Choosing the right voice.
I feel the first aspect to consider when choosing an Imaging Voice is experience. Regardless of the rate you are getting, your voice talent should have solid, practical experience in voicing and recording audio for Radio and Television.
Let's face it. Home studios are popping up all over the place and there's a ton of garbage out there - eveybody and their dog is trying to cash in on audio delivery over the Internet, using their high-speed connection from home. I can't count how many jocks I've seen make a desperate attempt at the home studio and Voice Imaging. Your first clue will always be.....
A) A crappy home-made demo and,
B) The quality of the audio you get via an audition. Always get it checked by your production people and heed your producer's advice.
I have personally helped some ex-jocks set up their studio at home. If there is one thing I've learned - they know how to operate a board and use a mic - but beyond that, many don't have a clue how to properly record audio, let alone edit, master and encode properly. One guy, no word of a lie - it took me over two years to convince him to use a condensor mic for recording voice.....I ended up lending him a mic to prove my point. Now.....if I could just convince him to by some decent monitors.....(groan).
A good rule of thumb is to request a couple of auditions at different times with different scripts and send along the audio to your producer for scrutiny. In the end, rookies will give your producer plenty of headaches. Speaking of production people - they should also be an important consideration when making your decision. Ultimately, they are the ones who will work with the voice talent day after day - therefore, they should be a major contributing factor in when choosing your voice talent.  
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