Hey, it’s Susan Berkley and this is the Inside Voiceover video training blog. We’re going to talk this week about the four pillars of voiceover success. In fact, this is the start of a four week series. So let’s get going with pillar number one. It all starts, of course, with your performance skills, and let’s break it down because that first pillar actually has three parts. The first part is relationship. You see, this is where people get hung up, right from the start. When they begin to do voiceovers, what are they listening to? Their own voice. They’re playing to themselves. They’re creating a feedback loop. So the first pillar of voiceover success is to completely get yourself out of the picture. It’s relationship. Who are you talking to? Who’s that one person? Very specific. You should know them so intimately. You should smell their cologne and you should be able to tell me their name, what they look like, all of that stuff. Then you need to figure out who am I in relationship to that person. Am I a friend? Am I a professional that they’re talking to?
The next piece of the pillar. The second part is where are we when we’re having this conversation? The conversation, of course, is in the copy, the story that you’re telling about the product or service that you’re advertising. Where are you? Am I in the bedroom? Am I out on the street? Am I in a store? Am I inside that person’s head? That’s valid too. And then finally, the third piece of the pillar is what we call the moment before or the mumble in. Why are we even having this conversation about this product or service in the first place? You need to make that up so that the first line of the script, the first word you say is actually a continuation of a story that you’ve made up, a reason why you’re even having this conversation with me. I hope that makes sense. Once you nail this, you’re going to be well on your way to performing good voiceover. And I’m Susan Berkley. We’ll have the second piece of the pillar next week.
