Publicity Stunts

As Oscar Wilde once stated, “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.” They say that the best form of advertising is word of mouth. That’s more true than most people realize. Think about all of the other forms of advertising: radio, T.V., billboard, etc . . . what’s the purpose of those commercials and ads, etc? Isn’t it simply to get people to think about their product . . . top-of-mind awareness.

It’s even more than that. If you see a commercial for a lawn care service – and the commercial is funny or “speaks to you” on some level, then you’ll likely remember it when a friend asks if you know of any lawn care services in the area. Suddenly, you’ve just become the word of mouth advertisement for the lawn care service. This scenario works best – paradoxically – for products categories that you’ve not used before. If you see a shampoo commercial that’s funny or “speaks” to you, but it’s for a brand that you’ve not used, you’re more likely to still refer others to the shampoo that you currently use. However, in the lawn care example, you’ve never used a lawn care service before, so you can’t speak from experience . . . you can only speak of what you’ve heard about.

Think about that last sentence for a moment . . . you can only speak of what you’ve heard about. So the goal of a commercial in that case is to get you to remember them so that they’ll be the first one you think about when someone asks about their industry – lawn care in this case.

In the shampoo market or cleaning product market, etc . . . they’re just trying to get you to try out a different version of a product you already have. It’s much more difficult. In our industry – entertainment – we’re more likely to fall into the former category rather than the latter. In other words, most people have never hired a magician. However, everyone buys soap. Lucky for us we’re not trying to convince (most people) to switch brands because they have no experience with any brand when it comes to hiring a magician. That’s good news for us. Now that we understand that, the next step is to just get people talking about you. There are so many ways to do that.

Below I’ll list a few with a few basic pointers. It’s up to you to apply it. I’ll also recommend a few resources that can be very valuable in helping you get publicity.

Free Magic

When it comes to free magic, there are a handful of things that come to mind. Some are big, and some are small. There are, I’m sure, plenty of charities or hospitals in your area that would love a free show. Senior centers are another great venue for free shows. The beauty of some of these situations is that they’ll do the advertising for you. They’ll advertise in their newsletters, with fliers, etc. It’s not unlike restaurant magic. The restaurant does some of the advertising for you.

Another great venue is toy stores that sell magic tricks or kits. Talk with the owner about setting up a magic day at the toy store. I worked out a deal with a local costume shop that sold a few magic tricks. The owner gave me a bunch of products that she was trying to move. I took them home for a few weeks and worked out some routines and put together some demos. Meanwhile, she’s advertising in her newsletter, with fliers and on her marquee in front of the building: Come see Magician Jeff Stone on Saturday X date for free.” It drew in a crowd, sold some magic, and gave me some leads.

Perform for your local library – In Salt Lake City, they actually will pay a couple hundred bucks. I worked the libraries several years back in my kid show days. I did about 20 shows for the libraries, and from it, I booked about 8 or 10 private shows, plus I met a local magician at one of the library shows. We exchanged cards, and for the past several years, he’s called me relatively frequently when he gets overbooked. Even if the libraries didn’t pay me, it still would have been worth it.

Challenges & Stunts

Challenges are much more . . . ahem . . . challenging, but still doable. Predict the outcome of a game a local event, etc. How to predict it is another story. Volumes have been written about this stuff (a couple are mentioned below under “resources”). However, the point is, if you know a good prediction method for this type of thing, it’s not too hard to get the attention of local media. Submit a press release to the local stations announcing that you will predict the outcome of a local election. On a smaller scale, get with a local high school or college and predict the outcome of an upcoming football game. Get with the college press and local media for coverage. If you’re an escape artist or more of an “extremist,” you may want to brush up on your Houdini history. Public stunts like driving blind folded and the like will definitely get the attention of the media.

In general, a free show that has some sort of catch or gimmick will get the media’s attention. Of course, your first step is to get their attention. Get some contacts. Have the guts to walk into the local T.V. or radio station and show the receptionist a trick or two . . . draw a crowd of employees and bystanders. Do that a few times and word’ll spread. Local reporters will watch a trick just like anyone else. Let them know that you can predict the outcome of x, y or z. A lot of this stuff is, obviously, easier said than done. And even more of it is way out of the comfort zone of a lot of you within the reach of my voice. And even further, it may back-fire miserably and land you no extra gigs. My intention here is to merely plant seeds, get you thinking, motivate you to think outside the proverbial box.

Resources

There are plenty of places to read and learn about publicity stunts and ideas. Of course Annemann’s Practical Mental Effects is a classic with some excellent ideas and methods for publicity effects. John Riggs has some great headline prediction methods in Heavy Mental. Sankey’s got an excellent effect on Disk II of Secret Files that could be used for getting gigs. Additionally, Jerome Finley’s work on “Cloud Busting” is excellent as well.

Hopefully I’ve met my goal by getting you thinking, and hopefully people will start talking about you.

Until next month . . .