Stats? What for? They don't work!

Deby Cedars · **Voice Talent** Joined: 23 Jan 2006 Posts: 1482

Lee.....This is my first time looking for talent on Voice123. I just got an email with a number to call in order to enable smartcast to be activated so far I have only sent a few private invites. I look forward to hearing your audition. I'll call them tomorrow.

Lee Gordon · **Voice Talent** Joined: 22 Oct 2004 Posts: 1549

I hope SmartCast sends it to me. Cool

Craig Burnett · Posted: Fri Jul 11, 2008, 02:34 (GMT) Post subject: Alex Replies

I just received a very nice reply from Alex, personally addressing my concerns:

Hi Craig. We understand your concerns. Most of them were addressed in our blog post of July 2007. Please take a look at it: http://voice123team.blogspot.com/2007_07_01_archive.html

Voice123 may not be as profitable for you as it once was for you, but it should still be profitable. Most premium talents and voice producers are making money and thus renewing. If that is not your case, your strategies may not be competitive enough to participate in Voice123 under its new rules.

We once said that talent's satisfaction was our highest priority. That is no longer the case. My job, first of all, is to make voice seekers happy. They are the ones bringing money into the industry. To that end, we are not looking forward to make all talents happy. Only talents willing to work with us towards making voice seekers happy will be successful in Voice123.

So that's that. I've thanked Alex for his personal reply, and promised to try to be a less-squeaky wheel.

I thought it was cool of him to reply personally.

Melba Sibrel · Posted: Fri Jul 11, 2008, 02:51 (GMT) Post subject:

WOW.

At least they now admit they aren't trying to make their customers happy.

And I love this: "My job, first of all, is to make voice seekers happy. They are the ones bringing money into the industry." Laughing

Yes, but they aren't bringing it here apparantly. Does he really think the vast majority of the budgets brought here are market price? How astonishingly uneducated. What "industry" is he talking about I wonder. Because it's not the one I'm in.

"Not competitive enough" -- translation: not willing to license the use of your vocal image in perpetuity for the cost of a tank of gas.

But just remember. It's all your fault.

Diane Havens · **Voice Talent** Joined: 09 Jun 2006 Posts: 1281

That would be the PTP VOICE SITE industry, Melba.

Melba Sibrel · Posted: Fri Jul 11, 2008, 03:48 (GMT) Post subject:

Greg Houser · **Voice Talent** Joined: 12 Mar 2008 Posts: 174

Melba,

nope, you're a resource. A tool has some residual value which the company had to invest in. A resource is something which they take and gain benefit from without having to invest much in.

This is why I love people in HR so much. If they referred to you as people, then they'd have to admit that you have needs, and worth. It's easier to simply use a generic term.

Anyway... maybe it's me, but basically Alex said that it's all your fault that the system isn't working for you (guess he hasn't seen all the flaws which have been reported here), that his allegiance is most definitely not to the talent, and that if you don't like it you can leave.

And to think that they needed another customer service manager.

I do have one thing in common with Alex's statement. I also want to make the folks who need a voice happy too. I go about that by providing a better product and services compared to the competition. You'll pay for it, but a fair price based on the market value for services rendered.

Craig, I think that the message you got ought to be the writing on the wall for you, and for a lot of other folks too. Unless you came off like a raving loon, that message is not one which I'd have sent if I wanted to keep your business.

EDIT: after reading his profile on V123 I can see why Alex is having some trouble understanding why people don't like how things are run.

Diane Havens · **Voice Talent** Joined: 09 Jun 2006 Posts: 1281

I'm not a child, and far from naive, and I've learned so much about how business works from following my husband's career in marketing, and friends and neighbors in finance and industry here in NYC and its environs. Many of you here come from or are in business now -- and surely would love to escape it to be in this "creative" field. Ha! It's a business, after all.

Of course, business is not about making "happy" -- it's about making "money." Even education, my profession for a good many years, began to follow a business model, because in American parlance, "business" is a magic word that somehow equates with efficiency and productivity. Sadly, not so. But I will venture to say it very often equates with insensitivity and dehumanization.

For the record, though, as I said before, I DID make a profit here at 123 -- and I STILL LEFT. Not a good business move for me? I don't know. But I do know, I feel better about myself, the world, my craft, my clients, and the beauty of positive, renewed energy fills me every day!

And coincidentally, or maybe not so coincidentally, I have suddenly been flooded with work from several other avenues.

I'm .... how shall I put it? Ah, yes -- happy.

JC Haze · **Voice Talent** Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 86

Diane Havens · **Voice Talent** Joined: 09 Jun 2006 Posts: 1281

Well, JC, I didn't say it was GOOD business -- I just said that's the way it IS in lots of businesses. When they don't think they need you. There is a growing trend I think, that sends the message YOU CAN BE REPLACED. Just look at all the mobility in business now -- no one stays anywhere for very long anymore. No tears are shed. We can all be replaced -- even the best of us.

JC Haze · **Voice Talent** Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 86

Yup. You're right Diane.
As "employees" I agree. We're replaceable.

But as "clients" or "customers"????
Since WE pay, WE're the customers...as the saying goes...

"THE CUSTOMER IS ALWAYS RIGHT" (most of the time, anyway!)

Diane Havens · **Voice Talent** Joined: 09 Jun 2006 Posts: 1281

Hold on!!! I have the answer. It was right before me all the time. How simple!

We all become SEEKERS!!! That way, all we have to do is post a job or two -- it shouldn't cost us more than $75 or so. That way, they'll make us happy!

Oh, but wait -- does being a talent as well cancel out your seeker happiness quotient? Perhaps. But what if you're a standard subscriber but also a seeker? That could work, since you're not paying to not be made happy.

Hmm ... better think on this some more.

JC Haze · **Voice Talent** Joined: 10 Aug 2007 Posts: 86

I'm SOOooo confused...

Clinton Nobles · **Voice Talent** Joined: 25 Mar 2008 Posts: 197

okay, it seems to me -- as I read over the many MANY post dealing with issues with V123 -- that they don't really have a business plan. And if they do it isn't a plan for a business. Maybe a nursery (the ones that help grow kids . . . not plants lol) where you can dictate what people do in a total authority capacity.

It seems that they have gotten so many brands in the fire they are now trying to control the blaze rather than slowly add what will both benifit the fire and produce the highest quality product.

In case you are not following the analogy figure it this way. The brands are the seekers. The fire is the Voice Artist. The more brands their are in the fire the less productive your heat will be. It takes a lot longer to produce the same quality of work with 100 brands in the fire than it is with just a few. The point? You ask. They are letting so many leads in -- which I know is great for us, but only if they aid the fire itself -- that it is smothering the fire. It isn't allowing us to produce the caliber and quantity of work we are capable of. Why? Because they aren't qualifying the brands they place in the fire. Not all brands are good enough to really be used and the fire expends the same amount of time and energy to produce a product that will never be up to par because the material isn't a high enough standard.

I know the concept of "customer always right." But the truth is, we are just as much a customer as the seekers. More so really. We are paying for the process and product offered by V123 -- the collection and information of a vast number of leads and contacts. The seekers are more our customers. We make the seeker happy! Not V123. They provide a way for the seeker to be satisfied , but we do the work and we get paid (more than V123 does). The happiness that V123 provides is actually more connected with opportunity to advertise their jobs. V123 is a huge billboard for jobs. We are the businesses, we are the ones that can provide the happiness that the seeker is after. The only way V123 can make them happy is by making it cheaper for them to advertise their needs (or make it so they can offer ridiculously low amounts for jobs, yet get as good or better coverage than the more professional ones -- which seems to be the way things are going.)

Anyway, I haven't really voice my opinion much lately, so here is my $0.02.

Greg Houser · **Voice Talent** Joined: 12 Mar 2008 Posts: 174

I prefer to think that they're using the Walmart analogy.

Outsource as much as possible to lower costs, with quality taking a back seat to quantity in order to maximize profit margins.

Wait... is it me, or does that seem to hit a little too close to home?