Why ‘a nice voice’ is not what makes you a VO

It happens at dinner parties, on Zoom calls, in casual conversations when someone asks what I do for a living.

I tell them I'm a voice over artist. And almost without fail, the response comes:

"Oh, yes you DO have a lovely voice!" 

And I smile. Because it's kind. It's well meant. And honestly, not entirely wrong.

But it’s also a bit like saying to a surgeon, "oh, you must have steady hands!" — they'd probably smile politely too. And think: yes, but that's about 5% of what I actually do.

So what is the other 95%?

Let me paint you a picture of a fairly average working day.

I'm up early, checking briefs, responding to client emails, chasing invoices. I spend a couple of hours auditioning — recording, editing, and submitting takes for projects I may or may not get, with no guarantee of a penny at the end of it. I spend time marketing myself, updating my website, posting on social media, tracking outreach. Then there's the actual paid work — recording, editing, cleaning audio, checking levels, formatting files, delivering to spec. And somewhere in the middle of all of that, I'm also coaching myself, keeping my skills sharp, studying new niches, and quietly managing the very particular kind of psychological resilience it takes to do this job long term.

The microphone goes on for maybe a third of that, if that!. The rest is craft, learning, and running and developing a business.

And coming back to that voice,…

..you can have the most beautiful voice in the world and still deliver badly. Timing is off, emotional tone doesn't land, the read feels flat or over-worked and the whole thing falls apart. A voice that can't take direction, can't interpret a brief, or can't shift gear between a corporate explainer and a warm lifestyle ad isn't actually that useful to anyone.

If voice alone is what got you in the room, then beautifully crafted AI voices would be able to deliver. But they can’t. Any, then there’s the question of what ‘beautiful’ actually is? More and more now, we realise that real, raw, imperfect is what makes ‘beautiful’.

So next time someone tells you they work in voice over

Maybe ask them what they're working on. What niche they specialise in. How they got into it. What the hardest part of the job is. What area they are aiming to get more work in…

Because I promise you… the answer won't be "finding a good microphone."

And to my fellow VOs reading this, you are so much more than a nice voice. You are a performer, a director, a sound engineer, a copywriter, a marketer, a business owner, and occasionally, a miracle worker on a two-hour turnaround!