Kim Handysides-Award Winning Female Voice Over Artist-Logo

514-803-2296

kim@kimhandysidesvoiceover.com

genuine

Best Voice Over: Spotlight on Health Care Ads

Voiceover Styles

Health care ads are a mainstay in advertising and the best voice over chosen to present medical messages is a critical part of creative choice. Healthcare commercials achieve their goals through a few specific avenues in terms of vocal tone and direction: sentimental – those that tug at heart strings, inspirational – through sharing success stories or great track records, and solution – matter of fact – as in, you’ve got a problem? We’ve got the solution. Which one do you think is at the heart of this health care ad I voiced for the Texas Children’s Health Plan?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6HhSwtfyCQ

The hallmark of healthcare ads no matter the end-goal is motivating people to take action toward taking good care of themselves. Easier said than done. Consumers aren’t generally interested in healthcare messages and place their own health at the lower end of their list of priorities unless they or a loved one is embroiled in the middle of a health problem. Challenging people to make connections between behavior change and well-being is not easy. Done well, it’s presented through stories that resonate with target markets. But many healthcare ads have the added constriction of tight FDA controls over what can and cannot be said about procedures, methods and the places and people we turn to for ideas of where to go to and what to do when we want to improve or take care of our health.

Behind the Message in Voicing Health Care Ads

Voice actors can get clues on how to better deliver the messages behind health care ads by gaining insight into how consumers react to certain word choices that may be in the healthcare script. Becker’s Hospital Review had some interesting insights into power words to lean in to in terms of performance. Words like “knowledgeable” “trust-worthy” and “cost-effective” gained top marks in terms of inspiring customer loyalty. “Sincere,” “authentic,” and “safe” are other words that resonated well with the consumers surveyed in this report. For voice actors, keeping these ideal messaging words uppermost in our minds when we approach how to perform our voice over narrations for these ads, whether they appear in the copy or not, enhances our delivery.

Personal Approach in Voicing Health Care Ads

To break past the vast divide of anonymity and reams of red tape people may feel when thinking about hospitals and health insurance, the actor voicing health care ads needs to remember to take a personal approach. Health care is ultimately very personal. Our interactions whether on the giving or receiving end are one person to one person at a time. Remembering that and bringing our voice over delivery to the one-on-one level helps humanize the message. Health care ad agencies know the best way to reach their audience is through creating an emotional connection. One that garners trust. In order to vocalize that, we voice actors have to be as authentic and genuine as possible in delivering the copy. Our ability to be sincere on behalf of our clients (i.e. the hospitals, health insurance companies for which we speak) can mean the difference between their client making a decision in their favor or not.

Voice Over on Behalf of Doctors and Clinics

Smiling Doctor holding Healthcare Ads sign
Source: Koeppel Direct

Though smaller than hospitals and insurance companies, commercial voice over on behalf of doctors and health care clinics are another important part of the mix of health care commercials. Showcasing physicians may be a choice made by some hospitals, like how Mount Sinai made their docs (and themselves as a result) seem more interesting and accomplished in promoting their musical side. Whether the marketing venture has a bigger or smaller lens, the successful voice over for doctor and clinic ads will be one that’s compelling and relatable. We need to spark emotion and curiosity and not forget the most important tool in our voice actor’s toolkit: the ability to storytell.

DTC Pharmaceutical Ad Voice Overs

Now, I can hear you saying, Kim, this is all well and good for branding messages but how can a voice actor riff away at a DTC (direct-to-consumer) pharmaceutical ad in a conversational, storytelling voice over manner? Especially when most of them are chock full of medical and legal terminology longer than Apollo’s journey to the moon and back. In a word, finesse. You work those $50 words until they roll off your tongue as easily as your grocery list and you imagine you’re sharing that info with your best friend – who’s life could just happen to become a whole lot better by taking said medication. I once had a client ask me to read a product monograph in a conversational way. A product monograph! That’s the little insert full of clinical trials and p values inside the medication box. Yup, it took a lot of imagining and world building, but I’m happy to say, it can be done. Happily, in spite of all the legalise and FDA restrictions put upon pharma ads, they do help people solve problems. They invite consumers to start conversations with doctors. So the artful voice over artist must self-direct to spin the words in, you guessed it, a compelling, authentic and genuine manner by focusing on the people, the pain of the problem and the hope and joy of the solution.

The Huge Role of Emotion in Health Care Ads

Whether voice over or action on screen, the myriad of emotions played in a health care ad are what ultimately make them successful, because our health is inextricably linked with our emotional state. Unwell, we are unable to interact socially with friends, family and loved ones at the same level. The stress of ill health unleashes a storm of emotional burden, whether we or a member of our close circle are the ones affected. Docs, HCPs and other health care providers also bring in incredible emotion in their passion for healing and finding cures and compassion for patients and caregivers. How do we as actors and voice artists pay tribute to the huge role emotion plays in health care ads in an honest, engaging way? We do it by breaking the fourth wall. By interacting directly (in our artist mind’s eye) with the person who could most benefit from the message we deliver.

Where Health Care Ads are Going in the Future

Health care and related industries are highly competitive and to succeed must stay on top of marketing trends. This not only includes pre-roll ads, banners and social media spots, it includes updating websites with patient portals and other tools to make it easier for patients to connect with docs and their services online. Mobile marketing, digital marketing and social media advertising has seen massive growth and will continue to grow. However offline advertising such as TV, radio, cable and print will continue to hold its own for years to come.

My List of 7 Behind the Scenes Insights in VR Narration

My Voiceovers, Voiceover Business

Got VR? You will.

 

Virtual, Augmented or Mixed Reality, 360…it’s known by several names and may morph into more before it takes over the world. Statista’s conservative prediction is that the market will grow from $3B now to $40B by 2020. Others in the industry think it’ll be much higher. Orders of magnitude higher.

Virtual Reality Voice over Narrator

SO, have you been part of a virtual reality narration gig yet? Last year I did a voice over acting job for one. This year VR narrations under my belt number about 12. The applications for the technology are endless. Among the work I participated in was a game based on 50 Shades of Grey, two company tours to live on home websites, a grocery store application and a watch-and-learn surgery, as well as a number of conference booths and other business videos. I expect/hope to do 50 VR narrations next year. I, and others working in the medium have come up with sharable insights to think about when approaching VR and its voice over narration. Here is my list of 7 of these:

 

  1. From Outside In to Inside Out

The medium is different than a movie, video game or theatrical production, but has things in common with all of those. So says Rafael Pavon, creative director at Future Lighthouse. Virtual Reality has the capacity to immerse you more fully into the story, feel moments more intensely, be closer to the characters involved. You are no longer outside, looking in. You are inside.

 

  1. Empathy

VR makes the participant feel things at a deeper level. If you’ve ever laughed, teared up or shouted in reaction to a movie, you’ve displayed your EQ of empathy for other people. 360 immersion into experiencing other realities, will sharpen that aspect, making the participant feel what it would be like to be in places they otherwise would never be able to be. This not only requires acceptance – the saying yes so often purported in improvisation work actors undertake– but it requires respect for your audience.

 

  1. Special POV

To date, the point of view VR writers have fashioned their stories around are from privileged observer, no one sees you, and you cannot change anything. You can be an observer who can change things. You can also be a character without impact or even a character with impact. With each special point of view an adjustment in approach is required of the actor or narrator. In essence, it is getting closer and closer to embodying the participant themselves.

 

  1. Vulnerability

The fall of the fourth wall in VR makes users vulnerable in ways that are unprecedented. With VR, we step beyond empathizing with a character who acts as our representative in the world – we become characters inhabiting the space. Meeting this requires vulnerability on the part of the actor or narrator, as well. Astrid Kahmke of the Bavarian Film Center says virtual reality involves a shift from time-based narration of beginning-middle-end storytelling to spatial narration. It’s not storytelling, per se, it’s world-building. It’s not narrating, it’s creating. It’s not linear, it’s nonlinear.

 

  1. Beyond suspending Disbelief

Immersive media causes a strong visceral reaction and cognitive belief in what is experienced. Belief puts the real into virtual reality. Books, theatrical productions, movies, all of these require us to enter a complicit contract. One where we must suspend our disbelief: that what we are reading/hearing/watching is real, when we know in fact it is not. VR gives our sensory input a push off the deep end. We perceive the unreal to be real. The power of the resulting visceral reactions and cognitive belief is profound.

 

  1. First to market opportunities

Companies and institutions that capitalize on virtual reality’s novelty and use it on their websites, in learning opportunities and other forms of engagement, provide their customers/users a more intense experience than traditional media, making them and their brand more memorable.

 

  1. Where the Voices and Narrator Sit

To paraphrase Pink Floyd, in Virtual Reality, the narrator is in my head. There is little distance in the case of characters and no distance between you as the narrator and the user. As such, your voice over performance needs to be better than best. Authentic, genuine, real, natural. Soft, I have found. You’re the angel sitting on the shoulder, the little bird who told them. More than any other medium, your facility in making the written word sound like your very own will ensure you continued voice work in VR.

What have your experiences been in virtual reality?

 

Though most days, Kim Handysides is found narrating from within a 4×6 padded cell, her virtual reality today is from the cold pristine Canadian mountains, on the edge of a lake with sifted snow dusting the ground and a pale blue sky overhead. 

Spotlight on a Retail Video Ad: My Voice Over Life

My Voiceovers, Voiceovers Completed

Ask anyone who knows me in my voice over life. I love video ads. In fact, if I had to choose only one form of voice work to do for the rest of my life, it would be commercial voice overs. The kind that sells things to the everyday Jane & Joe. Like this 15 second gem for Sears.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAiZxf4QAOE

Creativity within a Constraint

I hanker for a good set of boundaries within which to play. I first realized this during a year long stint on a weather channel, where I had to spiel off weather report after weather report in 4 minute and 50 second chunks over and over again for hours on end. Hotter than Hades you say? I did succumb to initial tedium, for about a minute. Maybe two. But then, I realized there was a secret challenge locked in “sunny today with a cold front moving in.” Yes, the basic info was pretty much the same from set to set, hour to hour, but I could change the delivery. Experiment within it. Improv it up. Find ways to make it more natural, more serious, more conversational. Roll it around in some humor, find out how to make commercial voice over funny, get busy with it. Same thing applies for that 15 or 30 second mini-saga centered around advertising toilet paper. It’s a creative constraint I love to play in.

Helping Humanity

Seriously Kim? You’re going to say convincing people to load up on discounted toothpaste and deodorant is helping humanity? Yes. I am. Because I am genuine in my approach to retail ads. And health and cosmetic ads are not exception. What does that mean? It means knowing that for the pensioner or single mom, the money they save on those toiletries may mean the difference in being able to spend it on something nice for themselves, or in some cases, in just being able to make ends meet. So I do get excited about deodorant 3 for $5 because that is my way of helping people. Cynics may see it another way. That’s their view. This is mine.

rows of spices like voice actor choicesThe McLuhan Spice Blend

Marshall McLuhan, father of media theory, said “Advertising is the greatest art form of the 20th century.” I grew up believing this and hearing the greatest minds are not in the universities, hospitals or on Wall street – they’re on Madison Avenue churning out ads. Whether that’s true or not, as a voice over talent, I bathe in the notion that adding human sound to ads is my predominant art form. Some of them are arty ads. Some of them are family friendly ads. A lot of them are not. But they are all different. Like curry, cumin or chili powder, they all have their own flavor. They all reach out creatively to tap someone on the shoulder and send what could be a very impactful message.

Looking for a great voice to help you sell your message? I’d love to help.

Join the Conversational Read: 2017 and Beyond

Voiceover Styles

Want to be timely? Want to be heard? Ask your male or female voice over actor to make it conversational.

4 friends talking, conversational style voiceover
The guys and girls next door

A recent voice industry trend report says the most sought after type of narration read now and for the foreseeable future is flawed, imperfect, and sounds a lot like your best friend. It’s erratic. The words come in fits and starts, punctuated by fast flows of phrase and occasional plodding pieces of prose placed here and there for emphasis. A conversational read, also described as genuine, believable or natural, exposes the haphazard bits and bites of thought our brains let us burp out into the world.

Trust me, I'm a professional narrator

 

So why not just hire Fred next door to voice your message? In reality, most conversations ain’t pretty. The trick as a professional voice actor with your text is to balance reality (or the semblance thereof) with enough sparkles and bows (technique) to make it pass as uncontrived when in fact everything has been scripted and planned. Right down to the last, “so”, “ya know” and “uh.”

 

 

We have to talk about the millennials…

Millennials. Blame ‘em. Thank ‘em.  Buy ‘em a latte. The popularity of the conversational read in voiceovers, whether commercial to corporate, eLearning to explainer video, is because of the millennials. Whether you’re actually targeting them or not, the 18-25 year old market segment influences all the rest. It’s “their time.” To create songs, muck around with styles, phrases, and art. In a word, to participate. And their take on the world trickles up and colors the rest of us.

Gen Y people are extremely communications savvy. They have been sold to and targeted since birth. Remember the Teletubbies? (“Again, again”) Anything that spells sell instead of tell earns a delete, not a click. In fact, a 2014 survey called Engaging Millennials: Trust and Attention says 84% of this age group doesn’t trust traditional advertising.

social media platform logos voiceover
Image Credit: howtostartablogonline.net

 

So, who do they go to for advice about stuff? Not you. Each other. On YouTube, Instagram and Snapchat, mostly. Sometimes Facebook. Who will they find there? The approachable expert. The peer. The peep next door.

Thus, the rise of regular people talking to regular, uh, um, you know…other people. On your website. Your ad. Your eLearning program. Well, if not yours, then your competitor’s.

As a female professional voice over talent, I chew on steady diet of this kind of read . What about you? Wanna join the conversation? Talk to me 😀