“You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.” – Zig Ziglar
In most categories of entertainment, there are a lot of candidates for every gig / job. So, we have trouble sticking out, or sticking in the mind of potential clients. It seems like we’re all coming at it from the same direction of “I’m good, use me.” That is a lottery approach instead of a strategy approach.
The way to stick out is to offer a service that is more suited to your clients than all of your competition. A problem we often have with this idea is we pigeonhole ourselves. We say “I’m a set designer. I design sets. All the other set designers design sets. I am better at set designing than other set designers, but how do I explain that I provide a better service?” STOP SAYING “SET DESIGN!”
No matter what your specialty, the number of services you provide can be endless.
You might be a set designer, but your client is going thru a divorce. You call her and help her find a lawyer. That’s a service that doesn’t take any expertise. This doesn’t necessarily lead to a gig, but if you don’t get a gig from it, at least you helped the lady instead of being another begging set designer. More likely, you’ll have a small leg up because you are not only more valuable, but you’re on the client’s side and that always adds to your value.
The tale of an email
In my email newsletter class, one student sent me a newsletter she sent out to booking agents before a big convention. She was going to see them all at the convention, they would see her. The goal of the email was to tell the agents all the shows she offers, the new stuff about her company, and get them excited about booking her.
This was a very long email with pictures and descriptions of all this stuff. It was a lot of work to assemble.
Imagine this from a booker’s perspective. You’re preparing for a weekend trip to go to a convention where everyone will want a moment of your time. Everyone will be trying to get some of the money in your budget. Everyone will be pushing for attention and adoration. While you do want to know all the options that are out there, you probably don’t want to get started early with this process, and you probably don’t want biased info about it. Nobody really likes reading a long email. The best response I would expect to get at the convention is “Good to see you! Got your email. Haven’t had a chance to look thru it yet!”
My suggestion for an alternative is to serve this person as they’re packing. Send out a “Complete Guide to the WCHO Convention” A beautiful pdf It includes a weather forecast, info about the city where it’s held, quiet places to relax in the convention hall, how the wifi works there, maybe a worksheet for keeping track of who you meet, top yelp rated restaurants nearby, free coffee in a nearby hotel lobby, a few other secrets to the place. This guide doesn’t talk about entertainment, identity, brand, nothing. It’s purely generous. This is an email someone would want to get. This is an email they’d keep for the whole convention. This will get responses like “I found that donut place! Paradise!” or “Thank you for the guide, I didn’t know what I was getting into here” or “Why did you do that?”
After the convention, send a wrap up email that summarizes funny moments, and interesting parts of the convention for everyone. Maybe answers some questions everyone had about the convention. Not about you. About the thing they’re already interested in.
Now
- you’re a friend,
- you’re an expert on the convention,
- you’re collaborative,
- you’re valuable to keep around,
- you’re not annoying.
You always have plenty of opportunity to sell yourself later. But if they already know you, you won’t really have to.