Finding the perfect voice artist to promote your brand shouldn’t be complicated. South Africa has a wealth of excellent voice artists that essentially are being hard done by because the search process can be laborious and time-consuming for clients.
VoiceMe.co.za is a newly developed voice artist database for voice seekers, voice artists, talent agents and recording studios alike. Launched to the public in August 2019, it is the creation of Andrew Sutherland, a formidable voice in the audio post-production and TV industry who has for over a decade run his own recording studio in Johannesburg. He is also a professional voice over artist and if anyone is better suited to bring the voice to the voice seeker, it’s Sutherland.
“The idea started in 2015 during a particularly frustrating casting for a client. It took almost a day to find the right voice options and I thought there must be a better and faster way to do this.”
Sutherland has identified a gap in the South African and African market, by moving the voice search online, giving registered users access to voice artists who are represented by various agents across South Africa, Swaziland, Lesotho as well as outside of South Africa. He is basically bringing all the talent to one place, which is a huge game changer.
What makes VoiceMe.co.za so reliable is its patented CastEngine, enabling users to find the perfect voice for their project quickly, with refined search algorithms that display meaningful results. It’s the backbone of the entire system, giving you the right voice and demo clip for your project the first time, without the need for complicated searching.
How does it work? Criteria such as gender, language, accent, ethnicity, vocal range, project category and keywords are entered into the CastEngine search fields and a score out of 100% is assigned to every artist’s demo clip in the database based on that specific criteria. The higher the score, the more closely the voice is matched.
In addition to the advanced search capabilities, the site has an artist rating system that helps voice seekers choose artists based on other’s experiences. Seekers are asked to give feedback via a star rating from one to five as well as write a short review. In turn, the artists receive constructive criticism and feedback from their clients, something that can be extremely beneficial and is often overlooked. It’s a win-win situation for all.
The platform features a useful ‘projects’ tool, where users can create a project, upload scripts and book artists and recording studios. Voice artists, their agents and the studio that are booked through this system can then access the project information and brief, view scripts, check their booking time and place and, ultimately, better prepare for the recording session.
Sutherland’s unique industry insight, from a production perspective as well as from behind the mic, is the perfect combination for the creation of a search engine site that satisfies both the voice seekers expectations as well as understands the voice artist’s needs.
“VoiceMe is the result of pushing together all my skills into one place - Voice artist, recording studio owner and voice seeker - so that it can make everyone’s job much easier.”
For more information visit voiceme.co.za
