Like so many of my colleagues, I have a free profile on Voice123, the online casting company, now owned by Backstage, LLC, and run by fellow Dutch person Rolf Veldman.
Unlike the CEO of another online P2P (whose name shall not be mentioned), Rolf is often an honored guest at voice over conferences and podcasts.
I saw Rolf once at VO Atlanta. I said “Hi” to him in the hallways of the hotel. He smiled a smile of recognition as he passed me, and that was that. I wasn’t going to run after him in my yellow clogs.
Maybe someone had told him not to engage with me, as I am known for being critical of outfits like the one Rolf is running. That would be weird, though, because on stage Rolf does not shy away from critical questions. He seems to be listening carefully, and he engages in discussions, but in the end I get the impression that V123 hasn’t changed much for the better, since Rolf took over. Prove me wrong in the comments!
To make my point, I am sharing an email I received yesterday, inviting me to audition for a client who’s looking for…. drum roll…. a native Hawaiian male VO!
What an insult to the good people of Hawaii to invite a Dutchman for this job! And this is just ONE example of the many ridiculous invites V123 sends me throughout the year (and I’m not the only one who gets these emails). They’re supposed to be a voice over matchmaker, so why are they constantly offering mismatches?
You know what the idea behind these invites is, don’t you?
The idea is to show non-paying members that V123 is a good marketplace to find fitting voice over work, and doing this so convincingly, that you sign up for the recommended tier of $395 a year. Or, if you want to splurge, you can fork over $4,950 for a Platinum plan. What does that kind of cash get you, you may wonder?
This is what you pay for:
Triple the number of audition invitations (compared to what a $395 p/y paying member receives), up to 8,542 search appearances (compared to 77), and you compete with up to 88 voice actors (as compared to 3,186).
Who says that money can’t buy privilege?
Now, if V123’s algorithm presents me with stupid matches like the Hawaiian one, why should I have any faith in the system once I’m a full-paying member? The trouble is that all these P2P’s (with the exception of Bodalgo), are trying to seduce you and me by showing us how many opportunities we are missing. They create a sad state of FOMO.
But once they’ve got your money, you’ll find out what the real deal is, and the ‘amazing opportunities’ melt away like snow on a warm day.
But you know what? As soon as it’s time to renew your membership for another year, they’ll throw you a couple of bones to give you the impression that’s it’s worthwhile to stay a paying member.
Are you still falling for these cheap sales tactics?
I’d rather save my money, and book a trip to Hawaii! Perhaps that’s where I’ll meet Alex Torrenegra, the founder of V123. And when I do, I’ll ask him:
“If Voice123 was such a success, why on earth did you sell the business?”
Speaking of Hawaii, I suddenly understand why they asked me to audition for that Voice123 job. It must have to do with that IHOP commercial I voiced a few years ago…
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I agree with you Paul. I’m a member in the second highest tier of V123. After a couple of years of anemic revenue from the site, I paid several hundred dollars to have a pair of experts fine-tune and optimize my V123 profile in every way possible. They did excellent work. However, the resulting revenue from V123? Mostly crickets. And now in just the past month, despite only choosing auditions most likely to earn a ‘like’, I’ve inexplicably fallen from V123’s Top 20 to its Top 40.
VO voice talent and marketer, Marc Scott’s recent interview with Rolf revealed even Veldman seems puzzled by the inner workings of V123.
If even the CEO is puzzled…
Years ago I made the prediction that P2P’s will eventually implode because they cannot keep all of their members happy who are wondering where all the jobs are.
I think the founders of V123 saw the signs when they sold their business to Backstage. After all, why would you sell something that would be a secure and successful source of revenue?
“Marc Scott’s recent interview with Rolf revealed even Veldman seems puzzled by the inner workings of V123”
YES! I was going to say the same thing. I was blown away during that interview at how much Rolf was as confused by his platform’s workings as I, the listener, was.
I had a session with marc soon after that and when I brought it up, he just kind of looked baffled and still a little shell-shocked out how that interview came out.
I only did the $49 fee ’cause a client booked me through voice123 (why? don’t know). I’ve tried doing the things that might make me more visible on there, and even gotten some tips from one of the people who work there but it’s, in my opinion, THE most flawed P2P for voicework out there.
Say what you want about voices.com but I still get work through it. Voice123 used to be a valuable tool in my arsenal of getting VO work but it’s now become a muddled mess of algorithm gobbldey-guck that not even it’s braintrust has figured out.
That’s not good.
Rolf is listed as “a historian with a specialization in corporate learning and politics.” Make of that what you will.
By the way, just like you Paul, here’s the V123 audition invitation I received: “English with Hawaiian dialect”. Pitifully off-target.
Aloha, and welcome to the club!
In 2018, I had an account, but the algorithm kept sending auditions for other ethnicities. Rarely was there a match, so I cancelled my account. In 2021, a group came out with ideas to navigate V123, so I tried once again. Lo and behold, the same issue occurred. Plus, auditions would come in the middle of the night and were filled by morning, EST. The “rules” they had for achievement on the site were negligible. Thank you for addressing this.
Amen! I got the same invitation, and had the same reaction. Voice123 is a scam that takes advantage of thousands of voice actors who are desperate to find work. I hope at some point some governmental agency will step in and investigate them.
Like you fellas, I get a lot of mismatched jobs. Whats kinda funny is how I get MANY jobs for native Hawaiian women, to Asian, Spanish speakers and middle aged women (all of which I am not or do not have the voice of). The weirdest one is receiving client direct invites who ALSO sends me mismatched jobs ! Whats that about?? And although THEY invited me, im sure those are also bringing down my rankings once they find im not the voice their description says they’re looking for, and let V123 know!
The only thing I want to say is this: I believe pay to play is an educational tool more than a job tool. I know its goal is to give jobs and refer talent to clients but i see it differently. I’ve been on pay to play since the beginning of the online birthing of them (Voice 123 included) it was the very first pay to play site and it allowed me an avenue to learn what type of clients hire and because I chose to stay nonunion it gave me an avenue of how I could pursue my own career, so I still believe (when used right) pay to play as an advantage to us as a tool but I’ve always believed it to be an educational tool. those that are looking at it as a career model to pay your bills are sadly mistaken there’s too much talent on there to make that happen. I know Alex well and I’ve had many conversations with him about what he created and he is a tech guy and his wife was an aspiring Voice-Talent and she wanted to be able to do it from home and so the story of its birthing is a good story, it’s got a good history to it, but it turned into algorithms and stats instead of casting. there’s no way I would be signing up for any of these expensive tier memberships myself either so I definitely don’t support that. I would rather hire a talent manager. but I do support the educational tool in pay to play. It’s much the same as how people view agents they think they’re just gonna get an agent and an agent is going to feed them the rest of their career – it’s not how it works. It used to work that way but not in todays time. Just my two cents.
If Alex still believed in the tool he created he would still own it. Those who want an education should hire a coach (like you), or sign up for Fiverr. It’s much cheaper than V123, and the results are just as disappointing.
I dunno. I make one heck of a great living with clients who start out on Voice123 and then continue to use me. I staunchly defend market rates on there, and avoid the crap jobs that sadly make that cut and land in my inbox.
Though I’m FiCore and there largely won’t be any renewals or commissions, the rates are largely commensurate to the usage, I can enforce compliance to that usage with my contract, and I get paid on time. AND – very many of these clients turn into repeat clients. That’s my goal anyway.
The truth is that NO pay to play is perfect. They never will be. They are a free marketplace for tons of ne’er-do-wells to come out of the wood work and offer crap jobs for crap rates. There’s no filter. WE are the filter. But the P2P’s aren’t perfect. Many are FAR from it. We know who they are. I applaud Rolf and Voice123 for being one of the best marketplaces that you can find where I can snag a lot of great work that you can convert to direct clients and get paid what I’m worth.
Ultimately, from time to time, I’ll find the misaligned role land in my inbox. But I and everyone can also take courses like Natasha Marshewka’s and Katherine Tole’s and really optimize our profiles thoroughly to eliminate those. You said it yourself – you’re on the free tier. Have you taken the time to optimize your profile at all? You might not see such mismatches if you did. You do have “English – Other” selected as one of your languages. That job had that parameter assigned to it, so, naturally, you’re going to get matched to it as a result. This is where the “lack of perfection” applies, and it would be great if someday V123 and others would offer the option of selecting more refined parameters to specify “include” and “exclude” options. But I don’t see them drilling it down to that level…and not because there’s anything nefarious in that…it just implies a measure of control that I don’t think you’ll ever be able to see and thus screen out ALL the undesirables.
I generally don’t receive many mismatches. I DID see the Hawaiian one – which is rare – but what I’m more concerned about is the fact that it came from “Rescue Agency” and was at a subpar rate. Instant decline. Rescue Agency is known for shenanigans of posting crappy bargain-basement pay jobs on V123, so THAT is the reason why I would avoid that one.
Again, no P2P is perfect…and Voice123 is far from it. I know of your “Voice123 gets a no from me” stance, so I can appreciate your article from that vantage point, however so many of us get so many great great-paying jobs from there, as well as repeat clients, that I’m not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater. They are a business, and they’re always going to be a business. They want paying members. Simple as that. I get it. I don’t respect everything about Apple and I think that their products are WAY overpriced…but I still buy them, because of the value that I perceive in using their products. On the flip side, Voice123 is not like XFinity in that XFinity is the ONLY realistic option for high speeds in my area even though I hate them with every fiber of my being and the fire of a thousand suns. I don’t use Voice123 because they’re my only option. I use them because of the value in gaining new clients, and the opportunity to do that over and over again. I wouldn’t call what they’re doing “cheap sales tactics.” It’s business. They want customers. Take it or leave it. I choose Apple even though it isn’t perfect, and I certainly wouldn’t call anything Apple does cheap sales tactics. I choose Voice123 and am on the $2200/year tier because of the giant ROI I’ve seen in auditioning, winning jobs and converting new direct clients there. But I know my approach isn’t the same for everyone.
IMHO, V123 is no Fiverr and it’s certainly no VDC – far from it – again, not perfect, but trying. (I know, I know…”trying your patience”, right?) 🙂
Just my two cents. I may be an anomaly, and I’m OK with that.
I’m glad V123 is working for you, but when you need to pay for additional courses to make the platform work for you, something’s not right. I’ve had a full-paying membership for a few years with more misses than hits, and I’m not coming back.
I have not ever taken their course or paid for it…I was just saying that it exists and that people have used it. I am in the Top 10% with 52 5-star reviews and 941 clients who have favorited me, so I guess that’s good? The truth is that I actually never look at those numbers or statistics, because frankly, I don’t care. All I prefer to do is just put my head down, offer great auditions, and deal professionally with those who respond favorably to them. The platform is working for me without paying for any courses or supplemental profile evals. I’m sorry I didn’t work for you!
Don’t feel sorry for me. P2P’s are not part of my business plan.
V123 is a greased pole, and I’ve been on and off it the last few years, inching up, sliding down. I took the V123Pros course prior to my latest fling in an effort to better understand this relatively new algorithm, get some metaphorical coarse sand on my hands, spikes on my feet. Alas, it’s still an algorithm.
I belong to a couple of sites, and am able to adhere to the rule that I need to get out more than I put in, but the sheer effort required to not lose my mind with frustration at V123 is wearing on me. I audition very carefully, do the things you need to do, but fundamentally, you’re dealing with an algorithn that doesn’t know or care. And, of course, human clients that may care even less. For example, I left the platform for many months before being enticed to return, and the sliding one-year “like average’ came trundling along, stumbled upon this ‘like’ wasteland, threw it into the hopper and spit out new numbers that dropped me down that greased pole a couple of steps.
However, I do have a basic understanding of how it’s meant to work on paper, at least, and why some auditions come at crazy-ass times. If nothing else, it reinforces the notion at the back of my mind – that I pretend not to see, because it’s harder – that self-marketing needs a lot more love in my plan. So, I swear dadburnit that I’ll not be renewing when the times comes – it’s just not worth the cost, expressed in any way you choose.
No one will care more about your business than you do, Michael. The moment I fired all my middlemen, I kept their commission in my pocket. Never looked back, and I’m still in business!
Hey Paul,
Another great article! Thank you!
I waited for 3 years to become a Platinum Member of V123. Then I had that membership from 10/13/17-12/20/21. I paid for it for four years and did pretty well. The first and last years were not much for ROI, but the middle two were fantastic. Then they changed the algorithm and suddenly Platinum members were penalized for auditioning too much. That was the point of the membership initially.
When Backstage bought them, I began to notice a decline in both rates and opportunities. I took Natasha’s awesome course, but the things I tried didn’t help.
Like Joshua, I still have a lot of clients from V123. I am happy about that. But my new clients last year netted me about $8K on a $5K membership. ROI vaporized. Too much time spent for too little money. So, I dropped V123 from my business plan last year. I’m happy to report my total billing did not go down. I am having the best year of my career.
No love was lost for the rudderless V123.
It works for some people. It worked for me for over a decade. Until it didn’t. I’m happy. Just wanted to share my experience too.
Thanks for always being amazing!
Thanks for chiming in, Dustin! Different people have different experiences with P2P’s. Both you and me have discovered we don’t need them to make a good living. But that’s a story P2P’s don’t like to promote. As long as they can make people believe P2P’s are essential to voice over success, inexperienced folks will sign on the dotted line. It’s very tempting because they do make the casting process seem very easy. That is, if they give you a fair chance to Play. These days, the focus seems to be on Pay, and I don’t like that.
Aloha, Paul!
You win the prize for best (and shortest) comment ever, Alex!
I got another equally ridiculous “invitation” from Voice123 today telling me they had automatically determined that I would be a good fit to audition for the part of a “cheerful Egyptian pastry chef.” And this despite the fact that my profile says quite clearly I can only play GRUMPY Egyptian pastry chefs. 🤣
You are too funny, Harold! Thanks for brining some comic relief to this page.