Acquisition of Voicebank.net

WHAT HAPPENED

In August of 2017, we were thrilled to share that Voices.com had acquired Voicebank, a platform that connects advertising agencies with union and non-union talent agencies in the US and Canada. In June 2018 Voices.com and Voicebank were united under one brand: Voices.com. As of August 2020, we have decided to sunset our union job posting and talent agency profile offerings.

WHY WERE VOICES.COM AND VOICEBANK UNITED?

After the acquisition of Voicebank we met, connected, and spoke with customers and stakeholders from both companies. These conversations all made a couple of things very clear. Some of what we learned included:

• As talent agents, you wanted more opportunity for the voice actors you represent and more access and exposure to producers looking for them and the skills they possess.
• As producers, you were looking for one single destination to source all your voice over needs. Whether you were looking to hire professional freelance voice over actors, or those who were unionized, you wanted a ‘one-stop-shop,’ that had the flexibility to provide you with what you needed, on a project-by-project basis.

The solution was clear - Voicebank and Voices.com needed to come together under one brand. This meant that Voices.com was the first-ever platform with the power to offer producers access to both unionized SAG-AFTRA members and acclaimed freelance voice over actors.

WHY DID VOICES.COM SUNSET ITS UNION JOB POSTING AND TALENT AGENCY PROFILE OFFERINGS?

It takes organizational maturity to realize when a door is closing in an area of your business. For us, that door is the posting of union jobs and, by extension, talent agency profiles and accounts.

Though valiant efforts were put forth on many fronts, the results were not there. One way we tried to get more union jobs on the platform from existing Voicebank customers was to waive all fees for posting their jobs. Jobs had previously cost $199 each to post on Voicebank, and now they were free on Voices.com. Despite this value, the union voice over jobs just didn’t materialize.

While union jobs have been declining for some time on the platform, COVID-19 has made those union job postings all but non-existent.

The pandemic hit parts of the industry hard. There have been layoffs at some talent agencies and closures of other talent agencies. Those that remain have been instructed to prune their rosters. No talent agency is immune according to Hollywood Reporter.

What’s behind all of this? Some may point to an antiquated business model that’s inherently analog and fails to embrace the digital world. Others would say everything was fine until March 2020 when COVID-19 was officially declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization.

In a world sent into lockdown, clients with media buys committed needed to quickly re-write messaging and re-voice campaigns. Clients either discovered or re-discovered Voices.com as a place to find professional voice talent on-demand. We became a solution as frantic Google searches for online voice over landed on Voices.com, allowing us to respond and deliver broadcast-quality audio files in a matter of days. The result? Five years of digital transformation in five months.  

For more information, please read this message from our CEO and Founder, David Ciccarelli.

QUESTIONS?

If you have any questions you can reach out to our Customer Service Team at [email protected] and they will happily get back to you as soon as they can!

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