Unqualified

The voiceover coaching industry has a popularity problem. And it is eating beginners alive.

I want to tell you about two coaching experiences I had recently. The pattern established here is…not great.

The first session was conducted over ipDTL. I never saw the coach’s face. Not once. That’s a small thing, maybe. But the absence of presence set the tone for everything that followed and I want to sit with it for a second, because I think it reveals something.

And look, I am not someone who loves being on camera. I made a TikTok about it yesterday and someone pushed back, asking how I could dislike cameras and still offer 1:1 coaching and classes. Fair question. Here’s the answer: because there’s a difference between performing for a lens and showing up for a person. When I’m coaching, I’m there 100%, face, energy, full attention because that’s what the work requires. Being present with someone isn’t a bonus feature. It’s the entire job.

A coach who won’t show their face in a session they’re being paid for has already told you something about how much they value your time. But this was only a little thing compared to the rest of the session.

We did not work on a single piece of copy. Not one. There was no script, no direction, no performance feedback, no agenda. What there was, instead, was a lengthy tour through this person’s career highlights. Their bookings. Their experiences. Their opinions about the industry delivered as monologue. I sat there and waited for a gap to ask a question. It never came. I DID NOT ASK ONE QUESTION IN THE ENTIRE 50 MINUTES.

The second session didn’t even happen. And look, I wanna be fair here. Life is unpredictable. Emergencies are real. Things come up, and I genuinely understand that. I'm not a monster. But I never got a link to the session and instead got a cancellation message thirty minutes before we were supposed to start. A legal emergency, I was told. I had been planning for this for over a week. Had paid within the hour of confirming it. Had gotten myself hyped! Had rearranged my day, which, as some of you know, is usually quite full and I often teach or coach in the evenings so I was giving up my working hours for this lesson. I waited. Two hours later: “false alarm”. And then, almost immediately after that, a text: “are you available at 9pm?”

Nine. PM.

I share these not to relitigate them, but because I know. I freaking KNOW I am not the only one who has sat in a session like this. I know because voice actors tell me. In my DMs, in the comments, in hushed tones like it’s something to be embarrassed about. Like they should have known better.

They couldn’t have known better. THAT’S THE WHOLE PROBLEM.

Popularity is not a credential

And here’s where I wanna get out my magnifying glass because the thing about voiceover coaching that the industry does not want to examine too closely is that the people who are considered the “go-to” coaches are often not evaluated on their ability to teach. They’re evaluated on their visibility. The money they say they make. And a few other little things that have nothing to do with their pedagogy.

How many followers do they have? Do they speak at VO Atlanta? Are they in the Facebook groups with the blue checkmarks and the pinned posts? Did they get quoted in that one article? Have you heard of them?

None of those questions have anything to do with didactics and credentials as a coach. None of them tell you whether someone can identify what’s wrong with your read and give you a note that actually fixes it. None of them tell you whether someone can hold space for a student who is struggling, ask good questions, or shut up long enough to listen.

But they are, functionally, the entire basis on which most beginners choose a coach.

And why wouldn’t they be? When you are new to an industry, you don’t have the frame of reference to evaluate expertise. You can’t listen to a coach’s demo and identify whether they’re still relevant to the current market. You can’t read a testimonial and know if it came from a student who actually booked work or just felt good about the session. You see the “celebrity” or “veteran” coaches who have SEO out the ass and they showed up first in search results. You go with the name you’ve heard the most. You go with whoever your other beginner friends are also going to.

The coaching industry is self-reinforcing. Popularity creates more popularity. Credibility is passed around like a hot potato among the same small circle of visible names and the people who pay the price are the students. Like me. Like you.

The conflict of interest nobody talks about

Of course I am not saying all VO coaching is bad. Hell I’m a coach! And I am not certainly not saying coaches should not be compensated for their time and expertise. I am saying the system by which we determine who counts as an expert is broken, and the consequences of that brokenness fall entirely on the people who can least afford it: beginners, people who are career-changing, people who saved up for months to afford a session. Because let’s be reallllllllly fuckin’ honest, these folks are charging big money.

There is also a specific conflict of interest baked into the coaching model that the industry talks around but never talks about directly.

When a coach is also the person who produces your demo, or who refers you to the person who does, there is a financial incentive to move you toward a demo before you are ready. When a coach’s income depends on a rotating roster of students, there is an incentive to keep you coming back without necessarily moving you forward. When a coach’s reputation is built on testimonials, there is an incentive to make you feel good in the session rather than tell you the hard thing you actually need to hear.

I am not saying every coach is making these calculations consciously. I am saying the structure creates the incentive, and incentives shape behavior whether we acknowledge them or not.

What you can’t know until you’re in the room

This is the part that keeps me up at night, honestly. The first session happened months ago and I’m still thinking about it——mostly because that person is still in our faces. Showing up and selling their services. And now that I know the truth—-confirmed by other people as well—-it BOTHERS ME.

I went into those sessions with my eyes and my cold little heart open. I have been in this industry long enough to have some instincts, some skepticism, some ability to evaluate what I’m receiving. And I still couldn’t fully assess the situation until I was already in it. Until I was already sitting there watching the clock, realizing this wasn’t what I signed up for.

And it’s this realization that a beginner has no chance that crushes me.

A beginner doesn’t necessarily know that a coaching session should involve actual copy work. They don’t know that a coach who talks about themselves for 45 minutes is not giving them what they’re owed. They don’t know that a 9pm reschedule request is a boundary violation dressed up as flexibility. They think this is just what coaching is. They think if they aren’t getting value, it’s because they aren’t advanced enough to receive it yet. Because we have made that acceptable.

And that assumption, that the student is the variable, not the coach, is exactly what an under-qualified coach is counting on.

The student blames themselves. The coach keeps their reputation. The industry keeps recommending them. Nothing changes.

So what do you actually do with this?

I’ve been sitting with the question of how to end this piece in a way that isn’t just righteous venting because righteous venting without utility is just noise, and you deserve more than that. I am not saying I have the answers, ok? But here is what I’d tell someone who is about to spend money on a coaching session:

• Ask the coach when they last booked work. Not their biggest booking ever. Recently. Ask them what the current rate environment looks like for the vertical you’re working in (or want to be working in). Ask them what their session will specifically cover and get it in writing if you can. Ask for references from students who were at your level and not their most successful alumni.

• Ask them what their session will specifically cover before you pay. Get it in writing if you can. A prepared coach will have no problem answering this. An unprepared one will give you something vague about “it depends on where you are” and hope you don’t push back.

• Ask what software or platform the session will be conducted on and whether you’ll be able to see each other. Presence matters.

• Ask if you’ll be working on actual copy during the session. This should not be a controversial question. It should be the default. If it surprises them, that is your answer.

• Ask how they benchmark your progress.

• Ask what their style of teaching consists of.

(And pay attention to how they respond to all of those questions. A great coach will find them reasonable. A coach who is more invested in their status than their students will find them threatening.)

There are genuinely excellent coaches in this industry. (I hope to be included amongst them) People who have stayed current, who have built real pedagogical skill alongside their performance careers, who will tell you the hard thing because they respect you enough to believe you can handle it. They exist. I have worked with some of them. They changed what I do and how I think about this work.

But the industry does not make them easy to find, because the industry does not reward teaching ability. It rewards fame. And until that changes, until we really start asking harder questions and demanding real accountability from the people we pay to help us, the system will keep producing the same results.

You deserve a coach who shows up prepared. Who works on copy with you. Whose face you can see. Who does not reschedule you into the next time zone two hours after a false alarm.

The bar is not high. The problem is we’ve been told not to expect even that much.

My final thought

The last thing I’ll say here is this: everything I just described, all the questions I wish someone had told me to ask, the things I didn’t know to expect until I was already in the room…that’s what I try to bring to every session I offer. You will see my face. We will work on copy. I will come prepared, and I will tell you the hard things when the hard things are what you need to hear. Not because I’m trying to be brutal. I truly don’t believe in “brutal feedback”. But because you’re spending real money and real time on this, and you deserve someone who respects that enough to be honest with you.

My sessions are built around your material, your voice, and where you actually are right now WITH AN ACTUAL AGENDA that I have taken time before our session to prepare, not a generic curriculum designed to keep you coming back indefinitely. If that sounds like what you’ve been looking for, I’d love to work with you.

LOTS ON THE CALENDAR THIS MONTH:

🎙THE AUDITION EXPERIENCE SUMMER COHORT IS OPEN FOR ENROLLMENT! In this 2 week role-playing experience, you will be exposed to various types of copy from commercial to interactive, medical to political and more. You’ll receive 3-5 auditions a day and feedback at the end of the two weeks. Grab your spot now! https://www.astoriaredheadvoiceover.com/the-experience

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GRAB YOUR SPOT HERE: https://www.actingbusinessbootcamp.com/is-your-demo-hurting-you

🎙TOY COMMERCIALS, JUNE 11th 730PM EST Toy commercials look simple from the outside. They are not. The difference between a read that books and a read that sounds like every other voice actor doing their “excited kid” impression is specific, learnable, and what we’re covering in this class. We’ll work real toy commercial copy, kids’ spots, parent spots, brand anthem copy and dig into energy calibration, implied audience, and how to make high-enthusiasm reads feel genuine instead of performed. If commercials are any part of your business, this is a session you don’t want to miss.
$20 to audit: https://www.actingbusinessbootcamp.com/offers/FSLyoAj5/checkout

🎙 GAMES AND INTERACTIVE MEDIA, JUNE 17th 730PM EST The games industry is massive, it’s growing, and most voice actors aren’t pitching it strategically. This class covers the full range of what “games” actually means for VO: board game and tabletop, app and mobile game, and interactive media. The tonal range in this space is wild: comedic chaos, epic fantasy narration, casual mobile hype, family game night warmth. We’ll work copy from across all of it so you can hear how different these reads need to be and figure out where you fit.
$20 to audit: https://www.actingbusinessbootcamp.com/offers/tvKtQT2c/checkout

🎙 BUILDING A TOYS AND GAMES PACKAGE, JUNE 23rd 730PM EST In this VO Gym we’re working copy AND building your roadmap for actually marketing yourself in this space. Who are the real buyers? What does a toys and games niche demo need to contain to open doors and does it even make sense for you yet? How do you find and approach Hasbro, a toy startup, or an indie game company without sending another email that gets ignored? You’ll leave with copy worked, targets identified, and a clear next step.
$20 to audit: https://www.actingbusinessbootcamp.com/offers/MjcTLXSL/checkout

💌 EMAIL MARKETING FOR VOICEOVER ACTORS: If you’re not sure who to target and how to speak their language, these THREE email courses will help you scale your business through direct marketing.
🌟For Agents: https://www.actingbusinessbootcamp.com/offers/wh3UQzLL/checkout
🌟For Entertainment Clients: https://www.actingbusinessbootcamp.com/offers/YxaCyFEH/checkout
🌟For Cold Leads Outside of Entertainment: https://www.actingbusinessbootcamp.com/offers/p87wxWS4/checkout

And of course, enrollment for THE VOICEOVER ACTOR ROAD MAP is open. If you’re ready to kick your career in gear, then please, join me for business coaching!! I can’t wait to help you craft the career you want to have. (Reach out to me for a 15% off coupon)