Business Overview:

If the idea of running an exciting, money-making business from home with no startup costs and little risk sounds alluring, consider starting a talent agency. The concept of this business idea is really quite simple: You discover new talent that you would like to represent and you seek out work for them. Usually, you get paid when your client gets paid, and you take a cut (10 percent or more) of their pay. This is what motivates a talent agent to find work for their clients. After you have successfully found work for a few entertainers, models, and actors, your reputation will grow and you will be able to start getting more talent just by word-of-mouth. Then you can consider hiring additional agents to work for you and bring in even more talent. Before that, you might need to do a bit of advertising to get your business going. Other than that, it doesn’t take much overhead to start a talent agency, and you can invest as much or as little time in your business venture as you see fit. Of course, the more you work and the more you keep yourself involved in the industry, the easier it will be to find new talent and to find your entertainers their gigs.

A Day in the Life of a talent agency business owner:

This article brought to you by Business Ideas! If you enjoyed this article, make sure to subscribe to the Business Ideas Newsletter to get ideas sent straight to your email inbox.The usual routine of a talent agency business owner will start with a look at the calendar—you will want to see what bookings your entertainment clients have that day and perhaps give them a reminder phone call, just to check in. There may be days where you will want to be on the set to be sure that the client is receiving exactly what they wanted from your talent. Then you will want to sort through your casting calls to see what jobs look like matches for your talent and start setting up auditions. A good agent will send a postmortem message to a booking client to ensure they were happy with their talent and to thank them for the business. Meeting with your agents if you have hired a staff will be important to make sure everyone is on the same page, and keeping a close eye on your finances will also add to your business success. Finally, this business is all about contacts, so keeping your PDA and your little black book handy will be the key to a winning agency.

About Your Customers:

In this business, your customers (clients) are twofold—you will have your talent clients (actors, models, singers, etc.) and your casting directors or companies that seek talent. You will get paid from your talent, but you need to maintain solid relationships with the booking companies so that they look to you the next time they need an entertainer.

What You Need to Start:

• A phone
• A computer with a high-speed internet connection
• A company name
• A business license (if required in your area)
• Talent (actors, models, musicians, entertainers)
• Contacts in the entertainment business who will book your talent

The Good:

• You can literally run this business from your sofa.
• There is little or no startup cost.
• Your profits are earned by others’ work.
• It can be a very exciting business to be in.
• You can meet great people.

The Bad:

• There are many talent agents out there who you will be competing with to book your talent.
• Some talent you work with may be temperamental and difficult to deal with.

Resources:

• The Association of Talent Agents
• Talent Managers Association
• Wikipedia on Talent Agents

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