How To Make Money Doing Magic

by Merchant of Magic Leave a Comment

Make Money Doing Magic Magic is an awesome hobby—and for a lot of us, the enjoyment we get out of it is more than enough to keep us satisfied!

But did you know that there are actually a lot of creative ways you could earn money through magic?

Here are three simple ways you can use your magic skills to pay the bills!

No1 Paid Gigs

This is the most obvious of all the methods, but it’s definitely worth mentioning. This is the most common and ‘tried and tested’ way to earn a very decent income through magic.

Here’s how it tends to work…

You build yourself a website that lets your prospective customers know a little bit about you and what you can do for them. This isn’t as hard as it sounds, and if you really don’t feel like doing it you can always hire someone else to do it for you.

You can learn all about how to make your own website to promote your magic here…

Alternatively, you could create some business cards to hand out next time you’re out performing magic. The most important thing is that you have SOMETHING for your potential customers refer to—whether it’s a website, business card or even a Facebook page.

The next step is getting your name out there—ask your friends to spread the word and consider setting up a few paid ads to get things rolling. Once you get a few gigs under your belt word of mouth should start spreading and you’ll naturally get people coming to you.

What type of gigs should you be performing?

There are a few different types of paid gigs magicians tend to go for (and they each have respective benefits and disadvantages).

Restaurants

This is a good starting place for magicians looking to start making their way up the paid gigs ‘ladder’. Performing at restaurants is a good way to get used to performing magic to unfamiliar crowds, and since you’ll generally be ‘table-hopping’ anyway, you’ll be performing for small groups at a time. Make sure to hand out your business card at the end of each performance!

Weddings

Weddings tend to pay nicely (of course they do—it’s a wedding!) so if you can get yourself a few of these booked then you’ll do very nicely for yourself.

A great tip for getting weddings booked is to attend ‘wedding fayres’ which are usually venues where couples can check out all the different kinds of things they’ll need for their wedding and how much they’ll cost. For example, photographers will often be in attendance at this event—looking to secure a few events.

You can do exactly the same thing as a magician (and chances are, there won’t be many other magicians there to compete with). This is your chance to impress the couples and pitch your value as an entertainer at their function.

Here’s a free ebook about marketing yourself for weddings

Corporate Events

This is a style of show where businesses will pay magicians to come in and present lessons and motivational ideas for the employees through the medium of magic. Or sometimes, it’s just purely for entertainment.

Either way, it’s a good atmosphere to perform in and often pays nicely!

Busking

If you’re not quite ready for paid events like we talked about above, you might benefit from getting your start on the streets.

Street magic and busking are less of a ‘step up’ from casual magic, but they still provide you with the chance to earn while you perform.

Check out this resource on getting started in busking!

No.2 Create Your Own Magic

If you know a thing or two about magic and have a creative flair, you can earn money through creating your OWN effects or gimmicks.

There are plenty of magic shops and companies that will then pay you good money for your efforts! Or you could create your own website and sell your effects exclusively through there.

Here’s a great blog post published here at the MoM that teaches you all about creating original and unique magic tricks.

No.3 Affiliate Marketing for Magic Shops

The other two ideas we’ve discussed so far have been pretty standard. But here’s something you might not have considered…

Affiliate Marketing.

What is affiliate marketing?

Affiliate marketing sounds complicated, but it’s really quite simple. You can earn money by promoting OTHER people’s products (all you need is a link).

How does this relate to magic?
Well, as it happens, you can become an affiliate of the Merchant of Magic here.

That means you can get a unique link for EACH of our products that will enable you to earn a commission whenever somebody clicks through your link and buys the product.

For example, if you made a YouTube video performing one of your favourite new effects, you could drop a link in the description that would take people to the Merchant of Magic to buy that same effect (which would earn you a commission!).

This approach definitely won’t work for everyone, and I’m sure many people would find it easier to go with the more traditional method of performing at paid gigs and functions, but it’s definitely worth considering if you haven’t yet done so.

So there you are! Three simple ways to earn some extra cash through nothing more than performing magic!

Do you have any questions we didn’t address? Feel free to get in touch with us.

About the author: Benji is a hobbyist magician from the UK who also runs a magic site over at thedailymagician.com.

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When Spectators Film Your Magic Performance – Should You Mind?

by Dominic Reyes 1 Comment

Keith asks if it’s OK when spectators film your magic performance.

Keith writes: Hi Dominic, Loved your book Approaching Tables. There’s more useful info in this book than all the books and DVDs I’ve bought on this subject. If you are ever looking to update it, I wondered what your thoughts were when people film your magic on their mobile phones (which seems potentially likely) – any thoughts on whether this is a good or bad thing, whether you should discourage them, or if you need to make any adjustments or compensation for it?

Hi Keith, thanks for the kind words about the book. I enjoyed writing it and it was a chance to answer a LOT of questions we get asked at Merchant of magic every day. To answer your question, I often have spectators film my close-up magic, probably because I encourage it as much as possible. There is nothing to fear from your spectators filming you. As long as you think about the following:

When people film your magic it’s invaluable marketing

They say that word of mouth is the best form of adverting, and they are right.. Every performance you give is an advert about how great you would be at your spectators future events. If some of the guests pull out their phones and film you performing, encourage it. Although all of my work tends to be close up to groups of guests, I’ve found this applies just as well for any size crowd. Make sure you switch around your material, so they can film something close up right away and then prompt them to pan out for reactions..

Spectator reactions are THE footage you want them to capture.

You want them to have some great footage of everyone having fun, they can show their friends..

Make sure your angles and misdirection is good

It’s pretty obvious, but make sure you switch over to material you know is 100% tight. Cameras can’t be distracted, so make sure that you don’t flash anything. The tricks you perform need to be structurally robust. In other words, they can withstand someone watching them over and over again. If you have to do a secret load, or misdirect the audience whist a change happens, this won’t hold up to repeat viewing.. always pick material to suit the conditions.

Remember: Audience attention spans are very short when it comes to video.. Switch over to short punchy effects at the start, so some magic happens quickly. If you start a long drawn out routine, don’t be suprised if their camera gets put away half way through.. you don’t want that.

Use off camera moments

Be aware of when the filming is taking place, and when spectators are just watching. You can use those moments, to set up something that can’t be done on camera. If I know someone is going to film because they are getting their phone out, I will try to do a body load or steal a watch, right away. I can then do the reveal, once the camera is rolling.. This is like instant, impromptu, pre-show!

Ask one of the spectators to use YOUR phone to film your magic.

You REALLY CAN do this. People don’t find at all. Just hand someone your phone and say:

“I’d like you to film this, because there is NO WAY you will believe what you are about to see..”

That doesn’t make sense, but at the same time.. it feels like it does.. I say that a LOT. You probably won’t show them the footage anyway, as you will go on to perform more.. but it SOUNDS good, and you will find the person will usually really enjoy doing it. That footage is great for your showreel, and you can even send it over to your client later when you recontact for a follow up.

Try to steer them to focus on the reactions of the spectators

Sorry to say, but the method of your trick is BORING to everyone other than other magicians. People sit through the method, to get to the magic. It’s just a tool to get a spectators reaction. The reaction is the reward and your footage should be full of rewards!

If you see a spectator just zooming in on your hands, steer them to focus on the whole group. other spectators questions and engage with them, make them a feature of the performance too. Bring you r hands up away from your waste line level. Your crotch is not the best think to be on camera,, faces are! If you reveal a card, move over to stand next to a spectator and bring it up to be displayed at a level that gets people in the shot. Open up whats being filmed. It’s quite easy once you start thinking about it.

Remember to smile and have fun

Pause at good moments for them, move into the best light available in that area, and remember to smile.. You need to make sure you look like you are having fun. I know you will be, but have you checked how you look when you are deep in a routine and paying attention to 10 things at once.. Smile, relax and make it look effortless.

Make sure you get them to send you a copy

After you finish with a group, take a moment to ask for a copy of the footage. They can transfer directly from phone to phone. or just ask for their email address so you can get a copy later. Make sure you do this… Bank all the performing footage you can.

When spectators film your magic tricks, they need to reference you.

Take a moment to give the spectator your business card and ASK THEM to put it up on youtube or facebook with your NAME. Always do this.. Without some reference to you, it’s giving you nothing back.

Remember to smile and have fun

Do you have any tips about having spectators film your magic that I have not mentioned here? Please tell me about it in the comments section below.

HELP: When you share this post on social media it really helps me reach more readers. So if you found this helpful or interesting.. Please give me a few seconds of your time to share the post. I appreciate your help!

Magic Business : The Most Important Thing a Magician Can Do Today

by Dominic Reyes 1 Comment

If you want to start a magic business, this is the most important thing you can do today..

It really doesn’t matter how much you have practiced if nobody gets to see your magic. All the learning and practice amounts to nothing without performance, and that needs an audience. What have you done TODAY to start building that audience?

Magic is a form of show business. Two words: SHOW and BUSINESS.

We spend all our time working on the show until it’s ready to present, but hardly spare a thought for the BUSINESS part. It’s as if we think that if we practice hard enough, an audience will just find us… That doesn’t happen. You have to learn basic marketing and go find your audience yourself.

MoM have created a range of guides and how-to’s on the subject of creating a magic business. If you would like some free help, just fill in the form below and we can start coaching you.