How Much Do I Charge if I Win a Script?

Wow, so much has been written about this and if you are in the USA or on the larger FB groups that aren't run by Hindus, the most serious answer you'll receive is something along the lines of:"look it up on GVAA", "go with the GVAA guide", "what's the client's budget"Followed by uninformed quotes by people trying to sound like successful professionals.  Or actual professionals humble bragging because they would NEVER work for that little (and let anyone know about it).  God forbid you post a question starting with "I quoted a guy X for X number of words for (insert job here).  Nothing will get you more ire than that.  Prepare to be accused of wrecking the entire industry single handedly because you are cheapening the work for everyone else.  Fear not.  I, as always, have the answer... well, it's "an" answer, because many do not agree with me because I am wrecking the super gilded world of GLOBAL PROFESSIONAL VOICE ACTING because I prefer to work instead of wait for the perfect situation.  First, a few words about GVAA.  What is it?  GVAA stands for the Global Voice Acting Academy and if you ask American VO artists how to quote something, they immediately bring up the venerated GVAA rate guide.  You can find it here:

Go to the GVAA Rate Guide and be amazed!

Why?  I have no idea, but as an aside, I have nothing against the GVAA as an organization and I'm sure they do fine work.  On that note, I've never met anyone online who tells everyone they got their training there... but nevertheless, the Rate Guide is the Gold Standard for setting your rates, or at least seeing how much money you aren't making for an average job.  In a perfect world, your agent sent you an audition, you hit it out of the park, your agent looks up the rates based on whether it's TV, Internet, Radio, usage, time period authorized and distribution.  All these things add up to a ton of money + the fee for the agent/agency.  You cut a 30 second commercial for a local market for a 6 month term and wait for your $900 to deposit into your bank account.  Good for you, enjoy it.  However, for the wide, and I mean WIDE majority of current and aspiring voice over artists it doesn't work like that.  In fact unless you are in the top 0.001% of VO's, you aren't only getting work from your super hip and professional agent and you probably don't live in LA or NYC.  So what?  Should we just forget about the GVAA and make shit up? 💡If you see a subscribe box below this, it means you'll need to sign up to read the thrilling conclusion.. but it's free and easy... if you don't see it... thanks, you're already a subscriber. Well, no... and yes.  Sure, if it's not a bottom feeder upwork gig or a prequoted Fiverr job.  Say a local company finds out from a friend that you are doing VO and they contact you inquiring about how much it would cost to have a 30sec spot recorded.  You maybe have never done a real job and don't know where to go... so, look it up on GVAA and then check out the Rate Guide at Gravy for the Brain, which is the second most mentioned VO rate guide.  The Venerable Gravy for the Brain Rate GuideAnd then, people always forget to mention this because not all business or stores are created equal and not everyone is in a great cash position... ask your client what their budget is before you quote anything.  That shows that you care and will be reasonable with your quote because you understand that it's not all about you, and over time maybe you can have a professional relationship with them instead of thinking of yourself like a hired gun.  So there, that's two industry standard resources that if you didn't know about before, you do now.  Ok, here's the deal.  This is why I get in trouble in online forums.  When anyone new to the industry posts some scenario that isn't a total scam or absolutely ridiculous, I invariably reply with something like "take the money.  You have zero real world experience.  Take the job, thank them and knock it out of the park."  People have a problem with that approach, but I'd like to make the case why it's not dumb.💡 "take the money. You have zero real world experience. Take the job, thank them and knock it out of the park." Take the money.  I'm a big fan of making a little money instead of no money.  Call me crazy, but that's how I roll.  Obviously, I have my limits.  I'm not taking an Indian youtube job that pays $20 per 15 minute video scripts (edited and timed) 3 times a week because at this point in my career I wouldn't have time to do work for my regular clients where I make a lot more money.  With that said, when I started I figured, why not?  I became the voice of two youtube channels and was getting paid a whopping $5 to do five 6-8minute videos a week.  I figured that's a hundred dollars a month and should pay for most of my beer.  Either that or I could send in audition after audition to upwork and voices.com (or any of the 12 other platforms I'd signed up for), but by it being necessary to do paid work, on mic for over 45-60minutes a day, my voice developed quicker and I got faster than almost anyone I know at editing.  Before I knew it, I could crank out quality auditions, audio books and 30second spots at blinding speed because I had spent a thousand hours looking at waveforms, editing, speaking, listening, rendering and uploading.  It was a net win.  After 10 months of doing spotty work for Asians and a handful of youtube channels, I was making like $600/mo part time.  I reinvested 15% every month into better gear, better studio and finally got everything streamlined so I could put out pristine audio in record time.  After that, I started getting a lot of repeat customers because I would deliver in hours, not days.  And... I never promise anything I can't deliver.  Enough about me, I digress.  Sorry.You need to ask yourself.  How long will it take me to do this job?  How much is an hour of my time really worth (taking into account how much you make the other hours of the day)?  Will I learn something by applying for/taking this job?  The key for me is "How long will it take me to do this job?" I had the idea early on that I should treat this like a job and if I'm not making any money, it's not a job it's a hobby and/or waste of time.  For instance, as a newbie, you audition on ACX and get an offer for $50/PFH (per finished hour), you most likely haven't ever read a whole book outloud and are most likely not exactly sure how to format the files for ACX audio quality acceptance, but you take it because $50/PFH is better than $0 and it will teach you a great deal about recording, editing and audio standards and give you hours of mic time to boot.  All that training without paying a coach AND you are going to make a few hundred when it's finally accepted by the rights holder and ACX AND you will feel great!  Not because you made like $8/hr working, but because you accomplished something and finally got paid.

So, how much do you charge?  This is primarily for new people who haven't charged many clients.  You charge whatever makes you feel like it's worth doing.  If you are new to this game with only a few scripts under your belt, look at every gig like a learning opportunity and keep clawing forward.  Don't pass up that 60 second youtube commercial because it only pays $50.  If you don't do it, there's Ai, there's about a billion Indian dudes with convincing english accents that'll do it for $2.  On top of that, there's another 1000 newbies with mobile phones and a terabyte of plugins that will make them sound like a very compressed Russel Crowe or anyone they want and they'll do it for $10 or less.  Should it pay $350-450?  According to GVAA it should, but will that particular client ever pay that much or even have that much in their budget to pay?  For 90% of them, no.  Just take the money, make a new client and move on.Finally, how much is an hour, or a minute or a day of your time worth?  I'm not asking what you think it's worth, or what your $400/hr VO coach told you it's worth.  It's only worth as much as someone is willing to pay for it.  The problem comes in when a new VO sniffs around a gig that says 7000 words, maybe it's an educational thing whatever, and the client only has a certain amount of money.  My baseline, like rock bottom for e-learning is about $6/100 words.  So, if the customer couldn't pay more than (7000 divided by 100 = 70 X $6 =) $420, than I would most likely kindly decline, but if it was through an agency I work with in Finland, it would easily be a $1000 job.  You may be in a different boat, I mean seriously, for a noob (assuming the 7000 words aren't all words like otorhinolaryngologist or phenylalanine) recording 7000 words might take them 6 hours, but they might be inclined to do it for a cool $100... especially if they aren't making any money.   How much should you charge?  Don't let anyone tell you what you're worth, the job is what you are willing to take and what the customer is willing to pay.  Can you hold out for more?  Sure, that works sometimes especially if they've never hired a VO before, but if you're happy with the number and it beats making zero hoping for the perfect gig...  just take the money.  

You're welcome.