Everyone is trying to stand out these days regarding their products, campaigns, brands, and businesses. With the information overload that hits consumers daily, any competitive edge for a business can radically shift. One of the simplest ways to differentiate your company is by understanding how voiceover impacts your business.
A distinct voice that fits your business needs is a surefire way to cut through to a consumer base already saturated with extraneous information. Voiceovers can give your business a flexible and effective method for delivering relevant information to your customers.
What is Voiceover, and What Can It be Used For?
A voiceover is any voice line or narration that an audience hears without an actor being seen. People who do voiceover work are voice actors or voice talents, and finding the right one for your business or brand voice is essential to making the most of a project.
- Within the voiceover industry, there are also many types of voiceover genres you can make use of. Some common ones include:
- Commercial Voiceover: These involve advertising a product or a service, and can be done through TV, radio, or online.
- Narration: These are when a voiceover covers a technical process, an explainer video, or tutorial/training content. A narration can go through something step-by-step, or it can even be for content like an audiobook.
- Interactive Voice Prompts (IVR): IVR relates to any voice-based system that delivers announcements or prompts. These include voice assistants like Siri and Alexa, GPS voices, app voiceovers, PA systems, and over-the-phone voice prompts.
- Character Voiceover: These types of voiceover involve a character voiced by the voice actor. This can be for a mascot for your brand, an animated TV show/movie, or even a video game.
- Promotional Voiceover: Promo voiceovers typically cover upcoming events, services, or content. These include trailers for TV shows, movies, video games, or broadcast sports events.
Because of the wide variety of voiceover types, there is no limit to how it can enhance your business.
Benefits of Voiceover for Your Brand
There are many ways any of the above types of voiceover can help your business. No matter what type of voiceover you need, there are vital benefits to using a voice to boost your business.
A recognizable voiceover can help establish a recognizable brand. Business owners are focused on the look of their businesses online, but a professionally done voiceover adds completeness to your brand’s presence. You can set the tone for your company by using the right voice.
A recognizable voice helps people remember your business or service and allows people to share your messages more easily with others. Sharing a video with a voiceover or sending links containing information about a business becomes much easier when there is a voice for people to remember attached to it.
Professional voiceovers can keep your business’s messaging consistent, too. Using the same or similar sounding voice actors to promote your brand and for internal communications keeps a consistent tone that is easy to market the rest of your messages around.
Connecting to Your Customers
Another effective way to utilize voiceover is to match your consumer base through a voice representing your business. If you have access to demographic data showing you who is engaging with your company, then a voiceover fitting that demographic can help sell a product, generate buzz for a promotion, or get the target audience to pay attention to what you have to say. You can tweak several aspects of voiceover when trying to match a demographic, like age, gender, tone, language, accent, etc.
There are even customer service applications for voiceover. If you need an excellent on-hold voice line for your business, voice prompts for frequently asked questions, or a voice for a dedicated app; then quality voice talent is a must. Everyone knows how annoying it can be on the receiving end of a tedious customer service matter, and having an appropriate voice can reduce that tension.
No matter what part of your business you want to focus on improving, voiceover is one addition that goes a long way. It can connect you to your consumers more personally, establish a solid and recognizable brand voice, extend your business’s reach across all channels, and even expand your consumer base. The right voiceover can quickly bring your business a noticeable return on investment.