bit of that, almost like a refrigerator or something. Just it's very low level, but it's there. And if we can hear it, the client can hear it, the casting director can hear it, so it becomes a problem. But all that being said, I thought it was a nice read. And one of the things I do like about it, where we're now moving in the right direction, is I feel there's an acknowledgement of problem and solution. And I've talked about this a lot, but it's the kind of script this is. And whenever there's something like that, I look at a commercial oftentimes in four parts. One is something to grab the attention, your problem. And the thing to grab your attention is also sometimes like a set up of the problem, the problem, the solution, and then the call to action at the end. And if you start to look for those things, then you can acknowledge them. So again, if there's a problem, you can sound like there's a problem, let me know. Acknowledge it if there's a solution. Sometimes even your physicality can raise the eyebrows. Lift your hands up. Hey, we've got this is a solution. Smile a little bit. Yeah. Get happy about it. And I'm beginning to hear that. I don't think it's enough yet, but we're moving in that direction. Yeah, we're good. Yeah, for sure. All right, let's move into our next audition. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit Specializedrealtycom to learn more. Okay, Bill, so just going back on the finding a problem and then having a solution, do you find that this sample gave that I do. Good audio and a good read. And you're right, that's exactly right. There was a nice set up. I could feel the build up, the problem, the tension there and then the relief of the solution that was offered. So now this is the kind of read that's going to, I think, make a final cut, get a call back. They're going to give a second listen to it because this audition, I think, is in the zone. I think we've carried ourselves through a journey today. Listening through these auditions, it's really kind of pointing out some of these issues that we've seen in past auditions and saying that last one, we were closer to the mark. We had the read, a couple of audio things. This one, like he said, I feel we get the read, we get the audio, and as you said, very competitive. He's hitting those points that he needs to. He's got clean audio, he's capturing some of that artistic direction, of not only hitting the problem, the solution, but there's a sense of proudness in his voice where he actually is engaging with his own personal emotion to engage the listener. So I really enjoyed that audition. It's a lot to like in that one. Yeah, definitely. All right, so onto the next audition. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit Specializedrealtycom to learn more. All right, Bill, take us through it. Well, I think this particular voice actor was probably, I'm just guessing is a classically trained actor. There is a polish and refinement there which sometimes can work very much to your advantage, sometimes not so much, depending on what's needed for the script. But obviously there's a lot of talent and ability. There the audio again, more treatment needs. The space is a little too loud, a little bit too much sound reflection, which is too bad because again, you can tell there's a lot of work that's gone into this particular voice. There's some acting that's going on there and there's a background there. And that is my guess here's where it falls short for me, is that it feels rushed. And also, let me say, at the same time, I do like the fact that she's actually asking the questions. She's asking the questions as if she's almost expecting a response, but she's so fast to get to the next line, you don't have a chance to process it. A piece of advice, whenever I'm coaching a student, I always say start slow, even if it's a script that needs to be read quickly. Because when you're dealing with a commercial script, it's got to be the time. Usually the best scripts, the highest paying jobs, they give you lots of room to breathe. There's never a rush. But those of us have worked in radio realize that's not always the way that works. But start slow, because when you go slow, you can see, you can understand what's going on. You begin to develop a feel for where you need to let things sit for just a moment to creep into the consciousness of your audience and so forth. Don't start fast. Start slow. And then you can speed it up to wherever it needs to be. When you do that, you'll take some of that with you, but it just feels like it's just kind of one blur from beginning to end, and I don't have a chance to really process it very much. Right, yeah, I totally agree with you, though. When you were saying when she asked the question, did you know? I kind of thought, well, I don't know do I know? It made me question and then think about it, but then I didn't really have time to answer it in my head because she was a little rushed in that sense. So I totally get where you're coming from, but the way she asked the question made me really personally think about it and try to think about it, at least. If you are asking me that question, how would you say, did you know? Or if you were going to say anything, if you're going to say, Bill, did you know that? Are you guys baseball fans? Toronto Blue Jays. We'll just say, let's go for it. Yeah. I like, Toronto. Did you know the Toronto Blue Jays one last night? If you're a baseball fan, how would you say that to me? Like, really excited. I was like, So you're thinking about it now. You're thinking about it. Once you think about it, you kill it. Be like, did you know? Yeah, there's some excitement there. And so usually when that happens, oftentimes there's a change of pace. Even it gets a little faster or slower. Not because you manufacture it, not because you're thinking, I need to go slower here. I need to go faster. It's because it's a natural. And the reason I ask you that, I wasn't trying to put you on the spot. It's just that when you react and you say it, that's how you would say it in real life, and that's what you take into the booth. We know it all too well. Like, I chat with Platinum members every day. And did you know Voices launched project Marketplace today? Did you know? Come on, people. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, keep that in there. Project Marketplace launched today. Everyone. Hope you know now. Nice little segway there. I think that is one of the main things that I felt as well in that first line of tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? There's a portion of that that needs to breathe. It needs to register before you hop in with the solution. They need to be able to recognize the problem. They need to be able to relate to that. And it doesn't take long. It can just be a fraction just to be a beat. Exactly. But you have to acknowledge, you have to allow that to somehow permeate their consciousness. Otherwise, we're just flying through and nothing lands. Definitely. Completely agree. All right, I think there's some great takeaways there. Let's segue to today's last audition. We will listen to this and then we will get to picking a winner. So with that said, the next audition, we can go ahead and play. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings. Connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes. Visit specializerealty.com to learn more. Very interesting. What do you think about that? Yeah, I like it. I think the audio was solid. And one of the things going back to what we were talking about, asking questions, this guy, he truly asked. He was more intense about the asking than anybody else involved. Now, if there was anything I would criticize, I would say maybe pushing a little bit too hard. Maybe there's just a little bit too much excitement. But let me be honest, I would rather err on that side than on the other side. Definitely. There's always something you can pick on anybody's audition, but if you're going to make a mistake, let's err on the side of actually caring too much. Yeah, that's okay. We can forgive that. Not caring enough, we can't forgive that. Well, you've been in the industry forever, and that's kind of a famous line of voice actors, right? We can dial you back, but we need to know you can get there. And that's exactly what you're alluding to here. And I agree completely. Yeah, it kind of felt like he was talking to me personally, but I totally agree with you saying it's a little bit better to lean on one side than the other, but definitely very loose, like letting go. Having fun with this one. But let's imagine now you're on your way to see a Toronto's Blue Jays baseball game and the radius turned on and that commercial pops on. Would you not want to pay a little attention? Would it not grab your attention in some way because pregnancy a little yeah,

Participant #1:
exactly. There's emotion there. This guy feels something. Knowing that we are looking for that personalization, we're looking for that upbeatness, knowing that he's gone a little bit too far within reason, like, not in a bad way. Is there something that you would kind of provide him with as feedback to try to carry forward or would you say, hey, stay up here, and if they need to dial you back, they will? What would be your recommendation to this talent? Here's what I would do. When I'm working with somebody that I feel it really kind of goes back to control. I think he's just trying to control it a little bit too much. Even though it's excited, there's a lot of control. I would have this talent. What I would have them do is I would have them read the script in the most excited, loudest, like ten times over the top and read it super fast where they can barely get I want them to feel out of control. Read so fast that you can't actually read the words. You're just stumbling all over the place. And then as soon as you finish, I want you to go back and give me one more take. And usually what that does, it just frees their mind. It's the craziest thing. And now I'm certain what would happen is we would get an even more authentic version of what we just heard. That's amazing. I love that trick. Definitely. Because he captures the upbeat, the professionals so well. I think that'd be a great way for him to allow the creativity side of things to just flow through. Yeah. And then I think you'd have a killer, a killer read with just that slight tweak. Perfect. Thanks so much for that, Bill. So that is all of our editions today. We heard some needs improvement, we've heard some fantastic ones and everything in between. And that does lead us to the final moments of Bill. We need to pick a winner here. Well, it was a close call for me. There were two reads that I felt stood above the others. And I know can't mention names, so I don't remember what number was. One of them was a few reads back, but my winner is the one we just did. Okay. And the reason for it is because I felt the second place in my mind aired on the side of being just a little less energy, meaning was a little less convicted or passionate about it. Whereas I felt the last read was committed, was fully committed, like this was super important. I could feel that. And that would be my choice. And and the runner up is? Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family? Relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings, connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes? Visit specializedrealty.com to learn more. And the reason that I picked this as the runner up is because there's so much good going on. Great audio. But more importantly, within this particular read, I can hear acknowledgement of the problem that the listener is facing here as well as the solution. So now we're getting the separation and acknowledgement of these different segments of the commercial. Nice work. Awesome. And now I know you had mentioned kind of dialing things forward and dialing things back. Is that the reason that he's fallen into the runner up here? Just aired on the side of caution there because he erred on the side of caution? Exactly. I'll always err on the side of having too much conviction as to not quite having enough. Amazing. So that leads us to our winning audition then. Let's go ahead and play that. Tired of sifting through classified ads and online directories to find your new home rental? Did you know you can hire a real estate agent to help pinpoint the most suitable units for you and your family, relieve the stress of finding units and setting up viewings, connect with one of our trusted real estate agents that specializes in finding rental homes visit specializedrealty.com to learn more. And why I chose this is much like the last audition, there's an acknowledgment of problem and solution. He's really asking the questions as if he expects us to respond. But I feel earlier in our conversation, we talked about the importance of emotion. It doesn't make me feel anything, and it does. I feel like I can trust him. I feel like this is something that he's experienced and that he's offering me a solution to a problem. He can relieve the tension that I'm feeling. That's what I get from him. And again, yeah, he may be airing a bit on the side of too much excitement or for me, that's conviction. He believes, and I'll take that any day. So that's why I've chosen him. Thanks so much for that, Bill. All right. And we'll wrap up here. All right. So that brings us to the end of today's episode. Bill, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, everyone who participated in sending auditions for this job posting. I hope everyone tuned in, had the chance to listen. I hope you had some great tips and some great feedback here from such an amazing expert. So just thank you to everyone who participated in thank you so much, Bill, for joining. Thanks, guys. It's all my pleasure. Awesome. And I also want to lead off with Vanessa. Please subscribe to the podcast. If you're looking to find today's script or any others, check out our blog on voices, comblog and any additional resources from Bill. Feel free to check out his socials. Where can we find you, Bill? Well, you can find me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, wherever a social media platform is found, I will be lurking there somewhere. We will be sure to find you on there. And what's your actual web address? There you can find me. [email protected]. [email protected]. Amazing. All right, so that wraps us up. Thank you so much, everyone, and as always, happy auditioning. That's it from voices and myself, Kyle and Vanessa. Thank you, everyone. Till next time. Happy auditioning. Happy auditioning.