Advertising Your Magic?

[Corey]

Alright, I've recently been groing in popularity with my routines in my city. I'm the only magician in my town other than Clint Grey, a middle-ish-aged magician that does magic shows out of town.
Now that my situation in the magic community has been revealed, I'm wondering... What should I be doing for advertisement in my town? I have my buisness cards, but what I'm wondering what I should be doing for public advertisement. I'm already associated with two other buisenesses in town, and they pay about $75-100 an hour, but this is rare for me to be doing things with them, about one to two times a week... I need to be able to pay bills.
I guess my main questions are:

• How do I go about adverising?
• What kind of things should I include in my advertisements?
• Where would be a good place to set up advertisement?
• How do I go about things like payments, hours, and (maybe) turning down jobs?

Any additional advice is seriously appreciated, being that I'm sure that someone can help, thatnks guys.

 

[D ICE R]

What sort of magic do you preform? I have a few ideas but it would help if i knew a little more about what you do.

 

[Corey]

What sort of magic do you preform? I have a few ideas but it would help if i knew a little more about what you do.

I have several performances, mostly it revolves around less of a mentalism thing, but more of telling the audience that it all revolves around skill. The end result of most of my performances is that the audience doesn't believe me, that it was a sleight, and that I really did something magical, or unexplained. I criss-cross it with some visual flourishes to even further differentiate the difference in their minds of what a magician and a cardist would be, all the while never even hinting that it could be real. The end result, is usually them thinking that they know what is going on, but they really have missed something.

... Sorry, just had to think about what I would actually call my area of magic... I guess, mostly deception, and misdirection?

 

[Rasmus]

I'm recommending getting into restaurant magic. Restaurants are great places if you want to spread out some business cards and let many people know about you. If you don't already own them, I recommend buying David Stones "Real Secrets of Magic" volume 1 and 2 where you'll get tons of advice and information about restaurant magic; how to get jobs, how to perform, how to make sure you get the right payment etc.

Also you might want to start a smaller enterprise and advertise in newspapers if you're feeling comfortable with your magic acts. In that way, people can contact you. If you have permanent work at one or several restaurants a few times/week, the enterprise (for people looking for YOU, not the other way around) might be enough.

About what to include in your advertisements:
Short, big, perhaps catchy phrases and stuff easy for people to read. Also include what kind of magic you do so that you don't get booked for a stage act if you're performing close-up magic (but I'm sure every magician thinks about that). If we are talking about bigger advertisements (like posters) a picture of you together with some object in your magic act is great. If smaller advertisement, you might want a smaller picture of yourself, but sometimes there's simply no room for one, so you'll have to go with a nicely sum up text about what you do.

Last, but not least, there are tons of movies and books for the working magician, aswell as for the perhaps inexperienced amateur. As said, I recommend David Stones movies and also his new book named "David Stone Close Up".

I hope I didn't get you wrong! I wish you the very best of luck!
//Rasmus

 

[Corey]

Thanks Rasmus, I understand what you're saying about advertising and some smaller, more frequent acts at restraunts, but just where should I be advertising, for say a small postr or something that I can just post up around town? I know putting it in a good public spot is right, but is there anywhere that I shouldn't put it, like somewhere where it won't be liked, and torn down?
I'm also guessing I should probably ask for permission if I were post in a mall or something. Just some ideas that aren't obvious would be helpful, I'm usually quite independent and resourceful, but I'm just curious, cause I've never really advertised before.
Thanks again guys.

 

[Rasmus]

There are many schools (with many different ages) where you can advertise about anything. Espescially theater and music related schools, and the people working there are usually very positive to any kind of entertainment. Also inside and sometimes outside supermarkets. Another good place is at bus/train stations. In Sweden there are places for posters everywhere at bus/train stations for anyone to put up. If you get work at a restaurant they'll most likely allow you to put up posters outside their entrance, because they want to drag as much people as possible to the restaurant. That means other people just passing by will notice the poster aswell. In smaller towns there are usually one or two places where anyone can put up posters.

What you can do is to travel around the towns around you and find these places, espescially the public poster-places.

The best to get noticed is the natural way, out from the mouth. A good (and even more a bad) rumour is usually spread fast between people. As oftes as you can, show people your tricks. This might seem a bit silly, but if you show people tricks at pubs when you're just hanging around, or birthday parties, or for your friends, you'll see that you'll get noticed and people will come back to you. Always carry your business cards, they are lifesavers!

Up, up and away!
//Rasmus

PS. Get a website. Looks impressive and professional. Try to make it clean DS.

 

[AlexFjellbergSwerdlowe]

All about the advertising

If you do make a poster get into graphic design or get a graphic design artist to do it for you or maybe one of your friends is good with Photoshop CS3. The best advertisers in the world are right in front of your nose, Theory11 and Ellusionist, ESPECIALLY ELLUSIONIST with pictures and T11 with trailers. Look at E's pics and how they put text on their pics and what they say. They get people sucked in to buying a 50 dollar DVD with content worth less than 5 dollars. Thats how these two magic companies are so successful. Its all about the advertising and the way it looks. Just look at T11's website they must of paid sooooo much money for the design and all that to Wa007.

 

[Corey]

If you do make a poster get into graphic design or get a graphic design artist to do it for you or maybe one of your friends is good with Photoshop CS3. The best advertisers in the world are right in front of your nose, Theory11 and Ellusionist, ESPECIALLY ELLUSIONIST with pictures and T11 with trailers. Look at E's pics and how they put text on their pics and what they say. They get people sucked in to buying a 50 dollar DVD with content worth less than 5 dollars. Thats how these two magic companies are so successful. Its all about the advertising and the way it looks. Just look at T11's website they must of paid sooooo much money for the design and all that to Wa007.

I'm actually trained as an advertisement artist, and animation artist, but I'm mostly stirring about where to place these advertisements, cheaply, remember, I can't spend a lot of money due to the fact that I make next to none, and I have bills to pay.

 

[MikeGoyke]

Im not sure if this will help or not ....but if you make a website(if you dont have one already) you could put that on your business card, then hand it out to people that see you perform.If you perform at festivals, thats probably a great place to hand them out too. Another thing you could use is craigslist.org and place you website on there. Im not exactly sure how many people search on craigslist but its always worth a shot and best of all its free advertising.

If you have any questions you can always private message me and i'll try my best t help you out.

 

[Ineski]

The best advertisement you can have is a good gig. Let's say you do a small show for 30 people. That means you'll get 30 more possible gigs since everyone who sees you could be a future customer. Keep that in mind. Business cards work wonders in these kinds of situations. A stage show would of course get you even more possible gigs, you just have to give subtle cues so your spectators will understand that you could be rocking their upcoming parties as well. This creates a lovely snowball effect.

Now you can only imagine what a TV performance would do to your bookings...

 

[hijackedmagic]

make a website. there's a very simple way to do it with a domain name for only $10. everything else is free. ill pm you about it

 

[Dylan P.]

flyers are a good ay to advertise your services to the community. I would say to hang them up around town and place them in restaurants and shops to be taken if wanted. Just make sure that you have permission from the town or buisness owner to do this. I personally do not like flyers as much as I like buisness cards for a few simple reasons.

1: They too can be handed out in stores.

2: More people will grab them since they are easily placed in a pocket and are not as large as flyers.

3: After a restaurant performance or street magic performance you can produce them in a magical way and hand them out to the crowd.

4: They look professional and very classy.

5: You can actually do a trick with it before handing it out. These tricks include the initial form of Stigmata or the blank card trick from How To Do Street Magic.


WHAT SHOULD BE ON THESE?

Well this is very simple. You want a picyure of youself on it. Note: ( Do not take an in action picture like brad chrsitaian running on taxi's with cards.) People would rather like a nice calm picture so they can judge if you look like a good guy or not. You also want a phone number that people can reach you with. Include your name on top but have it set in a colorful funny funt that will catch peoples eye. If you have space then you can include one of your own magic related quotes.

For example my quote is on the back of mine and is: " The mind likes to learn, but it likes even more to be fooled..."

You can also include your address if wanted as well as a short description of what you do and how long you will need to do it.

If you are going to do parties of some kind list all types of parties you'll do and what you'll charge for each.

For example: Kids Party: $15 dollars an hour
Churches: Work for tips. All money goes to Charity.
High class restaurants: $100 an hour
low or middle class restaurants: $20-$30 an hour.

This will help people find what they need. I also recomens having a unique eye catching design on the cards border or background.

Hope this helped. PM me if you have any more questions regarding this or anyhting else.

 

[dragon521]

The best advertisement you can have is a good gig. Let's say you do a small show for 30 people. That means you'll get 30 more possible gigs since everyone who sees you could be a future customer. Keep that in mind. Business cards work wonders in these kinds of situations. A stage show would of course get you even more possible gigs, you just have to give subtle cues so your spectators will understand that you could be rocking their upcoming parties as well. This creates a lovely snowball effect.

Now you can only imagine what a TV performance would do to your bookings...

^^^Pretty much this.

Go out one weekend and perform one of your hardest hitting effects to people on the street. Then hand out your business card. The more people you perform to the greater the chance of someone knowing someone who knows someone who needs a magician. As for advertising, I would put an ad in the telephone book. Buy a small one with your name and telephone number at first, then proceed to buy one (as you start making more money) that is big enough for a picture and real good description. The more professional-looking (and bigger, to some extent) the ad, the more clients you will get.

 

[D ICE R]

Try your local mall's most of them are willing to give you a free evening show on their stage as it usually will increase traffic flow for that night. The only disadvantage is that you need to have something that will play to more people than just close up magic. Unless you want to set up a camera and projector but that often creates more problems than it is worth. However the center management does not want anything that will be too difficult to set up they have no problem with a couple of microphones and some speakers, chairs tables but when you need more elaborate props then they see it as too much of a inconvenience. If you can figure something out it is well worth it. Free audience of easily 200 people, they will often make and place fliers up for the show and say it is your payment. And a good way to gain publicity both with the show and for a couple of weeks before you can do as many tricks as you want to random people with out worrying about the security interrupting you.

 

[ThrallMind]

You can actually do a trick with it before handing it out. These tricks include the initial form of Stigmata or the blank card trick from How To Do Street Magic.

There's also an entire DVD dedicated to business card effects by Michael Ammar here

I would not do Stigmata with your business card, or any effect which mangles the card. They'll end up with a crumpled up card which they may perceive as "trash."

You want a picyure of youself on it. Note: ( Do not take an in action picture like brad chrsitaian running on taxi's with cards.) People would rather like a nice calm picture so they can judge if you look like a good guy or not.

A very good idea.

You also want a phone number that people can reach you with.

As Dylan said, very important. An email is also a great idea.

Include your name on top but have it set in a colorful funny funt that will catch peoples eye.

This depends. There is no need for your name to be outrageous and eye catching. Depending on how professional you would like to look, you may want to go for a neutral color with a nice clean font.

You can also include your address if wanted.

Personally...I find having an address is not the best idea. Having people know where I live in a public place just seems a bit...creepy. But thats just me.

A short description of what you do and how long you will need to do it.

The card should advertise you do magic without you needing to describe it. How long you will need to do it will be based upon the venue. No need for this to be on the card, it will be discussed when they call you.

If you are going to do parties of some kind list all types of parties you'll do...

This is a great thing to have.

...and what you'll charge for each.

For example: Kids Party: $15 dollars an hour
Churches: Work for tips. All money goes to Charity.
High class restaurants: $100 an hour
low or middle class restaurants: $20-$30 an hour.

This is not. The prices should never be on the card. Since they may change based on size of the venue, the distance you must travel to get there, etc. Also, you don't want to confuse someone trying to figure out if they classify as a high class restaurant...

However, saying "Kids Parties, Churches, Restaurants" so and and so fourth can't hurt. It also can't hurt to add a small blurb saying how you will work churches free of charge, if thats what you want.

Not meaning to pick apart your post Dylan, but you hit points I didn't feel like retyping

-ThrallMind