E-mail Etiquette for Actors
Oct 24, 2018 21:18:35 GMT -8
Kamran, Michael Macaw, and 2 more like this
Post by Lady Stardust ★ on Oct 24, 2018 21:18:35 GMT -8
In general…
Reply promptly.
The majority of business communication is time-sensitive, so you’ll want to reply as soon as possible—-generally within the same day. If a client is inquiring about hiring you for a job and you take a few days to get back to them, they may assume you are uninterested or unavailable and move on to asking someone else. If you receive a booking email for a job from home but you can’t record right away, you can always send them a quick confirmation email to let them know you’re on it and will be recording later.
Check often.
I recommend enabling ping notifications on your smartphone for whenever a new message arrives in your business e-mail, so that you don't miss something important even when you're out. As tempting as it may be to ignore your inbox when you're on vacation or away from your booth, actors are never truly "off the clock"---e-mails can come in at night, on weekends, and when you're out of town. International clients may even e-mail on holidays if it's a normal business day in their country. If you absolutely cannot check even once per day, consider setting up an auto-responder for the time you're away.
Use proper English.
Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are very important in business communication and will greatly affect how professional you appear in your e-mails. Proofread as necessary and use autocorrect (but double check your autocorrect to avoid any embarrassing mistakes!)
Also, avoid overuse of text speak, emojis, etc. unless you already have an informal relationship with the person you are talking to. These things are fine for social media and texting with friends, but in a business setting - especially when making a first impression - using too many of them can result in not being taken seriously.
Read over your email before you send it.
From autocorrect mistakes to accidentally leaving a word out or misspelling someone’s name, it never hurts to read over your e-mail before sending it off, especially if this email is your first impression with a new client or casting director.
Use email signatures to your advantage.
Your e-mail signature is actually a great marketing tool that often gets overlooked! It’s a great way to automatically have your website link or even links to your demos appear at the bottom of every email. That being said, don’t have an obnoxious, bloated signature with a bunch of images or videos that’s longer than your actual email message!
Leave the “sent from my phone” signature ON.
Okay, this one really comes down to personal preference, but here’s why I’m a fan of keeping the “sent from my iPhone/sent from my Galaxy/etc” tags enabled in your phone settings.
When we’re out somewhere and we respond from a phone, our messages tend to be shorter and blunter overall, which may come off as unintentionally curt. But the “phone response” signature - enabled by default on most smartphones - serves as an unobtrusive way to let the clients know that that quick response is because you’re on the go somewhere and sending it from your phone.
Use greetings in initial emails or your first reply.
With the informal nature of e-mail, this isn’t a requirement, but adds a little bit of professional courtesy. If you’re contacting someone out of the blue, or you’re responding to a job inquiry they send to you, a simple greeting - preferably with their name - makes it more personable. For example, “Hi Joyce, here are my auditions for Bella and Sam. Thanks so much for the opportunity!”
Keep your “From” field and display name identifiable and professional.
Still intent on hanging onto that “cooldude202” Hotmail address from high school? That’s fine, but save it for your personal use or as an e-mail address to use for online purchases and mailing list subscriptions. When it comes to professional business correspondence with paying clients, you’ll want to use your first and last name (or whatever stage name you use for your professional credits) in the From field so that your clients can easily identify who the e-mail is from. For the actual e-mail address itself you can get a little more creative if you so desire, but keep it business-appropriate - “narutofan1990” looks amateur as opposed to, say, “kayla.sanchez”, “kjsanchez” or “kjsvoiceovers”. It’s not a big deal for hobbyist/fan projects, but once you start using your e-mail address for important work endeavors, you’ll want one you’re not embarrassed to print on your business cards.
Email address you want is already taken? Try creative variations—-for example, if you have a common name like John Smith, you could try “johnsmithvoice”, “jsmithvoiceovers”, “johnsvoice”, “johnsmithvo”, etc. I recommend avoiding numbers at the end as it can be easy for people to mistype them or mix them up.
Don’t give out e-mail addresses of studios or casting directors unless that information is already publicly available online.
These people tend to be very busy and may not want their e-mail inboxes inundated with demo reel submissions and messages from people hoping to get their foot in the door on a project. If you want to recommend a friend for something (and can vouch for both their skill and professionalism), YOU should be the one to send an e-mail on their behalf, and then it’s up to the recipient to reach out if they so desire. Don’t simply pass the casting director’s email along to your friend and assume it’s okay, unless that email is listed on their public website. If a friend or aspiring actor asks you for a studio’s contact information, it’s perfectly acceptable to say “I don’t want to get in trouble for giving out that information. Why don’t you look on their website and see if they have a contact form you can try?”
When pitching yourself for opportunities…
Keep it short and sweet.
You probably notice this in your own email, too: the longer and more rambling an email is, the less chance you’ll actually get around to responding to it [this Oatmeal comic sums it up nicely.] Casting directors tend to be extremely busy people and don’t have time to read an entire essay about why you want to work with them.
Never use someone’s name as a referral without their permission.
You’re trying to get in with a specific studio and you know your friend works with them quite often. What’s the harm in mentioning you know them?
HOLD IT! Unless your friend has said it’s okay to mention them, doing so implies that that person referred you and therefore endorses you. If it turns out your skills actually aren’t as up to par as you think they are, you’ve just created a bad situation for both yourself and your friend. There have been actual situations where actors used a friend’s name as a referral without their permission or knowledge, only for the casting director to come back to the friend and get upset at them for “recommending” someone who wasn’t at an industry competitive level.
Don’t follow up to the point of being obnoxious.
You’ve probably been given this type of well-meaning advice time and time again: “You’ve got to be persistent!” “The squeaky wheel gets the grease!” It’s true that sometimes you have to be proactive and follow up with opportunities…but constantly hounding a casting director or potential client in hopes of getting work is a great way to get your e-mails sent to the spam folder. Some casting directors will even blacklist people who are ridiculously incessant about begging for opportunities!
There are no hard and fast rules for how often is appropriate to follow up, but I would suggest following up four to six months after your initial e-mail, and after that, waiting a year to follow up. If you don’t hear back from someone after three attempts total (first email, six month followup, and one-year followup) chances are they do not have anything available or are simply not interested, and you should move on.
Avoid generic form letters.
“To whomever it may concern: I am a voice actor…” e-mails that are copy and pasted and mass mailed are obvious form letters. Of course, your e-mails will contain a lot of the same information regardless of whom you are pitching yourself to, but it’s a good idea to at least tailor your e-mail a little bit to the company or person you are submitting to. For instance, what about their company in particular makes you want to work with them? Use the person or company’s name somewhere in the email when possible to personalize it a bit more.
Don’t send unsolicited attachments.
Cold-calling and want a potential client to check out your demo? Include a link, not an attachment. Large audio files will clog up the person’s e-mail inbox and may even be caught in their automatic spam filter! It’s okay to send attachments if the person requests them, but if someone doesn’t even know you…play it safe and just send a link to your demo instead.
For auditions and bookings…
Know WHEN and WHEN NOT to “reply all”.
In some situations, replying all is expected or even required, and in others, it can be disastrous. Here’s a pretty foolproof way to tell whether or not an e-mail needs a reply-all: Look at who else is CCed on the e-mail.
REPLY-ALL if: The other recipients are people who need to be on the e-mail chain in order to be kept in the loop. For example, if you get an audition from an agency, they might have multiple agents and/or assistants CCed and you will be expected to reply all so that everyone receives your file. If you are responding to a studio booking, they might have several important people CCed including the project manager, casting director and receptionist—-all of whom need to stay up to date.
DON’T REPLY-ALL if: A bunch of actors are CCed on an audition e-mail or cast update e-mail, and your response is only relevant to the original sender. It’s good etiquette on the part of casting directors to BCC everyone when sending out an audition, but sometimes people forget or simply aren’t aware. If you reply all to an audition e-mail with 50 actors CCed, that means 50 other actors get their inboxes blown up with YOUR audition files, which is 1) awkward, and 2) irrelevant to them. Same goes for replying-all to a full cast e-mail with “Thanks for the update!” or something of the sort—-there is no reason the rest of the cast needs to receive that message and if too many people do it, it starts getting spammy.
Don’t forget to include the attachments for auditions and jobs!
I’m pretty sure that at some point, we’ve all sent off an e-mail for an audition or file delivery and… forgot to actually attach the file. It’s a human mistake and can happen to everyone (casting directors even sometimes forget to attach scripts), but it can still be embarrassing. You can reduce the chances of this oversight by being sure to double check that the files are actually attached.
Treat email communications as confidential, unless you have permission to share.
Auditions sent to a closed casting pool are usually confidential, and should not be forwarded to others without the director’s express permission. If the auditions are public or open to referrals, it will usually be stated so in the email. If you have a friend whom you know would be a GREAT fit for a job but isn’t on the casting list, you can give the director that person’s information and it will be up to them to reach out—-don’t give your friend the audition sides or the director’s e-mail unless they say it’s okay. It will look bad on both of you otherwise.
As for “you’ve been cast” e-mails, even if it doesn’t explicitly state “NDA” or “confidential”, many times it is assumed that you will keep it under wraps until the cast is officially announced or the project is out. Unless they invite you to share, don’t go rushing off to social media to announce the booking—-ask first if you’re not sure.
Confirm receipt when necessary.
Getting booked for a session time? It might be easy to simply add it to your calendar and figure you’re good to go, but the client or studio wants reassurance that you received the e-mail and will therefore show up at the proper day and time for your session! Confirmations can be short and sweet—-even a simple “Confirming, thanks!” or “Got it, see you there!” is sufficient.
Reply promptly.
The majority of business communication is time-sensitive, so you’ll want to reply as soon as possible—-generally within the same day. If a client is inquiring about hiring you for a job and you take a few days to get back to them, they may assume you are uninterested or unavailable and move on to asking someone else. If you receive a booking email for a job from home but you can’t record right away, you can always send them a quick confirmation email to let them know you’re on it and will be recording later.
Check often.
I recommend enabling ping notifications on your smartphone for whenever a new message arrives in your business e-mail, so that you don't miss something important even when you're out. As tempting as it may be to ignore your inbox when you're on vacation or away from your booth, actors are never truly "off the clock"---e-mails can come in at night, on weekends, and when you're out of town. International clients may even e-mail on holidays if it's a normal business day in their country. If you absolutely cannot check even once per day, consider setting up an auto-responder for the time you're away.
Use proper English.
Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are very important in business communication and will greatly affect how professional you appear in your e-mails. Proofread as necessary and use autocorrect (but double check your autocorrect to avoid any embarrassing mistakes!)
Also, avoid overuse of text speak, emojis, etc. unless you already have an informal relationship with the person you are talking to. These things are fine for social media and texting with friends, but in a business setting - especially when making a first impression - using too many of them can result in not being taken seriously.
Read over your email before you send it.
From autocorrect mistakes to accidentally leaving a word out or misspelling someone’s name, it never hurts to read over your e-mail before sending it off, especially if this email is your first impression with a new client or casting director.
Use email signatures to your advantage.
Your e-mail signature is actually a great marketing tool that often gets overlooked! It’s a great way to automatically have your website link or even links to your demos appear at the bottom of every email. That being said, don’t have an obnoxious, bloated signature with a bunch of images or videos that’s longer than your actual email message!
Leave the “sent from my phone” signature ON.
Okay, this one really comes down to personal preference, but here’s why I’m a fan of keeping the “sent from my iPhone/sent from my Galaxy/etc” tags enabled in your phone settings.
When we’re out somewhere and we respond from a phone, our messages tend to be shorter and blunter overall, which may come off as unintentionally curt. But the “phone response” signature - enabled by default on most smartphones - serves as an unobtrusive way to let the clients know that that quick response is because you’re on the go somewhere and sending it from your phone.
Use greetings in initial emails or your first reply.
With the informal nature of e-mail, this isn’t a requirement, but adds a little bit of professional courtesy. If you’re contacting someone out of the blue, or you’re responding to a job inquiry they send to you, a simple greeting - preferably with their name - makes it more personable. For example, “Hi Joyce, here are my auditions for Bella and Sam. Thanks so much for the opportunity!”
Keep your “From” field and display name identifiable and professional.
Still intent on hanging onto that “cooldude202” Hotmail address from high school? That’s fine, but save it for your personal use or as an e-mail address to use for online purchases and mailing list subscriptions. When it comes to professional business correspondence with paying clients, you’ll want to use your first and last name (or whatever stage name you use for your professional credits) in the From field so that your clients can easily identify who the e-mail is from. For the actual e-mail address itself you can get a little more creative if you so desire, but keep it business-appropriate - “narutofan1990” looks amateur as opposed to, say, “kayla.sanchez”, “kjsanchez” or “kjsvoiceovers”. It’s not a big deal for hobbyist/fan projects, but once you start using your e-mail address for important work endeavors, you’ll want one you’re not embarrassed to print on your business cards.
Email address you want is already taken? Try creative variations—-for example, if you have a common name like John Smith, you could try “johnsmithvoice”, “jsmithvoiceovers”, “johnsvoice”, “johnsmithvo”, etc. I recommend avoiding numbers at the end as it can be easy for people to mistype them or mix them up.
Don’t give out e-mail addresses of studios or casting directors unless that information is already publicly available online.
These people tend to be very busy and may not want their e-mail inboxes inundated with demo reel submissions and messages from people hoping to get their foot in the door on a project. If you want to recommend a friend for something (and can vouch for both their skill and professionalism), YOU should be the one to send an e-mail on their behalf, and then it’s up to the recipient to reach out if they so desire. Don’t simply pass the casting director’s email along to your friend and assume it’s okay, unless that email is listed on their public website. If a friend or aspiring actor asks you for a studio’s contact information, it’s perfectly acceptable to say “I don’t want to get in trouble for giving out that information. Why don’t you look on their website and see if they have a contact form you can try?”
When pitching yourself for opportunities…
Keep it short and sweet.
You probably notice this in your own email, too: the longer and more rambling an email is, the less chance you’ll actually get around to responding to it [this Oatmeal comic sums it up nicely.] Casting directors tend to be extremely busy people and don’t have time to read an entire essay about why you want to work with them.
Never use someone’s name as a referral without their permission.
You’re trying to get in with a specific studio and you know your friend works with them quite often. What’s the harm in mentioning you know them?
HOLD IT! Unless your friend has said it’s okay to mention them, doing so implies that that person referred you and therefore endorses you. If it turns out your skills actually aren’t as up to par as you think they are, you’ve just created a bad situation for both yourself and your friend. There have been actual situations where actors used a friend’s name as a referral without their permission or knowledge, only for the casting director to come back to the friend and get upset at them for “recommending” someone who wasn’t at an industry competitive level.
Don’t follow up to the point of being obnoxious.
You’ve probably been given this type of well-meaning advice time and time again: “You’ve got to be persistent!” “The squeaky wheel gets the grease!” It’s true that sometimes you have to be proactive and follow up with opportunities…but constantly hounding a casting director or potential client in hopes of getting work is a great way to get your e-mails sent to the spam folder. Some casting directors will even blacklist people who are ridiculously incessant about begging for opportunities!
There are no hard and fast rules for how often is appropriate to follow up, but I would suggest following up four to six months after your initial e-mail, and after that, waiting a year to follow up. If you don’t hear back from someone after three attempts total (first email, six month followup, and one-year followup) chances are they do not have anything available or are simply not interested, and you should move on.
Avoid generic form letters.
“To whomever it may concern: I am a voice actor…” e-mails that are copy and pasted and mass mailed are obvious form letters. Of course, your e-mails will contain a lot of the same information regardless of whom you are pitching yourself to, but it’s a good idea to at least tailor your e-mail a little bit to the company or person you are submitting to. For instance, what about their company in particular makes you want to work with them? Use the person or company’s name somewhere in the email when possible to personalize it a bit more.
Don’t send unsolicited attachments.
Cold-calling and want a potential client to check out your demo? Include a link, not an attachment. Large audio files will clog up the person’s e-mail inbox and may even be caught in their automatic spam filter! It’s okay to send attachments if the person requests them, but if someone doesn’t even know you…play it safe and just send a link to your demo instead.
For auditions and bookings…
Know WHEN and WHEN NOT to “reply all”.
In some situations, replying all is expected or even required, and in others, it can be disastrous. Here’s a pretty foolproof way to tell whether or not an e-mail needs a reply-all: Look at who else is CCed on the e-mail.
REPLY-ALL if: The other recipients are people who need to be on the e-mail chain in order to be kept in the loop. For example, if you get an audition from an agency, they might have multiple agents and/or assistants CCed and you will be expected to reply all so that everyone receives your file. If you are responding to a studio booking, they might have several important people CCed including the project manager, casting director and receptionist—-all of whom need to stay up to date.
DON’T REPLY-ALL if: A bunch of actors are CCed on an audition e-mail or cast update e-mail, and your response is only relevant to the original sender. It’s good etiquette on the part of casting directors to BCC everyone when sending out an audition, but sometimes people forget or simply aren’t aware. If you reply all to an audition e-mail with 50 actors CCed, that means 50 other actors get their inboxes blown up with YOUR audition files, which is 1) awkward, and 2) irrelevant to them. Same goes for replying-all to a full cast e-mail with “Thanks for the update!” or something of the sort—-there is no reason the rest of the cast needs to receive that message and if too many people do it, it starts getting spammy.
Don’t forget to include the attachments for auditions and jobs!
I’m pretty sure that at some point, we’ve all sent off an e-mail for an audition or file delivery and… forgot to actually attach the file. It’s a human mistake and can happen to everyone (casting directors even sometimes forget to attach scripts), but it can still be embarrassing. You can reduce the chances of this oversight by being sure to double check that the files are actually attached.
Treat email communications as confidential, unless you have permission to share.
Auditions sent to a closed casting pool are usually confidential, and should not be forwarded to others without the director’s express permission. If the auditions are public or open to referrals, it will usually be stated so in the email. If you have a friend whom you know would be a GREAT fit for a job but isn’t on the casting list, you can give the director that person’s information and it will be up to them to reach out—-don’t give your friend the audition sides or the director’s e-mail unless they say it’s okay. It will look bad on both of you otherwise.
As for “you’ve been cast” e-mails, even if it doesn’t explicitly state “NDA” or “confidential”, many times it is assumed that you will keep it under wraps until the cast is officially announced or the project is out. Unless they invite you to share, don’t go rushing off to social media to announce the booking—-ask first if you’re not sure.
Confirm receipt when necessary.
Getting booked for a session time? It might be easy to simply add it to your calendar and figure you’re good to go, but the client or studio wants reassurance that you received the e-mail and will therefore show up at the proper day and time for your session! Confirmations can be short and sweet—-even a simple “Confirming, thanks!” or “Got it, see you there!” is sufficient.
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I’m a female voice actor with a High pitched, normal and robotic voice and I can also do British accents! I do murder drones and I could try any other and I can follow scripts! Send me an email if you need me! (Mahatareq09@yahoo.com)