Recession "Snowball" Buries Voice Actors?

The spider ate a fly.... and so on and so on. It’s becoming evident that this trickle down effect is being felt in the world of voice overs. Voice actors are starting to feel the pinch of the recession. According the one of my favourite business writers Jim Edwards at BNET, clients are taking much longer to pay the the ad agencies. His article is a real eye opener ...” The news is predictable: In a recession, every company will try to delay payments as long as possible in order to keep the interest earned on the money.
But in the advertising business, delayed payment is an ongoing issue that frustrates agencies, who end up becoming their clients’ banks. Basically, if a client expects an agency to handle large upfront costs and then delays payments, the agency ends up acting as the client’s financier.
The issue becomes thornier because, knowing that every day without payment is a day on which the agency loses its own interest on the missing cash, agencies seek ways to reduce their exposure that aren’t always in the client’s best interest.
The temptation is to manipulate the vendor bidding process in order to go with vendors that are more flexible about waiting for payments from agencies, rather than those that provide the best work.”...MORE. Also check out the article from the WSJ....MORE.
These massive companies get into bed with an ad agency and during a recession neither one leaves a virgin. What the company has to do now is start to advertise smarter, get more for their ad dollars. Look at new media like the internet, pick better times to advertise on TV, change your ads so people don’t get bored with them and shop around for a good fair priced ad agency. You are paying WAY TOO MUCH right now.
As for the ad agency, who by the way are in real trouble too.
“At least 24,502 jobs have been lost recently. That total is based on a Bureau of Labour Statistics report as summarised by Ad Age, updated with more recent individual reports tracked by BNET”......MORE. Just get back to good honest basics.
The voice actor is caught in the middle of this whole mess. The client hires the ad agency, who in turn hires the voice actor to voice the commercial. So the whole house of cards comes tumbling down if the client fails to pay the agency. As a voice actor I’d like to see ad agency clients and ad agencies, start using a grass roots common sense approach to advertising. In a recession you have to advertise more. A couple of reasons for you here, it takes a bit more convincing for folks to get out a spend their hard earned dollars and it gives you a leg up on your competition who cut their ad budgets during a recession. You won’t be history but, people will remember you after the recession is history. Thanks for the read, comments are always welcome and if you need help with your advertising, feel free to contact me.
Bryan Cox-Voice Actor
bigbry@sasktel.net



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