Successful Freelancing in Game Audio

[Music] hello hello 9 a.m. crowd what is up I'm impressed that all of you made it my voice you can probably hear is a little ragged just like all of yours I'm sure but I'm gonna do my best to do my radio announcer voice and kind of lull you into a nice presence as I give you this talk so this talk is 30 minutes long so unfortunately I can't go into literally everything about freelancing that would be nice though so what I'm gonna do is have a follow up video call with those of you who want it so we're gonna do a group call so if you want to give me your business card at the end of this I'll send out an email to all of you afterwards and we'll do like a group chat where you can ask me follow-up questions because I am certain that after we're done here you big okay yeah okay I don't have any questions then one day later your big goddamnit which happens with every single talk that we ever go to so I want to give you a little bit more so you can this isn't the last interaction we'll ever have also make sure you turn off your cell phones noisemakers that sort of thing and also make sure that you fill out the surveys for whatever talks that you go to including this guy's and lastly um make sure that you give me your business card at the very end that's really important so that I can get you on my list to get that all done so as we begin one thing I want to mention to you is that you are running a business most people in the music sound design sense don't actually think about it this way they think about themselves as artists which is actually great I do as well but we make the mistake of thinking oh I'm not running a business I'm an artist that means I don't need to think about money what that's ridiculous oh so what we're gonna do is help you think in some ways of how businesses kind of think and how you can start thinking about that that doesn't mean necessarily that you have a Rolodex and that you're chomping a cigar every single day no no but it does mean that you are thinking about things in a more systematic way so a little bit about me before we dive into it my name is Akash the car I've worked on the sound design for a hyper light drifter some MIDI mock-up work for destiny rise of iron just released brass tactics which is a vr RTS just released in the oculus store heat signature which is in the igf Boop and I've given two tedxtalks one on the power videogame music and another on the idea of following your passion being not a good idea we can talk about that later and lastly I just released a book on Monday called maximizing game feel through sound which is now a number-one bestseller on Kindle whoo so that is for developers on how they can work with audio people better yay hmm like three people just like yeah sweetie so what we're gonna cover in today's talk is how business owners think obviously I'm not gonna go super in-depth but how you can start thinking about things to make it so that your work comes more fluidly and that you're not doing the freelance hustle that so many people talk about where you're wondering where the next gig is coming from how to find great work and what processes you can use to actually get better and better clients whether or not you should have a side job and the stigma associated with that some contracts and other boring stuff that you know we have to cover and obviously I want to just remind you that we're gonna do a video call follow up and lastly I do want to remind you that the things I say here my way isn't the only way I'm gonna give you some advice that you should actually take and use as your own this isn't the only way to actually go about this and for those of you taking pictures of the slides constantly I am actually putting these up on my website immediately after so don't worry about that so you'll be you'll be sent you don't need those grainy photos so let's go into how businesses think in the kind of intro of this so they think in systems what they do is think about their business or their products or whatever it is that they're selling or whatever it is that they're doing in reproducible steps and systems are actually just a fancy word for habits it's just a business word for habits so basically they think okay how can I sell this thing or do this thing or give this service in a way that is reproducible how can I keep getting clients for example or how can I keep selling iPhones or whatever it may be that's the general gist of how businesses think they don't think oh maybe we'll sell something today know they even have a procedure and steps that they can go through to reproduce great results every single time Apple is a great example and Google who are just kings of systems they are amazing at making things fall into place perfectly every single time so like I mentioned you have to make you have reproducible steps so some examples that I want to give you are okay let's say you want to find clients maybe you want to make a system based off of that goal I want to find clients who pay me X amount per gig whatever it may be what you want to do is start writing down and thinking of this in ways like okay what are the steps I can take every month every week every year whatever it may be in different time frames that I can use to reproduce this for example it could be okay every year I'll come to GDC okay that's one part of your system every week or month I'll go to a local networking Meetup okay great that's a system what is my system for following up with people after I meet them mine I use an app called clothes CLO ze it's really good to help remind me who to follow up with and who to keep talking to and what we've talked about it's a really good app for that but I have a system for following up with people and talking to people and I follow it every single time and I use reminders on my phone to actually remind me what things I need to do and I even spend sunday scheduling out that week okay what am I good what are my systems for this week what meetups are am I going to go into going to go to that makes it so that these steps actually start to be reproducible so when you have goals which are great I'm a big fan of goals like okay I want to get six clients so I want to get paid for my work whatever it may be write down systems that are associated with it so write down habits that you can start implementing week to week day to day month to month year to year on how you can actually start implementing those in your day to day life so if you are trying to get clients what are the systems what are the habits that you can do showing up to events talking to people giving talks or talking to mentors and finding work that way meeting other people in the audio community asking if there's any overflow or anything like that having follow-ups all that sort of stuff those are systems that you can implement underneath the goal because when you have a big goal that's great but it can be hard to follow step by step when you don't really know what every the habits you need to actually get there if you want to get better at music what's your practice system if you want to get better at sound design what sort of Folie work are you gonna do week to week month to month whatever it may be you need to think about things in that way so one thing I want to show you on in the kind of client getting side of things is a little funnel that I made and basically what I want you to start thinking about it's how you can actually start getting clients and kind of moving people through this funnel in such a way that you get more clients more easily in an authentic kind of sleeves free way and all about that so first up you have something called prospects now a prospect is someone who may have worked for you at some point in general but they don't really know who you are it could be a big company that you know needs music or sound but you're not sure if they're really interested in you they don't have a job posting open there's no opening you don't know anyone at the company you don't really have any information on it but there a prospect there a potential client that you don't really have much information on next up is something called a lead now a lead is a client or a potential client that you have a little bit of knowledge on they you know that they're looking for music or sound or whatever it is you do you have an idea that okay they have a job opening on their website or you heard through the grapevine that they're interested in hiring you that's kind of a lead and you know that they're interested so you kind of have a little bit of an opening now opportunities are when clients come to you or potential clients come to you and say send us a demo or we're interested in working with you what's your rate that sort of thing and we're gonna talk about answering that dreaded question what's your rate later but when you have an opportunity basically people asking you to pitch to them in some way shape or form so you're being asked to show your stuff or they're just generally asking what's your rate or how would it be like working with you anything like that that's an opportunity and then lastly you have a client someone that you are actively working for so what your goal though throughout all this process through GDC and we're on Friday so I'm giving you advice that you can't really use for the rest of GDC but hopefully for future conferences is to actually nurture these prospects so what you want to do is take leads and opportunities and move them through clot and move them to clients and the way you actually go about doing that is follow-up this is actually one of the most important things I'm going to talk about this a little more but follow-up following up with people you meet whether it be online or in person in person is ideal which is why you're here that's great following up with them sending them an email saying it was great to meet them within 24 hours of meeting them or giving them some sort of advice or maybe they ask about middleware or something like that following up with your potential clients within 24 hours is the most powerful way that you'll actually move people from prospect to lead to opportunity to climb that's the most powerful way and most people mess this up they get a pile of business cards they look at them and say they're not interested and then throw them away or they're just kind of languishing on their desk for months and months and months and how many if you've done that and just let all your business cards kind okay like one person raised their hand and it's honest so I know all of you have done this so don't lie to me I can tell so when we're talking about finding clients and finding great work your goal is to move like potential prospects do this funnel through talking to them and following up this isn't done in a friendly sleeves free way you're not constantly elbowing them in the ribs saying please hire me because that's ooh we do that too much and I hear too many horror stories of other composers and sound designers who are just begging for work that's not the way to do this your goal is to actually form some sort of business or friendly relationship with these people you want to talk to them you actually want to get to know them you want to know their games needs that's really important and you want to know how you can actually solve their problem this isn't just a gig you are solving their problem because they don't have music they don't have sound they don't have voiceover or implementation for their game and it's really important for them to actually have that off of their plate so they don't need to worry about it that's what we're doing here we're actually helping devs not worry about that side of their Deveaux development so much so like I've mentioned it's good to talk to humans I'm an extreme extreme extreme introvert so I had to actually train really really really really hard for the course of a decade to be able so much just look someone in the eye so talking to humans is really really important that is actually one of the most important things you can do in person is ideal I get asked a lot how do I find tons of clients online you can but generally in person you'll find higher-quality clients and you'll get more prospects and leads and opportunities and clients by talking to people in person face-to-face people will be able to trust you much much quicker that way now I get asked a lot oh I don't have a real lorry I don't have a website or anything like that I can't go to those networking events now this isn't necessarily for you because you're all here at the one of the biggest networking events for the game industry but a lot of people ask me if they don't have a real or website is it okay to talk to developers and absolutely yes I didn't have one for like three years when I first started but I still got clients because people just kind of said like ah you're cool come onboard and that is actually how it works in some cases especially kind of at a starting level people want to hire people that they like or that they know or that they trust or that they met in person someone that they've interfaced with that they know will probably do a great job and won't just disappear off the face of the planet which may happen more likely with someone they've never met and is completely online and they know nothing about so even if you don't have a real and you don't have a website yes talk to developers as much as you can because once you have that website once you have that real once you have all your stuff ready they'll know who you are already and you'll have someone to actually talk to about it and people will be more receptive because they already know who you are does that make sense is everyone follow yes cool so one thing I'll mention to people who are just starting out people say like oh should I say no other things like should I say yes to everything that comes my way generally unless the client is super shady and you're getting a really bad vibe from them and you're just starting out you don't know what your strengths are and you're still figuring things out and maybe you don't have paid clients yet it is a good idea to start saying yes to a lot of things so that you can get a lot of experience now again this doesn't mean necessarily working with bad clients or working with people who give you really bad vibes or disrespectful because there's a lot of that in this industry unfortunately but I'm not saying you have to do that but it's a good idea to start saying yes to a lot of things and taking on a lot of work within reason obviously don't sacrifice your health but taking in a lot of work is really important to getting your strengths and knowing what you like working on and having an idea of what sorts of clients you want to work with and knowing what sorts of things you'll need to say to future clients in the future as you start negotiating and getting contracts that sort of thing thing and lastly you all know this but just just so you know one thing that you some things that you can do is of course volunteer at events that's how I actually started I was a CA when I first started here so CAS I love them so much but that's how I started I volunteered at things like packs or GDC or any local events in Seattle we're on base too to meet people to meet developers to say hi to other people and meet all the other volunteers as well and that was networking that was kind of done for me so don't ask you volunteering from your mind it's really useful going to game jams of course great idea for experience most of you have done this already in attending local events wherever you're at and it may not be so local for you you may need to travel a bit some people live further away from hubs than others you may need to drive a bit or even fly like I'm sure many of you did to get here that's worth it it's worth it to actually attend events and actually talk to humans and get in people's faces not in a weird way but talk to people and be actual friends with them so let's talk about networking on that note a little bit more so like I mentioned before you're actually here to make friends and actual relationships you're not here just to go up to people hand and your business card out and run away which is what I certainly did when I started whoo so that doesn't work that doesn't work at all people actually want to form some sort of connection with you and if they do they're much more likely to hire you based on that principle they'll realize okay you're easy to work with you have a good vibe this will probably go a lot better than someone who just handed me their business card I know nothing about and just ran away it is worth it to form these relationships and I'm always about quality over quantity so if you can talk to people for a little bit longer instead of talking to everybody for one two seconds at a time that's more important having quality over quantity is really really important so one thing I mention is as you get more advanced and as you become more you know well-known in the industry or you start talking to more people just showing up doesn't really work after a certain point yes if you're starting out just showing up is great because you don't really know what's going on fantastic just do that but if you are a little more intermediate a little more advanced you you know your pay rate is increasing etc etc making a plan for networking events is really really really crucial I don't just show up anymore I you know research speakers I see who's gonna be there I host lunches I host events that sort of thing you don't need to necessarily need to go that far but looking at who's gonna be at that event whether it be speakers or just attendees especially if it's a local event you can usually see who's gonna be there it's very helpful you can look at what those people are up to and see what they're working on if you can walk up to someone and say oh I've actually been looking at your game that's really cool I'm excited about XYZ that's much better than tell me about your game because you've actually put the time in to actually research and learn and actually make an effort to learn about other people instead of hoping other people will just trust you instantly that doesn't work that doesn't happen so don't just show up at a certain point it's worth researching the event who's gonna be there who you should talk to it makes things much easier and it kills a lot of the small talk and you can get way easier into better conversations and like I mentioned sending emails researching speakers sending emails to people who might be there it's very important before you go to that event like oh it'll be great meeting you obviate your talk or I can't wait to see you at this event whatever it may be when I first started in Seattle I messaged the person who was the head of those meetups and I just said oh I just moved to Seattle I can't wait to meet you I'll be at this event great nothing more than that I'm didn't mention I was a composer sound designer none of that stuff but when I showed up I said oh hey it's so nice to meet you like oh you sent me that email yeah let me introduce you to some people because they already had an idea of who I was just a little bit and it got rid of the small talk they the stranger-danger was kind of gone a little bit and again like I've mentioned follow up is so so so so important now following up with people within 24 hours you get a card they're cool you don't default but literally everybody but if you get someone who's interesting follow up with them email them within 24 hours talk about what you've talked about if you had a good conversation say it was great meeting them Thanks see you later it doesn't have to be anything longer than that don't do the thing where people send and it's Encyclopedia Britannica emails which is what I get 150 of every single week please don't do that to me it's just like here's my life story here's 16 demo reels please love me don't do that just say hello it was great to meet you and then that's a perfect email so like I mentioned you do need a you do need a big network but that'll come with time the quality actually matters a little bit more and vibrancy is what actually comes about and I actually learned this quote was really good from the work-life balance talk that penka Brian Schmidt Jesse and Larissa gave and that was really good I can't remember who exactly that said this I'm not a hundred percent sure but you do need a big network that I'll come with time and you do need a vibrant one which is one that you're following up with in talking to regularly showing up to look vents those are the people who have your back so contracts will blaze through this really quickly you can ask me specific questions now or afterwards use contracts even for free projects a lot of people ask me whatever but if you use one it actually helps determine who owns your stuff and there is a little bit of a precedent I'm not a lawyer by the way I'm not sure if you could tell but it's there's a little bit of a precedent set now where if a contract isn't said then by default not always this is kind of great super gray area the the rights can sometimes go to the client instead of you if there's no contract and you may not want that you may want the ownership terms really clear if you're working on a free project and you're not getting anything out of it which I'll talk about in a second it is really important to actually make sure you own those rights to that music or that sound or you're just doing a license or you want to be clear that they own it so there's no kerfuffle in the future now the two major types of contracts are work for hire which means that okay this client owns all of the stuff that I give them they own all the music they own all the sound they pay me and we're good that's usually how it works so that's what I did for you know things like destiny for example I make something they own it I don't have only I can't take that and sell that later right pretty simple that's usually the most common that you're gonna run into now there's also a non-exclusive agreement which you can use for clients that may not be able to pay your full rate what actually happens here is that you retain ownership of your stuff your music your sound whatever it may be but your licensing and out to that client so you're giving it to them for some period of time where they can use it and then you can sell it to other clients later as well this makes it cheaper for the client and makes it so that you can make more money off of it in the future so if you make a whole bunch of sounds you can then say okay you can have these sounds maybe you have it exclusively for the next six months let's say you don't always have to have a timeline but you usually can and then you can say okay cool the six months is up I can give this to any other client I want I can use this in any other future game I want so you can make a little bit more money off of back end of it as time goes on so let's talk about charging clients that's really important now this is a little bit disputed and I'll give you a little bit of a qualifier on this flat fees are really important I see a lot of people shooting themselves in the foot with per ass rates that's not necessarily the best way not to say it's always the best way but using flat fees makes it easier for the client I see so many people say oh I charge X amount per sound effect or X amount per minute of music and especially in the indie world people will see that rate and be ik that's a blank check I have no idea how much I'm going to pay this person even if they say it'll be 100 assets and it will be 100 dollars per asset they still don't want to see that they want you to just throw a number out and use a flat fee and it makes things so much easier for them to not have to worry about it they don't get blank cheques syndrome it makes things so much simpler so whenever you can calculate your feet maybe you do per asset in your head but calculate how many assets measure it all out and say oh this will be three thousand dollars here you go and maybe you had a per asset fee in your head but you're giving them the final number it makes things a lot easier not all clients prefer this this isn't for everything but it is very useful and makes things a lot smoother and a lot easier so that's that's my advice to you now I'm gonna send this to you guys for those of you give me your card and all that I'm gonna give you a template for a project proposal so when someone asks like oh what's your rate instead of just emailing them back you can actually have a little bit of a PDF where you can send them you know here's our timelines here's how much I'll here's how much it's gonna cost here's why it's gonna cost this much thanks so much it's a much more professional way to actually give your rates I can't go into one here but again email me or you know give me your cards or whatever and I can send that to you now there's something that happens a lot with called post quote silence where oh I charge this much and then no response from the client how many of you have dealt with that yes okay a whole bunch of people have dealt with that now this is a this is a common thing this is really really common this happens a lot the general reason that this happens isn't necessarily because your price is too high it does happen because of that sometimes but usually it's the client sees that goes like okay let me think on that I'm busy right now I'll get back to that and they never get back to it cuz emails are the worst so how to actually get around it is to actually when they say when you give the rate no response within about you know one to two days give it a little bit of time to for them to respond I usually say something like okay great I'm started to get to work on this I can start on the sword sounds or whatever some specific thing I can start on the sword sounds today how does that sound it makes it a lot easier for them to say yes at that point and it makes it so that's like oh right I forgot to I forgot to respond to this yes don't mention the money in your follow-up either because it's really easy for us as artists and freelancers to kind of wring our hands like oh I'm sorry I charged $100 for this oh I'm so sorry let me just lower this for you don't do that just say I'm excited to get to work on this how about I start on X makes it a lot easier for them and it knows that lets them know that you're actually more motivated as well actually gets started now one thing for those of you who are beginner is that you don't know how to respond to the question how much do you charge now this is usually beginner level only but not not super advanced there other ways but if someone says oh how much do you charge and you you know you have a general kind of tummy number something in your gut that you know like okay how about like you know $1,000 for this or whatever I'm just making random numbers and that's really scary for you to say that I've had so many people say a column so scared too quality oh my god I have to send a dollar sign one one one zero zero zero does this person what I usually do in this case when you're that scared and you're not 100% sure if it's too high what you can do is say something like this normally I would charge $1,000 for this project now I know you're a small indie studio or whatever qualifier you want especially if it's a beginner project or student project whatever it may be how much of that number do you feel comfortable paying that puts the ball in their Court but they know what your number is so you'll probably often find something we just often find clients say like oh well let's okay I can't do 1,000 but 800 is good or but there's a human psychology thing that happens where you can easily say oh I normally charge 1500 let's say it's for the same project 1500 for this how much of that number do you feel comfortable paying oh we can't do 15 how about 1200 so you can actually increase your rates actually really really easily that way again if you're more advanced I usually just say here's my rate I don't really I don't really negotiate on that case but when you're first starting out it's really terrifying to actually wonder is this too high is this too low I want to leave a little leeway because I don't know what the rates are I have no idea that's the script I normally charge X how much of that do you feel comfortable paying that's usually how you can go now some people ask can I work for free is that okay especially if it's a student game or something like that yes you can totally work for free you're not devaluing the industry but-but-but-but-but make sure you're not working for nothing you can work for free but don't work for nothing most people work for nothing they think oh credit suite no you have to get credit it's in some places it's the law like that's nothing that's absolutely nothing get something else out of it it could be tickets to an event like GDC maybe the developer can get you there it may be business card design it could be web design it could be teaching you how to code whatever it may be get some sort of something out of it other than credit make sure you get something else whether it be a skill trade or something like that that's really important when I first worked for Penny Arcade way way back I was their audio guy I remember the final job I did for them I was a how about I do this for free but you give me free packs passes forever as many as I want great I have that I have that now so I have I have like endless passes for every pack so that I could ever want it rules and that was well worth it so people asked about side jobs should I can I is it a good idea yes it's a good idea I used to clean toilets when I first started so I was a public pool janitor I don't recommend that as your side job it was the worst it was ice the smells I actually had to wear a gas mask I'm not joking that's how bad it smelled so it's okay to have a side job so many people ask oh but I need to go all in no it's good to have actually some sort of financial stability while you're studying and while you're working on your craft that is so so so crucial and you're not a failure if you have one you're absolutely not it's really important to know that if you are building financial stability and hustling or working on your thing on the side I consider that a success so long as you keep going and doing your thing it's only failure if you completely quit and give up and say no I'm never doing this again this is too hard or maybe you want to pivot which isn't failure in in and of itself but if you realize that okay I want to do this thing and you're smart enough to realize you also need money to do it then that's actually a really smart thing that's a really smart way of thinking about it now some of you are higher risk than others and want to go all-in fine that's totally cool no worries at all if you have a higher risk tolerance and can do with those real financial lows cool but I do advocate for most people to have some sort of financial stability because it can be a lot harder to so much as write a note when you're worried about where the next meal is coming from right so make sure you have something so lastly as a reminder as we finish up there's no one right way this isn't just this is just me going and the me telling you from my point of view and we're gonna wrap up here we only have a few minutes left for questions so if you also want to you know I'm gonna be able to hang out a little bit here before I go to my next talk at 10 with Ryan Ike and Carly night on the don'ts how not to work in game audio so you can follow me there if you want to as well also we'll be doing that follow up business video call so please feel free to email me as well any of your questions let me know that you're at GDC because I get literally 150 emails a week of people asking advice so make sure you're at GDC because then I'll actually have you know a filter set up to make sure I talk to you guys first yeah high priority because I get to meet you in person I also have business cards here if you want to kind of just grab one and go if you're off to somewhere but that's it for today thank you so much for coming so we have a couple minutes for questions so please use the mic just so it goes into the recording to actually two things how do you transition clients that you've started with on a trade basis you've got I would call like a pro fish professional rate I do video production work okay perfect offering DVDs and you know you start with clients great clients great people you're helping them in a small business you know with work to get a professional job done but now you're trying to get other clients they still demand a lot of time but they can't move with you right to that rate I mean how have you handled that yeah so usually there's a few ways to do it you can give them kind of a bonus like a old client right like you give them a cheaper rate but if you don't want you may not want to work with that company anymore let's say let's say like hypothetically oh they just can't pay me anymore at all um it's a good idea if they if there is a hard cutoff recommend someone else so that's like good karma for you but if you want to transition them into a higher tier with you if you want to bring them to your saying your rates are increasing it's actually not a bad idea in my experience to say something like okay you know what I've been doing XYZ a lot I love you as a client my rates are increasing to this number for clients now but I'm gonna give you this much because you're such a trusted client let me know if that works for you if it doesn't I'd be happy to recommend someone else who can do this work for you at a different rate because that can give you good karma and they'll love you for it even if you can't work with them anymore and you recommend someone the big I'll think yeah and maybe help get someone else into the biz like hey you're someone who's starting out I met him in a networking exactly and basically you become Google to them well they'll keep coming to you for references they will not cut you off if you give some sort of reference you are kind of the person machine at that point like oh well who else who else oh my god Oh we'd love to work with you again it works really well okay yeah and real quick just as a comment on your about working a side job it it helped me when I got started to pick the clients I wanted to work with and I didn't have to worry about taking every job to buy the bills yes worried about terrible clients yeah you learn you learn more and you get better at your craft perfect Thank You Akash thank you so much for your presentation eyes so you specifically mentioned 24 hours as the follow-up time have you ever been that role yeah oh yeah sometimes they have but I like I've gotten so much better results within 24 hours because you know they remember you much much easier and a little trick the reason I do the 24 hours thing I never forget their name once I do that if I fall up within 24 hours I remember who they are I literally never forget their name I don't I remember like their dog's name I remember everything and when I see them in three years I'm like oh you're still at Google House you're like how's your dog Coco like all this stuff like what how do you remember this it's purely because I followed up within 24 hours so there's a lot working there behind the scenes too it works really well yes sweet and a lot of people who are just starting out they've never read a contract before so I was hoping that for the benefit of the audience you could say a few words about any kind of cautionary tale like you didn't think you needed to do something and then you've had some kind of kerfuffle and like no yeah perfect so thankfully I've been using contracts from the beginning but I can share a general story I won't name names or anything like that but I've seen a lot of friends who didn't have a contract they say like oh it's just a handshake deal it'll be fine it'll be fine - fine the game tanks it doesn't come out who owns the music who owns the sound how do you know if they had a contract it would go right back to them and be no problem but unfortunately it was completely unclear and someone I know actually had to go through some legal issues and it turns out no the client owned it there's no contract so use one it's very useful all right so our time is out unfortunately for today but I will be hanging out so thank you so much for coming give me cards and all that sort of good stuff as well thank you

Channel: GDC

Views: 12,781

Keywords: gdc, talk, panel, game, games, gaming, development, hd, design

Id: 93ggs7hwJeU

Length: 32min 8sec (1928 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 09 2019