As the former Head of Marketing for Ellusionist.com — I’ve had my fair share of criticism for past campaigns.
If people like the marketing, they praise the product.
If people dislike the marketing, they blame the marketing.
It’s a zero-sum game.
I once was given death threats for a genuine server outage. During Ellusionist’s transition from one web-platform (magento) to another (shopify).
But some people thought the server outage was a “lol, we’ve got your downloads” campaign. Which obviously it wasn’t.
^ That’s a whole other story for another day.
Anyway…
I recently stumbled upon an effect from a different magic company, where people were complaining about how bad the ‘marketing’ was.
“Terrible marketing.”
“It’s so over-hyped.”
“If this trick is so good… Why do you have to try so hard to sell it to me?”
Thankfully, I’ve had 13 years’ worth of experience, marketing magic, to have a few well-baked thoughts on the dichotomy of:
“How do you sell the impossible, without sounding like a liar.”
So today I’d like to share my thoughts with you, and maybe it’ll help you:
Learn how to market magic correctly (from mine and others’ mistakes), or
See if maybe your perception of the marketing may be impacting your view slightly.
#1. Expectation vs. Reality
The first problem with marketing magic is that we’re not selling real magic.
That’s not condescendingly obvious. It’s true.
When magicians see the trailer and read the product page:
No flaps
No magnets
No sticky stuff
No stooges
No dual-reality.
Whether they’d admit it or not, they’re fooled. They feel like a kid again. They click buy because they want to know the secret. It sounds like real magic.
“Maybe it’s as close to real magic as science will allow?”
Then they get the package and it’s a gimmick with a rubber band. It’s not real magic. It’s not a brand new principle of physics that you were unaware of.
Nobody lied, ‘rubber band’ wasn’t on the list — but the semantics of listing ‘everything it’s not’ gives people hope for ‘what it could be’.
And if it falls beneath their expectations, they’ll blame the marketing… Because it got their hopes up.
#2. Effect vs Secret
This is the hardest part of marketing magic.
Back in the old days, before the iPhone was released, I used to order magic from a Davenport’s magic catalogue.
I was disappointed a few times, but social media didn’t exist at this scale, so nobody ever heard about my disappointment.
Inside was a brief description of the effect. The ‘effect’ meaning what the audience will experience and NOT ‘what the magician is actually doing’.
Somewhere along the way, as online magic trailers buried catalogue sales, the method and the effect became one.
Experienced buyers began to feel burned by the claims. e.g…
“You borrow a coin from a spectator and bend it at your fingertips.”
That line, of course, explains the effect, what the audience will remember or experience.
But some buyers felt duped when they purchase the product and the method is revealed— and it’s just a switch.
“It’s not a borrowed coin at all!”
“So many lies in the trailer.”
This opens up a really hard dilemma. Do you sell the effect, or do you sell the method?
Most magic companies choose the former.
Yes, it is deceptive, in the sense that it’s working really hard to hide the secret from you — because, despite people’s claims of honesty, a trick will bomb if the secret is exposed.
aka. If people know how it’s done, they’re less likely to buy it.
You can point to outliers like gaff decks or Pyro Mini, things that people can’t make themselves… But the rule is pretty consistent that creators can only make money from their effects if they fool the buyers.
I know, because we’ve tested it many times. We’ve exposed good effects after people have begged us for ‘uncut performances’ — and we’ve tried the opposite. Of cutting the performance to mask the switch, and it’s sold through the roof… Not surprisingly.
Switch or not, the reaction is the same, and the effect the audience of laymen experiences is the same — but the cut is seen to be shady, or deceptive in its marketing efforts.
#3. Maybe it’s not for you
The other thing that catches heat in magic is beginner material. Something that’s designed to be easy, for beginners to enter into this artform.
Lines like…
“You’ll be the hit at any party.”
When existing magicians read it, it can elicit responses like…
*sarcasm* “Oh thanks Ellusionist. I usually sit in corners, but if I buy this fancy new gimmick, maybe I’ll finally have friends.” *sarcasm ends*
These intermediates and pros find it condescending. Like the marketing is talking down to them.
However, that is not the case at all. A beginner’s kit is positioned at beginners in the same way that a Happy Meal is positioned at children.
In other words, I don’t criticise or complain about the way in which a Happy Meal is advertised — with plastic figurines that I need to collect, because it’s not for me, it’s for kids.
Beginner’s material isn’t for pros, but it often gets complained about.
Lines about building confidence and standing out from the crowd are used because they work… and they’re true. If you do magic, you’re always the most interesting person in a room, because it’s so rare.
#4. It’s not the customer’s fault
So those reasons:
The effect and the method are conflated.
The expectations of the hype do not match the reality of the method.
The crossover with beginners and pros all being subscribed to the same email list.
They all contribute to magicians’ disdain for marketing within magic.
Of course, this isn’t to say that it’s all the customer’s fault. Not at all. Not even close.
Instead, it’s just an occupational hazard. The collateral damage from selling secrets.
Making the impossible sound desirable is a tough line to walk that is never appreciated.
Safe marketing = boring marketing.
Boring marketing = ineffective marketing.
In today’s attention economy, if you want to make money, you need to know how to get people’s attention.
Johnny Depp & Amber Heard aren’t having a globally televised trial because they had a super vanilla relationship.
It was wild, toxic and outrageous. She **** in his bed [allegedly]… That’s why everyone knows about it.
So like it or not, marketing needs to be bold and polarising to rise above the noise. You need to try new things, and those things don’t always work—and you pay the price for it.
Even Elon Musk was criticised for shooting a car into space.
“What a waste. There are people starving in the world.”
Others think he is a genius.
So how do you market without running into those problems?
The scars you need to market magic effectively can only be gained through failure—and that failure is harsh and unrelenting.
Mostly you have to ignore the criticism if you believe it’s misplaced. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion—and you won’t please all of the people, all of the time.
Especially when you’re selling secrets.
But you should, as we are, be willing to learn from your mistakes and admit when you’re wrong.
Remember, it should only hurt if there’s truth to it.
Did you over-emphasize a gimmick, but it’s actually sleight-of-hand?
Did you say it was compact, but it’s the size of a house?
Did you say it’s inspectable by a magician—but it’s actually not?
Did you say it was high-quality electronics, but you’ve got a 35% failure rate?
You have to ensure you’re not intentionally misleading buyers just to make a sale.
You need to ensure that the finished product meets their expectations, or they will not be happy.
A great product is the best defence against any criticism of the marketing. Even if some don’t like the way it’s sold, they may still like the product if it stands up to the claims.
Even if they think it’s “over-hyped”, as long as the product matches or exceeds expectations, they will still like the product.
And for those that still don’t — well, they were never going to buy it anyway.