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Category Archives: voice talent agency
The Adventures of Banjo & The Birthday Girl!
Banjo the adorable Labradoodle loves his birthday hat, a little too much – and Lisa turns 21, one more time! You’ll love the antics in this family friendly caper! Don’t miss “The Adventures of Banjo & The Birthday Girl!” At select drive ins soon.
Advertising Agencies Still Growing
Thankfully, 2009 and 2010 are long past and we in the ad biz have seen some positive turnarounds. In the voiceover production and voice talent agent business we’ve experienced double digit growth within SunSpots Productions Studios in North Carolina and Florida. Many of the agencies with whom we collaborate are pushing along well too. Profits are down, but we’re all keeping busy. This story from Sageworks written by Mary Ellen Biery explains the details…
Ad, PR agencies grow despite slowing U.S. ad spending growth
Mary Ellen Biery, ContributorU.S. ad spending growth might be looking tepid this year and next, but private companies in the advertising services business are experiencing their second year of double-digit sales growth, according to an analysis of financial statements by Sageworks Inc.
Ad agencies, public relations agencies, media buyers and other businesses that work in that space between advertisers and media owners have seen an average sales increase of more than 11 percent in the last 12 months , Sageworks’ data shows. It’s the second year of a recovery for the industry after an average drop in sales of nearly 7 percent in 2009 as advertisers clamped down on spending during the recession.
Indeed, advertising and other service-sector industries were among the top sales performers when Sageworks recently looked at the state of all privately held companies for the last 12 months.
Strategic consulting firm Kantar Media has reported that ad spending in the first half of 2011 was up 3.2 percent, driven by Internet media and cable television ad expenditures. But the biggest advertisers’ spending stalled in the second quarter, putting ad markets more dependent on mid-sized advertisers, Kantar said. And fresh concerns about the economy have prompted some forecasters to cut estimates for 2012 ad spending despite expected boosts from political ads and the Summer Olympics in London.
Media services firm MagnaGlobal, a division of advertising and marketing giant Interpublic Group (NYSE: IPG), recently lowered its 2012 forecast for total ad spending growth to 2.9 percent from 4.8 percent, pointing to a slowdown in manufacturing, consumer spending and ongoing problems in the labor and housing markets. The firm maintained its forecast for 1.6 percent growth this year. Online advertising and digital direct media are expected to outperform local media, according to the firm.
Some smaller, independent firms, however, are planning for another solid year in 2012 despite the outlook for lackluster ad spending overall.
“We’re bullish, in particular with our clients and the opportunity for new clients,” said Steve Luquire, founder and CEO of Charlotte, North Carolina-based advertising, marketing, and PR firm Luquire George Andrews. (Just a couple hours away from SunSpots Productions studios near Asheville.)
He expects the roughly 50-person firm’s sales could be up about 10 percent this year, and he’s added seven new hires since July in anticipation that business will remain good.
By the way, outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas on Wednesday said job cuts across all industries in the U.S. have already topped cuts in 2010, with one month left. But layoffs announced by advertising services companies have tapered off in recent months.
You can read the entire article at Forbes/Sageworks.
SunSpots Productions
SunSpots Productions provides professional voice talent and creative audio production to agencies, web designers, networks, theme parks, radio, tv, film and wherever quality audio production is needed. If it makes a sound or needs a voiceover SunSpots makes it happen. Plus we offer our ISDN sound booths to voice talent who are visiting the Orlando or Asheville areas.
Bambi visits SunSpots near Asheville
The wildlife hits just keep on coming. Looks like it’s lunchtime in the animal world too. Around noon today a large deer visited SunSpots NC recording studios property near Asheville. We’ve got a heavy producing apple tree that the deer are beginning to visit every other day. Here’s our latest visitor:
Have any wildlife where you work? (Other than that creepy guy with the weird hair at the water cooler.)
And as always if you’re searching for professional voice talent, fully produced, supervised and directed recording sessions and creative audio production in most languages please visit SunSpots Productions.
What wild beast will show up next?!
SunSpots Productions Youngest Voice Talent
I want to welcome a new voiceover talent, Alexandra Spaziani. She’s on her way to becoming a pro and at only 4 years old (she’ll be 5 in December) she’s currently the youngest voice talent on our EZcast™ voiceover talent roster. Thankfully, she and her parents live close to our Asheville, North Carolina studio so it’s no hassle to come in for auditions or spots.
Earlier this week I spoke with her mom, Suzanne, about Alexandra’s career as a voiceover talent.
Suzanne said Alexandra got started voicing by, “Practicing at home, imitating commercials and cartoons. One day an audition came along where the line was, “I have to go to the bathroom.” and she nailed it!”
I wondered if she could already read or if the lines had to be fed to her. “She’s close to reading”, Suzanne says, “she just repeats the lines for now. She memorizes things incredibly quick. She’s mimicked reading since she was 2. She would open the book and “read” it word for word. I was always amazed when I wanted to hurry a bedtime story along and she would point out every word I skipped.”
Her mom says that she goes into the voice booth with her and helps feed her the lines. She’s getting comfortable with the headphones and mic position. “I think she’s pretty close to being comfortable enough to take direction with the headphones on. I want to make sure she is having fun and not get intimidated by it. After every time she goes in the voice booth, I ask her did she have fun and did she love it. I want her to want to do it more then me wanting her to do it.”
At 4 years old Alexandra enjoys doing voiceovers, but also loves gymnastics, soccer and even horseback riding (she must be using a tiny horse). As far as a career in the voice business her mom Suzanne says, “She’s mentioned she wants to be an actor, but also has talked about being an astronaut, a teacher and a cheerleader.”
We love having her on our roster and hope she has fun and enjoys being a voice talent for as long as she wants.
Thanks to Suzanne for taking the time to speak with me about her daughter, Alexandra Spaziani. In the coming weeks, once school is over for me…(4 classes, never again), I want to focus on every one of our voice over talent so we can all get to the know them better.
How old were you when you started voicing? I didn’t do anything professional till I got into radio at age 18, which is now over (BLANK) years ago. I did record crazy voices and little audio shows with my friend Bob Feeley back in Pompano Beach, Florida when we were 12. When I was at Cardinal Gibbons High School in Fort Lauderdale, Bob, Tracy Clahan and I made up a fake news presentation for the high school’s morning announcements. That’s pretty common these days, but was fun and new to us at the time. Bob’s now a comedy writer in Connecticut and Tracy teaches theater at LaGrange College in Georgia.
Did you “do voices” as a kid or have early theater or even broadcast experience?
Like I’ve mentioned in other posts, please keep me informed about what things you’re doing as a voiceover talent. If you have a head shot and want us to use that in our promotion of you please email me.
Hope you’re having a beautiful Sunday! It’s cold, but beautiful here in the North Carolina mountains.
Tom