By: David Wooddell, Barbizon USA

Often times I hear clients asking why they are not hearing back from an agency to set up a meeting; “They’re not responding to my email,” or “They keep pushing my meeting off,” or even “Are they really this busy?!” The simple answer is yes. Agents are very busy, especially during pilot & episodic season. With that being said, patience is a virtue. Agents are responsible for procuring auditions for their clients. If the agents are getting those appointments, the clients are auditioning. If the clients aren’t auditioning and booking those jobs, no one is getting paid. Generally, agencies will have a certain time of week that they will schedule in-house appointments with potential clients. Here are a few examples of ideal and not-so-ideal times of the year to submit to an agency as well as what your submission email should look like.

BEST TIMES:

• • Just before or after pilot season (first week of January & June 15th until mid-August).
  • November / December (the industry “shuts down” during the holiday season – productions wrap, agents take vacations & agencies have more time to sit down with potential clients).
  • Monday – Friday (generally, agents don’t respond to client submissions on weekends).

WORST TIMES:

• • Pilot season! This is a very high-stress time of year for agents – agents just simply don’t have the time to meet with potential clients (mid-January until June).
  • Three in the morning (no, seriously – don’t email agents after 8:00pm).

Submitting to an agency can be a very exciting yet nerve-wracking ordeal. I think the waiting game is what gets to young, new clients. Stressful thoughts start to creep into our heads: “What if they don’t like me?” “Oh my gosh! It has been a week – why aren’t they responding?” “I give up.” Remember, just be patient when submitting and respect the agent’s time.

You shouldn’t harass the agent either. When I worked at DreamScope Entertainment in Los Angeles, I would get anywhere from 50-100 new client submissions a day. I would folder them and dedicate one day out of my workweek to comb through every single email, every single resume, every single headshot. Often times, I would find that 5-10 of the emails came from the same person! While I appreciated their persistence, I was immediately turned-off from the submission based on the correspondence they would write. It started off with a strong introduction and quickly trickled down to a very rude “You could have at least responded to me.” That is a large red flag.

When submitting to an agency, you should include several items that I have outlined below.

WHAT TO SUBMIT:

• • 2 strong headshots: one comedic & one dramatic.
  • Video submission – monologue OR a professionally edited reel (if you have experience).
  • Resume – formatted to industry standard.
  • Brief blurb about yourself.

Happy submitting!