OPINION: Don't overlook the voiceover's impact on branding

With the rise of the celeb voiceover on everything from feature-length animations to TV commercials, it’s easy to see how a good ad campaign is made better by the addition of a beautiful, resonant and characterful voice. A voice should heighten, brighten and ultimately add oomph to the core message of your campaign.

But, what if your budget doesn’t run to thesps Morgan Freeman or Julia Roberts? Or what if they, like Snoop Dogg, are off lending their voice to the latest sat-nav device? How then do you find the perfect voice that consumers can connect to?

The first thing I suggest is to shop around. It’s all too easy to ask for the voice talent used on the last campaign and book them in. Sure, they know the score, and you know they can deliver. It might look like a win-win, but it has the potential to fall as flat as Lindsay Lohan at an afterparty. By pulling the same voice card time and again, the impact of each new campaign is weakened. Worse still, the spark of perfection provided by the right voice, that could really make your ad fly, is missed.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that in the Asia-Pacific market, where the voice talent pool is smaller, your regular VO is likely to be everybody else’s regular VO too. The chronic overuse of a certain voice talent on my local TV station sends me reaching for the remote faster than Joan Rivers books facelifts. When you hear one voice non-stop for five TVCs, how can any of the products possibly stand out?

It also riles me when a good voice is used for the wrong spot. I don’t suggest that a voice can make or break a campaign. But like a good vintage port and ripe stilton, the voice and picture need to complement each other. I recently saw an ad for a book of classic English children’s stories voiced in a broad Australian accent: a wonderful voice—rich, resonant and so on—but entirely wrong for the spot. The audio equivalent of pairing a Prosecco with a vindaloo.

Lastly, it really does pay to look in the right place for your voice talent. Recently a panicked producer needed us to fix an oh-so-common little problem. The spot had been voiced by the wannabe voice talent from the producer's office, the guy who dabbles in amateur dramatics. When I saw the ad and heard the read, it was more shocking than seeing Mel Gibson at a ba’mitzvah. The pronunciation, pace and intonation were totally off, and did nothing for the product being advertised. Little wonder the client rejected the voice.

It’s worth giving your brief to a voice agency, listening to the voices they recommend, and selecting the one that gives your campaign that special something it deserves. Play around with differentials—age, tone and style—to see if a particular voice makes your pictures pop better than Janet Jackson at the Super Bowl. The results will certainly be better than your office mate. Maybe even better than Julia Roberts.