How to do Magic Tricks at Weddings

This is an excellent video on how to do magic at weddings.

Pay attention to how the magician involves his audience. Whenever possible, he'll make the effect happen in their hands. And he really does a good job of getting them emotionally involved in the experience.

Also, the video is entirely focused on the audience reactions. This is really good. Your customers don't care about you. They care about the wedding guests. So your promotional materials should be about THEM.

This is how to do magic tricks at weddings

Become a full-time professional magician

I love Randy's stuff. For the price, this book is a steal. I usually see performers make their money back in the first week. If you're serious about improving, get this book now and save yourself a lot of trial-and-error.


Yes, I want to get Randy's book and start my business today

Criss Angel revealed

I love watching Criss Angel on TV. I think he's probably the best TV magician since Copperfield. The amount of thought and attention-to-detail that goes into every trick is absolutely stupid.

Let's take this video for example. Criss is performing one of the oldest, dumbest tricks ever. It's so easy, and straight out of Tarbell. Yet, he manages to somehow personalize it, and turn it into this incredibly intimate and emotional interpersonal experience.

Pay attention to the setting. The props, the clothes, the theater.

Pay attention to how he involves the audience.

Pay attention to how he's cut out every unnecessary movement. It all looks so slow and deliberate. This sort of refinement can only come from long rehearsal and refinement sessions.

And look at his attitude. He's not trying to fool anyone. He's trying to share an experience with the people in the audience. He's going on a journey, and bringing them with him.

This guy is a total pro. Here you go: Criss Angel revealed

Free magic tricks online

This is the first in a series of posts where I'm going to show you how to do some specially-selected effects that will make you money in your magic business. Best of all, these are all free magic tricks online.

The first effect you're going to learn is the matrix. The basic concept is simple. You have 4 coins covered by 4 cards. one by one, the coins all vanish from under their cards in order to appear under the final card.

I know there's a 2-card version of this effect. Normally, I would always recommend the cleaner version. But the 4-card version lends itself so well to trade shows.

You see, most companies follow a pyramid strategy when developing their brand identity. They try to structure their messaging in terms of 3 key benefits, and an all-encompassing brand ideology.

So when you're hired to do one of these trade shows, you simply structure the 3 vanishes around each benefit. Write a benefit on the face of each card, so it gets revealed with each vanish. And the last card will be inscribed with a call-to-action, or the key statement that you've been hired to promote.

You only have a limited amount of resources at your disposal, and you need to spread them wisely. (Spread the cards) That's where Acme Systems comes in.

• Acme Systems is less expensive (poof) and that puts money in your pocket
• Acme Systems has excellent support (poof) so you know it's always dependable
• Acme Systems will improve your productivity by 30% (poof) so you get better margins.
• And at the end of the day, that allows you to keep more of your money, while freeing up your time and eliminating unnecessary stress from your life. And today only, we're offering %15 off (Show fourth card with %15 written across the face)

Sorry about the performance quality of these videos. I was unable to find a real pro performing this on Youtube.




For added effect, put the cards away every time you reveal a coin. This way, your grand finale will just be one card on a pad. Very clean. No clutter. This enhances the illusion.

Also, have the spectator remove the last card to reveal the card. This will also increase the effect because you're making the magic happen in their hands.

That's all for now. Subscribe to our blog for more free magic tricks online.

Until you become a famed magician...

This one is for the newbies.

Let’s suppose you’re just starting out. You’ve never even done a card trick before. How do you slap together a show ASAP so that you can get off the ground and start making money in the shortest amount of time?

You don't need to be Lance Burton or Gregg Frewin in order to be a well-paid professional magician.

In order to be a full-time pro, you just need 45 minutes of solid material. It has to be fresh, captivating, well-rehearsed, visual, reliable and commercially attractive.

Guys like David Copperfield spend millions on their shows. They hire the best experts in the business to design original, never-before-seen illusions that blow their audiences away. This is an expensive process that takes a lot of work. In the end, nobody knows if the market will appreciate the end-product.

Creation of new material is a long process that required a lot of trial and error. But the big names will take these risks in the name of art.

Thankfully, there is an easier way.

Fact is, people don't like new things. Given the choice, they usually prefer the familiar. They just want to see the same things over and over. And originality is actually a turn-off. Don't believe me? Just open the newspaper and look at the top 3 movies out right now. It's always the same series of clichés.

People like to buy things that feel familiar. They don't want to think.

The average consumer couldn't care less about Houdin's orange tree, or the see-through cups and balls, or whatever super-advanced one-handed triple false cut pass card move you can do. Your customers don't want to see art. They want the same stuff you've seen a thousand times. So just give them what they want.

• Cups and balls
• Chair suspension
• Cut and restored rope
• Linking Rings
• Card to pocket
• Zombie
• Spring snakes in a can
• Break-away wand

The more overplayed the better.

Find simple, adaptable routines and rehearse them to perfection. 20% of your time goes into memorizing and practicing the routine. The other 80% should be spent on rehearsal. (We've already gone over this in a different post)

And keep it clean. Make the jokes super-corny. (Think Bob Saget) No politics, sex or religion. Avoid effects that involve fire, knives or anything else kids might want to imitate.

So now I can hear the moaning. "I want to become a famed magician, and this guy's telling me to do the same tricks as everyone else. I don't want a boring act. I want to be original."

There's nothing wrong with originality. That's art. I love art. Art is my reason for living.

But that's the hard way to make money. When it comes to cash, I like to take the proven easy road. And that’s what this blog is about.

When someone asks about your show, you should be able to just say "cups and balls, bunny from a hat, linking rings". You don't want to be stuck giving a 2 hour explanation about some brass tube with different colored disks. Nobody cases. Keep it simple and easy to communicate.

Of course, famous performers have it easy. When someone asks Chriss Angel about his show, he just say "I do that stuff from TV." He can do that because he’s already become a famed magician.

Since nobody knows your name, you don't have that luxury... yet.

Penn and Teller, David Copperfield. These guys already have established reputations. They already come with built-in credibility. They can afford to be different ant take risks. Nobody pays to "watch a magician produce a tiger from thin air". Instead, they pay to "watch Siegfried and Roy ". But it's very difficult to do this without an established brand and a strong marketing team.

Thankfully, all of these repetitive effects already have established reputations of their own. And you can piggy-back on their fame in order to make easier sales. Best of all, these overplayed effects are usually very portable, reliable, adaptable and easy to perform. That's why everyone does them.

And unlike magicians, laypeople don't care how technically difficult your act is.

Remember, most people have seen fewer than 10 live magic shows in their whole lives. So anything you do will seem imaginative. If you need to make a bunny appear, do it in the safest, easiest and most reliable way possible. Nobody will know the difference.

So to summarize...

You're not a performer. You're a businessperson. It's not about you or the magic. It's about the service you provide and the problems you solve for your customers.

You can build an entire career by sticking to the established meat-and-potato routines.

As you develop your character, and you can add your own stuff. Just make sure to rehearse and put out a quality product.

So give them what they want, and you’ll become a famed magician.

Keyword: become a famed magician

Stronger magic through personalization

Want to really make people freak out? Structure your magic in such a way that it’s about THEM, not you.

In my torn-and-restored card, I don’t ask the spectator to sign the card. Instead, I draw a stick figure and ask them to write the name of someone who’s hurt them in their past. Then, when I tear the card, it becomes like a sort of voo-doo curse. It becomes very personal, and the audience reactions are very emotional.

How can you personalize your magic to your audience?

• If you’re performing abroad, integrate a story about a local landmark that your audience can identify with.
• Performing for a wedding? Structure your routines around romance. Predict the name of their future love.
• Kids party? Make the birthday child into the star of the show.

How many ways can you think of make your magic more personal?

Magic Blogs Wanted

Hey everyone,

Just checked the stats. WOW! I'm really impressed with all the attention we've been getting in such a short amount of time. Thanks everyone.

I'm constantly on the lookout for news from the community. If you have a site and would like to be added to our blogroll, simply place a link to us on a prominent area of your site, then send the link to email removed for now

I'll be sure to add you and send some magic blog traffic your way.

Once again everyone... thanks for all the support. I really wasn't expecting this at all.

Business Cards: Part 1

Let’s take a quick look at the most common way that magicians promote themselves. The business card.

I’ve taken an examples from the magic business card museum. I strongly recommend that you take a look at this site for more concepts.

The average business card looks like the one above. There are some points that I feel could be improved:

• “A show for every budget” This is terrible. It sounds desperate and makes you look amateur and inexperienced. We’ll get into this more in a later issue. But for now, I’ll just pose the following scenario to you.
  
  Let’s suppose there are 2 identical used car companies. One has the slogan “We stand behind the reliability of our cars”, and the other’s slogan is “Lowest price, no matter what we have to do”. Asan average consumer, where would you rather shop?
  
  


• “A legend in his own mind” Alright, I understand what’s going on here. The card is too formal for this sort of approach. This would be better with a card that establishes the magician’s character. But right now, there are too many confusing messages. Here’s an example of a card that works in this style.
  
• The card fan logo. Every magician in the world uses either a top-hat, or a fan of cards as a logo. If you put this card in a stack of other magic business cards, you couldn’t tell it apart. It would just get lost in the generic clutter.
  
  Although this is a custom logo, I suspect it’s homemade. For just $99, he could’ve hired an online company to redesign his logo and put together something that really expresses his individual style. This investment would pay for itself in just one show.
  
  


• The address and phone number line. This is ok too confusing. The address comes before the phone number. In my entire career, I’ve NEVER had a customer send me mail when they already had access to my e-mail and phone number. Get rid of the address line. There’s simply no reason for it to be there.
  
  Now that we have some empty space, I would replace it with a call-to-action. Tell them exactly what to do. Odds are, your customers have never hired a magician before. They’re really confused. They don’t know how to buy, or what questions to ask. Part of your job is to guide them through this process. Try something along the lines of “For customer testimonials, call 555-555-5555 or email ppp@pppp.com” or “To book your event, call 555-555-5555 or email ppp@pppp.com”
  
  


• Magician MICHAEL WINTERS. In any area of life, a specialist will always beat a generalist. Let’s assume you had a heart problem. Would you rather see a heart surgeon or a general practitioner? Your customers are the same way. They’ll take your business card because they have a birthday party coming up. Then, they’ll shop around for performers until they find one that specializes in children’s birthday parties. (And this specialist will usually be more expensive)
  
  Now I'm being controversial. Yes, I know it sounds counter-intuitive. I’ll explain this in more detail in another post. You’ll just have to trust me for now.
  
  


• Assuming this guy mainly does birthday parties, I would change “Tailored to your group needs” to “A fun birthday party they’ll remember forever”. And I would change “Magician Michael Winters” to “Birthday Magician Michael Winters”

So in summary, here are the changes I’d recommend for this card:

• Change “Tailored to your group needs” to “A fun birthday party they’ll remember forever”


• Get rid of “A show for every budget”


• Change the logo and slogan to something more congruent, differentiated and reflective of the performer’s individual style.


• Replace the address line with a call to action.


• “Magician Michael Winters” to “Birthday Magician Michael Winters”

This is a really deep subject, and I could elaborate for days on each of these points. For now, let’s just cut the lesson short and let you absorb some of these broad concepts. In the next lesson, we’ll look at some business cards that got it right.

Link: Magicians Links Directory

Performance Standards In Your Magic Business

One of my best friends was in a gang as a teen. His main job was to enforce debt collection for the drug dealers in the group. Despite his sketchy past, today he’s one of the smartest guys I know. And he once imparted me this piece of advice:

“People aren’t stupid. If something is good, someone will figure it out, and they’ll find a way to get it.”

Remember this saying, because I suspect it’ll be a recurring theme throughout this blog. It applies to so many different areas of your service. (you don’t “do magic” anymore, you “provide a service”)

For today we’re just going to talk about the difference between practice and rehearsal, and how it affects the quality of your service. The difference is small, but in no way trivial.

After watching a video or reading a book, the typical hobby magician will pick up a deck of cards and do the moves over and over. Sometimes he’ll practice hundreds of times until he does the move perfectly, but usually not. Either way, he’ll go out and start his own magic business so he can start showing people as soon as possible.

The result is usually something like this. (No disrespect intended. We were all like this at one point)

A professional magician takes a different approach. He’ll watch the video and practice until he does the move correctly. Then he’ll sit down and write a script, complete with choreography. If you ever watch a full-time pro, you’ll notice that every trick at every show is performed exactly the same way, with the same words, timing and movements.

Of course, there’s some occasional ad-libbing. But that’s the exception rather than the rule.

This is the typical process that a full-time pro will go through before adding an effect to his repertoire:

• The professional will learn a trick and spend 25 hours practicing the moves.
• Then he’ll spend another 25 hours scripting, choreographing, memorizing and rehearsing the new act under real-life conditions. He’ll keep doing this until he does it exactly the same way, with the same timing every time. Just like a robot.
• Then he’ll spend another 25 hours rehearsing his robotic act until it seems more natural.
• Only now will he test it in front of a live audience, constantly refining the act and making small changes as needed.

And that's when the effect gets added to their repertoire. The result usually looks something like this.

Beautiful.

And after all this work, the trick might get thrown out if it doesn’t quite mesh with the audience or suit the performer’s personality. And the whole process starts over again.

That's the difference between practice and rehearsal.

Keywords: Magic Business

Welcome to Magic Business

Hello everyone, my name is Thomas (the lion) Dugas, and I’d like to welcome you to my magic business blog.

First, some background on me:

• I have a business degree.
• I’ve spent my career managing marketing campaigns for everything from small organisations to Fortune 500 companies.
• I’ve produced more over $2,000,000 in new business for one of my clients.

And it all started with a close-up pad and a thumb tip.

Like you, I once was a struggling magician trying to create a name for myself. It took a lot of time and effort, but I eventually made it. In fact, I used magic to support myself while I was in college.

Having successfully started my first company, I fell in love with business. And since then, I’ve been working in sales and marketing.

It’s been 5 years since I’ve picked up a wand. And now I return with a fresh perspective. I keep meeting young magicians with so much opportunity. But they lack the basic tools needed to fully unlock the potential.

This is my chance to give back to the art that’s given me so much. (Single tear rolls down cheek)

This isn’t going to be like any other magic blog. It’ll deal mainly with professionalism, and hard work , and all the stuff performers don’t want to hear about. In fact, I expect this to be the most unpopular blog in the magic community.

Having said that, I’d like to officially announce the grand opening of Magic Business. I’m always looking for new topics. So if you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment. I’ll be more than happy to answer.