What is New Media and how do you charge for it?

Have you heard of DOOH? Welp, it's a type of new media. What is it and how do you charge for it?

The Gift of Gab: DOOH and OTT Advertising

What is New Media and how do you charge for it? - 7:30

Hey guys, thanks for joining me on another edition of The Gift of Gab.

We’re going to talk about DOOH.

No, not Homer. This isn’t just any modeling dough. No—punch your dough down. No, not that dough. No, bit of a soggy “B” there.

DOH—no, not a deer. What’s the matter, Donna? Dear God, we have to put him down.

D’oh! I like a relatively thick pastry. D-O-O-H.

Do, do, deer, a female deer… oh, forgot. Just stick around.

What is DOOH?

Designated Out-of-Home advertising—known as DOOH.

Yeah, I don’t know, the acronym’s kind of goofy. It is stuff that you encounter—literally what I can only call media that you encounter outside of your house. I mean, obviously, but in slightly unexpected places.

Some gas station chains like Circle K and BP have their own gas station television network. Have you seen this? Like literally as you’re at the pump you’re kind of forced to watch TV. Stop it. Stop it, please, I beg you.

And there are ads obviously promoting the gas brand, but other things as well. There could be additional advertisers who hop on board.

It is ads at your ATM machine, ads at self-checkout registers, all of these strange little places—kiosk advertising that we’re now encountering as additional forms of media.

What About OTT?

DOOH also goes hand in hand with something called OTT, which stands for over-the-top advertising.

Now, as a performer, right—we hear “over the top” and we think: jazz hands! “Now don’t stop ‘til it’s as natural as breathing.” No, no, there is no Liza Minnelli, and despite how I am dressed, that’s not what we’re doing.

Over-the-top advertising is what I think we used to call, when I worked in advertising, “added value ads.” And I think that terminology had to change, and somehow over-the-top is what took over.

But this is ads that run in marketing situations that cannot be tracked the way we can with terrestrial types of media like radio and television. This is internet-based stuff.

It does, however, affect our television watching and our radio listening—ironically—because it’s all based on streaming services, right?

This is material that can be selected for very, very targeted, very specific advertising groups. It is material that is usually on demand, which is why it’s associated so much with streaming channels—Hulu in particular.

There’s no set broadcasting schedule. It’s not like the Super Bowl where we know exactly when it’s going to air and what time and why and all of that good stuff. This is people click it and access it whenever they want. 24/7, potentially globally.

It’s very hard to measure the metrics here. It’s very hard to get concrete numbers on how many people watched, and when they watched, and who watched.

Sometimes we also call it CTV advertising in the industry—and that has to do with connected devices. That’s your phones, your tablets, your computers, gaming systems.

This is all new media, guys. This is really what it’s all about.

DOOH and OTT fall under these categories of Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, HBO Max, YouTube, Disney+, and all of these other things that now really dominate how we consume media and how we interact with brands.

Why This Matters for Voice Actors

The reason this stuff is really important is because, as a voice actor, so much of this determines how we get paid.

You should know—I would hope you know—that when you’re dealing with broadcast work, you’re paid on whether or not something is local, regional, or national in origin.

Unfortunately, this new media makes it so that those metrics no longer matter the way they used to. And it’s getting more and more difficult for standardized rates to apply to things.

So this is affecting… this is one of the many, many ways in which all performers—all actors—are being affected by how these clients are coming up with their pay numbers, what they’re offering to performers, and how negotiations are being dealt with with agents.

It’s kind of tricky stuff right now. It’s going to be a long battle. It’s going to be a long time, I think, before actors really see the rates of pay that they should be getting paid for this type of work, unfortunately.

And so as a result, things are a little messy right now, and a little out there.

Advice for Actors

But I’m telling you this because it’s important to understand that when you see an audition or when you see a potential job opportunity for something that is labeled as OTT, for instance, or DOOH—pay really close attention to the dollar amount being offered and ask a lot of questions.

Because there is a big difference for an OTT spot that’s going to run on a very small, niche product to a very specific region in a particular area that Hulu covers… versus an ad that is going to run globally for a major product across all of Hulu’s channels and lines.

And that can mean the difference between making a few hundred on a job and making tens of thousands.

So please: ask a lot of questions. Be very careful when you’re pricing these kinds of jobs because they might be worth a lot more than you realize.

And that’s part of just being a good business owner and being a good negotiator.

704-674-8294 / GabrielleNistico.com / gabby@voiceovervixen.com

Gabrielle Nistico, Gabby Nistico, The Voiceover Vixen, The Business First VO Coach, #VoiceoverVixen #VoiceOnFire #BusinessFirstVOCoach Voiceover, Charlotte, North Carolina, DOOH, new media, audition, OTT, new media work, negotiation