Awesomely Awesome Sound

[azw]

I had no idea...

[atheisticmystic]

This thread turned interesting like quick.

[Gerard-NYNY]

.lmfao

and it worked. i've gotten some calls. its a good rate, a cheap rate in fact. and for a kit that fits in a messenger bag, i dont mind giving a cheap rate for those blokes one bit. notice i indicated:

'no flat day rates'

because, as we all know, the new to the biz people don't work as fast. so the $19 hourly adds up, rather than down. most of the time. it only hurts when i have an early a.m. call time the next day.

additionally, its been a good way to connect with newbies. and seasoned pros.

i put up a different poster about three years ago and one of the busier cameramen in nyc responded, because he saw it where he gets his breakfast every morning. been hired up as sound and other capacities ever since. a lot.

btw, posters is my side biz, and i'm always busy in that regard. quite often i go straight from a shoot to the poster biz. i also never worry when video is slow.

www.promotermotor.blogspot.com

if you've seen the attached 'PromoterMotor limited edition Max Headroom Video Pirate poster' around your neighborhood, that is one of mine as well.

one of the first things i learned in postering for my service oriented clients is:

"find the first time customer first, before somebody else does."

another thing i've learned in dealing with clients who have a professional and/or emotional

attachment to their their livelihood:

"divorce your narcissism from the product"

sure you're wonderful and talented and all that, but that doesn't mean doodley squat to a buyer

who has a list of things in his or her head to satisfy when making a decision whether or not to press the 'buy' button.

i deliberately priced the 'awesomely awesome' package with operator to generate calls.

it worked.

i could care less about all my professional attributes that i hold near and dear to my heart in relation to the poster, this is marketing, plain and simple.

i printed 500 of the 'awesomely awesome' posters, so its not a matter of it it being in a bodega or wherever, the fact that its in about 300 locations at the moment matters,

because of the amount of random encounters that occur in the fluidity of people getting around in their neighborhood and the city.

in this business, any free spot is a great spot. particularly when i know about 500 free legal spots around the city. that has paid off handsomely when i advertise the poster biz. i can't even begin to tell you.

and it keeps getting better every year.

if it didn't work, i would have been out of this business about 8 years ago.

i invite any nyc member of jwsound with a fledgling or successful video production business to give it a try at my 'awesomely awesome' discount rate of 1/3 off prices listed on the blogspot url.

i'd love to go on and on, but it's a busy day here in promotermotor-land: there's about 2000 posters

in my storage space in midtown that to get done by april 4, plus 5000 club flyers and 600 new posters coming in today.

nobody noticed i used 3m transpore to tape the poster up. shame on you guys.

[azw]

Bravo! Huzzah to Gerard! I salute your industriousness. Right on.

[Johnny Karlsson]

[Dan Ostroff]

Bravo! Huzzah to Gerard! I salute your industriousness. Right on.

Let's try not to celebrate undercutting too much. Industrious or not.

[Chris Woodcock]

Bravo! Huzzah to Gerard! I salute your industriousness. Right on.Let's try not to celebrate undercutting too much. Industrious or not.

Agreed if he is happy bottom feeding then fair play but it will be hard to move on from the low pay clients to the bigger jobs.

As soon as the next one comes along that offers even more awesomely awesome sound at a cheaper price he will know about it

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk 2

[Max Hirtenstein]

What a waste of transpore. That ain't cheap.

[Max Hirtenstein]

and another thing. it's cool that you have a successful side business. most of us don't. i just do sound. would you be able to live off your $19/hour if you didn't make posters?

[geordi]

What a waste of transpore. That ain't cheap.

 

Exactly what I thought.

 

I agree with Gerard's ideas about diversifying. When that phone doesn't want to ring for a while, it can be nice to have money coming in from a side business that does most of the work for you and isn't so labor intensive. I have a couple businesses like that too, and I use them to further myself in the film industry, but also to keep myself fed.

 

That doesn't mean that I lower any of my rates to compensate. I charge standard rates for production sound mixing, and industry standard rates for each of my side projects. When you undercut like that, you aren't just undercutting your competition... You are undercutting YOURSELF and leaving money on the table. Why be poor when you can be rich?

[Gerard-NYNY]

[studiomprd]

" When you undercut like that, you aren't just undercutting your competition... You are undercutting YOURSELF and leaving money on the table. "

I lose money on every deal,  but I make it up with volume!

[aristotle_kumpis]

Well, has anyone called him yet?! Someone from this site should call him out on it. Just when I thought things were getting worse.

[Wyatt Tuzo]

Well, has anyone called him yet?! Someone from this site should call him out on it. Just when I thought things were getting worse.

 

There is an awful lot of bullying going on around here lately. If you happen to be calling for a witch hunt, it speaks more to your insecurities than anything else.

If you go to the linked page on the flyer, take note of the language and tone. No hiring professional is going to mistake this guy as a "professional". Everybody has to start somewhere... yada yada

[Max Futterman]

+5 Wyatt.

[Gerard-NYNY]

[Dan Ostroff]

Bargain awesome sound and awesome YouTube links? Too good to be true.

[atheisticmystic]

Just to be fair, there are several newer members sweating it out, having charged low rates, being a bit unsure about their rates, desperate for gigs and going the CL route, and got royally chewed out by the vets here claiming that those newer members were destroying rates, the industry, and several pieces of fine china (maybe not that last one).

 

I'm sure there's a middle ground between bullying, and being embarrassed into silence, having discovered we were talking about a proud low-baller who turned out to be one of us.

 

Why isn't Gerard screwing his colleagues, racing to the bottom, etc.?

[Henchman]

Doing jobs others felt were below them, didn't stop me from advancing my career when I moved to LA 5 years ago.what it DID do, was pay my bills, as I moved forward.

I'm never above receiving a paycheck.

[Gerard-NYNY]

it's not low balling if the shoots are non pro. the 19 per hour rate is not applicable or in the league of varicam, sony f3, network broadcasts and the like.

 

i targeted 5d/7d shooters who  do not have the money, nor do they need a nomad, 3-4 wireless, comteks. and a timecode slate.

 

it's kind of ridiculous to complain that this is lowballing considering what those shooters have in their pocket. they know what they don't need on a bare bones shoot.

 

in the poster biz, i've interfaced with entrepreneurs on every level of the economic ladder; i've also dealt with big companies that are international brands.  there is a difference between the two. a big company pushes the 'buy button' faster.

 

this business has given me a keen eye in objectively observing the 'buy button' process, because i get feedback from the clients, which equates with my experience in sound or posters. i call it the rule of thirds. out of every 3 calls, there is one buyer in the spectrum of 'new clients.'

 

thus, people who don't buy outnumber buyers 2 to 1 in that category of buyer.

 

in the broadcast, video, production world there are many entities that push the 'buy button' quickly, but we all know the bottom line trends have been brutal.

 

networks send unpaid interns out with a canon 5d and zoom recorders for work that ends up on the web or a broadcast. instances like that are the work-a rounds that are always in development and they are the result of pressure on the bottom line to increase profit in a very different economy than it was in, say, 1980,

 

everything has changed. but pricing of services has not kept pace with inflation in a lot of areas. that is due to a process called

'creative destruction.'

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_destruction

 

technology changes, jobs change, staffing structures change, bottom line strategies change,and many negative trends emerge that are economically painful.

 

lots of big companies used the opportunity of 'the great recession' to lay off people during a slowdown and subsequently invest in new technology, software for instance, or manufacturing processes, and then restaff at lesser levels in order to increase profits later on when the initial crisis has passed.

 

but on the upside, in the entrepreneurial world, new types of clients emerge. find them and deal with them on their level and your level too.  the key word is 'new.' they are not from 1980. 1980 cannot exist in 2013 and beyond is my gut assumption.

[graham]

Isn't a Tier 1 $20ish/ hour? There are professionals who take this rate frequently. They do get a kit rental often lower than episodic or majors. No one is bagging on those or the people who work them. What am I missing here about undercutting etc?

[Wyatt Tuzo]

I will go on record saying that you shouldn't be giving your gear away at that rate

[Richard Ragon]

There is an awful lot of bullying going on around here lately. If you happen to be calling for a witch hunt, it speaks more to your insecurities than anything else.

 

No there is not!  Your misusing the word bully.  Bullies use intimidation and threats of violence as their main tools.  No body is threatening anyone!

 

However, Shaming would be a much better word.  And, there is nothing wrong with shaming.  Shaming is what keeps people in line doing the right thing. Shaming is what keeps peoples moral compass pointed the right way. Shaming is what this next generation needs.  Letting newbies know that their older, wiser peers are NOT happy with something they are doing, is needed, how else are they going to correct their behavior?

 

For some weird reason, shaming is not considered politically incorrect, and as a result we now have an entire generation of youths, expecting everything for free, and returning nothing in return!!

[Jesse Watts]

No there is not!  Your misusing the word bully.  Bullies use intimidation and threats of violence as their main tools.  No body is threatening anyone!

 

However, Shaming would be a much better word.  And, there is nothing wrong with shaming.  Shaming is what keeps people in line doing the right thing. Shaming is what keeps peoples moral compass pointed the right way. Shaming is what this next generation needs.  Letting newbies know that their older, wiser peers are NOT happy with something they are doing, is needed, how else are they going to correct their behavior?

 

For some weird reason, shaming is not considered politically incorrect, and as a result we now have an entire generation of youths, expecting everything for free, and returning nothing in return!!

+1

[Gerard-NYNY]

very fun thread overall. i don't take any comment personally during the time it was unknown who it was who put the poster up, and after my identity came to light. everybody's entitled to an opinion and i personally agree with 99% of them. don't have a 'tourette's guy moment' too often over stuff in this business.