Do You Have the Voice to Earn Money As a Book Narrator?

If you've ever been interested in knowing what it takes to make money with your voice as a narrator, this information should help answer a few questions.

For anyone curious about getting paid to narrate books, the ACX website provides a great opportunity and is a solid option for you to consider. ACX is a highly reputable company and is one of Amazon's popular resource for authors.

If you're a self published author, looking to create an audio book, ACX is a resource specifically for Amazon authors. You can go there and find people to narrate your titles available in the Amazon marketplace.

Here's how it works:

• Anyone can sign up to be a narrator, and they have various conditions you can agree to work and get paid under.
• Authors post their book titles that they’re seeking narrators for.
• Authors provide details about the book, as well as a sample of text for the narrator to read.
• Authors select the method of payment that must be agreed upon by the narrator

ACX Steps to Narrating Books

On ACX, it's relatively easy for authors to set the wheels in motion, so they can get their books narrated. After they list the book(s), that's where perspective narrators come in.

If you're signed up as an ACX Narrator, you:

Choose the books that you think you might want to audition for. The site provides an abundance of books for you to narrate. Consider them as potential acting gigs.

Once the audio books are produced, they’ll be available on Audible, Amazon, and iTunes. That’s usually how most narrators agree to get paid, via these recurring royalties, whenever a book is sold.

Even though I'm an author, I love the idea of becoming a book narrator, however I personally don't have the voice for it. So instead, I stick to writing books, and allowing someone else to do the narrating.

I previously had two of my books turned into audio books, thanks to an ACX narrator, and I'll be looking for other narrators in the future.

Could you potentially be one of them?

I've self published books on a variety of topics, both fiction and non-fiction, and hope to connect with other ACX narrators, once I'm ready to create more audio books. [SEE: A current list of my available titles and various pen names]

No matter which genres, or which types of books you're thinking about narrating; if you have a nice voice and some simple recording equipment, ACX might be a good fit for you.

Here's what you need to know:

The Narrator can choose from two ways to get paid

A) Narrator's own per-finished-hour rate, is paid upon successful completion of the audiobook

B) The Narrator shares royalties from sales with the Rights Holder (the Author).

Many authors - myself included - choose the "B" option, and enable book narrators to earn shares of the book royalties. That's a smart move and a great incentive for authors to turn their titles into audio books.

The Basics to Getting Started as an ACX Narrator

As you can see from the simple details, getting started in a new voice related career is not as difficult as you might have imagined.

If you have a nice clear speaking voice and a decent recording device, you can make money on places like Fiverr, Youtube, and of course – the ACX platform, just like was mentioned above.

You don’t have to be an expert, or possess any professional acting or recording skills for Fiverr and Youtube.

You may or may not need additional equipment with ACX, but you can determine to what extent that will be necessary, and proceed accordingly.

Be candid when you sign up, and when you approach a potential client. It can help to let them know about your writing background, if you have one (Like Wendy Almeida - the talented woman who narrated my two audio books)

Do what you can to show you’re familiar with the literary world, and that you will be able to do their writing justice. Your foot in the door is really the video sample you provide them, demonstrating a good reading of their material. If you do happen to have previous acting or speaking skills, well that’s even better.

Since you’ll be able to select the gigs you actually want to read for, you can decide if you want to read only non-fiction books that discuss a specific theme, or if you want to narrate complete novels.

You’ll also have the choice of narrating short novellas, tutorials, and whatever else the Amazon authors publish via ACX.

Recording Devices

When it comes to the types of recording devices you use to start your new career with, this is probably the one issue that may cause a bit of concern.

Obviously, the sound quality of any video you create will need to be acceptable, both to the author/client and to ACX.

Once again, keep in mind that this particular type of income earning activity is one that you will want to make sure you’re committed to. The ACX website provides details on what kind of sound quality checks they have in place, so you will need to get familiar with what they require.

This is true, whether you already have a recording device you plan to use, or whether you plan to go out and spend some money.

Here is what they had to say on the matter:

“Audiobooks uploaded to ACX must adhere to the following requirements. The ACX Quality Assurance team may reject titles that do not meet these standards, and their retail release may be delayed."

In order to help individuals meet their requirements, they provide Video Lessons & Resources, and also their Audio Terminology Glossary.

Even though your voice and equipment doesn’t need to be professional level at the start, you will definitely want to learn more, grow, get better at recording, and maybe even purchase some superior equipment.

For now, simply concentrate on learning about the requirements, so you can determine which ones you already meet, and which ones you may need to work on.

ACX also provides you with help and support, such as giving you an opportunity to work and collaborate with studio professionals, and also a chance to participate in the ACX University.

They teach both authors and narrators about promoting their projects so they can maximize their earnings.

Final Thoughts

If you have the basic abilities and nothing else to prevent you from doing it, why not consider doing more than simply soliciting for work to write scripts.

You can get paid to write video scripts, and at the same time, get paid to narrate the scripts you write.

Remember:

• Learn to think outside the box when seeking online opportunities that pay.
• Find ways to tap into all your creative skills and talents, in an effort to make more money while gaining more visibility.
• Take advantage of the Fiverr website, and use effective strategies like using Fiverr to gain Youtube voice over gigs.

Discover everything ACX has to offer to narrators, and do what it takes to get started on setting up your own ACX account and selecting available book narration gigs.