Your instinct as an actor is to always lunge for the audition process. Book a role, get your face out there, work your way up. It’s certainly traditional approach and one that has seemed to work for a percentage of actors out there, but the audition room or standard cattle call are NOT the only ways to get discovered! Some of the greatest stars have been dug up from other soil. Our advice? Take an improv class. Take up sketch comedy. Dive confidently into independent projects. Start a YouTube channel or get creative on Vine. There are endless ways to get your face out there – DO NOT LIMIT YOURSELF!

As the world of technology changes, so is the casting process. Casting Directors are beginning to think more outside the box when it comes to scouting new talent.

At a recent SXSW Panel, Casting Directors talked about something a little intimidating, but worth looking into — apparently acting ABILITY may only account for less than 10% of why an actor lands a role. There’s so much more to account for these days. An especially telling excerpt lets us know that CDs are thinking in different directions these days:

For actors, perhaps the most notable panel was one featuring casting directors describing what goes into making their decisions, from money paid to talent through the positives and negatives of discovering new talent on the Internet.

Kaplin said that many casting directors are using YouTube and Vine to scout new talent, though Weber admitted “Often they come alive on camera but they’re not well-trained.” In fact, Middleton added that the box office value of such social media stars wasn’t clear because “you see that person for free every single day.”

Of course, effort remains the key. The casting directors spoke about filing away a talented actor’s tape if they knew he or she had talent, but didn’t have a project for that particular actor at the moment. Because of that, a failed audition might just end up being a success in the long run.

Our main point is that there is no sure-fire formula to “make it”. MAKE YOUR OWN LUCK, get your face out there!