How To Get Started With Voiceover Work

Voiceovers are ubiquitous in modern life. Whether you’re listening to the radio, an audiobook, or watching (or, more likely, ignoring) ads on social media, you’ll find it hard to avoid hearing a voiceover artist.

Voiceovers have traditionally been the preserve of professional voice actors, but with so much online advertising nowadays, and a boom in audiobook popularity, voice artists are more in demand than ever before.

And this means there’s an opportunity for people without any voice acting experience to jump on board the voiceover bandwagon. If you’ve got a voice people like to listen to - especially if it’s particularly smooth or distinctive - you’ve got the potential to become a successful voiceover artist.

If that sounds like something you’d be interested in pursuing, this is the article you need! We’ll talk you through all the basics of voiceover work to help you decide if it’s the side hustle for you - and if it isn’t, we’ve got a few alternative suggestions for making extra money online.

So let’s get started!

What Is Voiceover Work?

If you’re reading this article, you probably don’t need a definition, but just in case: any piece of narration where you don’t see the actor speaking is considered a voiceover.

This can cover a huge range of productions, from commercials to online courses to radio work, and consequently there’s a lot of work out there, and a large number of organisations in need of voice actors.

As a voiceover artist, your job is to record yourself reading a script or audiobook, before sending the finished audio file over to your clients. Sounds easy enough, right?

Of course, it’s not quite as simple as that. It takes skill, hard work, and a certain degree of natural talent to be a successful voice actor, plus high quality equipment to produce recordings of a professional standard.

But if you’ve got a good voice and the determination to succeed, it can be a very lucrative side hustle - and if it goes well, it could even end up being your full time job.

Who Can Do Voiceover Work?

In theory, anyone at all can do voiceover work! There’s demand for all types of voices and accents, so there’s no reason not to give voiceover work a go just because you’re, say, an elderly person with a strong Glaswegian accent.

What matters most is, of course, your voice. You should be able to speak confidently and without hesitation, and ideally your voice should be an appealing one.

People who’ve done acting work in the past are especially well suited to voiceover work, for obvious reasons, but you certainly don’t have to be a professional actor to start a voiceover side hustle.

If you’ve got confidence, clarity, and a voice people like to listen to, that’s more than enough to get started.

Do You Need Any Qualifications For Voiceover Work?

None at all! You don’t need any kind of certificate or qualification to start looking for and getting voiceover work.

However, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t help to have some training. If you’re new to voiceover work, it’s worth considering working with a voice coach for a while.

While a voice coach won’t guarantee you voiceover work, they’ll be able to correct any beginner mistakes or poor habits, establish what your strengths and weaknesses are, and give you some ideas as to how to market yourself when you start seriously looking for work.

How To Get Started With Voiceover Work

If you’re a total newcomer to voiceovers, you may feel a little overwhelmed when you start thinking about how to launch your new side hustle.

But never fear, we’ve compiled a few specific steps you should take to get going:

1. Record a demo. You won’t get far with voiceover work if no one knows what you sound like! You’ll probably need to pay for this, unless you happen to be pals with a recording studio, but if you’re serious about your side hustle it’s worth the investment.

2. Start networking. Voiceover work is one of those areas where it pays to be part of the community. You’ll benefit from getting to know fellow professional voice actors, who are usually a mine of useful information, and may be able to help you find your first jobs.

3. Create a home studio. If you’re planning to work from home, you’ll need to create a suitable environment - no one’s going to pay for poor quality voiceovers. The main things you need are soundproofing material, a computer with editing software, quality headphones, and a quality microphone. You may be able to improvise to start with (e.g. using soft furnishings or clothes for soundproofing), to avoid too high an initial outlay.

This probably sounds quite intimidating, but it’s possible to create a good studio in almost any confined space - we even heard of one voice actor who created a studio on board a boat, to allow him to work while sailing the world!

4. Start looking for work! This is, of course, easier said than done. Getting your first job is probably your biggest hurdle, as once you’ve got one under your belt more are likely to follow. As for how and where to find work, we’ll tackle that question below.

For more information, websites like Spotlight, a British casting resource and database, offer advice to aspiring actors, including voice actors, to help them when they’re first starting out.

How To Find Voiceover Work

There are a few main options for landing your first voiceover jobs. While you can certainly stick to only one or two, you’ll probably find that trying all of them gives you the greatest chance of securing your first client. Once you’re established, you can be more picky about the work you take on.

• Pay-to-play sites. Unfortunately, this is another out-of-pocket expense before you’ve made any money at all, but it’s probably worth the cost of signing up to a site where you pay for access to auditions.

• Freelance sites. There’s been a proliferation of freelancing sites in recent years, such as Upwork or Fiverr, and you can create a profile on one (or more) of those sites for free. The downside is that the competition is fierce and the rates tend to be fairly low, but these sites can certainly help you get a few jobs under your belt.

• Networking. For many people, the idea of finding work through networking probably sends a shiver of dread down their spine - but voice acting is one of those fields that requires a bit of extroversion. Putting yourself in places where you’re likely to meet people in need of your services can be crucial to early success.

• Direct marketing. It’ll require a fair bit of time and effort, but one of the most promising ways to secure work is through building and promoting your brand. Establish an online presence for yourself as a voiceover artist, and then use direct marketing techniques like emailing prospective clients or cold-calling companies to offer your services, and direct their attention to your brand.

Getting your first paid gig is the hardest part of any side hustle, and voiceover work is no exception. But if you put in the time and effort, you’re likely to find that it gets much easier once you’ve done a few jobs, and your confidence will grow in proportion to your success.

What To Charge For Voiceover Work

One of the key benefits of voiceover work as a side hustle is that the rate of pay is comparatively high. Unfortunately, the way rates of pay are calculated is also pretty complicated.

The type of voiceover work being completed will dictate not just how much is charged, but also the way it’s costed.

For example, audiobooks are usually charged by the finished hour (i.e. how long the actual audio file ends up being), but that isn’t the same thing as the number of hours you’ll end up working.

You’ll need to have read the book in advance (probably a number of times) before you start recording, and your end result will need to be a ‘clean edit’ - i.e. a recording without mistakes - to be handed over to your client.

So although audiobook narration may be charged at anything from £75 - £150+ per finished hour, it could easily take double that amount of time, or more, to produce each of those finished hours of audio.

Corporate narration (e.g. for commercials), meanwhile, has two separate fees. Firstly, the Basic Studio (or Session) Fee, or BSF, which is the cost just of recording the script - usually around £250-£350 per hour for experienced voice artists.

But that’s before the usage fee comes into it - which is effectively a licence fee for a company to use the recording. The amount can vary wildly depending on the industry, the medium in question, the purpose of the audio, and how wide the audience is expected to be.

Other types of voice work may be charged by the word, rather than by the hour. E-learning, for example, is typically costed at 30-60p per word in the UK, but doesn’t have separate usage fees, making it much more straightforward to calculate rates.

All in all, working out rates for voiceover work is a bit of a minefield. You should therefore do extensive research on the type of voiceover work you’re planning to offer, to make sure you’re charging neither too much nor too little for your hard work.

Pros And Cons Of Voiceover Work

Other Ways To Make Money From Home

If you like the sound of earning extra money from a new side hustle, but you’re not sure about voiceover work, perhaps because of the initial outlay or because you’re not sure your voice is up to the job, there are tons of alternatives available to you!

You could make money transcribing audio or try your hand at copywriting if you like the idea of working from home, or perhaps look at getting into stock photography if you’re good with a camera.

Or you could always give Matched Betting a go. It’s another great way to make money online from home, with the potential to make £300-£1000 a month!