Recently, I was turned on to the audiobook industry and opted to explore book narration and production as a side venture. It’s a crazy world and a much different discipline than broadcasting, though there is a fair amount of crossover.
I work through Audiobook Creation Exchange (ACX), which is owned by Amazon. A finished ACX audiobook goes to the major player in this space, Audible, which is also owned by Amazon. Audible distributes the book to its own retail site, Amazon, and iTunes. Amazon basically rules the world!
As a narrator and producer, I audition for books that authors or rights holders post on ACX. From the book’s website page a narrator can also see how long the book is in word count and hour count. The latter is based on a narrator reading about 9,300 words per hour. This is important because the rights holder pays for services two different ways: by a negotiated rate per hour based on the book’s runtime or by a royalty share contract. Narrators are not paid for how much time it takes to do the job, which is considerably longer than the book’s actual runtime. It’s important to be as efficient as possible when working!
A lot of books are royalty share on ACX. These are lower risk for rights holders because no production fees are paid upfront. It’s higher risk for narrators. The longer the book the more it requires active promotion by the rights holder in order for the narrator to recover compensation in relation to time spent producing. There is also a fair amount of junk available for narration that will never sell much, making royalty shares a hit-or-miss proposition. Audible takes 60 percent of a sale while the rights holder and narrator evenly split the remaining 40 percent. The royalty share contract is in place for seven years.
After accepting an offer, I read through the manuscript and make notes. I set a recording and editing production schedule based on the deadlines given. The initial milestone is the first 15 minutes of the book. This gets recorded and sent to the rights holder. That person can ask for corrections, but once they sign off, they are committed to the narrator for the project. Backing out of the contract after this point leads to financial penalties for the rights holder as outlined in the contract.
Once the book has been recorded and edited, I have to master the recording. This adds a little voice processing and brings the book up to the audio specifications Audible requires for distribution. I do one final quality control listen and then pick a passage that will be used as a listening sample for potential customers. I upload each section and chapter as individual files and notify the rights holder that the project is done. Once that person signs off, assuming they don’t ask for corrections, the book goes to Audible’s quality assurance department where it takes about two weeks to receive final approval and notification that the book is going to retail. If Audible finds any problems during its quick quality assurance check, the book gets kicked back to the narrator for corrections.
Those are the basics. Here is the news…I have completed my first audiobook!
If you’re a friend of mine on Facebook and interested in giving the book a listen and writing a quick review, send me a note on Messenger. I have promo codes so you can download the book for free on Audible. Your review, assuming you like what you hear, helps me promote my narration audio quality. That can lead to better jobs down the road. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have an audition…