Paul (00:00.602)

Well, my guest today is one of those folks that in the voiceover world, kind of borders on celebrity. She's got close to 20,000 followers here in early 2024 on TikTok alone. Then you go over to Instagram. She's got another 5,000 there. So, she's building a little empire. She's known by a couple of names, @AstoriaRedHead on TikTok, but...

Her real name is Mandy Fisher and we couldn't be happier to have her here today. Mandy, thank you so much for joining us.

Mandy (00:31.55)

Hello, thank you. Thank you for having me. I appreciate being here because I feel a kindred spirit with you and the style of how we talk about voiceover and the business and life. So, I am grateful that you have me come on.

Paul (00:50.226)

Well, and that's why… I don't know, algorithm wise, I literally stumbled on you on TikTok as a fan. Like I just started getting your content in my stream and I went, this chick is slinging truth, right? And I knew immediately we got each other. We disagree on a couple of things, but that's life, right? I'm amazed by your TikTok journey, but I'm also, I know nothing really.

Mandy (00:59.469)

Yeah.

Mandy (01:10.35)

Sure.

Paul (01:20.414)

about your voiceover journey. So, can we start there? Like, how did this all start for you?

Mandy (01:23.656)

Yeah.

Yeah, I started at the very beginning, a very fine place to start. Yeah, it was, I was a child actor. I grew up in Atlanta. We moved to Atlanta when I was a kid, and I was doing theater, film, and television. And just around that time, it was really starting to become a place to be for film and television and theater and whatnot. So I was focused on that. I came out of the womb like tap dancing, and it was like...

That's what I knew I was meant to do was to perform. And I got my first agent. I was with the People Store. I signed with the People Store when I was like nine. And they didn't really have a voiceover division because a voiceover division, it really didn't exist at that time. Voiceover was not the cool thing. It wasn't what people were doing. And if they were doing it, they were doing it very.

silently behind those padded rooms, right? It wasn't really talked about a ton. But there was still stuff here and there happening. Obviously commercials and other stuff were happening and a gal within the agency had booked this job and for whatever reason she couldn't do it. And they called us frantically, can you please get Mandy to this studio?

today and my mom picked me up from school. I went to the studio and I was recording a national commercial, which I had never done before, obviously. And I kind of just went in and when you're a kid, you don't really have the same kind of pressures you do as a grownup. So I was just like, yeah, sure, I can do this. Whatever. I got it. And I went in and did it. And to this day,

Mandy (03:12.306)

They are actually still a client of mine from that very first job. I was 11. Yeah.

Paul (03:14.982)

Wow.

How old were you when you booked that first job?

Wow. So by 11, you had already gotten an agent, which by the way, I'm also with the People Store. I am not 11. And you nailed your first national commercial, even if you didn't... But you know what? You booked it and there's still a client, right? And so you were 11 then, so this is clearly nine years later, right? So you...

Mandy (03:29.606)

Oh wow!

Mandy (03:35.87)

just very accidentally.

Mandy (03:41.683)

Yeah, yeah they are.

Mandy (03:49.991)

Thank you. Macy's.

Paul (03:50.93)

Do you want to share who the client was? Really? That's amazing. Congratulations.

Mandy (03:55.678)

Yeah, yeah, thank you. But again, like this anomaly, right? Very non-typical way of getting into voiceover, very random, like I didn't do anything to get the job, right? I was in the right time, right place, but that also goes to show that does play a part of the entertainment industry. Yes, some people can call it luck, but it was a little, it's a little different than luck because I was already in a position to.

be in a position, right? But it was absolutely right time, right place. If my mom hadn't answered the phone, they would have gone on to the next girl that was around my age on the roster. You know what I mean? So it was... Yes. And it changed the trajectory of my life. From that moment on, I was like, voiceover is awesome. Voiceover is so fun.

Paul (04:36.922)

Well, sure, luck got you that first job, but preparation got you every job since then. Right?

Mandy (04:51.914)

Yeah, I can do this. And it became, I started to focus less on film television theater stuff. I still did it, but it wasn't what I, it wasn't that new passion that I had found. But again, at the time, there was no information, like there was no one teaching voiceover, one, and there was sure as hell nobody teaching voiceover for children. So it was a struggle to find those resources and find people who were even willing to,

to talk to me about voiceover as a child. So.

Paul (05:25.274)

And I had the same experience. I started, made a run 25 years ago in 98, 99. And I found that if you weren't in New York, if you weren't in LA, if you weren't on camera in those other markets, then you were, pardon the phrase, the redheaded stepchild, right? You just did not work, right?

Mandy (05:35.883)

Yeah.

Mandy (05:43.799)

Right, sure. Yeah, and that's a very good point because a lot of the voiceover work did already just go to on-camera actors.

Paul (05:51.95)

Yeah, yeah. So you get the fire lit, you're doing Macy's now. And so how do things progress from there?

Mandy (05:55.122)

Yep. Yeah.

Mandy (06:01.514)

Well, I went to high school and graduated high school and decided to try my hand at doing film and television in New York. So I moved to New York and I got a job as a stand-in on a TV show, which was able to put myself through college doing that, which was amazing. And I was doing voiceover like here and there, maybe one or two auditions a month with agents that I had gotten in New York.

Paul (06:18.971)

Nice.

Mandy (06:28.754)

It just wasn't, it wasn't a full time thing, but it was still sort of lurking, right? I was still trying to figure out how to get more of it and to make it more of what I was doing. And when I graduated college, I said, I need to buckle down and really find agents who are going to nurture this and help me. And I signed with a new agency. They pointed me in the direction of a very...

wonderful man who is absolutely directly responsible for my entire career of what it is now. And they said, take a class with this guy. He's a casting director. He knows what he's talking about and he offers classes. Take his classes. So at the time, I couldn't afford his classes. I said, I don't know what I'm going to do. Like, this is the guy. He's the key in. And luck had it that I had an audition.

where we were still going into studios at the time. And I went in to read for him and he said, who the hell are you? Why don't I know who you are? You should be in my classes. And I said, well, I would love to, but it's not really something that I can do at the moment. And he said, get your ass in my class. We'll figure it out later. Let's not let money prevent you from learning. And he changed my life. Yeah, and that man is Roger Becker.

Paul (07:43.878)

How about that? Wow.

Paul (07:50.294)

Interesting, very cool. So you get hooked up with Roger. That's where you really start to get your first real voiceover specific coaching or is that not true? Okay.

Mandy (07:54.517)

Yup.

Mandy (08:00.258)

Yes, yeah, it really rocked my world because everything I kind of thought I knew was not true. It was just not the case. Well, what voiceover is? And look, the landscape, as you very well know, changes so often and trends come and go. But at the time, we were in this sort of like flux area of what was booking. And that was sort of the traditional commercial, announcer-y

Paul (08:09.099)

such as such as

Mandy (08:29.998)

thing, right? And Roger was really the first one to say, get out of that. Like, that's no longer what we're doing. We're having conversations with people. We are connecting to the script and not just reading these words. And I thought, holy shit, like, this is acting still. Like, all of the acting training that I had gotten as a kid and through college and everything.

This is where I can really put it to use. Amazing. And I learned then that it is telling stories and character work exists from a five second commercial spot to an audio book, to radio image, to every piece of voiceover that you touch, it's character work. And he really opened my eyes to that. Yeah.

Paul (09:12.05)

Fantastic. This would have been around what time when you started working with Roger?

Mandy (09:17.974)

2002? 3? 4? Yeah. 20 odd years ago.

Paul (09:21.698)

Okay. Wow. Okay. Uh, wow. You see, this is, this is more proof that Paul would suck at the carnival game where the guy, you know, guesses your age because you've got about 20 more years on you than I thought you would. So, uh, whatever you're drinking, keep drinking it. Um, yes.

Mandy (09:37.824)

Ha ha

Mandy (09:42.772)

Thank you, appreciate you. Thank you. I'm in my 30s, I'm in my mid 30s, just so everyone knows, okay?

Paul (09:53.506)

So Roger Becker changes your life. You're a working voice actor now from the early to mid 2000s on, correct?

Mandy (10:03.198)

Yeah, yeah, and in more of a semi-regular way. And I was starting to learn more in the world that there wasn't just commercial out there. And I started doing more things overseas in Europe and connecting with people there who did animations and e-learning and corporate and this. And I didn't really start.

expanding out of that world into like now looping and radio imaging until I would say 2017-18. So I was mainly focused in commercial and e-learning up until 2017 when I booked my first looping gig.

Paul (10:38.194)

Okay.

Paul (10:47.238)

And so you've been in this long enough to see the transition 20, 25 years ago. The only way you worked was through agents largely. Uh, then we saw the world change with social media and YouTube and everything else, uh, Tik Tok, which we'll get into in a while, uh, but the world changed. Every company became a media company. And so what we saw was the rise of the non-union voice actor who could go and grab work.

Mandy (10:53.666)

Yeah.

Yeah, yes, absolutely.

Mandy (11:09.612)

Yes.

Paul (11:16.826)

wherever they could find it. Was that part of your mix? Was that part of your journey? Or were you still relying solely on agents or maybe paid a place? How were you getting your work in those days?

Mandy (11:27.838)

was absolutely solely relying on agents, just agents. I didn't dip into pay to plays and I wasn't, and maybe like a referral here and there if I was lucky, but I was solely relying on agents until about 2016, 2017 when the light kind of went off and I heard people, it was probably like at

Paul (11:31.933)

Wow.

Mandy (11:55.282)

an audition when we were still going in studio for stuff. And I heard people talking about emailing clients. And I was like, why would I ever email a client? This is so weird. And I started learning more and more about direct marketing. And that hadn't even entered into my sphere of being until that moment and understanding the non-union world. Cause at the time I was union and I...

Paul (12:14.311)

Right.

Mandy (12:22.274)

didn't have any kind of inkling as how to get my own work outside of agents. And that just sort of rocked my world. And I thought, OK, let's crank it up a notch and see what happens.

Paul (12:33.582)

And so how did you find that education? Because you started out with the classic actor's background, which is also the flip side of the coin, is to say you didn't have any business background, much to speak of. So how did you find that, you know, how did you figure out how to reach out to clients, what to say to them, how to follow up, all that stuff?

Mandy (12:46.229)

None.

Mandy (12:56.394)

a lot of trial and error, a lot of making big mistakes, like sweeping nonsensical mistakes. But I was also very fortunate in that people would respond back to me and say, what the hell are you doing? Like, this isn't how we do business. Like, if you wanna do business, let's try this approach. So I got a lot of feedback in those early days from people that I was reaching out to that was like, hey kid, this is not the way. If you wanna do this,

Here's some tips that will help. I also took some marketing classes. I reached out to friends that I knew who were marketers and who were in the corporate space and who could kind of give me some advice on how they communicated, because it's very different than what I thought it was. And then after that, I sort of just, I took all of that and made it something that made sense to me. And...

Yes, there is a certain way you can talk to people in these spaces, but at the end of the day, people just want to talk to people. They want you to solve their problem. They just want to get to it. And so once I kind of cut out all the other extra nonsense stuff and just got straight to my point and started having real conversations with people about their pain points, then things became a lot easier. But it was a lot of trial and error upfront.

Paul (14:22.815)

I talked about the actor's background versus a business background. I also think culturally, we have this sort of iconic idea of what we think a salesperson is and a lot of times it looks like Herb Tarlik from WKRP or the classic used car salesman. And that's what you just touched on is finding people's pain points and how you can solve the problem for them.

Mandy (14:33.216)

Yes.

Mandy (14:36.802)

Thanks for watching.

Mandy (14:46.183)

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Paul (14:46.47)

Uh, I think that's key. That's key for anybody because it's not about what you can get out of somebody else. It's what you can bring to them. Right.

Mandy (14:54.594)

For sure, for sure. I mean, we're service providers, and we are providing a service that they need. And whether they know they need it, and they don't know how to get it, or they do know how to get it, and they don't wanna listen to 500 auditions, or pay casting fee sites, or agent commissions, or whatever, or they don't know that they need voice actors, and we're educating them and saying, hey, you put out this kind of content, you do this kind of stuff within your business, well, it's way the hell better when you have somebody who can provide that.

service to you. And that's, I think, what it's all about when you're when you're direct marketing with people.

Paul (15:30.786)

Let's get to what you're most known for. I think in the voiceover world, certainly. And that is TikTok. Yeah, now TikTok is only, you know, middle-aged white dude here. TikTok has only been on my radar for maybe four years. And I built a following on TikTok. I was doing TikTok. That's how you and I initially met. And somewhere along the line, I got it in my head that, yeah.

Mandy (15:36.757)

Tik Tok!

Mandy (15:42.03)

Thanks for watching!

Paul (15:58.81)

I don't want to do TikTok anymore. So I trashed my account. I deleted it. My second run started literally last night. I went, you're an idiot. You got to get back on TikTok. Uh, let's make it about you. Uh, you have 18,000 followers and change. I discovered you literally organically through TikTok. Uh, and that is to say, I didn't like, it sounds weird to say I discovered you literally for myself, I discovered you. Um,

Mandy (16:08.534)

rebirth.

Paul (16:28.51)

Talk about that journey. Like when did the light bulb go on? When, like the first time you went, you know what? I think I can help people in our business on TikTok.

Mandy (16:39.286)

Yeah, yeah. Well, I was on TikTok for the same reasons that you were, finding community and voiceover and finding other people who were doing it and talking about it and showcasing it. And I was finding that a lot of the videos that people of authority were talking about voiceover, I completely disagreed with, or found that they were just saying things that were flat out.

wrong, not subjectively, but like very, very like objectively wrong. And I thought, wow, they've got thousands of people listening to this. And if somebody who's never done voiceover is interested in voiceover and trying to come into the fold and take this advice, it could really hurt them. It could really damage their first impressions, damage them financially, like damage them emotionally. And it started to

Paul (17:08.642)

Objectively. Yeah.

Mandy (17:34.462)

It broke my heart initially and then I just got angry. So my content was really born out of rage, of anger, of trying to... I just couldn't believe that it was allowed to be there for anyone to see. And I felt like this responsibility that I had to just combat it.

Paul (17:44.5)

Well, that's, that's the slight difference between you and me. I went straight to pissed, right?

Mandy (18:01.354)

and say, this is nonsense. And if you really want to do this, here are some ways that you can start, or here are some things that you can do. And really talking about differences between hobbyist voiceover work and professional voiceover work, because I found a lot of people were just lumping those two things together. And while they're both amazing, they're very different trajectories. So I didn't want anybody to take this word as gospel and think, oh, now I can do this under my blanket on my bed.

and in my bathroom and make all this money. It just, yeah, pissed, like it just made me mad. So content erupted out of that, out of anger. And then it just, I found the joy, I found the fun in it. I found my people, I found community. I found what I wanted to get out of it was connecting with other actors. So that's why I continue to do it. And I...

I have some fun in there. I throw some characters in there that I think are fun and have conversations with people that I think are fun and sometimes collaborate. But it's now more less about the anger of combating the thing because, you know, I'm not a white knight. I don't need to come swooping in here and try to save everybody. But it is helpful to have another perspective. You know, you hear someone say XYZ and I'm going to say ABC. And at least...

they now have information and access to information that maybe they didn't have before, so.

Paul (19:28.254)

And that's one of the first interactions you and I had. You very respectfully disagreed with something I said and made your point. And that's to me, that's when this community works best, right? When we can disagree with each other. And I've said this a million times, Mandy, just because I say it doesn't mean it makes it right. It means it's true to my experience, right? And that's why

Mandy (19:31.042)

I'm sorry.

Mandy (19:35.47)

Ha ha.

Mandy (19:41.023)

Absolutely.

Paul (19:55.822)

I think a lot of people get balled up because they see all this contradictory information in our world and it's hard to make sense of, and I objectively get that. But you have to understand Mandy Fisher's talking about her experience. Paul Schmidt's talking about his experience. I hate talking about myself in the third person. Uh, you know, Mark Scott, Tom Deere, Tracy Lindley, you know, any other voice actor, we're all speaking from what we know. And sometimes that seems contradictory and sometimes it objectively is.

Mandy (20:13.823)

I'm sorry.

Mandy (20:20.578)

Mm-hmm.

Mandy (20:25.003)

Yeah.

Paul (20:25.202)

but it doesn't mean we can't have a decent dialogue about it.

Mandy (20:28.11)

Absolutely, absolutely. And I say this all the time, you ask 100 different voice actors about their process, about their thing that works for them, and you're going to get 100 different answers. And that's great, because we don't offer the same things as service providers. We're not the same person. We don't have the same personality. We don't have the same likes or dislikes. We don't have the same life and responsibilities. And so of course, we're not going to have the same.

working life. Like two salespeople at a company don't have the same process. So how can you expect voiceover actors to have the exact same process? I mean, and then we're creative. So of course we have different views and different ways of doing what we do. So yeah, just because it works for me doesn't necessarily mean it's going to work for you or vice versa.

Paul (21:14.946)

I understand it. I think there's basic human nature that wants the answer. Uh, when I was a kid, I was hemming and hawing on whether or not Santa was real. And I asked my parents and neither one of them, Mandy would tell me, right? I wanted the answer and they wouldn't tell me. They told me you're going to have to decide for yourself. And that's a lot of what voiceover is all about. Right.

Mandy (21:19.467)

Sure.

Mandy (21:31.202)

Tough. Tough call.

Mandy (21:39.446)

Well, but that right there, the critical thinking aspect about this business is lost. It is, well, it's out at sea and people don't want to swim out to get, you know, to the critical thinking and unfortunately that to me spells doom because if you can't critically think about your own business, then you're not going to scale, you're not going to grow and you're not going to, probably not going to stay in it.

Paul (22:05.574)

Yeah, and I think, you know, critical thinking and then grit, right? Uh, when you come across something that isn't savory or stretches you out of your comfort zone and you have to deal with that, uh, there is nothing that has stretched me more than having my own business, right? Um, let's talk about TikTok in the, you know, you got in this to sort of fight disinformation and misinformation. When do you remember the first time that?

Mandy (22:09.727)

Yeah, yeah.

Mandy (22:23.214)

Sure.

Paul (22:35.474)

The light bulb went on when you went, oh, people are actually paying attention here.

Mandy (22:40.678)

Yeah, it was someone had commented and said, gosh, there's so much I want to ask and so much I want to say. I wish you had a Discord. And I thought, what the hell is Discord? I don't know what this is. So I went in like a deep dive rabbit hole evening of learning everything about everything I could about Discord and started one and said, OK. Like.

you want to ask me more stuff, you want to have real conversations about other stuff outside of just the limited characters we have to comment on videos, then sure, like let's have real conversations. And then I started a discord and, and was able to have, have deeper conversations and deeper insights with people and build even more community there of people who, yes, they want to learn, but also wanted to.

collaborate and practice and learn from each other because look, I'm just one person. So having this space where it didn't feel like, because I'm very in control of my content on TikTok, right? But then there's now this other sort of safer space where other people can talk. And now there's engineers in there. There's a casting director in there. There are some agents that are in there. There are people that are part of the industry that people can connect to, ask questions, collaborate with, meet, understand, learn from in this way.

safe and open, but not just, you know, me. Like they have other perspectives that they can lean on. Yeah.

Paul (24:09.714)

Sure, it's a community, yeah, yeah. Talk about this for a minute. I've often thought that social media, here's a rabbit hole, that social media is fantastic for voice actors to develop that sense of community. I talk to a lot of people, especially when they're newer, who feel cut off. I think that's been accelerated since the pandemic, of course. We long for connection. We don't always know where to find it.

Mandy (24:20.465)

Hmm

Mandy (24:26.747)

Mm-hmm.

Mandy (24:34.414)

tour.

Paul (24:39.582)

Um, and I think social media is a great way to build that, build those relationships with other people in our industry. I personally have not found it to be a great source of finding work because what I have found in my experience, and I hope yours is different so that we can talk about it is that buyers, producers, casting directors, aren't necessarily going to follow you on social media. Is your experience different? And if so, does that let the.

Mandy (24:51.054)

Hmm

Paul (25:07.054)

Does social media work for finding work for you?

Mandy (25:09.958)

Yeah, I think in the beginning, I had the same perspective on it that you did. And I was never anybody that really loved social media anyway. It just never was something that excited me. And even now talking about it, I'm thinking, oh, Jesus, I forgot I should have posted this on something else. To me, social media is almost a chore sometimes outside of TikTok. But then...

Paul (25:21.564)

Word.

Mandy (25:39.722)

Because of TikTok, I was on TikTok, and I very rarely post my work there. And if I do, it's always in this sort of educative experience where I showcase, here's stuff that I did in the audition, and then here's what made it to booking. Because it's so rare that what you do in the audition is the exact thing that happens in the booking and goes to final. So I was kind of showcasing that process of here's what the audition was like, and here's what made it to final.

But then one day I got a message from somebody who was a producer and said, you know, I really like your personality. I think you have this tell it like it is sort of thing that I respond to. And I happened to do some work with this client and we need some voiceover. Are you interested? And that then started to spark into other conversations I was having with people.

and really made me realize that they're out there, they're watching, they're listening. They're not necessarily waiting for me to hear all of my spots that I do or jobs that I do, but they are listening to me. They are responding to me as a presence. And I used to post stuff on LinkedIn all the time or Instagram all the time of work that I had done. And that sort of light bulb moment clicked on where I was like, they don't really wanna see my work. They just wanna get to know me as a human being. And...

Paul (27:01.553)

me. There you go.

Mandy (27:03.634)

I stopped posting my work on LinkedIn because I learned that it wasn't really for the producers and the casting directors and other clients that are hiring me. It was really more for my other actor friends and getting that validation from other actor friends or other actor friends to know that I'm doing this, I'm doing that, I'm doing this, and sort of this keeping up with the Joneses thing that I just, it didn't serve me anymore. So I stopped doing that and started posting other things and that got more response from

clients and casting directors and producers and people that are hiring people that do what we do. So I had this sort of shift in the content that I was making and that changed a lot. And so yes, social media does actually produce paid work for me. I would say about 20% now is social media. But it was a shift. It was definitely a mindset shift and it was definitely a content shift that...

Paul (27:54.425)

Oh wow.

Mandy (28:02.517)

made that change happen.

Paul (28:04.786)

Do you feel like now that social media, probably mostly TikTok for you, is now 20% of your work, do you feel a pressure to sort of lean into that and go, well, if it's working a little bit, right? Do you feel that pressure, do you not feel that pressure?

Mandy (28:25.678)

Sure. I think we always want to lean into the things that are working for us. But I realistically don't have the time. Like, I'm already working with several agents. I'm already doing direct marketing. And social media is just part of the cog. It's just part of the machine. I've got the plates spinning. It's just a plate that I continue to spin. And if I can dedicate more time or if it makes sense to dedicate more time, sure.

But right now, I think the balance that I have struck between all of the things that I'm doing in my business model makes sense for me. So maybe that will change, and I'm open to change in my business, because I think that's the only way you can grow and scale is to be receptive of change, because as soon as you get stagnant and those plates stop spinning, then what are you doing? So I'm open to the possibility of things changing, but right now I feel like the balance is pretty good.

Paul (29:14.426)

Absolutely.

Paul (29:21.414)

We've talked about three of, I think there are four legs in finding work. We talked about, uh, we, we talked about, um, agents. We talked about, uh, direct marketing, right? Marketing directly to clients. We even talked about social media. The fourth leg rabbit hole alert, uh, is the pay to place the online casting sites, how are you, if you had to sort of fig, you know,

Mandy (29:28.514)

Mm-hmm.

Mandy (29:34.028)

Mm-hmm.

Mandy (29:40.449)

Hmm

Paul (29:48.934)

put a percentage or a proportion of those four pillars, how are you getting work these days in air quotes?

Mandy (29:56.102)

Yeah, so 20% from like social media and referrals, I'll throw that in there. I would say 30 to 40% from agents and the rest from direct marketing. And zero from pay to plays.

Paul (30:12.514)

And so you're not a pay to play person at all. Let's dig into that. So why? I mean, did you ever experiment? Why are you so anti pay to play?

Mandy (30:23.946)

Yeah, yeah, I did experiment just so that I would know what it was about because I don't believe you can have that opinion that it doesn't work for you without giving it a go, right? So yes, I did, I had tried in the early days and I even tried two or three years ago, I tried some other platforms. The thing about them is that I believe is I don't think the investment of time or money

gets the ROI back. And I think you had to have signed up for some of the, and like, look, the big pay to plays that were bought by other bigger companies, things shifted when that happened. And if you, I know plenty of voiceover actors, and Tim Friedlander was even talking about this in your seminar, that if he were to jump on one of those big ones today, he wouldn't book. And it has nothing to do with how talented he is because my God, what a force of talent there.

Paul (31:22.152)

Right?

Mandy (31:22.902)

But it's all about how much money you pay to be seen in those percentages, how many likes that you get, and how you're gonna show up in the algorithm and how long you've been on the platform because they reward platform loyalty. And I understand all of that, but I don't agree with it. I don't think their business models fit my business models. And I cannot...

afford like mentally to put myself through those gymnastics of trying to understand how that algorithm works, which has nothing to do with how good I am. And I think a lot of people get that, those two things married. Oh, my audition wasn't listened to. That means I suck or I wasn't chosen. I was shortlisted, but I wasn't chosen. That means I suck.

What am I doing wrong? How am I, why am I not doing this? Other people, other feedback that I'm getting from coaches in classes say I'm doing all of these good things, but I'm not booking here. And that is some fuckery. I can't condone it. Like I cannot, I personally can't put myself through that. I get enough of that feedback in other places. I don't need another platform, algorithmic based platform to mess with my emotional wellbeing.

And I just, like I said, those business models, yes, there's other platforms that are a little less based on that kind of thing. And could it be worth it to be on some of those other ones? Maybe, but again, I don't have room in my business model right now for those things. So I do what works for me. Doesn't mean it won't work for you, but.

Paul (33:05.466)

Gotcha. Let's wrap up by talking about the future. Given all you've seen, given all you've been through, some tough lessons along the way, what fires you up today and where do you want to go with your business and your career?

Mandy (33:11.734)

Hmm.

Mandy (33:22.902)

Whew, what a question. What fires me up? Like what makes me angry or what gets me excited or both? Ha ha ha.

Paul (33:28.166)

What gets you excited? Yeah. We got plenty. We're going to have a drink at some point and we're going to talk about what makes us angry because I think we both have a pretty big wellspring there. Let's talk about what gets you excited.

Mandy (33:38.682)

Yeah, for sure, for sure. Yeah, what gets me excited? Because even five years ago, the opportunity was limited for voiceover actors. And now social media, all the usages and ways that you can have the job has changed so much. I only see that continuing to change. What new things are going to be happening for voiceover actors?

I don't know, but I guarantee what worked for us five years ago is going to expand in the next couple of years with technology and how people are using actors. So I see new opportunity as it comes, and I think that's amazing. And how we are crafting those opportunities ourselves, because sometimes I have found myself in situations where clients...

didn't know a certain type of thing existed, and I can introduce them to that. And then that inspires them to say, oh, well, if we can do this, maybe we can do this. And that, to me, is exciting. Finding out what the possibilities are within a client and within those parameters is exciting to me. What I want to do? I think, so last year, a lot of my work was looping. And since I didn't get to do that for nine months of the year, I'm going to do it.

it really forced me to focus on other parts of my business. I started working with a radio imaging manager and was doing more imaging, which I had never done and now I love. So I think the effects of the strike are still very present and will continue to be present through this year. So I see myself hopefully getting back to do that work, but opening up more opportunities like I found with radio imaging and putting

time and energy into learning new verticals of voiceover so that I don't feel closed off to opportunity or if opportunity comes, I can say, yeah, I can do that with confidence and not like the fake actor way of saying, hey, do you know how to baton twirl? Oh, yeah, I can learn how to do that in two hours, sure. I don't want to be that kind of actor. I want to be one that's prepared and feels ahead of the curve in case those opportunities come. So hopefully, I'm taking time to...

Mandy (36:02.654)

Learn some new stuff. That's what I see for this year.

Paul (36:06.238)

Fantastic. I've said it before and you just alluded to it. I think there's more work out there than there ever has been. I think maybe we saw a little bit of a dip last year. Do you believe that AI is going to substantially change that in the foreseeable future?

Mandy (36:12.802)

ever.

Mandy (36:23.766)

Well, what is foreseeable in 10 years, 50 years, 100 years, five years? No, no, I don't. I think there are lots of ways to work alongside AI and not feel like it's replacing us. Because I think if we start to believe that all these new agreements on social media platforms, Spotify and Findaway Voices, they just released this new agreement about how they own your content, which they do, just as any other social media platform.

Paul (36:26.15)

Five years. Let's say five.

Mandy (36:53.166)

technically owns your content, but I think we get all up in arms in fear that they're going to take it and then use AI to make derivatives of the work and sell that without paying us. And that's just not going to happen. That's not happening because there's still protective IPs in place for the things that you create. Do I think we're going to be replaced? No. Do I think there will be differences and different ways of working? Yes. Do I think there will be other opportunities with AI? Yes, sure.

Um, so I don't have that same fear of AI is taking our jobs. AI is coming for us. I don't feel that way at all because I have lost clients to AI who have come crawling back begging me, please, can we, can we continue working together? Because working with AI right now sucks and it was not what we wanted. We thought it was. It wasn't.

can we continue this partnership? And that's happened a handful of times over the last year. So I'm not worried about being replaced. I'm worried that maybe some things will get out of hand and we will have some hard lessons to learn like we did with Bad Standing. Amazing, like I'm glad she won and I'm glad all of those things happened. But I think there will be continued to be learning curves like that for us as actors.

Paul (38:14.866)

Fantastic. Um, I can't thank you enough for your time today. Uh, I cannot meet to meet you, uh, wait to meet you in person. Meet to wait you.

Mandy (38:23.745)

Yes. We're voice actors.

Paul (38:28.662)

Right, exactly. How do people, if they haven't already, and they must be living under a rock, but how do people find you on social media?

Mandy (38:37.518)

Sure. On TikTok, you can find me at Astoria Redhead on TikTok. I also have a website, Astoria Redhead VoiceOver, filled with all kinds of helpful resources and things that are there. So if you're in need of a coach, in need of an engineer, in need of some business help, there's lots of links and people there that I know and trust. So yeah, head on over to those two places or if you're...

Paul (39:04.655)

Fantastic.

Mandy (39:05.178)

looking to hire me as a voiceover actor, mandyofish.com.

Paul (39:08.678)

There you go. You, my friend are a force and it's a, it's a pleasure to get to know you a little bit in the last, I don't know, 40 minutes or so. So thank you for spending your time with us today.

Mandy (39:18.571)

Likewise, thank you.