The Actor’s Efficiency Matrix

Remember that scene when Neo unplugged from the Matrix and saw that the world was made up of a bunch of ones and zeros? He saw the agents standing before him, taking shots and bent reality to his will, stopping the bullets in midair.

With every release, I aim to give you a little taste of that. Every week, I offer you the choice of the red pill or the blue pill. If you are reading this, it’s pretty clear which one you have chosen.

Now it’s time that you start bending reality to your will, grasshopper.

Just like Neo, it’s not enough to simply take the red pill and download the information. You too have to act upon it.

That’s where I come in. Over the years, I’ve come to know the players and more importantly, I’ve learned how to play their game.

What I’m sharing with you today is straight from their playbook. This is the strategy that has launched or relaunched the careers of actors that we all look up to. I’m not one to call anyone out by name, but let’s just say that The Avengers franchise would be much different if it weren’t for this strategy.

I’ve taken what I’ve swiped from my industry insiders, cut out the fluff, and refined it so that’s even simpler for you to use.

It’s called the Actor’s Efficiency Matrix.

To use the strategy effectively you have to understand the method behind the madness. Simply stated, everything you do falls into one of four categories, as you can see on the chart below.

Those categories are: Low Efficiency, Low Effectiveness, High Efficiency, and High Effectiveness. Not having any knowledge of this strategy, most actors just fill their days with activity that is haphazardly planned at best.

This is kind of like hopping in the driver’s seat of your car and randomly pushing buttons, pulling knobs, and stomping pedals, hoping that you make progress towards your destination.

Because we all have limited time and limited resources, it’s important to focus on the activities that will be the most effective and that are also highly efficient. I’ve given you some general examples of things you’re probably doing every week (I hope!).

What you want to aim for is creating a plan for launching your career, through activities that overlap in the highly efficient and highly effective categories. From the chart above you can see how some activities are double edged swords.

For example, posting to social media falls into the High Efficiency category, however without a plan and purpose it also fits into the low effectiveness category. The circle part of the graph shows you the activity to replace it with, in order to make it overlap into the correct categories. In this case that’s “creating a dominant social media presence.” We’ll come back to that in a bit.

So many of us think that we’re doing everything we can, because we’re going on 3 auditions a day…except they’re all cattle call auditions. Of course, these overlap in the low efficiency and low effectiveness category.

Let me be clear, you don’t have to stop doing this. In fact, you might go insane if you quit cold turkey, but you do have to employ the 80/20 rule.

Most actors are spending 80% of their time focused on stuff that yields 20% of their results (like open auditions). The fix for this is easy, simply flip the equation and allocate more time to activities that are more efficient and more effective.

It’s ok for activities to fit into opposing categories. This will still allow you to make massive strides. For example, instead of going on tons of cattle call auditions, network with decision makers that can hire you. This activity normally requires face time in small groups or even one on one, so it falls into the low efficiency category.

However, because you would be in direct communication with people that can hire you and move your career forward, it is highly effective and counteracts the “efficiency drag.”

The way to do this is out of the scope of this release, but I encourage you to spend time checking out one of the many releases I’ve put out about this topic.

There are also activities that are highly efficient but not very effective. Because you can send out 100 headshots in about 90 minutes, this is highly efficient. Because they would only be looked at while being sorted into the trash bin (sad but true) it falls into the Low effectiveness category.

The opposite of that would be to send out your demonstration of power pack. That falls into the low efficiency category but it is one of the most effective things you can do to push your career forward.

So that’s it grasshopper. You just took a crash course in a strategy that Hollywood power brokers have been working on for over 50 years. There’s a reason why some things haven’t changed. New movie release=late night show circuit. It’s both highly efficient and highly effective (along with a few other closely related activities like the press junket) so they focus heavily on it.

Here’s what you should do next. Make a list of all of the career related activities you do on a weekly basis. Then, label which categories each of those activities falls into.

Anything that doesn’t at least have a counterbalance (such as low efficiency countered with high effectiveness) should be slashed from your list of things to do.

A couple of things will happen when you start doing this.

1. You will inevitably have more time to focus on the things that move the needle and push your career forward
2. You will have the building blocks of a plan to launch your career

Throughout this process you will be tempted to cheat and justify the reason for keeping some items on your list when you know they don’t belong. Resist the temptation grasshopper. If in doubt, throw it out.

Success doesn’t require doing 1000 things a few times. It requires doing a few things 1000 times.

On that note, the number one thing you can do to thrust your career to the next level is build a dominate social media presence and polish your industry credibility. Not only does this make everything else easier (literally every-thing!), but it is also one of the few things you can do that falls into the highly efficient and highly effective categories. 

There’s no downside to it, so that’s why I created this for you.

It’s the only thing that puts this crucial activity, arguably the most important part of your career development, on autopilot.

Do the exercise above. If you decide that you want to achieve your goals faster and easier by building a platform that you can leverage, then go here and get the details on that.

I love hearing your tales of triumph so remember, I’m always only a comment or an email away.

See you at the top,
Scott

P.S. the world needs more great actors, so why not you? It’s no secret that building a platform and having a stellar industry reputation is the fastest road to success. It’s waiting for you here on a silver platter.

Entertainment Industry Elite

Is there something different about the entertainment industry elite, grasshopper? 

You know I always tell it like it is. No sugarcoating. No fluff… 

Short answer yes there is. Having studied them, to reverse engineer their formula for success, I discovered a secret that none of them really talk about. I don’t blame them and this release is not about “exposing” them. 

The information is out there if you look hard enough. Lucky for you, as a tribe member, I’ve done the digging for you. 

Not only am I going to tell you their secret, I’m also going to tell you exactly how you can duplicate their success, by doing what they have done. 

So without further ado, here’s the secret… 

The industry elite, from Taylor Swift to The Gyllenhaal’s were well funded. 

Here’s what I mean. 

Taylor Swift was aided in her rise to fame by her ability to blend in as the girl next door. If you grew up in the lap of luxury and on a multimillion dollar estate, she very well could have been the girl next door. 

Even though celebs like to play up how they paid their dues and suffered until they finally made it to the big time, those stories are often…embellished. 

Take our current example Taylor Swift. When she was shopping for a record deal and couldn’t find one that was suitable and allowed her the artistic freedom she desired, guess who she turned to? Her dad, Scott Swift, wrote a check and founded the record label that she is still signed to today. 

Pretty sweet, right? 

And she’s far from the only one. Maroon 5 front man Adam Lavine had an upbringing that set him up with the freedom to indulge in creative pursuits. When you’re born into a fashion fortune, you can do that sort of thing. 

Oh yeah, his bandmates weren’t exactly roughing it either. They attended the same private schools. 

Don’t think it’s only musicians though. Ben Savage (Boy Meets World) was born into wealth, Jake and Maggie Gyllenhaal come from a successful industry family, Kate Mara was born into a family that founded the New York Giants and the Pittsburgh Steelers (a multibillion dollar empire), Allison Williams is the daughter of Brian Williams the NBC anchor that has been pulling in 8 figure pay days since the 80s, the list goes on and on. 

This is not intended to be a rich kid bashing whatsoever. This is about reverse engineering success and in order to do that you have to identify where they started from. 

Big businesses call it market research. Politicians call it opposition research. 

I call it common sense… 

Once you identify key success factors, you then figure out how to duplicate that success factor yourself. Sometimes you can do this directly. For example, a key part of Dwayne Johnson’s success was the ability to do his own stunts (it’s hard to find a body double for that guy!). 

So if you were reverse engineering him, you could directly duplicate that factor and get stunt training. 

Some factors, like the one we’re talking about, are more difficult to directly duplicate. If you dig around the interwebs, you might find blueprints for a garage time machine to take you back in time to your childhood with a winning lottery ticket in hand. 

When it’s built and you’ve successfully had a few round trips, drop me a line and I’ll update this release. Until then, let’s shelf that possibility LOL. 

So how do you duplicate a success factor like this one? 

Short answer: you don’t duplicate it, you have to defeat it. I’ll come back to that in a second. 

First, I want to go over a point I made at the beginning. There is something different about the most successful people in the industry. Success leaves clues, and scientists have now discovered the reason that wealth may be generational. Success literally leaves clues in your DNA. 

Here’s a stunner: the wealthiest 85 people in the world hold as much wealth as literally all of the world combined. Wrap your mind around that one. 

Researchers from New York University and The University of Southern California have discovered the genetic markers for generational wealth. I don’t mean a McMansion and a leased Mercedes kind of “wealth.” This is generational wealth like that of the Rockefellers, the Morgans, and the Vanderbilts (by the way Anderson Cooper is an heir of the Vanderbilt fortune, one of the largest fortunes in world history). 

So if Rockefellers are born genetically programmed for success, it’s reasonable to deduce that multigenerational industry families are too. 

What does this have to do with your career? After all, you can’t change your genetic markers…or can you? 

Again, you don’t duplicate it, you have to defeat it. 

See, when you devote yourself to a field of study (whatever it may be) you begin to reprogram you mind for success. So, even though you will be playing catch up, you can in fact rewire yourself for the acting success that you seek. 

This means that in order to conquer that success factor, you have to dive deep into your training. If you’ve been here for any length of time, you probably know that I’m not a big fan of training for training’s sake. 

The reason I caution against that is that most actors will train incessantly and just expect that the training will magically make roles fall in to their lap. You have to train with a purpose and cover all of your bases so that when opportunity knocks, it won’t find you unprepared. 

It’s not just about taking classes and rehearsing nonstop. Simply reading a book has been shown to create powerful neuronets (that’s the brain wiring) too. Look, you can’t conquer what you haven’t yet mastered so if you don’t know the history of the industry, if you don’t know the inner workings of the industry forwards and backwards, you can’t expect to conquer it and leave your mark. 

Part of my mission is to give you this through Boost My Star and make it easy for you, so be sure to spend some time reading through each release. When you do this, not only are you getting insider knowledge of how the industry works that you can’t find anywhere else, you are literally programming yourself for acting success. 

Conquering this success factor takes a bit of dedication, but it should be fun for you if you actually love what you do. 

The other success factor is even easier to conquer. You actually have access to unlimited funds, right now, as you read this. 

While it may not be in the form of bank notes, you have more than enough capital available. 

Here’s what I mean. The industry A listers, whether they are multigenerational or not, took advantage of their familial wealth to give themselves options and open doors. 

You can do the same thing too, without spending the vast sums of cash that they spent. 

For example, if they needed to get some face time with a blockbuster producer, they simply bought a table at a charity event and had the producer as their guest. Easy, right? 

You have the power to do this too and your capital is worth more to them than money. 

I’m talking about social capital. 

See, in a world where attention is literally everything, you can swing open doors that previously required a bar of gold to budge. 

It’s no secret that a social media influencer can make tons of cash but what’s even more valuable is that once you build an attention asset like an Instagram following, you can leverage that asset (instead of cash) to open doors. 

Does Mindy Kaling’s blog ring a bell? How did she get the face time she needed in order to launch her post-The Office career? 

Once you build this asset you can either use it to give shout outs to anyone who send you a t-shirt or you can direct that attention and influence towards your larger goal. 

For example, if an A lister is looking to meet the marketing demands of her latest project, an online interview that gets 500K views is 3X more exposure than they could get for any of the late night shows. 

There are 1000+ ways to leverage this attention to open doors that were previously closed, to meet the people you need to meet, and to thrust your career forward like no other time in history.

I’ve developed something to make this even easier for you. Not only does it help you conquer this success factor, it puts your industry credibility on steroids too. Go here to get the details on that.

In a later release, I’ll dive into some strategies on how you can leverage your new attention asset once you’ve built it, but for now I want to know what ideas you have in mind. Let me know what comes to mind in the comments below or shoot me an email. 

What are you going to do now that you know? If you’re serious about making big moves in your acting career then don’t you owe it to yourself to give yourself every advantage possible?

See you at the top,
Scott

Move the Needle

Anytime you get the opportunity to study the career of an actor with 82 credits to his name (not including recurring roles or characters played over multiple seasons of course), you should pay close attention.

One of the keys to success is to stand on the shoulders of giants and the way to do that is to model what made them successful. We live in the information age…

Stick with me, this is not a tangent. The time we’re living in is a double edged sword.

If you Google “how to become an actor” you will get over 96 Million results. We don’t need more information...we need actionable information. That’s what’s lacking. It’s so easy to go from one blog to the next and pick up tip after tip that gets logged into a mental list of to-dos, most of which never get done.

It’s easy to mistake activity like this for progress. When it comes down to it, the only thing that measures progress is results, and you only get results from the things you do that move the needle: auditioning and being booked.

Having been in the industry for a very long time, I can tell you one of the key differences between actors who never fulfill their dreams and actors who work consistently and build a career they love.

The former always have a lot of “activity” going on and they’re always winging it. As for the latter, they’re engaged in focused activity that moves the needle and produces results. They understand that reshooting your headshot a dozen times or filming glorified B-roll to add to your reel doesn’t make an ounce of difference, if you never get it into someone’s hands.

Also, the successful ones are obsessed with studying patterns of success. Here’s why…

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result, right?

So if you model what successful actors have done and repeat that over and over again, should you expect a different result than what they achieved?

I can you hear you screaming through the interwebs “It’s not that simple!” Agreed. There are a few factors that will affect this, but the bottom line is that this gives you the best shot at achieving your desired result.

It’s the difference between baking a cake blindfolded using whatever you happen to lay your hands on and hoping that it turns out OK, and baking a cake following a proven recipe and using the exact ingredients in the correct quantities.

Follow me?

This is why I bring you case studies like today’s. Let them be your recipe. If you want to be an actor and not an “actor” then you have to stop winging it. Your dreams are too important to leave it to chance.

The actors that we’ll study today couldn’t be much more different and that’s precisely why I selected them. William Fichtner should be instantly recognizable to everyone reading this. His career spans decades, featuring 82 credits and a cast of co-stars that reads like the who’s who of The Hollywood Walk of Fame.

It’s important that you study those that you can learn from, not just someone you like. If you’re a fan and can learn from them, then it’s a huge bonus! William Fichtner rose to fame with films like Armageddon, The Perfect Storm, Blades of Glory, Black Hawk Down, Crash, and many more.

When you begin to model someone, you have start by reverse engineering what led them to the peak. You have to study “the climb.” If you dissect William Fichtner’s career, you will instantly recognize one of the core tenets of our tribe’s philosophy at work.

He created a category of one. He specialized in playing a character, mastered it, became known for it and rode that wave straight to the career he desired. He varied it some but didn’t get side tracked with passion projects until the time was right.

This is about as textbook as you can get. Depending on who you ask, William Fichtner is either washed up and long past being relevant, or he’s just getting started. 2017-2018 is actually slated to be one of his busiest times ever.

He’s making a directorial debut, leaping into producing, and he’s even co-hosting Top Gear America (a franchise of one of the biggest TV shows on the planet). That move raised a few eyebrows as if it was a sign of desperation but it was quite the opposite. It was calculated and perfectly timed.

See, he’s a car guy. His fan base knows this and taking on the role of host in a show all about cars will only draw him closer to his fan base. This is exactly what I mean by “building a career you love.”

Had he made a similar move, directly after Armageddon, his career would have likely derailed. The timing is key. You have to be firmly rooted in your category of one before you begin to deviate too far from it.

Such was the case with Will #2, Wilmer Valderrama. You know him as Fez from “That 70’s Show” or as that guy dated Lindsay Lohan and Demi Lovato.

Not only do you have to study what to do, you also have to study what not to do. This way you sidestep the pitfalls and avoid the mistakes these actors made.

So, Will #2 was undoubtedly at the peak of his star power during his time on That 70’s Show. He’s not exactly a cautionary tale, as he is poised to make a comeback having fixed his career strategy.

Some of our tribe members are people you would recognize if you were to cross paths. Like Wilmer, they’ve been there. They lost their footing and are wondering what happened.

After wrapping That 70’s Show, Wilmer was lost. His character on the show was beyond goofy and you can’t blame him for wanting to create a separation and avoid building a career as the punchline.

See, there’s a delicate balance between building and sustaining a category of one and being typecast. At the time, Wilmer was one of only a handful of Latino actors that were seen as being capable of carrying a film and building a franchise around.

Rather than exploiting that, he ran from it. Unlike William Fichtner's move, this one was not well timed. He wasn’t firmly rooted in his category to began departing it so he got lost in the crowd and became just another struggling actor. This is further evidenced by the time he spent on other projects.

Until recently he was credited as Wilmer Valderrama actor, singer, music producer, screen producer, writer, director and television personality. This is akin to an accountant that will also shine your shoes, and take a look under the hood of your car.

You can’t be great at any one thing, if you’re trying to tackle everything. The moves into other areas must be well timed. He is finally back in the mainstream after a long hiatus (long in Hollywood years). The market has moved away from the category he should have created for himself, but it’s never too late to carve out a niche.

His full slate for the coming year hasn’t yet been released, likely because there isn’t much of one. That’s OK though, bouncing back can take time and I’ll be following his next moves closely. His next project is a voice over character in a family oriented animated film.

Not only this a departure from his previous work, but it’s also telling. See, his fan base today was largely inherited from his relationship with Demi Lovato. The windfall of social media capital that he gained from that was the ace up his sleeve.

With over 700,000 twitter followers, and a rapidly growing following of over 1.2 Million on Instagram, he leveraged this social capital to find a project where he would be able to “move the needle.” For this project, he comes with a potentially lucrative revenue stream attached.

See, sometimes you have to evolve to meet the market. This is primarily why I chose to chronicle Will #2. He’s meeting the market where it’s at rather than trying to revert it back to where it was.

My question to you is: are you meeting the market where it’s at? Do you have an ace up your sleeve: a social media following to leverage when you need it?

Do you have a strategy for building a career you love or are you winging it? Have you defined what your category of one will be?

Here’s how to solve 2 of those problems forever.

So, what was your biggest takeaway from this release? Let me know in the comments below. Stay focused on your success and stay tuned for more to come.

See you at the top,
Scott

Kickstart the Party

Boom! It’s about to happen Grasshopper!

So much has happened around here over the last few weeks that my head is spinning. We’re seeing the old Hollywood cabal crumble before our eyes. Traditional media is on life support and has begun to openly wage war on their digital counterparts.

There is so much going on behind the scenes that you wouldn’t believe, even if you sat in the studio meetings yourself.

This has opened up a window of opportunity for you to jump through. You now have a second chance to be one of the first movers online.

Here’s what I mean…

Can you imagine how things might be different for you right now if only you had been one of the first “YouTubers?” I know a guy that runs his channel out of his basement and collects upwards of $15 Million dollars a year in revenue!

Granted, it is now a very large and nicely equipped basement, but it wasn’t always that way.

He started with a webcam and DSL internet, but he was one of the first online in his space and fully took advantage of being a first mover.

Someone once said “When you’re entering a new marketplace, you can either be first or you can be good.”

Imagine what happens if you’re first and good?

This is so important that my mind is getting way ahead of my keyboard, so I want to backup and keep this simple.

I’m going to detail a strategy for making yourself the only logical choice to be cast. If you simply read this release carefully until the end and do it what it says. You will find yourself overflowing in opportunity.

Plus, I’m literally going to gift you the tools to make this happen. So shut off the distractions and read through carefully.

To really understand all of this, I’m going to share an incredible story with you.

Through a chain of events that started when I was in the eleventh grade, I’ve landed on screen with superstars that we all look up to.

It was all possible because, I was at the forefront of a movement in the entertainment business... A movement in which you now have a second chance to be a part of.

I wouldn’t trade my journey through the industry for anything in the world. It’s been the best of times, and at times it’s been worse than anything I could have ever imagined when I left Pennsylvania.

I remember, I touched down at LAX and immediately enrolled in every acting class, workshop, séance, whatever my wallet could handle.

I thought this was the way in. Get really good and surely, the agents would beat a path to my door with scripts and offers in hand. Over the next few years I landed a few gigs here and there but nothing to write home about.

It was cool though, I thought it was just part of “paying your dues.”

I’ll never forget this though. As big as LA is, Hollywood is actually pretty small, right? You tend to see familiar faces around the audition circuit. One day though I was waiting for my turn to read and I couldn’t help but notice someone new.

He had that unmistakable glimmer of hope and excitement that comes with all the newcomers.

When he was called to read, I noticed that he took an extraordinarily long time. Later on, I heard through the grapevine that he actually won the role.

So I started asking around about him. I don’t know why I cared but I just knew that there was something to this guy. No one I talked to seemed to know anything about him except that he was starting to get booked left and right!

I was in the habit of catching some sun on the sand in Santa Monica, after improv and before my shift at Del Lago. Lo and behold, there he was doing the same so I walked over and asked him how it was that he was taking off so fast.

He told me about this thing online called Myspace and how he had thousands of people all over, following his every move.
Before he even said it, I connected the dots. “You’re using this myspace thing to convince the casting directors that you’re already famous aren’t you?” I asked.

“Bingo!” He said in a thick, almost smug Australian accent. “Internet fame, is the next big thing my friend.”

I knew this was the key.

Over the next several years, I tried everything I could, to get an online presence that I could somehow leverage to show casting directors that I was for real.

Myspace came and went, Tumblr flopped, Friendster was LOL, Facebook was kind of hit or miss at first. The biggest breakthrough finally came when IMDb went mainstream.

When I was finally able to show casting directors a rock solid star rating on IMDb, I was legitimate.

When I was able to show them this and tens of thousands of Instagram and Twitter followers, I made it nearly impossible for them to cast someone else. I came with a built in audience, and that meant I also came with revenue attached.

As I got busier and started to book more jobs, people started to ask me how I was able to stay so busy and they were even asking me if I could help them do the same.

The formula to dominate social media, particularly Instagram since it is rapidly replacing Facebook as the go-to social network, is deceptively simple.

So here’s what you need to do to dominate Instagram.

1. Start a “fan” account and profile your favorite actors and their work
2. Research the biggest accounts related to your actors and see what’s working for them. Figure out the top 3 hashtags they use and the types of content they post
3. Post 3-5 times per day, working those hashtags into your captions
4. Comment on other accounts, related to yours, in order to increase exposure and gain new followers
5. Once you hit the scaling point (5K+ followers) introduce yourself to your followers and move them into your sphere of influence. You now have a platform

Yep, grasshopper it’s that simple. People overcomplicate this soooo much! Instead of looking for articles on how to grow an Instagram account, just do the above. You literally cannot screw it up, so just start.

The one thing you may have to do is kickstart the party.

Click here for my gift to help you do that.

Getting your first few hundred followers can be a bit tough, but you can hack your way to it.

Once you control the attention of the platform you just built, you can leverage it however you want to improve your career.

I wanted to personally help everyone I could but with a busy life on set, I didn’t have much time to spare.

Long story short, I could only help a handful of actors at a time, but they all they all got amazing results! Every last one of them increased their industry cred and ultimately landed steady work.

That’s when the idea for Boost My Star was born.

It is the only system that will drive real organic followers to your IMDb profile day in and day out. This will light your ranking on fire, showing the industry that you have a big fanbase.

Ultimately, this means more gigs for you!

Look, it is no longer a secret that actors with large built in fanbases make projects much more profitable. This is why it is getting increasingly harder to break into the industry if you don’t make a real effort to become well known across platforms like IMDb and on social media.

And the sooner you start to put a real effort into it, the sooner you can start to see results like these:

“Hey Scott, I just wanted to let you I know that I just turned down a gig for the first time ever! I am just too busy thanks to you!”
- Diana K.

"Wow guys! Thank you so much for the boost! It just helped me solidify a huge deal that was in the works! I owe you one :)"
- Chris

"I just wanted to say THIS SERVICE ROCKS! It has given me yet another tool to market myself confidently to the industry."
- Jamie

And because you’re a member of the tribe, I want to give you access to the same system for FREE! I’m doing this for a simple reason...

I want this advantage, having a platform to leverage, to be within reach of every worthy, dedicated actor that actually gives a damn about their career!

So if that’s you, click here to get it for free.

It’s 100% FREE, I simply ask you to enter a credit card to get you into the boosting system, you can cancel it at anytime.

It’s simply my gift to you.

Unfortunately, I can’t give this away for free forever, and once I hit the threshold of people that we can let in free, I’ll have to take the links down.

So if you’re still reading this page and haven’t yet clicked over to get the system (for free) that has launched more careers than probably anything else in this new industry landscape...

Remember, you literally have nothing to lose and only the career of your dreams to gain.

If you’re on the fence about getting the Boost My Star system for Free, you might be thinking “I’m an actor not an Instagrammer.”

The good news is: you don’t have to be. You just have to build a platform that you can leverage.

But you have to decide what’s important to you. Do you want to be an actor or a working actor?

Remember that the industry is a business. Being a working actor means you have to bring value to the table beyond just your talent. You are probably “better” than most actors for your role type, but that doesn’t translate into production profits.

Your platform does...

That’s why I decided to give you the best gift I could think of. Free access to the exact system that builds your platform for you, while you focus on more important stuff (like nailing those auditions).

If you take the bold step to build a platform, it becomes an asset that you can control and leverage however you wish. Click here for free access to the only tool that will help you do that.

See you at the top,
Scott

P.S. Remember that breaking intel I promised??? Let’s keep it between us... It seems that Facebook is in talks to buy CNN! Care to guess why It’s already set up as a network with content distribution and viewership that Facebook can revive and leverage as it dives headfirst into the new Hollywood.

If you’re thinking that a news network isn’t exactly a part of the industry. Consider that within the last 6 months, their programming has become less news, more scripted (btw that’s not a “fake news” joke, I literally mean they’re moving to add more scripted shows to their schedule).

Remember when I mentioned that the social media companies would likely start buying the studios in the near future? Well, here’s the first sign of that happening. I’ll keep you posted on this. If you wait until the main stream media has been gobbled up, you’ll be too late to the party.

So start building your platform now, while you’re still an early mover. Click here to get started for free

The Tipping Point

The dawn of a new day is upon us, dear grasshopper.

Side note: I’ve been accused of being liberal with the dramatics...but, we are in show biz, right? LOL

I mean it though. The industry is experiencing a dramatic shift unlike anything we’ve ever seen before. History is being written and sadly, most of us are missing it. This is not just my opinion either, the facts and the statistics clearly show that Hollywood is quickly transforming.

Here’s why I bring this up. The industry is at a tipping point. Actually, it’s my contention that it’s already tipped and the established system is breathing its final breaths.

Remember, what’s coming will either be a time of unprecedented opportunity and growth in the industry, or it will be what everyone warned you about when you first told them you wanted to be an actor.

There’s so much noise in the media today, that it’s harder than ever to get at what is important.

You may have heard about “Net Neutrality.” On the surface it sounds great: keeping the internet free of bias for everyone and ensuring that equal access is available…

But there is so much more than meets the eye. In reality “Net Neutrality” is life support for the dying studio system. It is an attempt by the studios and media conglomerates to push aside alternative forms of content distribution.

This is extremely important for all actors.

Gary Vaynerchuk, social media architect to the biggest brands, hottest athletes and entertainers in the world has said,

“If you look at Facebook, Instagram, YouTube you have to realize that they are the next ABC, NBC, Fox. Streaming services like Amazon video and Netflix are overtaking the big studios with movies and giving them a run for their money...The way in which we experience TV and Movies is changing before your eyes. The question isn’t whether it’s going to change, the question is what are you going to do about it...”

This is what has the studios terrified.

They are trying to adapt to a market where they have no experience and operate in a business where they don’t understand how revenue works.

Everywhere you look. Consumer driven content is crushing the studio system.

Whether or not you were a fan of the TV Show Veronica Mars, you probably heard that it made records by being the first major film to ever be crowd funded.

Nearly a decade after the show wrapped, fans were still so engulfed in a storyline that left many mysteries unsolved, and they demanded a movie to tie up the loose ends left by the show’s abrupt cancellation.

And they spoke up with their wallets. The cast put out the challenge that “if the fans could raise the funds to produce the film, then they would do it.” The film’s multi million dollar budget was 100% funded in record time.

The reason production went this route, is that they were unable to secure funding from the studio. They felt as though the market was too small to make it a viable project. Wrong again!

A-list actors are already positioning themselves in anticipation of what’s on the horizon. You can, and should, do the same. For the first time in history, you can own the media.

Here’s what I mean by that...

Mindy Kaling took an ensemble role on The Office and became an absolute powerhouse. She was brilliant on the show, but what really catapulted her to superstardom was owning a platform (media). She has been able to leverage a highly successful blog to stay relevant and ultimately launch new projects successfully.

One of her costars on The Office has made similar moves and is staying relevant, without even relying on mainstream projects. He has parlayed the attention into a very successful YouTube Channel: SoulPancake.

He has been given lucrative publishing deals and has even been featured on Oprah regarding the nontraditional nature of his ongoing success.

What’s important to note about these two actors is that they have the flexibility to chart their own path. They don’t have to jump at every role just to make ends meet.

In order for you to do the same you have to stop depending on a “day job.” The truth is that you can earn a great living as an actor starting now, if you change the way in which you look at the industry.

Remember, the traditional model is dying quickly, so even if you have an agent or a manager, don’t you ultimately need to be in charge of your own destiny instead of being dependent on someone else?

I’ve developed a simple system for you to do this. It’s called the Actor’s Revenue Rescue Formula and everyone I have shared it with has seen amazing results.
The A.R.R. Formula is a real, simple, and proven way to go from where you are now to $100K from acting so you can finally go full time and kiss your day job goodbye.

Just imagine for a moment what it will feel like to walk into your boss's office and say sianara! Never looking back because the Actor’s Revenue Rescue Formula has set you up with a way to bankroll your career.

Have you noticed how YouTubers and Instagrammers are everywhere these days? There is so much opportunity to cash in on right now, if you have a following.

Take a look at this. This is a prime example of the A.R.R. Formula in action.

Did you know that a YouTube Video can make you upwards of $5 per 1000 views even if you are not selling anything in the video.

See YouTube runs on advertisements and advertisers will pay top dollar to show ads before, during, or in between popular videos.

You might think that this is difficult to do or that it takes a lot of time and effort..

Trust me, if you can hit the record button on your iPhone and count to 5, you can make this happen. You just need to have the proper formula to do so.

Check this out. This is probably the easiest way in the world to turn $20 into $13,000.

The premise of the video is simple and the are tons of similar ones.

In a social experiment, the guys bought a homeless man a pizza and sent in one of their buddies to ask for a slice, in order to document if greed or giving would prevail.

Here’s how this became the best $20 these guys ever spent. Assuming you spent your twenty bucks to buy the pizza (you can actually get one for much less if you’re really strapped) and already have an iPhone, Android or some device with a camera to capture the action, that’s your entire production budget.

This video has generated over 2.6 million views so far. Using the YouTube revenue rule of thumb of $5 per 1000 views, here’s how the math breaks down.

2,603,000/1000= 2,603 batches of 1000 views. If you make $5 for each batch: 2,603 X $5=
$13,015

BOOM! How many times do you have to do this in order to get to your $100K?

You might be thinking. That’s great Scott, but there’s no way I could ever get 2.6 Million Views on YouTube, starting from scratch.

Not to worry grasshopper. Here’s another example to show how you can hit $100K super quick, even without millions of views to a video.

This one is comes courtesy of ShowSlimStunna the self proclaimed greatest rapper from Richmond, VA.

The concept of the video is similar. He documents what happens when he treats a homeless guy to Burger King and “spares some change.”

Let’s say this cost a grand total of $5-$6 and an iPhone to film and let’s go through the math.

The view count here is much more attainable at just over 136,000.

We divide it by 1000 to get our batch number and we get 136. Multiply by $5 (the rule of thumb earnings per batch of 1000 views) and that five dollar bill he invested just turned into
$680.

That won’t make you rich but I’m sure it doesn’t hurt either. For some of our tribe members, even just a handful of these every month would be enough to go full time with acting.

Now for the ultimate one. Let’s say you left your wallet at home on the day you were planning to shoot and only had your iPhone and $0 to spend on production.

Here’s how you turn $0 into $16,000

The scenario in this video is nothing more than a conversation that turned into well over 3.2 Million views. Let’s run through that again.

3.2 Million/1000= 3200 batches X $5 per batch of 1000 views= an even $16,000 profit!

I realize that these numbers probably seem intimidating at first, but understand that they are very attainable. I’m not giving you examples from a super channel like Roman Atwood's with over 3.3Billion views.

These are simply, real, moderately successful examples of what’s possible.

It really is that simple. Remember this is a fluff free zone! I could insert tons of filler content here, but why bother?

The concept is simple and it’s possible because of the shifting industry landscape. Produce content, distribute content, get paid. You have the power to write your own ticket and you don’t have to depend on base rate anymore.

Some of you might be thinking “that’s great but I want to be an actor, not a YouTuber!

Loud and clear!

See, what you have to understand is that you need something that will enable you to focus on your career 100%.

Elon Musk put it this way. “If you are working 80 hours a week just by that measure alone you will accomplish in 6 months what takes others a full year to do.” Research has shown that companies that are venture funded and sitting on big piles of cash are 5X more likely to succeed than those that bootstrapped.

Which begs the question: are you bootstrapping?

If you pay attention, you will see that the actors who are succeeding tend to also have the luxury of a big pile of cash at their disposal. Actors like Rashida Jones, Emily Blunt and many others had the benefit of focusing on their careers 100%.

Treat this as a stepping stone to get that advantage for yourself.

The goal of everyone in the tribe is to become a full time actor.

There is one tool that you must have in your actor’s toolbox if you want to book steady work that you actually enjoy doing, and it has nothing to do with your headshot or acting reel.

It’s called the Demonstration of Power Pack and it comes straight from the WME powerhouse. It’s a literal package, delivered to your “target” that is intended to create a sense of Shock and Awe.

Your “target” can be anyone with whom you need to connect in order to advance in your career, such as an agent, a producer, director, casting director, etc.

Let me give you an example that I learned about over lunch with my William Morris Endeavor insider.

There was an agent at WME, let’s call him Tommy, that was pretty fresh out of the mailroom and he was just building his book of clients. Most of them were D listers looking to move up in the world or newcomers that showed promise.

Tommy had hit a brick wall with a client that happened to be a newcomer. She was super talented but because of her short resume, he could not get his new client an audition. Everyone thought she was just too green.

Normally, this is when someone would throw in the towel. But not Tommy, not his client, and I know you wouldn’t quit either.

So this is when The Demonstration of Power Pack was created. Like every other great invention, it was created out of need and in a do or die moment.

Tommy’s client fit a very important criteria that super agents look for when signing new talent…she was smart!
The brilliant idea that she came up with was so crazy that it had to work, or at least that’s what she hoped.

She wanted to read for a new project that would put her alongside some pretty big stars but of course Tommy couldn’t get her an audition the old fashioned way.

This is where it gets interesting. She went to Target and picked up a briefcase.

She loaded the briefcase with a portable DVD player charged and preloaded with her reel.

She rigged it so that the DVD player would power up when the briefcase was opened. She then printed a giant headshot, wrapped it in brown butcher paper, and rolled into a scroll.

She even sealed it with red wax and a stamp.

While at Target she also picked up a neck pillow and a bag of popcorn that also made their way into the briefcase, along with a cigar, and 2 notes that said “read first, read second.” The first note read “sit down, get comfortable, press play and enjoy a snack…Then call casting and tell them I’m your leading lady.”

If you think that’s bold, get a load of this…

The second note read “go to this restaurant tonight at 7:15 pm and tell them you’re here to meet Tommy. He’s my agent. You two can work out the details over dinner. After dinner, light your celebratory cigar because we are going to make a great f***ing movie.

I agree, this is totally nuts! But that’s the kind of business we’re in: showbusiness!

Her agent was super skeptical about it working but he admired her creativity so he said “you put the briefcase together and if you get him to show up to dinner, I’ll wine and dine the hell out of him.” All in, she spent less than $200 on this experiment and the return has been humongous.

She got the role she was after, and has since worked on many projects for this studio, starring alongside Ben Affleck, Paul Giamatti, Reese Witherspoon, and many more. She pulled the career of her dreams out of this little experiment. These days, when she’s not doing a feature, you can catch her doing a recurring role on primetime.

There is not another tool as powerful as this. It doesn’t have to be as orchestrated a courier delivered briefcase, either.

If you need to scale The Demonstration of Power Pack down to drive down costs so you can reach more people, you could mail them a flash drive, comp card, a note, and a snickers bar instead.

This would be ideal for reaching out to multiple agents or multiple Casting Directors, without spending a ton of cash. It still gives you the benefit of differentiating and creates a unique-enough experience for the recipient, since no one else is doing this.

And if you really want to scale the concept down and accomplish this without spending any cash, you could do the entire thing online.

Put together a simple website using Wix. It should have your reel, your resume and headshot available, along with clear instructions on how to contact you. This simple website would only take you a couple of hours to put together and it would allow you to send out The Demonstration of Power Pack at scale, to whoever you wanted to, and without even paying for postage.

Consider what’s on your screen right now. You have proven strategies to go full time in your career and earn a great living doing what you love.

You also have a strategy for how to grab the attention of the people you need to get in touch with, in order to advance in your career.

These are unique times we’re living in and I want to help you make the most of it. I want to help you get into a position to live the life of your dreams, working the career you deserve.

I have something special planned for you next week. I’ve been working on it for quite sometime and I’m ready to give it to you.

Over the next week keep a close eye on your inbox. I don’t want to ruin the surprise but trust me...if the thought of becoming a full time actor that earns a great living doing what you love intrigues you, then you will definitely want to tune in next week.

For now, put the above into action. There is tons of opportunity ready to be had. Are you going to take it? If you’re ever lost about what to do, leave me a comment below and let me know how I can help.

See you at the top,
Scott

Exposing the Hollywood Cabal

This post has been updated on March 31st 2020 to include links to new posts and edited for content.

Dear grasshopper,

How far do you want to chase this rabbit? I have to say, this topic really resonated with so many of you in the tribe. I think it’s because you can feel that something is going on too.

Look, I could go into 1001 different topics and not even scratch the surface of the secret inner workings of the Hollywood Elite.

However, trust that I’m only telling you what you need to know. I’m only sharing things that will give you an advantage, once you’re aware, and that will help your career.

Plus, some of this stuff is just too weird...Even for the internet! LOL

When you reach a certain level of success in the industry, you will be faced with a decision. Will you follow the crowd or march to the beat of your own drum?

There is a little known, dark secret that no one really talks about. If you are prone to paranoia this would be the time to fashion your tin foil hat…

Since the dawn of the modern Hollywood era, the most powerful people in the industry were members of secret societies.

Jack Warner, Walt Disney, Daryl Zanuck, and virtually every other major industry founder were members of secret societies. Though fierce competitors in the public eye, behind closed doors, they would collaborate and hold bilateral negotiations about which actors they would release or “lend” to each other, which projects one studio would pass on (to avoid bidding wars), etc.

The industry we know today was designed and decided upon in a rather conspicuous building on Wilshire Blvd. where all attendees swore an oath of secrecy. Sound strange?

It gets a lot stranger, but we’ll keep things career centric and factual instead of indulging in theory.

So, here’s why this is important to you. Though organized very differently today, these societies are still very active in the industry. They pull the strings as much today, as they did 60 years ago.

These groups are very idealistic, and you can use this to your advantage when reaching out to their members.

Look at it this way.

Think of your closest circle of friends. Do you mostly agree with each other on your worldviews or are their views opposite of yours? When you share someone else’s ideology, it acts as an ethereal calling card. You’re drawn to one another and instantly bonded.

It’s much easier to operate in the industry if you’re a member, but you certainly don’t have to be. You just have to know how to subtly speak the language, and know what’s going on inside the head of the person you’re reading for.

The purpose of these groups is to give the insiders an edge over everyone else. If you really start to dig through the lives of the actors and A list producers, directors, and executives, you will quickly see that they mostly come from similar places.

Though they play up the story of being from a small town in South Dakota, and risking it all to make it big in Hollywood, they generally leave out the genealogy that ties them to Wilshire Blvd in some way. Typically, there is a member of the family that was part of the industry and paved the way.

Don’t take my word for it though. Look into it for yourself.

Because the industry is like one big club that is very weary of newcomers, the ones that have truly climbed through ranks and made it to the top of this town had to get really creative at times.

See, there is a backdoor into the inner circle that is often ignored.

The true gatekeepers are not sitting in glass towers fielding phone calls and sorting mail. They wear five figure watches and shiny shoes to man the doors at industry hangouts. Party promoters hold the keys to the kingdom.

Think of anyone you need to meet in order to get ahead, and there’s a good chance you will find them in a promoters contact list. They handle the recreation for A listers and know their darkest secrets because it’s the promoters that arrange for them.

They can tell you who is going to be where, when they will be there, and even walk you over to the table and make an introduction.

The same is true of personal assistants. Actors tend to be creatives that do not thrive in roles where organization and attention to detail are required. However, there are a number of executives, managers, agents, and lawyers that started as “go-fors.”

You can read that two ways:
You decide to become an assistant and hope that you get lucky and hired by an A lister or a B lister on the rise
You infiltrate the network of assistants that make the A lister’s world function.

The second is pretty easy to do if you pay attention to your surroundings. For example, rumor has it that Michael Eisner took his coffee at 10:12 every morning. This means that at about 10 am, there was a lowly assistant headed to fetch it for him. Everyday like clockwork.

When you think about it, you are one phone call away from reaching just about anyone in the world. Are you going to pick up the phone and reach Clint Eastwood?

Not likely, but there’s only one person between you and him. The assistant has the power to patch through any call or deny any call. Let the implications of that sink in for a moment and start plotting what to do with that.

There are a lot of myths about this town, and there are just as many truths.

The stories of Hollywood “fixers” making people with damning information about actors disappear, are true.

Yes, motion pictures were an important part of Mafia money laundering in the 60s and that hasn’t completely gone away either. Scorsese and DiCaprio were recently caught in the middle of a scandal when the rights to The Wolf of Wall Street were caught in a web of shady business dealings that tied the financiers to the mob.

A previous version of this article included other truths that I’ve since removed, because they were either irrelevant or too out there.

In the myth category, you can find stuff crazier than you can imagine. Apparently, the idea that Johnny Depp and Jennifer Lawrence are time travelers is a very popular subject in some circles.

If that same crowd is to be believed, then John Travolta, Tom Cruise, and even Beyonce have been programmed by a secret government agency to brainwash the masses and carry out an evil agenda...

A lot of this has been fueled by strange events that are taking place all around this town. Things like spirit cooking rituals, and Sanctum being exposed have sent ripples through the industry.

Rather than speculating or indulging the theory, here’s what that means for you career.

There is an air of desperation everywhere. I’ve covered the evolution of the industry in previous releases. Here it is in a nutshell.

Old forms of media are dying or they’re already dead and on life support. The studios haven’t yet figured out how to make new mediums work and they are desperately trying to keep the status quo, instead of evolving with the times.

The modern studio system is rapidly declining, and their fate is almost certain.

What’s coming is unprecedented and it can either be the best opportunity you’ve ever imagined, or it can be worse than you ever thought it could be.

The studios have lost control of the media, propaganda, distribution, and most importantly they’ve lost the attention of the public.

Here’s where the opportunity lies for you. Most studios will fail and fold or be taken over by forward thinking companies.

Amazon launched Amazon studios recently, Netflix and Hulu did the same, and even YouTube is quietly rolling out its own production division. These are companies that have already figured out the new operational models and already have distribution in place.

They are the sleeping giants of tomorrow and it’s possible for you to get in on the ground floor of a new era. What’s great is that they are not controlled by the old Hollywood Cabal trying to preserve the status quo.

They are actually working to destroy the industry and build it anew. The way in is much easier than being invited to the Lodge.

Your ticket into the new industry that is rapidly taking shape is simply a platform. Here’s how you build it.

Some of you will look at what I’ve written and see it as a message of doom. It’s quite the opposite. The power is literally in your hands like never before. You have the opportunity to build a platform, independent of traditional media, in a way that gives you 100% control.

As a member of the tribe, you have access to the best way to get started.

Online media is eclipsing traditional media in every way. Something you won’t read about in Variety is that there is an exodus of talent taking place, as more producers are turning to places like Youtube to distribute their projects.

To put this into perspective, Buzzfeed gets about 10 million viewers a day.

That’s more than Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, The Late Late Show, Conan, and The Daily Show combined! These shows used to be a gold mine of attention for actors and celebrities.

Today it’s “alternative media” that is coveted. Still in its early stages, getting a foothold in this massive market, is relatively simple and I’ve covered that in depth in previous releases.

The first step is here.

Without this, the climb is much harder than it has to be. So you can either leave your career in the hands of the self serving cabal, or start to take back control and look for a way into the evolving industry.

What’s it going to be?

See you at the top,
Scott

P.S. I know that there is so much more that we could get into it and I got tons of emails asking if I was going to cover X, Y and Z. I wanted to keep this focused on the facts rather than theory and speculation, and I wanted it to be relevant to your career and give you solutions like the one here.

Mainstream VO

I’m incredibly excited to share today’s release with you grasshopper. I had the chance to sit down with Craig, one of the most in demand voice actors. 

You know him as the Listerine guy, the Colgate guy, the Comcast guy, the Mercedes Guy, the fill in the blank and he’s probably done it guy… 

It would be safe to say that everyone in America has heard his voice at one point or another. 

When I sat down with Craig, I was hoping to just get a few high level tips for landing voice over gigs that I could share with the tribe. 

I definitely did not expect that he would open my eyes to what could arguably be an entirely different industry. 

Before you roll your eyes and think that voice over work is not what you want to do, take a second to think about the bigger picture. 

VO work is a means to an end. Developing a full time income from VO work, would allow you to focus on your on camera career without the 9-5 grind. It would give you the flexibility and resources to create your own productions if you so choose. 

It’s all about getting in alignment with the career you desire and removing any obstacles along the way. 

So read through with an open mind, and start to think about all of the ways that this could free you to pursue bigger and better things. 

You may have known about the traditional voice over opportunities for a long time, and you may have even had a few voice auditions. 

What Craig shared with me was totally different and the opportunity is HUGE! 

$15 billion dollars a year huge… 

Also, there is much more work available than there are actors to complete the projects. It’s not uncommon for a talented actor to get be and running, working full time in just days. 

What’s great about it is that you can choose what to work on. You don’t have to work on mind numbing projects just to make a few bucks, because there is tons of work covering nearly any topic you can imagine. 

Now that you know what’s possible, let me remind you that this is a no fluff zone. Let’s get to it. 

I was introduced to Craig at dinner through a producer friend and I thought that I could pick up a few golden nuggets to share with the tribe. After sitting down with him for just a few minutes, I knew there would be so much more than I anticipated. 

I asked Craig how someone could get started doing Voice over work and his response was telling. 

“Just do it. There’s so much work to go around that a complete newbie can be booked in hours. People are doing this every day.” 

We’re all familiar with the voiceovers for commercial spots and animated films. However, Craig went on to tell me all about the huge opportunity that exists with online voice over work and corporate voice over work. 

The demand in this sector is growing much faster than the talent pool. There is tons of work available from online retailers that shoot product videos and advertisements, training videos for their consumers and staff, and much more. 

Online news networks use a handful of voice actors during every broadcast and more of them are coming online every day. 

We’re also seeing more CGI characters and animated films going into production than ever before. This trend is likely here to stay for the long run. 

While this could be problematic for actors who find themselves unprepared to adapt to a changing industry, you have the opportunity to get in on the ground floor of the movement. 

The videogame industry is experiencing tremendous growth and so is the demand for voice actors to bring the characters to life. 

Virtual Reality is going mainstream faster than anticipated. Apple recently unveiled a technology for the upcoming iPhone that will bring VR capability to the masses. Demand for voice actors to bring VR characters to life will inevitably spike. 

The demand is even coming from tech companies, working on software to make computers sound more human. They too are in dire need of voice talent to study. 

When the shift from moving pictures to “talkies” (movies with speaking actors) happened. Actors were forced out of the industry in droves because their voices did not match the characters they were portraying. 

Because you seldom have another human to feed off of, voice acting can either be challenging or liberating. The mic doesn’t react, no matter how well you’re playing the role. You’re in a sound booth, without the benefit of a set or a location to set the scene. 

That takes some “getting used to.” 

Many actors will simply be unable to make the transition into this sector and will be forced to compete with everyone else in a shrinking job pool. 

However, if you take the time to master craft (and get rewarded handsomely along the way), you will go straight to the front of the line. 

Many actors tend to stay away from VO work because they’re afraid that their image will be hurt, limiting their on camera opportunities. Because of the nature of the work, you can totally separate your VO projects from your on camera work. 

No one has to know that you’re the voice of Target. You can have complete anonymity. 

When chatting with Craig, my head was spinning before long. 

“Give me the steps,” I said to him. 

“There is a lot of bad information out there from people that don’t know the industry. Clients that need the highest quality recordings will provide a professional studio so you don’t have to spend a ton of money buying fancy equipment. You don’t have to hunt for an agent, half the time you don’t even have to audition. So many clients need last minute work, that you will sometimes get a script and wire transfer without even talking to anybody. It’s pretty cool” he said. 

To get started all you need to do is: 

• • Write a short commercial spot about an imaginary product. An easy way to hack this is to rewrite a good commercial. It should be no more 30 seconds. 
• • Pull out your iPhone and record the script. This will become your voice demo. 
• • Download an app to edit the recording. You might spend a few bucks (5 tops) to unlock a few features but it’s well worth it. 
• • Hang your shingle and start looking for clients. Do a quick search for “voice over work.” You will find several forums and websites to get started. Use this as a starting point to get a few jobs under your belt. You will end up signing clients that comeback over and over again. 

We went into much more details on how to scale and I will compile all of this into an “advanced” post down the road. The above will get you started without the confusion of scaling. 

A few things to note. Your fees will be much better than base rate. Expect to earn about $150 for a 30 second spot for online distribution. 

Product videos and long form advertisement videos will pay $300-$500 for limited online distribution. National spots with wide distribution will typically pay $2000+. 

This is this just the tip of the iceberg and these projects are beyond plentiful! You’re a trained actor. How many 30 second spots could you knock out in one day? 

How many projects would you need in a week to go full time, so that you can focus your efforts on your on camera work? 

Clients are nearly desperate to hire actors, not “voice over people.” So, if you have acting credits and a solid reputation, you can get up running faster and your rates will increase faster too. 

Remember, this isn’t about becoming a voice actor. It’s about monetizing your talent so that you have the resources to make the connections you need, pursue the projects you want to, and go full time in your acting career. 

Because of the nature of the voice over industry, there is very little and often no face time when interacting with clients and auditioning. This makes your reputation key. 

You either build a good reputation within the voice over world slow and steady…AKA the hard way. 

OR you give them an outside source, like IMDb where you already hold a good reputation and ranking…AKA the easy way.

That’s here.

So give it a shot. You can be up in running in less than an hour. 

Give it a good solid effort then come back here and leave a comment about your experience. Remember I’m only a comment or an email away. 

I’ll leave you with this. There are 2 types of people. 

Those that know and those that do. You may already “know” about this. But, to know and not to do (anything about it), is not to know. 

Which will you be?

So just get out there and do it. You will be glad you did. 

See you at top, 
Scott 

Ninja 2.0

Think back to ninth grade.

Remember how everyone ran over to the board excitedly the day after auditions? People would climb over each other to see how they were cast.

It was a time of...adolescent bliss.

A mentor of mine told me that you are the truest version of yourself when you’re about 16. This is an age when you are mature enough to separate fact from fantasy (for the most part) but you are still young enough to have that glimmer of “anything’s possible” in your eye.

Most of my peers from that time, didn’t want to be professional actors. And the few of us wackos that did want to pursue this professionally...let’s just say there’s much less than a handful of us still standing.

I find that fascinating and it’s one of the things that drove me to create BoostMyStar and this phenomenal community.

At first I wanted to dissect what made us pursue the industry. Once I did that, I became obsessed with finding out what made us succeed in the industry.

See, if you Google “how to become an actor” you will get 97.3 Million results. There’s plenty of information out there on the subject…

However, if you dig through just a couple of pages, you will quickly find that it’s all more of the same stuff.

They all tell you to get a great headshot, network with other people, do improv, etc.

While all of that is certainly good advice and has its place, I created this tribe with the intent of sharing the real side of Hollywood. I’ve been around the block and back in this town and I have the proverbial scars to go along with the journey.

So BoostMyStar is a place for us to talk about the side of the industry that no one else dares talk about. It’s why I’ve introduced you to the ultimate tools for your actor’s toolbox. Trust me, master the palm reader trick and you will be unstoppable.

There’s so much information on this site already that if you pieced it together, you could literally write your own ticket, not just in the industry...anywhere.

One of the mistakes that we actors make is treating the industry and our careers like unicorns: mythical creatures that defy all logic.

I’ve been guilty of it too and I still do it sometimes. I mean, when you’re sitting across the table from someone that you once asked for an autograph...logic goes right out the window. LOL…

At the end of the day, Hollywood is a business.

Not just that, it’s a business that is changing faster than the powers at be can even comprehend. This is why the industry goes into absolute turmoil every few years when the union contracts start to expire.

If there’s anything to be learned from history, is that the periods of greatest uncertainty (like the period we’re in now) also present the most opportunity.

More wealth was created in America following the great depression and following the great recession than at any other time in history.

Stick with me for a second because no one in the industry will have a level headed conversation with us about keeps the wheels turning in Hollywood.

Simply stated...it’s cash. More great films ended up being scrapped in preproduction or even midway through production than ever before, during 2009-2011.

Following that, during a period of unprecedented prosperity we saw the evolution of super blockbusters. No longer was $100 Million dollars an acceptable budget for a franchise film, as it was pre 2009.

Budgets today for big franchise films like the Marvel series are over a quarter of a billion dollars. Yet, box office revenues are down and streaming revenue models haven’t been figured out yet by the studios.

They’re having to spend much more to make much less. It’s an unsustainable business model. Here’s why this is important to you.

We are going to soon be experiencing a great contraction of slated projects across all media. Scripted TV, Films, and their various categories will have production loads cut dramatically.

This is not simply my opinion, rather it is compiled from many industry insiders that are the very top of the industry, running the show.

Efforts will be shifting to more economical formats like reality TV and game shows.

This will be a time when audition rooms begin to resemble the “breadlines” of the the 1930s.

Sound dramatic? Maybe...and I hope it is.

The point that I intend to communicate is that there will be far more actors than projects. There’s already a surplus of actors as it is and the coming period of contraction and consolidation will make it much, much worse.

Here’s the good news. Those of us that are the top our game, like the members of our tribe, will be able to outperform and outlast those that are unprepared.

However...

You don’t prepare yourself for this by taking another acting class. You’re good enough already. You don’t prepare by retaking your headshot or updating your reel…

That will come in due time.

The only way to be prepared and take advantage of the opportunity is to give yourself an unbeatable advantage.

You do that by employing the strategies that you have learned about as a member of the tribe. Remember, the strategies I’ve laid out for you have been learned by trial and error and studying what really works. It’s insider info straight from the masters of the industry like WME.

Now, more than ever, it’s important that you build as many industry connections as possible. Throw pleasantries to the wind and just go for it. If you’ve been wanting to read for a show but haven’t had the chance to, hunt down the CD at Starbucks and get their attention.

Want an agent with better access? Now is the time to ride the elevator up to 35th floor and back down again. Do this all day until you catch them and get your 30 seconds to pitch.

You need to get into as many audition rooms as possible. This may seem like it goes against what I normally share.

I don’t mean that you should show up for anything and everything whether or not you’re suited for the role. You still have to be smart about what you read for and ensure that it builds your “category of one.”

But in order to get to where you haven’t gone, you have to do what you haven’t yet done. This means that if you haven’t put together your demonstration of power pack, it’s time to do it.

You already know that, in order to get invited into more auditions and have the best shot at being cast, you have to build massive credibility and build a great social media following too.

If you haven’t yet figured out how to do that, no sweat. I have you covered here.

See when the big studio mergers start to happen at an even faster pace, it will leave many of the smaller production houses without distribution and run them out of business quickly.

This means that there will be fewer projects and thus fewer roles to go around. So if you haven’t yet started on creating your own content, stay tuned. I have a great step by step series on that coming up soon.

If you’ve been a member of the tribe for a while, you probably know the story of my friend Mark. The anniversary of his passing is coming up and it’s always a painful time.

He was such a talented actor that would have upleveled the entire industry. He never got the chance to and died with the music still in him, as they say.

Not a day goes by when a Hollywood newcomer doesn’t stop me and ask “what do I need to do to get my big break?”

My response is always the same. “Live your life as if no one’s watching. Do what everyone else is afraid to do and take the risks that everyone else is unwilling to take. Otherwise the music forever stay in you.”

So what will it be dear grasshopper? Will the music stay in you or will you live your dreams?

We are often our own worst enemies, so it’s important that we get out of our heads and out of our way from time to time.

I can’t take the entire tribe by the hand and make introductions and accompany everyone to auditions. It would be physically impossible.

What I can do is give your industry credibility a huge boost.

I know the secrets to building massive social media followings, so that you can get more auditions and be the only logical casting choice since you come with a platform attached.

Click here for the way to do that.

Whatever you choose to do,

1. Start now. Don’t wait another second
2. Increase your industry credibility and build a massive social media following to leverage as a platform. This will make you the only logical casting choice.
3. Use the demonstration of power pack, the audition domination cycle, the actor’s revenue rescue formula and everything else to get into as many auditions as possible (that still fit into your category of one). Reach for roles that may seem unattainable too.
4. Lean on me and the tribe for support.

Remember. I’m always only a comment or an email away. Let me know how I can help. Your success is my success, because we’ll top level the entire industry.

One thing is certain, the world will always need great actors and entertainers.

So if it’s going to be someone...why not you?

See you at the top,
Scott