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Everyday VOpreneur® with Marc Scott
Direct Marketing Isn't Dead; But Your Approach Might Be with Marc Scott
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Direct marketing is not dead. A no response is not a no. I've had responses after three years. Right now, every single project that we're working on is casting female One of the things that we miss the boat on with social media is engagement. 25 or 50 new people in the pipeline every year. Are you focusing on those three pillars? Show that you're human, that you're not another AI chatbot. The thread that runs through all of them. And this is the difference maker. My goal for the everyday veopeneur podcast is simple, bigger guests and better information. Because I know that if I can get those two things, I can help you grow your voiceover business even further. But there's something that you can do to help me get there. Make sure that you subscribe to the podcast, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, wherever you're listening. Bigger download numbers helps me get bigger guests. I hope you enjoy this week's episode. Direct marketing is not dead. Let me say that again. Direct marketing is not dead. Every once in a while I hear rumblings within the voiceover community, mostly from people who are frustrated with their marketing efforts. And because of the fact that they're frustrated with their marketing efforts, understandably so, their assumption is this isn't working, this is pointless. Direct marketing is not dead. And recently I've heard from some people in the community that there are a couple of coaches who are even proclaiming direct marketing is dead. Now, coincidentally, some of those people are also selling pay to pay solutions. And so they probably want you to think that direct marketing is dead because it would be easier for them to sell their pay to play solutions. Of course I sell direct marketing solutions. And so some may say that my opinion is biased as well. But I want to really break this down because I don't want you making decisions based on bad information. Have you purchased anything in the last couple of months as a result of some form of direct marketing? An ad that you saw, an email that you were sent, A social media post, A message that you got from someone, a recommendation or referral that you received, Somebody told you that a particular product or service was good. All of those things are forms of direct marketing. And so if you have made purchases in the last couple of months as a result of any of those things, then that in and of itself is proof that direct marketing is not dead. What I think might be dead is the way that you are doing direct marketing. So stick with me for a minute. If the things that you are attempting to do for your voiceover business right now, to market yourself are not producing results. It may not be that direct marketing itself is dead. It just may be that your approach to direct marketing is not working. And maybe that approach that you're taking to direct marketing is in fact, what is dead. So let's walk through that and try to figure out what we can do to make your marketing efforts work a little bit better. I think there are probably three primary areas of direct marketing that we need to be focusing on. The first one is new leads. We've always got to have new people coming into the pipeline. The second one is follow up. We want to make sure that as those new people come into the pipeline, we're continuing to maintain communication with them. Follow following up until we get either a yes or a no really is what we're ultimately looking for. And then the third aspect of your direct marketing is your relationship building. It's nurturing those people who have expressed an interest, or more importantly, nurturing those people who have already hired you in the past. So those are the three main areas that we need to be focusing on. New leads, follow up, relationship building. And there's one common theme that threads through all of those. And I think it's this common theme that threads through all of those. That's what is missing. And when this is missing, chances are that's why your marketing is not working, and that might be why you think that direct marketing is dead. And that common theme that threads through all of them is personalization. AI has given us a gift. And I know that's a very bold statement to make, particularly when I'm speaking to a group of voice actors, but I want you to stick with me for a minute here because I genuinely do believe that AI has given us a gift. AI has brought a great deal of sameness to marketing. And maybe you've noticed this. Think about the marketing emails that land in your own inbox and how often those emails, regardless of what they're trying to sell you, regardless of what industry they're coming from, those emails often feel very similar. Sometimes they're worded almost identically. So, for example, because I have a YouTube channel I have on a regular basis, I would say probably at least five or six times a week. I have people who are emailing me, trying to market me SEO optimization for my YouTube channel. And this has been going on for probably close to a year now. So imagine that probably five times a week for close to a year. All different people, all different email addresses, all from different companies, or allegedly anyway. And almost every single one of their pitch emails is Almost identical. Almost word for word identical. Exact same format, exact same language, they use, the exact same types of images. Everything is almost identical. And I would be willing to bet money that most of those people, if not all of them, are using a service like ChatGPT and to help them create their marketing strategy. And what happens is everybody goes in and says, I want to sell SEO services to people who are running their YouTube channels. Can you help me write a marketing email? And everybody writes basically the same prompt, which means everybody gets basically the same result. That is a gift for those of us who are willing to do direct marketing on a higher level. We talk about the fact that there's so much noise in the inbox. It's entirely possible that some of the leads that you've reached out to in the past have probably complained about the fact I get another. I get a million emails from voice actors or oh, good, just what I was hoping for today. Another email from voice actors. I think that's only part of what is bothering them. I don't think it's just that they got another email from another voice actor. I think that they got another boring, generic email from another voice actor. Another one of those, hi, my name is. And do you have any voiceover work or do you keep a roster of voice actors and please go to my website and the email is basically the exact same thing. And everybody is sending this email. And one of the reasons why I know everybody is sending this email is because I teach voice actors how to write write better emails. And more often than not, the first version that we're starting from, as we're making adjustments, they all look exactly the same. And I would be willing to bet again that a lot of these emails are being written by AI. I need to write a marketing email. I'm a voice actor who wants to write a marketing email to a production company and ChatGPT spits out an email. The problem is if a hundred voice actors give some variation of that same prompt, then 100 voice actors are going to get some variation of basically the exact same email. And if you send some variation of the exact same email, a hundred voice actors send that to the same production company. Is it any wonder that that production company is responding negatively and that they're over it and that they're not interested and they're telling you that this doesn't work anymore? It's because they're sick and tired of getting the same old, same old, same old day in and day out. This is why I think ChatGPT has done us a favor, because for the voice actor who is willing to put a little bit more effort in, for the voice actor who is willing to take the time to actually personalize their marketing outreach, it gives us a really easy way to cut through the noise. One of the reasons why I have consistently been able to produce results from my direct marketing efforts is because I write personalized messages. I take the time to write a personalized message. I can't send as many emails in a day, and I'm okay with that. I don't need to be able to send as many emails in a day. If I'm getting a higher conversion rate, my emails get responded to. And I'll tell you, one of the most common responses that I see from my emails is some form of appreciation, acknowledgement, recognition, or gratitude for the fact that my email was personalized, that it wasn't like every other email that landed in their inbox all day long. That's where I think we're missing the boat. We get a negative response. And that negative response to us means we assume direct marketing is dead. This is no longer working. But in fact, there's a little bit more nuance to that negative response. It's not that direct marketing is dead. It's that bad direct marketing is dead. So you've got to take the time to do that personalization. You also have to consistently use all three steps that we talked about earlier. So first and foremost, let's talk new leads. There needs to be new leads going into your pipeline every single day. And that can come in a lot of different ways. That can come by doing email marketing, looking up people, finding their email addresses, sending them personalized emails. That can come through sending LinkedIn connection requests. And then when those connection requests are getting accepted, sending people personalized direct messages that could come through following people on Instagram. And if you notice that they follow you back, send them a personalized direct message. That could come through people that you're meeting at networking events. Maybe it's your local chamber of commerce, or maybe there's conferences that you're going to, or maybe there's small business groups, networking groups that you're going to, that could come through online communities that you have become a part of. And I'm not talking about voiceover online communities. I'm talking about maybe you are plugging in with a community of elearning developers, or you plugged in with a community of documentary filmmakers, or you've plugged in with a community of video producers and you've started to join those conversations and start to nurture those relationships. New leads can come from that. New leads can come from online casting. Yes, I said it and I've been saying it for years. People just often ignore this part. New leads can come from online casting. I think that online casting can be one of the tools in your toolbox. I don't think it should be the only tool in your toolbox, but it can absolutely be a tool in your toolbox. Every single day. Your primary objective is to get as many new people to hear your voice as possible. Auditions through online casting, auditions for your agents, auditions for clients, auditions for prospects. And then putting new people into the pipeline and sending them to the website to hear your demos through all the different things that we just talked about. Email marketing, cold calling, networking, social media, whatever it is, you need new people hearing your demos every single day. As many new people as you can get to hear your demos every single day. Obviously the odds swing in your favor. The more people that hear it, the higher there is a probability that you're going to convert if you are making those outreaches personalized. So that's the first thing. New leads. Second thing is follow up. It's going to take more than one message in most instances to get some of these people to actually convert. Are you going to have moments when you send an email to somebody on the exact right day when they just happen to be casting a project and they give you a shot at it? Yeah, it can happen. Especially if you're doing it consistently, reaching out to people consistently, it can happen. It is much more likely that it's going to take a series of emails to actually get to the point where they decide to give you an audition opportunity or decide to book you. Part of the reason for that. Again, granted, there is a lot of noise in the email inbox and sometimes you've got to send multiple emails in order to be able to cut through. But again, it's about the content of the emails, the type of emails that you're sending that help you to cut through the noise. If you're writing boring, generic templated follow up messages, those are probably not going to work as either. My follow up strategy is again, much more personalized. Yes, I am sending automated sequences, but I'm targeting very specific genres with very specific messages. I'm asking myself, what does this video production company that specializes in corporate video, what are the things that really matter to them most and how can I speak specifically to those things that matter to them most? Are there particular solutions that I can provide? Are there Particular pain points that I know that will resonate with them. Are there ways that I can add value? Can I make them smile? Can I make them laugh? Can I entertain them in some way? Can I offer them a helpful tip or something that might be beneficial to their business? These are the types of questions that I'm asking myself and these are the types of messages that are going into my follow ups. And this is why my follow ups convert higher. Because again, I'm taking the time to be personalized. If you don't get a response on the first email, that does not mean give up. It means send a second email, send a third email, send a fourth email, send a fifth email. A no response is not a no. A no response may just be a not yet. A no is stop emailing me. A no is not interested. A no is we don't keep a roster. A no is an unsubscribe. If you don't get those things, then there is still the potential that they are interested. So just keep going. Just because they may not respond right away. Just keep going. You don't know. Maybe there are there are production companies out there that create 50 videos a year and there are production companies that are out there that create five videos a year. Production company that creates 50 videos a year is obviously going to be hiring a lot more frequently because they have more work in their pipeline. The company that only produces five, maybe they're producing a much higher quality product, but that means that they're hiring significantly less throughout the year because they've got significantly fewer products, projects. You don't know who you're reaching out to at the time. Are you reaching out to the company that produces 50 or the company that reaches 5? Maybe the reason why they didn't respond to you right now is because they don't need you right now. I've talked about this before. I've had responses after a week, I've had responses after a month, I've had responses after six months, I've had responses after a year, I've had responses after three years where I've ultimately ended up booking a job with a client. Follow up is the second most important part of your marketing strategy. But again, it needs that common thread of personalization in order for it to be effective. The third thing that you need to be leaning into is your relationship building. Once somebody expresses an interest in working with you, that doesn't mean that they're going to hire you immediately. Going back to the example that I just gave, maybe they just don't have anything in their pipeline right now or here's a great example. I got connected with a production company about two weeks ago and the email response that I received from them was, mark, your demos are amazing and we really, really like your stuff. We're absolutely gonna add you to the roster. But for whatever reason, right now every single project that we're working on is casting female. So just hang in there, but know that we're interested. Okay, I'll take that. That's still a win. Didn't get me a job right away. That's fine. Everything they're hiring right now is female. Great. One of these days a project's going to come up where they're going to need a male voice. They're going to think about me. So my job now is to make sure that they don't forget about me. This is where relationship building starts. So I need to have a system in place that allows me to maintain regular communication with those prospects and clients. The prospects are the ones that haven't hired me yet, but they've expressed an interest in doing so. The clients, obviously self explanatory. Those are the people who I've worked with in the past and I don't want them to forget about me. So I need to have a way to continue to nurture those relationships and my communication with them is different again because we are at a different point in our relationship. For many of my clients, some of them, I've known them for years, we talk about different things. Those emails again, tend to be much more personalized because as I've got to know them over the years, I've gotten to know a little bit about how they work, a little bit more about their company. Maybe I've got to know a little bit more about them on a personal level. I can keep those notes in my CRM and I can use those as a reference point when I'm sending a new communication to nurture that relationship. This is also where social media plays an active role. I think that one of the things that we missed a boat on with social media is engagement. We're so busy trying to figure out what we're going to post on social media that we forget that it's actually a two way street. There's posting content, putting it out there into the world, but there's also engaging with all of the content that is already there. And I can draw just as much value by spending half an hour each day dropping comments on posts that I'm seeing from my clients and my prospects as I can get from posting my own stuff. And so that needs to be part of your strategy as well. So this whole idea that direct marketing is dead, I think it's false. I've also heard several different ideas that you've got to send multi thousands. One recent thing that I heard was that you have to send one and a half million emails in a year. Let me just tell you, if it gets to a point where I have to send a million and a half emails in a year in order to generate some work for myself, I will officially retire from voiceover. We'll just put that out there on the record right now. That is 100% not what I am doing at this point, at this stage of my career, where I'm at, where I've got a pretty decent client base, I've got a pretty decent list of prospects. A lot of what I'm doing is just maintaining those relationships, nurturing those relationships. And I'm trying to put 25 or 50 new people in the pipeline every week. Some weeks I can do more, some weeks I can do less. But I'm always trying to make sure that somebody new is hearing me. And that is a combination of sending out emails, submitting auditions through agents and online casting and things of that nature and then taking advantage of free social media tools to also meet people where they're at. Yeah, some people don't use email. Some people prefer LinkedIn. Great. I have no problem using LinkedIn. Some people don't use LinkedIn, they prefer using Instagram. Great. I don't have a problem if I have to use Instagram. I will meet you where you are at, but I will include all of these different tools as part of my overall strategy in order to get more people in the pipeline and create more voiceover opportunities for myself. So there's a couple of questions that I want to leave you with on this really short, quick episode. First and foremost, are you focusing on those three pillars every single day? Every single working day, we'll say I'll give you your weekends off. You can take vacation too. Every single working day. Did a certain number of new people hear your demos for the first time? That is your new leads? Are you putting new people into the pipeline? Did you make new connections through email, through social media, through networking, whatever, a certain number, and you get to decide the number. I would say it should be at least five or 10. But you can decide it can be more, can be less. Keep in mind, the lower the number is, the longer it's going to take you to build something but you need to set a number and commit to 10. New people will hear my voice every single day through a combination of email, social media and auditioning. Now you've covered the first pillar. The second pillar is follow up. Am I maintaining a follow up strategy with those new leads that I am reaching out to? Because it's going to take more than one attempt. Now, if some of those people that you're getting connected with are happening through auditions, through online casting, obviously you don't really have a way to follow up with them. But when you send connection requests on LinkedIn, are you keeping an eye out for when those connection requests have been accepted? And are you sending a direct message, a personalized direct message when that connection request is accepted? If you're reaching out to a certain number of new people every day through email, do you have a multi email follow up strategy to try to convert those new leads into prospects? Follow up has to be a part of your everyday marketing efforts. Using a CRM can be really helpful for that because it will help you remember who you need to get in touch with when the last time was that you got in touch with them. And if you're using something like Nimble, for example, you'll be able to use automated sequences to help you to make that follow up strategy a little bit easier. But that's the second pillar and it needs to be happening every single day. In your business, there needs to be some form of follow up. And then the third pillar is there needs to be some sort of relationship building for all of those prospects and clients, the ones who have expressed an interest in hiring you or the ones who have hired you. Are you getting in front of of a group of those people every single day? Now, how many that you do is going to depend a little bit on the size of your database. If you're getting started in voiceover, you're a little bit newer. Obviously you don't have as many clients to follow up with at that point. That's fine. Just make sure that you're doing it on a regular basis. If you do have a larger client base, make sure that you are reaching out to a percentage of that database every single day. Don't just look back through most recent invoices or maybe your 20, 25 invoices. Look back through your 2024s. Look back through your 2023s. Maybe there's people in there that you forgot about and it's time to get top of mind with them again. Nurturing those relationships is one of the ways that is going to keep you top of mind and one of the things that is going to keep you getting hired. So that is the third thing that needs to be a part of your marketing strategy every single day. And then the thread that runs through all of them. And this is the difference maker. You can do all of those things in a completely disconnected and generic way and not produce any results and genuinely feel like direct marketing is dead and that this is pointless. When you do those three things in a much more personalized way, yes, you are not going to be able to do them at the same scale, but you're not going to need to because you're going to get a higher conversion rate. Take the time to personalize these messages, to personalize these outreaches. Show that you're human, that you're not another AI chatbot. Think about audition directions. What does audition directions ask for? It asks for genuine, authentic. It asks for real person, real connection. Your marketing shouldn't be any different. One of the things that I've seen happen is the tone of emails has changed because we're using these AI tools to write our messages. And now the messages no longer sound like they're coming from us, and particularly with your clients and to a degree with your prospects. If you've been reaching out to these people for a long time, if you've been having regular communication with them for a long time and all of the sudden that communication sounds very different, it's probably going to stand out to them that this is AI and that this isn't you anymore. And they're probably not going to be interested in nurturing a relationship with an AI. Look at social media. How many posts do you see in your LinkedIn feed now that follow almost a completely identical format? I can guarantee you that a large percentage of those posts are being written by AI and people are complaining about it. People are calling other people out for it. It doesn't land anymore. This is the gift that AI has given us. The more human that you can be in the midst of all of this AI content and AI slope, the higher the chances are that you are going to cut through the noise and that you are going to continue to be able to grow your voiceover business. Direct marketing is not dead. Maybe the way you were doing it is dead, but that's why you're going to take some of the things that you've gathered from this episode. You're going to make sure that everything is more personalized. You're going to re evaluate your strategy and you're going to start producing even more results for yourself in 2026. If you enjoyed this week's episode of the podcast, can I ask two quick favors? Number 1 Share this episode in your social media, post it in your Instagram stories, help other people to find it. And number two, leave a review wherever you are enjoying this podcast, including Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It helps other people to find the show and I certainly do appreciate it. Thanks so much for checking out the Everyday Veopreneur podcast.