Wanna Grow Your Voice Over Business? CUT the Crap!

This time of year, early January, everybody's fired up about their New Year's resolutions. I hate them, but I understand them.

Typically, New Year's resolutions mean setting new goals, which means breaking those down into new added behaviors. It's the psychology of achieving more by doing more and I myself subscribed to it for a very long time.

What we don't talk about is the fact that still, even in this new year, there are still only 24 hours in a day and 7 days a week. But every year, we add all these new behaviors to the days and weeks that are already crammed full with existing behaviors.

And by Valentine's Day, your brand new treadmill is used for drying clothes.

And if you've been around on the planet long enough to go through enough of these cycles of “set the goal, set the behavior, fail to execute consistently on the behavior, give up on the goal,” then it eats at your self-esteem. And the message you eventually drive home to yourself is, “I really can't change my life.”

So, why are some voice actors, some freelancers, some people successful and others aren't? After all, isn't it a level playing field 24 hours a day, 7 days a week?

First, the idea of a level playing field is often a myth. If you are a full-time freelancer like me, yes, very often you have agency and dominion over how you spend your most precious asset: your time.

But if voiceover, or whatever that freelance work is for you, is a side hustle and you still have a full-time job to pay the bills, then you have way less of that most precious asset.

If you have children or maybe parents or other loved ones, family members that require care, then you have way less of that most precious asset. And even if you are, “full-time” in your freelance or voiceover career, you still may have other truly higher priority commitments that require your time.

That's life. The playing field isn't always level.

And secondly, successful voice actors, successful people subtract as much as they add. They use, whatever time is available to them, to their advantage. And that means spending their time and effort on the habits and behaviors that truly make a difference and dropping the ones that don't like, well, like a bad habit, hence the expression.

I hear from voice actors all the time. The number one thing they tell me is, “I don't have time to market my business.” And when I dig in and I ask them how they're spending the time that they do have, most often I find that they aren't spending that time on the habits and behaviors that are truly going to move the needle in their business. And they're doing a lot that has no bearing on the success of their careers, their fulfillment, or their purpose in life.

They don't have time to market their businesses, but they've got time to scroll on social media, doom-consume the news, binge watch TV, and spend all kinds of hours on Facebook talking about their careers.

But not growing them.

So let there be no doubt. You have the time to change your career, your life, your relationships. You have the time to do the things you need to do to get what you want.

You have the time, but do you have the patience?

Do you have the commitment to yourself to do the little things daily? Do you have a clear and powerful enough Why, so that in the moment you choose the gym over the couch, the acting class over the dinner out, marketing work over Game of Thrones?

So back to New Year's. I get it. We've got this big blank canvas all laid out in front of us, staring us in the face, daring us to make it the best year ever.

In psychology, it's called the Fresh Start Effect. It means that people are more excited, more motivated at the beginning of something new, whether that's a new year, a birthday, maybe a new work period or school year, maybe even a new relationship.

But whether you have 80 hours in a week or 20 hours in a week, you still have to make the best of it. Just like whether you make 80 grand a year or 20 grand a year, you still have to make the best of it.

So why not watch every minute like you watch every penny?

When you budget your money, you make sure that whatever money you have coming in is spent in a way that it provides the most positive impact to your life. And you to do that, you set priorities, right? You have mortgage and rent, you have utilities, investments, entertainment and so on.

So, to make the best of this new blank canvas of time, how are you going to budget your time, and secondarily, your financial investments in your business, to have the maximum positive impact on growing your business?

Making time to do what it takes means giving up things that don't advance your goals.

Take an honest look at how you spend your days. Even for one week. Just one week. Track how you spend every hour of every day for one week. You will be shocked at how much time you're wasting.

What candy and sugar can you eliminate from your time diet to make room for the more healthful, the more impactful behaviors?

Here's one quick personal tip that I have found that works wonders for for both your time and your health: set an early and consistent bedtime.

We tend to fill up our days with lots of activity and we make ourselves very, very, very busy. And at the end of the day, we “relax” for a few hours, which usually means sticking our nose in a screen, be it a TV or social media, the phone, the laptop, whatever it is.

If you budget your sleep consistently, you get more truly restorative rest and you waste a hell of a lot less time.

Turn off the damn TV, put down the phone, and go to bed.

Now, I'm not suggesting that you budget every available minute to only those behaviors which will grow your business. That's a surefire recipe for burnout, frustration, eroding self-esteem, and poor health.

(Says the guy who's been sick for six weeks.)

I strongly recommend that you prioritize health, rest, nutrition, and your relationships, all with a healthy dose of joy and fun and budget your time accordingly. Because if you don't take care of yourself, you can't possibly take care of the people around you. And if you don't take care of the people you love, then what the hell is the point of all of this?

And I think this is especially challenging for women. Culturally, in our culture, women are taught to be the caregivers, and so much of their cultural identity is tied to that. And ladies, we love you for the love and the care that you give to us. But the problem is women are conditioned to take care of others, often at the expense of taking care of themselves.

And yes, men do it too. For men, it usually comes out in some sort of workaholism where men derive their value from the expectations of being a provider.

But if a woman is the main or only breadwinner in a house, then those expectations of provider and caregiver are exponentially harder to achieve.

Ladies especially, please take care of yourselves.

So, as we head into a new year, ask yourself not only what habits and behaviors you can add that will truly impact your career and your life, but what can you subtract? What can you stop? What can you give up?

You have the time. But do you have the stomach to give up the fluff?

For more information on the VO Freedom Master Plan, which teaches voice actors how to market their businesses at scale and book more consistent work, click this link and get my Move Touch Inspire newsletter for voice actors that comes out every Thursday, click this link as well.

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From my son Robbie and I, to you and your family and your team, we wish you a very happy and wildly successful New Year.

Thanks for watching. We appreciate your support. And we'll see you back here again real soon.