Tonight is our eighth show of the fringe. It’s been thrilling, exhausting, demoralizing, and uplifting. Here are my thoughts on promoting the show:
Fail Greatly
A few days ago, musician JP Saxe took to social media to explain that if he didn’t sell an additional 20,000 tickets in the next 48 hours, his upcoming tour would be cancelled. The internet rallied, several thousand tickets were sold, but he still fell short of the mark. He had to cancel the tour.
Struggling is hard. Writing about it in the moment, rather than describing it in retrospect, is especially hard. In a column for Variety, Saxe said:
“Very few artists want to be sleeping in their car eating ramen. But every artist wants to say they used to sleep in their car eating ramen.”
Right now, here’s all I can say—I’m eating my ramen. Lots of it.
The crux of getting people to come to our show is flyering. Literally—standing on the street, handing people flyers, and essentially begging them to watch you perform. It is the most humbling thing I’ve ever done.
As you can imagine, most people don’t want to talk to you. If you’re walking, you don’t really want to be approached by a stranger handing you information about a show you know nothing about. And statistically, that show won’t be very good, because if the show was good, it would probably have an audience already, wouldn’t it?
Fortunately, I’ve found a small hack to the constant rejection. It doesn’t always work, but I don’t really get rejected with it. Here’s what I do:
I do not approach people who are in motion. Think about when you’re walking somewhere. Do you want to be stopped? I certainly don’t. It’s not to say that you’ll never get someone to stop for you. But your success rate is going to be tiny.
Once I find a group of people who are:
standing around on their phones,
looking at a board of showtimes trying to figure out where to go or,
sitting on a bench and casually chatting, I approach them with very specific words.
Those are: “Excuse me. This is gonna sound a little strange, but I’m a magician. Do you want to see a mindreading trick for a few seconds while you’re standing around? Just for fun?”
Then, I show them a short trick. Once it goes better than they expect it to, I pitch them the show.
Words words words
Let’s get into the details of why this works, starting with the specific wording of the approach. Because I promise you, I’ve thought about every word.
“Excuse me:”
Most flyerers say something like “Comedy show in ten minutes?” It’s a complete interruption into someone else’s conversation. I approach a group, nothing in my hands (no flyers), so that they don’t know what I’m doing yet. A stranger who says “excuse me” will get people to stop, because for all they know, I’m asking for directions.
“This is gonna sound a little strange:”
This shows self-awareness and also creates an expectation that I’m gonna say something pretty weird. When it’s just a magic trick, I think they take an internal sigh of relief that I’m not asking them for money.
“I’m a magician. Do you want to see a mind-reading trick for a few seconds?”
I used to say “magic trick,” but that simply wasn’t intriguing enough. I also used to ask for “a minute or two,” but that was too much time. People simply don’t want to waste time on something they’re not sure about.
However, mind-reading is inherently a more interesting term, and “a few seconds” is an amount of time that everyone has to spare.
When I sense hesitation, and I often do, I’ll throw in that last line, “Just for fun? While you’re hanging around…having beers/drinking coffee/staring at your phone.”
I would estimate that eight times out of ten, people say yes. Some people literally don’t have time, or speak a different language, or just don’t want to. But if I approach a group of reasonable people who speak reasonable English who aren’t in a big rush, the odds they watch the trick at this point are nearly 100%.
These are hot leads—it’s all people who have chosen to go to the Fringe Festival, meaning they want to see performances.
The Pitch
I then proceed to show them a banger and far surpass their expectations. This is critical. If you mess up the trick, they will laugh you off. I know because it happened a few times.
Once I’ve done the trick, we enter the “post-trick questioning” phase, which is where everyone stands around for a few seconds trying to process what happened. This is when I tell them about the show.
At this point, I’ve learned the names of the group, and we’ve built rapport. It’s completely natural for me to then say, “I’m doing a mind-reading show down the street in an hour if you want to come. It’s free, and there’s a great comedian (Tess) who does the show with me.”
Now, the conversion rate is still tiny. A lot of groups like the trick, but they already have plans that night. Or they say they’re going to come, and they don’t.
All of that is ok, though, because now that I’ve shown them a trick, they’re so much more likely to tell their friends, or people that they meet, to come. At the very least, they remember me.
Maybe 10-20% of the people I talk to will show up, and that’s on a good day. Sometimes, none of them come. But I guarantee you that that conversion rate is higher than if I stood on a street corner yelling “Magic and comedy show!”
Likewise, I’m playing the long game. Some people might come the next week, and we’re still too early in the run to see those benefits.
At the end of the day, magic is free advertising, and it is the best tool I have. I’ve become completely shameless, willing to pitch my show to anyone and everyone I meet, always willing to do a trick.
But it’s a great lesson, and I hope I take this willingness to perform back to New York. A ton of people who came to our early shows were there because I performed for them. As long as you’re kind, considerate of people’s time, and do a good trick, people are generally happy you came into their life for a few seconds.
Eat Your Ramen
Flyering is still incredibly tiring and demoralizing. Edinburgh is ten times harder than touring. Because at least on tour, I knew every show would be sold-out. Despite the exhaustion that came from early morning flights and memorizing 100+ names every night, I can’t explain how uplifting a full house is.
Begging people to come see you perform is, on a certain level, a little sad, no matter how good your show is. But that’s why the Fringe is such a great equalizer. I’ve done more sold-out shows in the states than I can count, but that does not matter here.
This is our first fringe. We are seven shows deep. And it takes a hell of a lot more than seven shows to build a following.
One day, I’d love to do a sold-out Fringe run. But like a race, you have to carb-load to give yourself enough energy to make it through.
So right now, I’m eating my ramen.
another banger!
Well said Max, and well played. Routing for you from here in the US! Hoping you can continue to add protein and veggies to your ramen!