Branding | Dave Courvoisier's Blog

Introducing the “CourVO” App!!

October 19, 2011 By CourVO 12 Comments

Didja really think I’d be able to resist the inevitable march of progress?

The COURVO app is now available in the iTunes store. It’s free.

Now you can read all the great content of this blog on your iPhone/iPad.

You can also do a search for the app from your iPhone App Store icon by searching for “CourVO”. There’s apparently an app named “Courvoisier” too. Not mine. (the actual name of the app is CourVO’s Voice-Acting in Vegas)

The app presents all the branding and content of this blog by pulling the info from my RSS feed and displaying it in a simple interface.

This was actually not brain surgery at all, and almost anyone can do it. Visit AppMakr.com to see about doing your own. There were some costs involved: about $100 for the Apple Developer’s license, and some minimal AppMakr fees.

This was actually slated for launch a couple of weeks ago, then Apple announced iOS 5.o. Immediately, all apps considered for review were rejected for rebuild to be compatible for the new operating system. S’OK…the result is pretty much what I wanted.

From the app, you can:
comment back to the blog article
share the article on Twitter
share on FaceBook
“like” the article
see the original blog layout in a browser window
email the article

Some functionality of the app is still in development. You’ll see that if you select the “camera” icon, or the RSS icon. Pressing the ATOM icon will bring you back to the list of articles.

I hope you’re reading this blog on your iPhone.

BTW, the Android version of this is coming…likely within a week.

Let me know what you think.

CourVO

Filed Under: Apps, Branding, iPad Tagged With: app, CourVO, courvo app, CourVO's app, CourVO's Voice-Acting in Vegas app, iPhone, iphone app, VO, voice acting, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice talent, voice voice over, voiceover

Crafting Your Personal Brand

July 30, 2011 By CourVO Leave a Comment

Wanna know why resources on the web about branding are never-ending?

1) New ideas come up every day.
2) New perspectives on old ideas come up every day.
3) People/companies change…and what works one day, won’t work the next.
4) There’s a lot of flailing around, and sometimes you just have to take calculated risks on things to see what sticks to the wall when you throw it out there.
5) What you can legitimately claim as your most marketable (branded) feature/service/product has evolved.
6) {and about a million other reasons…branding is a moving target}

For all those reasons and more…I will probably never stop posting and referring to great articles about branding….and this one is about as good as any I’ve read.

Courvo

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/ri69eC

http://www.personalbrandingblog.com/crafting-your-perso…

Filed Under: Branding Tagged With: brand, Branding, career, dan schawbel, Marketing, offers, personal branding blog, VO, voice, voice acting, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice talent, voiceover, your story

Why You Need a Brand, & How To Create One

May 27, 2011 By CourVO Leave a Comment

That’d be great if I was actually smart enough to write a blog with that title…but the truth is someone already has, and I don’t want to be guilty of plagiarism.

I’ve mentioned FreelanceFolder before, right?

Good, ’cause that’s where you need to go to read this excellent article.

Sure, you could read books and books about branding…but that’s for tomorrow. For now, just start with this excellent blog.

CourVO

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/kNI746

URL: https://www.google.com/reader/view/?tab=my

Filed Under: Branding, Marketing, VO Community Tagged With: 1000, blogs, brand, freelance folder, freelancefolder.com, google reader, Marketing, news, onegoogle, VO, voice, voice acting, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice talent, voiceover, voices

7 Sizzling Tips to Enhance Your Online Brand Identity

March 1, 2011 By CourVO Leave a Comment

My Fave in this list: #6 “Break Category Norms For Your Product”

Branding is such a hard target for most people to hit. At FaffCon the topic came up often, and while there are some timeless truths about branding, today’s social media world HAS changed the game a little.

One of the opening lines to this article that is so true: You need to flow with the trends and touch those tipping points to make it big. The more you adapt what is new, the more you come into the spotlight. What becomes usual fails. There is one thing. Businesses either change or they are finished!

Peruse this list for a little refresher!

CourVO

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/bs508

See original post: URL: http://www.quickonlinetips.com/archives/2011/02/enhance…

Filed Under: Branding Tagged With: debleena bose, enhance, indentity, species, strongest

Bettye on Branding

December 31, 2010 By CourVO Leave a Comment

What a ballyhooed word: Branding. Where to start? What’s MY brand? Is a brand a logo?…a slogan?…my face? How do I get my brand out there?

January 4, VoiceOverXtra starts the New Year with “7 Steps To Building A Better Brand” – a webinar led by Bettye Zoller.

Zoller details how to analyze current brand marketing, effective marketing techniques, and how to keep the brand consistent everywhere – even in personal networking.

Here’s the link to details: http://conta.cc/BrandingWeb

CourVO

Filed Under: Branding Tagged With: Bettye Zoller, brand, Branding, voice acting, voice actor, voice artist, voice talent, voice-over voice over, voiceover, voiceover talent, VoiceOverXtra, VoiceOverXtra.com, voicesvoices.com

49 ways to build your brand using online marketing

December 28, 2010 By CourVO Leave a Comment

VoiceOver is 20% talent & technology, 80% marketing. Of these 49 tips, make sure you’re using at least half…OK?

See this Amp at http://bit.ly/fClynC

URL: http://blog.sponsoredreviews.com/?p=67

Filed Under: Branding Tagged With: brand, building, market, scratch, thing49

Brand in a Box

September 21, 2010 By CourVO Leave a Comment

How will the rest of the world see you?
What is your “look”?
How do you want to be perceived?
What kind of first impression will you make?

When you consider BRAND, these are some of the questions that you’ll ponder (along with others — I do not profess to be a branding expert).

There’s more that goes into a brand of course, especially in voice overs. But when you do business cards, when you design a website, when you consider what your email signature will look like…you start thinking about finding a logo and a tag line, and putting it all together in a nice neat little rectangle, or square, or circle, etc.

What colors will you use, what font, what picture (if any)?…how should it appear?

These are all rhetorical questions, of course, but lately I’ve been getting LOTS of examples of how Voice Actors want to be perceived.

In the rush to launch National Voice Over Month, I promised to place the logo of any supporter on the home page of the NVOM site. I’ve been doing that over and over again, thanks to the enthusiastic support of many VO companies and individuals.

What has emerged is a colorful tapestry of logos and brand statements. Have you looked? Do you have a favorite? How does yours stack up against the others? Did you get some ideas seeing all the different offerings? What works? What doesn’t?

Take a look now if you haven’t lately. I added two more logos last night. I find it fascinating to see the spectrum. Yes, there are some microphones. There are very few faces. Some have slogans, others have website URL’s. Some are no-nonsense, others are artistically or aesthetically pleasing.

Here’s the question, though: Which ones WORK? Which ones achieve the owner’s intent? Which ones truly extend a memorable brand worthy of what the voice actor hopes to impress upon the seeker?

CourVO

Filed Under: Branding Tagged With: National Voice Over Month, NVOM, voice, voice acting, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice over talent, voice talent, voiceover, voicing

5 Great VO Branding Tips

April 26, 2010 By CourVO Leave a Comment

The number of books and articles written about branding could sink Noah’s Ark.

But brand is something you absolutely MUST spend some time thinking about…preferably BEFORE you spend a lot of money on websites, business cards, graphics, and letterhead.

The no-brainer approach to VO branding dictates you find a decent picture of a microphone…choose a name or a slogan with the word “voice” in it somewhere, and start plastering it all over your website, your FaceBook page, and maybe even buy some ad space on a high-traffic VO forum.

‘Nothing wrong with that whatsoever if that’s what you want your brand to be. Ultimately, your brand represents your essence, the character, personality trait, ability, or reputation that defines you and your work. Am I wrong?

Uh, maybe…Seth Godin makes a career (and a healthy living) out of dissecting “brand” and here’s his definition: A brand is the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer’s decision to choose one product or service over another.

In fact, a great case can be made for the theory that VO branding is virtually indistinguishable from any other service-oriented or freelance branding. This is the sneaky way I am able to justify offering the following 5 links on branding in general, and claim they’re VO Branding Tips. (so shoot me!….I did some research on this, and these are GREAT ARTICLES!) My favorite: #2.

VO Branding Tip #1
Seth Godin Defines “Brand”
http://goo.gl/8YaX

VO Branding Tip #2
Think You’re in Control of Your Brand? Think Again! Google Never Forgets!
http://goo.gl/ckLM

VO Branding Tip #3
Build Your Brand So People Will Refer You
http://goo.gl/eW3F

VO Branding Tip #4
7 Ways to Identify and Market the Uniqueness of Your Freelance Business
http://goo.gl/RhQX

VO Branding Tip #5
Top 10 Free Tools for Monitoring Your Brand’s Reputation
http://goo.gl/KT3u

…AND ONE FOR THE ROAD
How to Best Promote Your Brand Using Social Media
http://goo.gl/ouqD

CourVO

Filed Under: Branding Tagged With: brand, Branding, Marketing, Seth Godin, voice, voice actor, voice artist, voice over, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover talent, voices

PostOp on a Teleseminar

November 15, 2009 By CourVO Leave a Comment

When do you become an “expert”?

That word makes me uncomfortable.

That’s why, when I started my teleseminar Saturday morning (Leveraging Social Media for Your VoiceOver Business) on behalf of the VoiceOverDirectory, I began by saying I’m a fan of Social Media, I enjoy Social Networking, I’m familiar and comfortable with New Media…I’m drawn to its potential…but “expert”? Nah!

Social Media is too new, and so ever-changing for anyone to be able truly be an “expert”…at least by my definition, which I’m conveniently not stating here.

My talk was more about trends, indicators…mapping out a few directives that seem to be working FOR NOW…and why voice actors really shouldn’t ignore the opportunities afforded by New Media for furthering their brand, their personality…the relationships that may lead to enriching their personal lives, and advancing their business.

Amazingly, I talked almost non-stop about that for almost a half-hour, and still felt there was much left unsaid.

I’m a geek at heart, which means I’m a genetically hard-wired metal detector, perking up when a wayward fragment of social media metal shows up on my radar. But I know (that’s right, keep telling yourself, Dave) that Social Media is only one of the tools in my job-searching toolbox. It just happens to be the one that captures my fancy (hey!…I found a gold doubloon!).

Maybe I’m on to something. Maybe not. Maybe it’ll bring me more VO jobs…or not. Or maybe — just maybe — all this flailing around may lead me into an unexpected career vector that has little to do with voice-acting. All I know is along the way I’m learning a ton, and meeting some of the savviest people on the planet.

Below is about a 2:30 excerpt of my teleseminar. I recorded the whole thing on a trusty Logitech webcam…and the audio you hear is from the onboard Logitech mic (not the greatest). On this segment I blatantly break a number of my own rules, stated so smugly on my new website: OnCamTips.com. But, there may be some value in watching this anyway: a segment on the rationale for voice actors to consider authoring a blog of their own.

I have no idea how many listened in, but quite a few responded afterward to say they’d like the resource material I promised to make available if they’d just send their e-mail address to me. I think they were just being polite…;-}

BTW, write me at [email protected], and I’ll put you on the mailing list for that resource material, too.

My thanks to Mark Davidson and Austin Alexander of VoiceOverDirectory for asking me to speak, and arranging this teleseminar so professionally.

Also my gratitude to a couple of voice-actors who are social media VO giants in my eyes: Trish Basanyi (@Trishsvoice) and Terry Daniel (@TDaniel39).

CourVO