May 14, 2024
Arm yourself against voiceover scams with insights from Anne Ganguzza and Lau Lapides. The BOSSES shine a light on the potential dangers of casting scams, providing you with the necessary tools and instincts to recognize when something simply doesn't look right. From notorious overpayment traps to false urgency ploys, we dissect the mechanics of these schemes, emphasizing the importance of due diligence and healthy skepticism. Navigating potential job offers can be intimidating, but this episode will help you confidently sidestep the dangers. The BOSSES unpack the nuances of vetting opportunities, the significance of physical company locations, and the red flags that warrant a second look.
00:01 - Intro (Host)
It's time to take your business to the next level, the boss level.
These are the premier business owner strategies and successes being
utilized by the industry's top talent today. Rock your business
like a boss a VO boss. Now let's welcome your host, Anne
Ganguzza.
00:20 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Hey everyone, welcome to the VO Boss Podcast and the Boss
Superpower Series. I'm your host, Anne Ganguzza, and I'm here with
the lovely Lau Lapides. Yay, Nice to be back, Hi Law, as always. Hi
Annie, Lau, you know I'm wearing my red today.
00:37 - Lau Lapides (Host)
You're looking all red and crimson-y and like ready to rock and
roll Like a red flag.
00:44 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Oh, I'm so punny sometimes. So now what are we going to talk about
today? Let's talk about, maybe, red flags and or scams. I know that
they are a popular topic, but I think it's something that we need
to watch out for in the industry these scams that go around and ask
us to submit our voices and then gosh only knows what happens after
that. Typically, it has something to do with money, but, yeah, law.
What are your thoughts about scams and how we can avoid them as
bosses?
01:15 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Well, totally prevalent. We get it. It's in every industry. And I
have to tell you and I know you've been experiencing this too in
the last few years tell you and I know you've been experiencing
this too in the last few years there have been an onslaught of
hackers and slackers and scammers and bammers and everything you
call them. They're around and they are literally coming at you. So,
as a business owner, you have to be ready for it. They're literally
trying to get through your firewalls, whether it's your website,
your software. I have, unfortunately, a resident new stalker who
leaves me voicemails. You got to be ready for that. You got to take
the personalization and emotion out of it and protect yourself,
protect yourself and protect your business Absolutely.
02:02 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
So I know that there's some great first of all resources online
that you can find out. I mean, the number one thing is is if you,
let's say, get an email or a phone call and it's asking you to
submit something personal, like your voice file or an audio file or
give money, the first thing that I think you can do is to take
action is to Google. Google is your friend and again Google here.
Google is your friend and again Google here. Google is your friend
because a lot of times, especially even if you get like a phone
call right, you can put in the phone number and you can see if it's
a phone scam, or you can put in the subject of the email and see if
you can find anything out there that talks about it.
02:39
There might be discussions in Reddit. There might be discussions on
Facebook that say, yes, this is a scam, don't believe it. But the
thing of it is is to make sure. If something doesn't feel right or
something is off, then definitely take the first step and research
it, go to Google. That's what I would say would be your first step,
and then there are lots of other tips and tricks that we have for
you. Bosses out there Law. What would you say is your first and
foremost line of defense if you feel you've been taken advantage of
or are being scammed Right.
03:09 - Lau Lapides (Host)
There's a bunch of stuff we can do and, by the way, I would take
what Annie said even a step further and I would make sure you're
talking to your inner circle of your coaches, your uppers in the
industry, people who are in the know, Because I have found, Annie,
that if I go to Google, or a lot of you may be now using DuckDuckGo
only because Google has a lot of online drones that go after you
now. So if you use DuckDuckGo and you're on there, you're going to
find they do have websites oftentimes and they do look legitimate
and they lift that information. It's very easy to make a landing
page. So you have to really talk to people in the industry that
really would know to really cross-check. I always say go with your
gut instinct. Your gut instinct is telling you something. Listen to
it. One of the big scams, Annie, that is out there is the
overpayment scam. This is big in our industry. That's where the
client sends you, right.
04:02
Well, let's describe what it is for people who don't know what it
is. It's a client sends you money, right, and they say that they're
expecting to ask you to send the overpayment to someone else. It's
like this. We used to call them chain scams. Right, don't do
anything of the sort. Never accept money, never send
money.
04:21 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Well, never send money to somebody who claims to be your client
number one. I mean Never, never.
04:26 - Lau Lapides (Host)
I mean that's a red flag right there. Right, that's your red flag,
right there.
04:30 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
So basically they've sent you money, but it's typically it's a
check that is not legit. Yes, exactly. So when they ask you to,
send money back, then you basically are just giving them money, the
overpayment. You are giving them money for nothing because they've
given you a fraudulent check.
04:47 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Hello, and what about the urgency one? This plays on your emotions.
This is the sense of urgency making you feel like you're under
pressure. Right, the client pressures you to like, handle the
payment processing really fast, because there's a reason to handle
it really fast. And they want to scramble your brain, they want to
get you confused and discombobulated. So you're not thinking
straight and you're just acting because you may feel like, oh, I
want that job, it sounds great. Or you're a little desperate, you
haven't worked in a while, sounds like a great job, you don't want
to miss out on it. So they'll put that urgency on it for you. So be
very, very careful of that.
05:26 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
And that urgency can be to submit voice files of which they will
not pay you for. That goes back to law. This is like a business
practice For me for many, many years. When I negotiate a job with a
client, I especially a new client that I'm not familiar with I will
always ask for payment upfront. It is not a big thing to ask, as a
matter of fact, the way that I'm not familiar with.
05:47
I will always ask for payment up front. It is not a big thing to
ask as a matter of fact, the way that I word it in my email is
payment is appreciated and preferred up front. Otherwise, other
options are available upon request, and so for a new client, I will
request that they pay me up front before I even send them an audio
file, and I'll tell you what. 99.9% of the time, unless it's a
large client that has to go through a process to pay, like through
purchase orders or something like that I will get payment and I
will request payment electronically, because that way I can
guarantee that the money lands in my account first. Then I will
send them files, and so, therefore, when it's requested up front
after you've negotiated and then it's a statement that is right on
my email that says payment in full appreciated made to my Venmo or
my PayPal and then basically other options available upon request
and I get it.
06:42
Guys, I get it. I've been doing this for years. It's amazing how
people are like well, charge 50%. I'm like, no, just ask for the
full thing up front. Now, if somebody doesn't want to give you the
full thing up front, then get on the phone with them. Make sure
there's a human being at the other end of the line. This is not all
done through email. These are some tips that I've learned over the
years. Right is make sure you've got a human at the other end of
the line and check out the business Again. There is a way to
research those things online. Is there a business? Is there a phone
number At the end of the email? Is there a signature file that has
a company name, a way to contact them via email, via phone? I don't
care how old school I sound, bosses, I get on the phone and I call
yeah, you need to contact them.
07:26 - Lau Lapides (Host)
I make sure there's a real person at the other end of the line.
What about you? Because here's the other thing too. There's a
double reason why you should contact them, especially by phone. If
they're going to give you a phone number and that is, if it's a
scam they need to know about it. So they need to know their
identity has been stolen, and then they can put a post out online
that people are coming at you using our name and our identity and
it's not us. Yes, yes, absolutely, and they will really appreciate
it. So there's the double reason to protect yourself, but also to
protect that company, because sometimes they're just not going to
know about it right.
07:59 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Sometimes they're stealing the identity of the company. Absolutely
Right Filling the identity of the company.
08:02 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Absolutely. One of my clients fell into this one, unfortunately,
and that was she was already knee-deep into a job and she had
submitted a bunch like 10 pages, 15 pages on a long form, and there
were no edits. That's a red flag right there. So, unfortunately,
she had already submitted something and she already saw oh, there
are no edits. There's something wrong with that job, there's
something strange. Also, if you see in your breakdown you're going
to get, say, a form letter online asking you to be a VO for AI or
for this or for that it could be for anything, right, and the
numbers they use are weird. Look at weird numbers. Like we're going
to use this from three and a half to 11 and a half months. You know
the numbers look strange, they look off.
08:50 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Oh, that's interesting. I would not have thought about
that.
08:52 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Yeah, strange numbers, like strange configurations of numbers. We
used to look for grammar and lowercase, but now we can't do it
anymore because they're going through chat, gpt, so everything is
formatted fairly well. How about this one, you guys? How about this
one? They're deeply, deeply focused and over-focused on the payment
versus the job.
09:13 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Yeah, I agree.
09:15 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Yeah, payment, it's all about getting the money quick
right.
09:18 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
So they can get in and get out right, Because they really don't
care about your audio files or they care about the audio files, and
then they just ghost you and won't pay you. And that's a different
type of a scam. Typically, that kind of falls within. What kind of
clients are you working with? And again, I always say educate
yourself on the client that is contacting you as soon as you get an
email. That's typically how we get inquiries right. We'll get an
email or we'll get a direct message from somebody. Make sure that
they have a legitimate domain on the end of their contact
information.
09:51 - Lau Lapides (Host)
And what if they have a whole bunch of domains that lead you in
circles?
09:58 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Different emails, different domains that confuse you, or a domain
that doesn't exist for a company. It could just be somebody at
gmailcom or somebody at hotmailcom. I would always look at those
people twice because if they're a legitimate company they should
have a company domain. It should be yada yada yadacom, and if they
don't have that then I would be very suspect. If they do not
include a phone number, I would be suspect. If they don't have a
real signature file, I would be very suspect.
10:23 - Intro (Host)
And as the law said back in the day.
10:25 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
We used to look for grammatical errors, and now that's less common.
Now you've got to look at more people that are stealing identities,
and or maybe people who just don't put a valid domain at their
email address or there's no way to contact them, even if they have
a website. I can't stand when I go to a website and I can't find a
phone number to contact someone. That to me— Well, that's
unfortunately more common too.
10:49 - Lau Lapides (Host)
That, to me, is a red flag. Yeah, and here's the problem with
technology is it's getting so good that certain elements are cut
out of our industry that used to be there. Like a lot of the bigger
companies we work with do not provide you even customer service
numbers anymore because they don't have staff to answer phones, so
everything is a bot now. So you could be contacted by a bot. You
don't know they're a bot. The bot is scheduled to get information,
so never give your information out online. No account numbers, no
bank numbers, no social security nothing.
11:22 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
I'm going to say that any legitimate company will have a phone
number, or at least any legitimate company will provide that
they're harder to find, Annie, and I'll give you an
example.
11:32 - Lau Lapides (Host)
I'll give you a direct example. We're on the Calendly link. Whether
you're using Acuity or Calendly, I dare you to find a phone number
for them. And they are a legit global service, their calendars that
we use all the time. You use them, we use them all the
time.
11:49 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
But I'm going to say that's dedicated to maybe software, right? I'm
just going to say if you've got a company with people that maybe
you're doing a corporate or an e-learning right, yeah, go after it.
Yeah, you should absolutely be able to find a way to contact them.
I mean, even like I buy a lot of clothing online just saying, Is
that a surprise and I have a customer service issue. I want to be
able to talk to a human being, right and you're right.
12:14
It is getting more and more difficult to find. However, I'm going
to say that your chances are better if you do have a phone number
that you can contact a human being at the other end of the
line.
12:24 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Of course, of course. But remember, I still caution people because
I ran into this myself. For the banking fraudsters, because
identity theft is number one in the US. So for the banking, they'll
send you something that looks exactly like Bank of America exactly
like. Paypal and they'll say you owe us $500.
12:43 - Speaker 4 (Host)
Here's our invoice yeah, click here to resolve.
12:46 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Click here, don't click on anything. Never click on anything. And
if you call them, just know you may be calling someone that they
hired within their fraud service. So I suggest, if at all possible,
go to a location. Go to the location. If it's a bank or financial
or whatever, you should be able to find a location where you can
talk to someone live, like Annie's talking about, to try to get
some sort of vetting on it, because you don't know, they look
exactly real, they totally look real. And how about the big game
show host? Oh gosh, yes, the game show host. The assignment for the
game show host right, everyone's getting excited about that because
you've been assigned to be a game show host? Yep, absolutely no,
you haven't. No, you haven't, no, you haven't. The next step is
going to be asking you for account information. Yes,
exactly.
13:35 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
And that's been going on for years and years. And so what they do
is they appeal to our emotions, they appeal to our oh my. God,
you've got a great job. You've been selected. I even at one point
got contacted by Disney, who said that they researched me online
and wanted me to audition and I'm like, I'm not so sure about
this.
13:54 - Lau Lapides (Host)
I don't think so. I mean as good as you all are and, I'm sure, even
if you have excellent SEO.
14:01 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Well, that's an even bigger target. You're an even bigger target,
that's a bigger target.
14:05 - Lau Lapides (Host)
That's a bigger target Don't fall into. We found you online. I want
you to audition. Well, go through my agent. Go through my
agent.
14:15 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
But I will say that I am very much an online business and I do have
a lot of people that contact me for legit jobs through my website
and through my social media channels and through referrals, and
again, those are the ones that I trust. If they're coming through
referrals, right, Because then I basically, oh sure, I have the
job, but I always have the ability to contact someone or speak to
them.
14:35 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Oh, that's totally different. I mean, very rarely do I and I think
I have pretty good visibility online. Very rarely do I have I found
you online. That would be specifically through, like Google Ads
purchased SEO. They'll get information, they'll be like a wannabe
client of a coaching service or something like that, and you can
feel that out very, very quickly. But when it comes to giving you a
job as a talent, beware, keep those flags up. How about the
interview, annie? Have you seen the online?
15:05 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
interviews, the online interviews.
15:06 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Yeah, I've heard of them vaguely they invite you on to like Signal
or Telegram, zoom, skype, whatsapp. Be careful of WhatsApp, you
guys. Now, I love WhatsApp because it's free. It's an international
community that can get on there for free. Who cannot text you? So I
love it. We have it for our Talent Inner Circle members. That being
said, do not jump on WhatsApp for interviews with anyone until you
have vetted them, because that's a very common scam platform. It's
just known to be that, so just be careful. Be aware of that. The
language you have to be careful of too. Like does it look weird,
even if it's gone through chat GPT. Like does it look strange? The
sentence Does it sound strange?
15:46 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
It's not formed well, right? Yes, If English is not the first
language, right formed well, right. Yes, If English is not the
first language, right. So be careful of that. Well, first of all,
I'm just going to say that clients that are international and I
have a lot of international clients Typically the international
clients that I work with are very well-spoken, well-versed in
English, because they've worked with clients in the United States
before. So if they are not as well-versed, I'll investigate them
more. Because number one I want to make sure I get paid. There are
certain clients that are known to not pay a whole lot for voiceover
and they will give you lots and lots of promises for lots of
work.
16:20
A lot of e-learning companies and I'm going to mention a lot of
e-learning companies that are not based in the United States that
want to hire you for as little money as possible per word. I'm a
big person on e-learning that I don't quote per word, but I know a
lot of people do, and here's my philosophy is that if somebody's
asking you for a particular number per word, then probably right,
they're hiring you. Right, You're a company, a curriculum
developers or an e-learning company that's hiring the voice talent,
so you're not the first line of paying. I'm just going to say
because they're hiring you and so they want to negotiate the
cheapest price because they don't want to pay a lot.
17:00
When I deal with e-learning clients, I deal with companies directly
and I'm able to negotiate a much higher rate. So I don't typically
quote on per word. But if somebody starts asking me for my price
per word, I will get a little more rigorous about my investigation,
because I want to make sure that I'm not going to be haggling over
five cents or a penny or a word. And then also I'm going to make
sure that I have a point of contact that I am able to contact
either via email and that they get back to me right away, or that I
can text them and even text if it's a new client. I'm going to try
to see if I can call them or have a Zoom call Sure,
absolutely.
17:38 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Or have a Zoom call Absolutely absolutely. I would also be careful
of wiring. Oh yeah, wiring. Wiring is tough nowadays. My partner
won't do it anymore. They won't do it anymore, they just won't.
They won't do it anymore, they just won't. They don't trust it. So
they don't want to do that anymore. They'll do PayPal, they'll do
Venmo.
17:53 - Intro (Host)
They'll do it any other way.
17:54 - Lau Lapides (Host)
But they won't do that. And I mean, needless to say, don't ever
send money out for any reason. Ever Don't send it out unless you're
sending your commission cut to your particular agent.
18:13 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
That's different. Well, that is legit. If a company needs to pay
you and wants to pay you ACH, and wants to pay you right into your
bank account, you will need to supply your bank account information
and, for what it's worth when I investigated it, god, many years
ago there's nothing dangerous about providing your account number.
The bank itself has security in place so you can provide a full
account number to somebody if they request it, and a routing
number.
18:39 - Lau Lapides (Host)
So all right. So I have a question about that. So let's say you
haven't worked with a company. They've reached out to you. You want
to work with them. What kinds of practices, Annie, do you use to
vet them? Do you ask them for references? Do you ask them for
clients? I know most legitimate companies that I know of and have
worked with have actually put their client lists out. They're on
their website, so I could really reach out to them and say, hey, do
you know of this company? Have you worked with them? Whether I
reached the right person or not is another thing, but the point is
what do you do to vet a company?
19:13 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Well, that's a great question. So the first thing I do is I
research them online. I do I research them online. I go to their
website. I make sure that they have contact information on their
website. If they don't, I'll ask the person that emailed me or
reached out to me for their contact information. And then I'll say
but I can't find a website, or I can't find any contact
information. Do you have a point of contact in case I have
questions about the project?
19:39
Right, and it becomes very much about you know, I'm interested
because I want to be able to get a hold of someone in case I have
questions, so that I can service them better, right? So it doesn't
appear that I'm paranoid or not trusting, but I am asking in order
to serve them better. So I make sure they have a website. And if
they don't have a website, then I'm suspicious, because who doesn't
have a website these days? If they don't have a website, maybe
they're very small, and if they're very small, they might have
budget issues. And then I want to make sure that they're going to
pay me in full prior to my job start, like I request, and that they
will pay me electronically. There will be no checks, or if there is
a check, I won't start or deliver the job until I've cashed the
check, and that's very rarely the case. I don't know when's the
last time you wrote a check.
20:21
Almost never, very rarely, people who can't pay via any sort of
electronic method these days or through a credit card, you know
that kind of a thing then you're protected by all of that. And so,
yeah, definitely research, definitely point of contact. And my last
point is like literally talking to someone, and there's a lot to be
said for a company's brand and a company's longevity, right. So how
long have they been in business? Am I familiar with them? As you
mentioned? What other companies have they dealt with? Have they
dealt with other people?
20:51
I don't necessarily ask for references right away, because if it's
a corporate entity, I might ask around the groups to see if
anybody's worked with the company before. And yes, there's an
actual group before Nava became very involved called the Red Flags
Group. It's a Facebook group started by Dave Kavosier and is still
around, where when we all had questions or we're all like hey, have
you heard of this? We would post in that group. It's a wonderful
group. It's still there. And there are some other groups like, I
think, Veopreneur, Mark Scott. Actually, people will ask in that
group if there's been contact or if people have worked with that
company. And again, it's something you can talk to your
accountability buddies or colleagues in the industry to see if they
yeah, and I would add on, too your coaches.
21:35 - Lau Lapides (Host)
So if you have a coach or a coaching team or have coach, your
coaches really should know about this stuff. If they don't know
about this stuff, they should be willing to reach out and find out
about it. If they're not, that would be a red flag on the coach.
Yeah, absolutely, because the coach should really be in the know.
Even if you haven't worked with them for a while, they should be in
the know.
22:02
I'll give you an example this student that I had in class not too
long ago. She wrote to me and she said hey, I want to go FICOR and
here are my reasons and I need help. How do I do it? Well, if I
said I don't know, I have no idea what it is and I don't know, go
figure it out. I would have a red flag about her looking at me
saying that and saying well, let me just find out for you, let me
figure it out, because I need to know myself. I actually know
exactly how to do it, but my point is is that that would take me
aback, like who am I working?
22:26 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
with who's my teacher?
22:28 - Lau Lapides (Host)
You know what I mean, because this is a very huge issue right now
in the union, so it's very relevant and current.
22:34 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Right, and that's another great aspect to a scammer, right, how do
you know you're working with a legitimate coach and or demo
producer? And I'm going to say, any coach worth their weight is
going to offer a consult, a free consult so that you can kind of
get a feel. And again, that's something where you're meeting with
them on Zoom or you're meeting with them on the phone or you can
kind of have a back and forth with that coach so that you can get
an idea of their style. You're open to ask any questions and also,
again, I think that word of mouth is really valid there I think a
coach should have previous student references and or work and or
testimonials on there and you can get a lot of knowledge from that.
So don't just spend thousands of dollars before you do your own
investigation and research and talk to a potential coach and or
demo producer.
23:23 - Lau Lapides (Host)
And be reasonable about weighing it out. If you're asking your
coach who's been in your coach base out of New York, well, what do
you know about Mary Jane's out in fiscal Wisconsin? It's not
reasonable that they're going to know the answer to that. But what
do you know about joining the union these days? They should really
know some of those answers to resource you.
23:44
So, anything that's of a national or international. Now,
everything's international but national base. They should be in the
know, even on the most basic level, or at least be able to resource
you to the places you can go.
23:57 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Yeah, they're not just voiceover, they should be business. They
should also understand the business and the marketplace and the
industry enough to be able to guide you. Yeah, right, right,
right.
24:07 - Lau Lapides (Host)
I always come back to your survival instinct. You have a gut
instinct for a reason Like listen to your gut. What's the worst
that happens? You lose a job, you miss out on a job, so what? Yeah,
that's the worst that happens. You may have saved yourself from a
lot of heartache and a lot of hell by jumping into it because you
really wanted it or were desperate for it when you knew it was
going against your gut instinct. So always go with your gut
instinct.
24:33 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
And I get a lot of people who are like okay, so I did a job and I
didn't get paid. I can tell you, I've been in this industry over 17
years. I have never not gotten paid, Never, never.
24:42 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Wow, never not gotten paid.
24:43 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
That's lucky, wow, is it lucky or is it me vetting my clients Could
be. I'm going to say yes, I vetted my clients. If I found somebody
that I thought was a little bit, I don't know if I want to work
with them. If I was hesitant, I chose not to work with them and I'm
very fortunate. Again it comes down to I requested that money up
front.
25:07
I'm going to say that I feel like that saved me in many, many ways
is having that, just that simple statement on my quote that says
payment in full is greatly appreciated and available via my PayPal
account to annanganguzacom and basically that is it. I never have
anybody really contest it and if they do contest it it's because
they're a large company that I'm very familiar with and I'm able to
get in contact with the people in purchasing who can give me a PO
and who can give me the net terms of payment, which sometimes can
be 90 days Now have you ever had a company sign that and say, yeah,
we're going to give you whatever 50% upfront or 100% upfront and
not come through and still do the job?
25:45
No, no, I've always gotten either paid upfront or I've gotten my
payment. I've never, ever had that happen. Yes, I'm fortunate, but
I also think it has a lot to do with me being savvy and not
necessarily picking up clients that are questionable. Right, gotcha
and I do have clients where I signed contracts. They went out of
business you know what I mean After so many years but ultimately,
because I had been working with them for so long, either
transferred me to the new owners, right, and then I might've had
issues with the new owners.
26:12
But again, I've never where I didn't get the job or I didn't get
the offer. I'd say I worked with a company for a very long time and
then my point of contact changed, right, that happens quite a bit
when you work with clients over a period of many years, your point
of contact changes and then maybe you don't have that job anymore
because they've brought in somebody new and maybe they want
somebody cheaper and it's time to change voices Either way. So
that's happened to me, which I think has happened to anybody, but
thankfully, I've always gotten paid and knock on wood.
26:42
I'm grateful. And again, just keep my eyes and ears peeled. Now, if
you are working with an agent, right, that's what your agent does,
right, your agent negotiates those contracts for you. Now, have you
ever had at a point where one of your clients didn't come through
and pay and then you weren't able to pay? The talent.
27:01 - Lau Lapides (Host)
No, I've never witnessed that or seen that happen, not within our
agency, but I've had it happen in my coaching business. I've had it
happen under Lollapeda Studios a number of times through the
years.
27:11 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Where you've had a student that didn't pay you.
27:13 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Yeah, or whatever. Or someone came for a first time, they looked
super legit, they took an hour this was in the days in person,
right and then they just cut out, they just never paid for it, and
then I learned okay, so I have to get it up front, that's
okay.
27:27 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
I mean for coaching services, learning lessons.
27:29 - Lau Lapides (Host)
I call it learning money. I tried not to get angry and hold on to
that because I said that's the nature of some people, so you have
to just know your audience.
27:38 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
I did have where, let's say offering services through VO Peeps,
where I used to run events, and people will come to events and say
I will pay you later, right, can I come? Is there a spot available?
Can I come? And yes, being young in the business, sure you can come
and then ghost and then not pay. That has happened not often,
because after that I got very smart and it's gotten to the point
where I host events that are non-refundable at this
point.
28:06 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Well, that's important actually because everyone would pull out.
Everyone would pull out for some reason, even for sickness
right.
28:13 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
I try to be very like with coaching if somebody gets sick, I will
be very understanding and lenient about that. But now with events,
when I run events and I have to sell spots, even if somebody gets
sick, I'm sorry. I have a no refund policy and that has developed
over 15 years of doing events.
28:29 - Lau Lapides (Host)
I do find, though, Annie, honestly, because I've been an event
organizer for a long time, most, most, most people take no issue
with that. Yeah, exactly, they know most most people take no issue
with that. Yeah, exactly, they know. Hey, listen, I punked out, I
didn't make it Well yeah, absolutely.
28:40 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
It's all right.
28:42 - Lau Lapides (Host)
And they just forget about it. Very rarely do I have people
fighting, because that would be like they would think that they're
in the right.
28:48 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
I have people that want credit.
28:49 - Lau Lapides (Host)
They get sick and then they want credit and sometimes I'll do that
Some big events do that, but I don't think it's a good policy
because I think it gives people an out.
28:58 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
Yes, agreed, Guys, be educated, be smart and be savvy and try to
avoid those being taken for granted and being scammed. Great
episode, Law, Great episode.
29:09 - Lau Lapides (Host)
Good stuff, great episode.
29:10 - Anne Ganguzza (Host)
All right, I'm going to give a great big shout-out to somebody I
have been with for years and years and years and that is IPDTL. I
love IPDTL. Still continue to actually do all of my coaching
sessions via IPDTL. So many advantages to that. It's a great
quality, fantastic audio quality. My students can record their
sessions. It's amazing. I have playback. It's super easy. Guys, you
can find out more at IPDTLcom. Connect and network like bosses Law.
Thank you so much. It's been amazing. Bosses, have a great
week.
29:41
My pleasure We'll see you next week. Bye, see you next
week.
29:46 - Intro (Host)
Join us next week for another edition of VO Boss with your host,
Ann Ganguzza, and take your business to the next level. Sign up for
our mailing list at vobosscom and receive exclusive content,
industry revolutionizing tips and strategies and new ways to rock
your business like a boss. Redistribution with
permission.
30:06 - Speaker 4 (Host)
Coast-to-coast connectivity via IPDTL and corporate narration, and
even just working with her on my e-learning reads has made me a
better voice actor when it comes to the corporate narration work
that I get in, and I can hear the difference from the first day I
coached with her up until today when we had our session, and I'm
really excited to see how much more I'm going to keep growing and
keep outsmarting all the AI bots, because she'll give you tips on
that as well of how not to sound like you're just reading or how
not to sound like an AI voice but actually sound like a
human.
30:51
I love that Anne cares about her students and their success,
because she's such a good teacher and she's a teacher at heart, and
so you know when you're gonna work with her, you're going to do
your best and it might really push you sometimes, but when you can
look back on your growth and see just how far you've come, you know
all the tears, the blood, sweat and tears is gonna be worth it. So
thank you, anne, for taking your time with me and helping me get
past those moments of frustration to finally understand and grow as
an actor. I really appreciate it.