Latest / A VO's Journey: Voiceover and more voice over / Ep. 77: What Is Going On With Fiverr?

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Ep. 77: What Is Going On With Fiverr? · A VO's Journey: Voiceover and more voice over

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to episode number 77 have a vos journey.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: My name is Anthony Pika and this podcast is all about helping the new and upcoming voice over artists.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: Learn how to make it in this crazy business by following my journey and hopefully sidestepping all of the problems that I run into.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Well, hi everyone.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: It is great to be back.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: It is the day after the Easter break and I am thrilled to be coming to you tonight just to really be giving you an update about what's going on with becoming a full time voiceover artists, which I'm super excited about.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: And also going to talk to you about some of the things that are happening with me in moments, uh, with Fiverr and you know, all the different ups and downs that go into that.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: All right, cool.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: Let's do it.
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: This is the oes journey with your host, the incomparable Anthony peak.
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: Alright, so
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: man, it is good to be back.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: I, uh, you know, I've gone to this format of trying to do a podcast once a week and you know, I miss doing more.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: I actually really liked doing the podcast more than once a week because it, it, it really was like a, it is, it's, it's a journal of my journey and it's nice to talk to you daily about what's happening, you know, and, and you know, that's, that's the re that's the realness of, I think this business for me at least, was to be able to share with you what was going on.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: So today I want to share with you what's going on and talk to you about some real things that are happening and some things that, you know, we probably all experience so, you know, things that had been going on and my life as, you know, I, it's so interesting because I, I declared that I was going full time as a voiceover artists, so excited.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: I'm, I'm, I can't wait, but I still have to get through these next, I guess it's about, it's the middle of June that I'll be done technically working at my other job.
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: So that's like, you know, that's still about seven weeks away or so.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: And a so like, you know, that's, uh, I'm, I'm so ready to go.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: Uh, not because I, I'm so anxious to leave my job, but more so just to really back, you know, get going full time on doing this.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: Uh, I'm, I'm looking forward to getting up early in the morning, coming to my studio, working on the business, doing voiceovers and the day time when it's sunny out, not necessarily when it's super late.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: However, my wife pointed out the other day and I think someone else did too.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: Even when I do that, it will be probably weird for me not to work at night, but I don't think it will be as weird is I as maybe as many people think it will be.
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: Because for me, I do like to sleep at night, like all of us and I think it would be really awesome to be able to go to bed, get up in the morning and work, you know.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: And that's something that I have not experienced yet from, you know, from that standpoint of working full time.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: But anyways, what I was saying was, is as I declared, I was going full time, you know, my other job revved up.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: Like it just ramped up insanely.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: And you know, I don't know if any of you guys experienced this, but I did.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: So as you know, Fiverr, uh, I love Fiverr.
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: Fiverr is a big part of my income and everything.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: You know, uh, it was going well, but then I, I started getting, I was super busy.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: I had some big books going on and you know, I as as always happens on Fiverr, you know, there was a car, there was some people who were trying to get me to do a lot for a little, you know, and that's, that's just normal Fiverr and you know, instead of me working with them, there was one person who, uh, was trying to get me to do a 300,000 word audio book for only$3,500.
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: And that's just a ludicrous, because you know, 300,000 words, if you think about it, I mean even if you were to every single day[inaudible] you think about how many hours that is a and finished hours and then you think about how many hours that actually is.
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: You're talking about like a month of 40 hour work week work weeks just to get the book done, maybe in a month.
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: And that's working eight hours a day on just that, nothing else.
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: And for$3,500 that's, that's not a lot when technically it should be more like seven to$8,000 or even maybe a little bit more to do that type of book.
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: So anyways, this was a person, this was a client who I had done some books for book, I'd done some books before, uh, with them and they had charged, I charged them a little bit less because the books weren't as long and it was okay for me to do that.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: But on this book, you know, I was willing to go a little more, a little down from, you know, the$7,000 or so, or 8,000 however much it was, but they wanted to go all the way to$3,500 and I just, you know, I couldn't do it.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: You know, I was like, I just, that's, you know,$3,500 is a lot of money.
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to lie.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: But at the same time, the amount of work.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: So if I think about all the other things I have to do, Ryan, and you add that up, it was, it was just not possible.
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: So where I'm going with all this was, is that it didn't go through and then there became, there was like a series of a couple of different clients who came on who wanted, you know, a lot for very little, you know, and I was like, I'm not doing that.
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: I'm not going to do it.
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: So what I, I, so what happened is, what happens on Fiverr and a, here's a, here's a fiver tip.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: If you do not have a steady stream of business, even if it's$5 gigs or$5 jobs going through and being completed, okay, Fiverr will will, I mean, your account becomes almost like an active a little bit and it will drop down in the rankings.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: So what happened with me is, is that because of that, my account started dropping down in the rankings and I wasn't getting a lot of business, you know?
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: And that's, and that was very frustrating because it's like, what the heck is going on?
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: Why do I got to deal with this stuff?
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: And, uh, you know, and of course I went back on there and business, you know, came back and you know, it's, it's steady again, but you know, the idea, the, the, the thing is, is that it's still, it still is up and down, you know?
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: And that's okay.
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: I mean, I love Fiverr.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: I, you know, this is still been a great, a great month, hasn't been fantastic, but it's been okay.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: You know, I mean, it's, I'm at around$3,300 this month, you know?
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: And that's all right.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: I've not actually done a terrible amount of work on fire of this month.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: And you know, honestly speaking it's been, it's also been nice in a way because I've been so busy at my job cause I had a full time, I had a full main stage production where I had to build the whole set and do all the tech stuff and about 10 days because I couldn't get on before spring break on the stage.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: And then now I've got about a week and a half to get this other set done.
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: We're doing clue and that's another full mainstage and I'm building like a mansion on stage and all this stuff.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: So you know, it's a lot of work, a lot of work in a short period of time and it's a lot of physical work.
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: And you know, when you do the physical work, you come home, you're, you're super exhausted.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: When I'm doing the mental work, that's exhausting as well.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: But it's not as exhausting.
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: I can, you know, I can go longer, but the physical work, I'm just so exhausted physically that it's harder for me to go longer into the night.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: And you know, with all the different things going on was it's, it's been, it's been a lot slower.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: So business has definitely started picking back up again.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: And it could be too, I mean, maybe some people experienced it.
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: I mean, let's be honest, we went through tax time, you know, that's always a weird time where things are up and down.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: We went through a Easter as well, but there's a lot of people I see who are doing very well on Fiverr and there's some people who still aren't getting any work on Fiverr.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: And I think that, uh, as I went back and looked at my Fiverr stats again, you know, as I'm always trying to evaluate, it became very clear without a shadow of a doubt that when I did a job and I got a five star rating or review and it was accepted of course, and got a five star review, uh, that it shot up, my ratings were shut up my rankings and every time.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: And when I did it over a period of time, they go back down.
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: And it really is, it's like clockwork.
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: It's pretty crazy.
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: It's like clockwork with that.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: And the more that you get, you can actually track it.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: If you go back, if you have enough work, you know that you can track that way.
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: It's really amazing that it's that you know, that simple.
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: And here's another thing I did, I actually even messaged Fiverr and I said, hey listen, I've had a downtick in my, my business, I've gotten all these five star reviews.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: I don't know what's going on.
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: And the fiber, a fiber person emailed me back and said, uh, I looked at your account, everything looks great.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: You might want to try to do some social media to drive some traffic to your account.
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: I thought it was one of the most generic answers, uh, to give a person who has been doing five or I feel not of course as long as other people, but I've done a decent amount of work on Fiverr and you know, like that was something I should look at and be like, oh, I didn't know that.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: But anyways, I, I took it for what it's worth.
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: And to say that, you know, I think the people who run Fiverr, or at least the moderators on there, you know, they don't have as much control.
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: I mean the person in the email said, we don't control what ranking you are or who sees your gigs or not.
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: I don't know exactly how much I agree with that or in the sense of which they're, they're, you know, they're responding to that or how they're their meaning it.
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: But, but that's what they said.
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: And I do think as I, again, I went back to the stats to try to figure something out and that's when I saw about the importance, like when I would get a a job and it would be completed and get a five star rating, et Cetera.
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: How much, you know, your, your Gig is boosted and you know, so that's really important.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: Something interesting I did and I wanted to tell you guys is that, uh, I was able to start generating a little, some more business because I wanted to get five star reviews.
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: So what I did was, is I actually, as you know, well you might not know, but something that I do, uh, and is that, uh, when I deliver an order, I always try to, you know, I say thank you and I always put in there of course some information about, you know, please, if you have a few minutes, fill out a review.
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: Again, you never ever, ever tell them to put a good review or any specific type of review.
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: You, you can ask them to give you a review but never ask them to give you a specific type of review.
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Anyways, so I was doing that and I realized, you know, some of the people who go on there, they're going really fast, right?
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: And they just, they download this stuff cause they want it really quickly.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: They might not even look at your message.
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: So what I did was, is I was noticing that, you know, I'm, I'm at about 65% rating or 65% of people rate my, you know, like, except and rate my, my, my gigs, the rest of them, 35% just download the stuff.
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: And move on.
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: So I thought, you know, maybe, maybe I could up that a little bit.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: So what I did was, is I started to message them too.
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: So if they hadn't accepted it or whatever, and then I would see them online, I would also send them a message, a separate message thanking them for working with me.
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: And if they happen to get a chance, I would really appreciate it if they could leave me a review because it really helps my business.
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: And you know what?
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: Lo and behold, I started, you know, I got a lot more reviews from these people.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: It was really, really nice.
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: So you know, that helped and I started getting more business back, you know, and, and, and more and more people coming back and so forth.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: But the thing is, is that I think you know, you, you, it's always a, it's always a journey.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: It's always a trial and error.
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: You've got to continue to try things.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: You got to continue to do things here and there.
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: I, here's a, here's a perfect example of a, of a fail.
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: I put up a Gig on Fiverr and it was a gig about, um, something that I'm trying to do some, I'm trying to offer some different things cause you know, I do coaching and I, you know, I sell my Fiverr course and so forced, I put ups in different things on fiber.
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: And what's happened is, is like I put up this course and it's good, it has zero impressions.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: So now I've never put up something that just gets no impressions.
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: I went on there, I'm not quite sure what, why it's not getting impressions or literally could be that no one at all is seeing this game, this offer, this Gig.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: So that's not going to work.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: But it's been about a week, a week and a half, and it has zero impressions.
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: So clearly that's not correct.
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: So that's a fail, right?
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: Uh, so I got to go in and figure out what I can do, where I can put that to change that, you know what I mean?
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: So, but, but the, the point that I'm trying to make is, you know, you, you, you fail, you do stuff and you fail and you got to keep trying and you got to try different things.
• 15:09
  Speaker 1: And so anyways, I just wanted to tell you guys about that part of my journey and everything that's going on.
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: Uh, so that's been, you know, that's been, that's been challenging and it's actually been a little frightening, uh, with this whole thing because of, you know, this time where I'm going full time and you know, when you, you, when you go full time, there's a couple of things that happen, you know, the sink, when my poor wife had to get a root canal, you know, and our insurance covers only some of that.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: So like, it's like a thousand and it was like 1000 bucks.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: And you know, the, like I didn't tell you guys about the sink went out.
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: So like there we are, not the sink, but the, our faucet in our kitchen and we, and the, the line froze up to the house so we couldn't turn off the water to the house.
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: So no most flooded the entire kitchen.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: We had had the fire department out to the house, you know, general, crazy, wacky homeowner stuff.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: But the thing is is like, you know, and all this stuff happens, right?
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: It makes you a little nervous.
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: And you know, I realized again that as I'm working so hard at my other job and not really getting paid what I know I should get paid, you know, I, I keep that deep down inside that I am doing the right thing.
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: And I think that it can be a challenge for any of us that fear that, what if this happens or what if that happens?
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: You know what if I, I do this and the bottom, the floor falls out underneath me and I've got nothing and I don't get any work and for like five or just stops working or ACX stops working or the clients don't need me for a couple of months, you know, what am I going to do?
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: And I think that is a real, that's real.
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: That's really scary.
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: But here's the thing, man, we got to have faith in ourselves.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: We got to have faith that we can kick ass and make it happen.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: We have to all right, because we can do it and I know that I would rather put my faith in myself working my butt off every single day.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: I know I will make something happen.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: I know I will never ever let the, the you know the ball drop if I work and I really truly work at it and you need to know that too.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: Whatever you really want and you place right in the forefront of your mind and you go with it with every single ounce of your being, every bit of your passion and your strategy and your love and heart and all that, that Dewey mushy stuff that drives us beyond what we think is possible, it will happen.
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: It will because there is no stopping someone who is determined, all right, who's already burned the ships and decided that they're not going back because there's nowhere else to go but forward.
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: There isn't.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: And the craziest thing about the world and the universe is when you're determined to go somewhere, the universe will help you get there.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: Because once you've made that decision, no one will stop you.
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: Maybe it'll take a little bit longer, maybe a wound, but think of just thinking your life about the times where you've made a concrete decision.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: You've made a decision and you are like, I'm not turning back.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: It's already decided I'm, I'm doing it or I'm moving forward.
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: And it's like once you've really, I'm, and I mean really made the decision.
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: I don't mean you're teetering back and forth.
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: I don't mean you're thinking, well, maybe I'll do it.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: Or here's my backup plan.
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: I mean, you made a decision, it was like concrete in your mind and it was like, wow, I can do it.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: And you do it and it happens and you move forward.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: And it was like, well crap, why didn't I make that decision before?
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: All right, it's real.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: It is real.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: Now I know I've made the decision that now, does that mean that you're not scared?
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: No, I'm, I'm still scared.
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: But at the same time, I'm really excited.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: I'm really excited and I know that I am going to be fantastic.
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: I'm going to be great.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: And the opportunities are endless and they are for you to use, have to keep pushing yourself forward and make that decision that there is no going backwards.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: There's no turning back.
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: And remember, your success also is determined by how well you solve the problems that present themselves.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: So if there's a problem, Matt comes in your path.
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: If you get by that problem, there is the promise land on the other side of that problem and you're in the promise.
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: Land Promised Land, then another problem comes.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: You beat that, then you're in a bigger promise.
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: Land Promised Land, there's another problem.
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: You beat that promise land again.
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: That's life, right?
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: That is our life.
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: It's the people who quit that never get to the promise land.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: When the problem comes that people look at it in the face and they quit, the promise land is on the other side.
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: Don't quit.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: Keep pushing yourself.
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: Even if you don't know the answer.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: Dad Gone and go out and find it or screw up enough times until you figure it out on your own.
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: All right.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: I was missing my rants.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: I hope you like that to go get it, you guys.
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: I am so excited.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: I cannot wait to do the next podcast with you.
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: I hope you enjoy this tonight.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: It was great to you.
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: Again, I'm really looking forward to the future for you and for me, for all of us, and for voiceover.
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: All right guys.
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: Have a wonderful night.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: I'll talk to you soon.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: Who's.