My awesome new site

Apr 11, 2012
35
0
Hey everyone. Just released my ultra awesome new site. Check it out at skmagic.com or skmagic.net and comment on it below. Thanks :)
 

formula

Elite Member
Jan 8, 2010
968
5
It's not bad. Try to add pictures of you performing as well as promo pictures of just you. I don't particularly like the way you've written everything about yourself, it's not the most professional format. You say you are recommended by lot's of people but there are no testimonials or anything.
I know you're only 13 but your pricing is ridonkulous. $25 per hour for corporate work is insanely cheap, so cheap that it's a negative point. It's hard enough to get people to take you serious at 13 but even more so when you cost less than what business people spend on lunch.
 

formula

Elite Member
Jan 8, 2010
968
5
I don't live in Canada so I can't help you with pricing. Look at what other magicians are charging in your area. Personally I think all your prices are too cheap. If you get booked in the next town things you have to factor in to your price are transport and supplies (like a new deck of cards). I think if you keep your prices but add a bit it will be fine, until you're older and more experienced.

So;

$20 + expenses
$25 + expenses
 

WitchDocIsIn

Elite Member
Sep 13, 2008
5,877
2,945
Look around at other local performers' prices. You want to be competitive, but don't undercut yourself or the other local magicians too much as you'll build bad blood that way. As Formula said, charging too little compared to other local performers won't help you, it'll be a negative point against you, both in the eyes of possible employers and other performers. Possible employers usually have the mindset of, "You get what you pay for." Therefore, if you're inexpensive, you must not be any good.

Not 100% sure I'd call this "ultra awesome" and that sort of language isn't really professional.

There are some typos on the page, and some of the language is rather informal. If that's the feeling you're going for, that's your choice, but it's not terribly professional. Given that you're pretty young, you're going to have to go the extra mile in presenting a professional image. I advise some editing.

Put a link to contact you on the services page, don't make them go to another page. Basically, you never want to make them work to hire you, you don't have that reputation yet. Where it currently says, "You can contact me on my contact page to set up an event" you could have your direct contact links.
 

Bizzaro

Elite Member
Sep 1, 2007
464
10
Vegas
www.smappdooda.com
Don't ever put your prices on your website. EVER! It will vary by client and you should find out what kind of budget they have first. They might be willing to pay more than you were going to ask for.

Also be aware a flash website will not show up on mobile devices.
 
Sep 26, 2007
591
5
Tokyo, Japan
But Flash is gross. Not only is it not compatible with all devices, it also has a much slower loading time than HTML/CSS based sites and is terrible for SEO.


The Kid is 13 years old, and he found a site that would let him put up a pretty customizable site w/o having to pay for a designer or spend all of his waking moments learning CSS/HTML/PHP and the fine tunings of web standards in order to pass everyone's never failing and always watching critical eye on the Theory11 forums. His writing might not be the most appropriate for a professional site, BUT it is quite good for a 13 year old. AND, considering that there have been way older magicians on these boards posting sites with English composition FAR worse than this kids, I say kudos for taking the time to put up such well written content.

FLASH not great for SEO? You are right, but I am pretty sure that this kid is not trying to book all of his performances through random search requests and SEO based search queries. If you read his actual content, he has repeat bookings and is doing quite well, and I am fairly sure that his lack of SEO, his lack of professionally written content, is preventing him from performing magic.

STOP trying to spoon feed and force guidance and advice on a kid where it usually takes anywhere from 5 years to a decade to learn naturally. THE KID IS THIRTEEN, let him be thirteen for crying out loud.

To the original poster. You have done a great job setting this site up on your own. Keep modifying it as you go and you will slowly start to see what works best for you, what looks naturally appealing to a viewer's eyes, and as you continue to get more work, you will be able to modify your site more accordingly to your needs! In the future, you can have people not only edit your content, but perhaps give you some advice on how to make the language more catchy (not professionally adult sounding, but just catchy).

Keep working hard! Maybe in the future, web-design will also become a hobby to go alongside magic!!! They both take an enormous amount of creativity!

Ignore the Negative Nancies and Debby Downers that try to put you down.
 

WitchDocIsIn

Elite Member
Sep 13, 2008
5,877
2,945
The Kid is 13 years old, and he found a site that would let him put up a pretty customizable site w/o having to pay for a designer or spend all of his waking moments learning CSS/HTML/PHP and the fine tunings of web standards in order to pass everyone's never failing and always watching critical eye on the Theory11 forums. His writing might not be the most appropriate for a professional site, BUT it is quite good for a 13 year old. AND, considering that there have been way older magicians on these boards posting sites with English composition FAR worse than this kids, I say kudos for taking the time to put up such well written content.

FLASH not great for SEO? You are right, but I am pretty sure that this kid is not trying to book all of his performances through random search requests and SEO based search queries. If you read his actual content, he has repeat bookings and is doing quite well, and I am fairly sure that his lack of SEO, his lack of professionally written content, is preventing him from performing magic.

STOP trying to spoon feed and force guidance and advice on a kid where it usually takes anywhere from 5 years to a decade to learn naturally. THE KID IS THIRTEEN, let him be thirteen for crying out loud.

To the original poster. You have done a great job setting this site up on your own. Keep modifying it as you go and you will slowly start to see what works best for you, what looks naturally appealing to a viewer's eyes, and as you continue to get more work, you will be able to modify your site more accordingly to your needs! In the future, you can have people not only edit your content, but perhaps give you some advice on how to make the language more catchy (not professionally adult sounding, but just catchy).

Keep working hard! Maybe in the future, web-design will also become a hobby to go alongside magic!!! They both take an enormous amount of creativity!

Ignore the Negative Nancies and Debby Downers that try to put you down.

To be honest, I think you're patronizing him. Just because he's 13 doesn't mean he shouldn't try to make his marketing tools as good as they can be. By fine tuning things now he'll quite possibly be even farther ahead of the game when he's older. And quite frankly his age isn't really what I'm thinking about here, it's the fact that he's trying to be a professional/semi-professional magician and is therefore in the competition pool with other pros and semi-pros, and many of them have people telling them the things we're telling him here.

To paraphrase House M.D., "Do you want a doctor that holds your hand while you die, or do you want a doctor that ignores you while making you healthy?" In this case, does he want someone that tells him how to make the most out of his tools, or someone who simply pats him on the head and says, "Good job!" whether the tools need work or not?
 

formula

Elite Member
Jan 8, 2010
968
5
THE KID IS THIRTEEN, let him be thirteen for crying out loud.
The same basic business rules apply to you whether you're 13, 50 or even 100. He is clearly trying to make a bit of money from performing magic and his age should not be an excuse, for anything.
We're also not forcing guidance on him. He has asked for feedback and it's his choice whether he takes our opinions on board or not, in no way are we forcing him to do what we say.
 
Sep 26, 2007
591
5
Tokyo, Japan
Think of it this way if you would though. Yes, it could be great for the OP to have an amazing professionally built website that not only follows industry standards, but also has professionally written and edited content with high resolution shots, videos, other media, etc... but is it necessary right now, and more importantly, is this was the OP is looking for? For example, if from after reading his current site, I got the impression that he was trying to score major corporate gigs, black tie events, higher end restaurant gigs, etc... then yes, the above advice is exactly what I would suggest. But no, after reading through his site, I can see that he is performing at events and locations where seeing a 13 year old magician would be totally accepted, go unquestioned, and ultimately, seem to fit right in with the total environment and tone of the event. That being said, his website does a great job at not only portraying his professionalism and maturity for a 13 year old, but gives prospective clients the information they may need when contemplating hiring him.

I understand everyone wanting to dive right in and offer their best possible advice, but one of the biggest aspects of being a teacher, instructor, or basic advice-giver, is not just the amount of knowledge you have to pass on, but the ability to sift through that large bank of knowledge and to know when to give what information and to who. A lot of the advice being given right now is like trying to teach an orange belt the fighting tactics that a brown belt might need to beat a black belt. If the orange belt was trying to fast track himself to being a black belt, then yeah, perhaps some of that information might be ok... but with the OPs site... you can obviously tell he is exactly in the right situation that he needs to be in to help him progress slowly and surely.

So just saying that business rules apply to whether you are 13, 50, or even 100, is actually incorrect, because society naturally and unconsciously expects different things from different age groups. I would definitely expect a 22-25 year old professional magician to have a professionally built website with well-written content, but not a 13 year old. To be honest, someone thinking of hiring a THIRTEEN year old magician would most likely not even expect that 13 year old to HAVE a website. And when upon hearing he does, and checking out the website, indeed, he would be very pleased to see something extremely professional, but would definitely not expect it. He would be pleased to see the site that the OP has created (provided the grammar and spelling errors be fixed). And, because of this, giving advice that would more suitably help his current situation is far greater than throwing words like SEO, standards, professional sounding text, etc... is not what he could benefit from the most. What would help him more at this point is getting advice like, "have a parent look over your writing and give you some advice on how to make it sound a bit more catchy" or "do you know anyone with a high resolution camera (family friend), who can help you take some new shots of you performing?" Perhaps even, "play around with the font size (bigger or smaller), and ask people their opinions to find out what is easier on the eyes."

This type of advice will not only let him know what could use some fixing, but let him experience HOW to fixe those points. Don't just spoon feed end-game advice to someone who obviously enjoys the learning process.

Those are my main points.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Apr 29, 2012
7
0
Dallas, TX
I'll echo some of the lines about Flash. I am an Android user so I don't care as much, but Flash is simply annoying and makes browsing harder. Not only that, you're excluding the visually impaired and if you want to be making money in Canada, your compliance with the CDR (Canadian Disability Rights Act) is one of those things many corporate and governmental potential patrons will look for.

Have someone read over your copy, please. "I am ... that" is very bad copy. Something like "I am a 13 year old ... living in Edmonton AB" is much better and reads more fluent. Potential clients also want their guests to be entertained and you to bring value to their party, not you stealing the show. Your site, however, is very self-centered, not very value-focused. Remove the whole "signed" part and replace it with a "things I can do for you" explanation. List a few routines, tell stories.

You're not a grizzled veteran of the business so use your website to overcome objections. "Look at me, I am cool" doesn't do that very well. "Here is why I am cool" does.
 
Mar 10, 2011
59
0
Fnord, is correct on this one. I recently read "The 48 Laws of Power" by Robert Greene. One of the better laws is not to argue, but rather demonstrate. If you want to demonstrate effectively, stop talking about yourself and put up some performance videos and testimonials. The most powerful position to be in is one where people are reliant on you, not the other way around. In order to do this, manipulate the reality of your business to make the customer WANT you at their event.

As for flash websites, i simply think some solid HTML & CSS along with some javascript accents does a superior job as compared to flash and is more compatible with different browsers and devices. Just a tip with the next upgrade ;).
 
Apr 11, 2012
35
0
Thank you for taking time out of your schedule to visit and comment on my forum. However, I have noticed that many people have not been writing proper reviews. Instead they choose to write nasty reviews in which they complain about specific elements on my site rather than giving me good suggestions. A good review should say: "You should change... because...". The bad reviews are structured as so: "Change... because... is bad". You may think that this is a good review but it is really called: Trash Talk. I did not create this forum for people to trash my work but to suggest ideas for me to improve on. Nasty reviews do the exact opposite.

Also, I have noticed a lot of talk about the use of flash. I am currently creating a mobile site in which flash is not needed. I am not going to change my current site (from flash to HTML) because of the fact that I am 13. I do not have time to read countless books and spend all my time and money on learning something that I do not need as of now. I do have to go to Jr High School\ from 8:30 AM to 3 PM. After that I would like to relax next to my computer and relieve the stress from the day and get my homework done. If you would like to give me the time and money to learn HTML than I say go right ahead but for now, I think that I'm doing alright.

Thank you to all of the great critics on this forum (Formula, Bizzaro, TokyoUW etc.). I appreciate the dedication and advice that you input into your reviews. As to everyone else, please do not write on my forum if you are going to trash my work and call it a review. It is disrespectful and that is not what I have asked for in this forum. I asked for quality feedback and advice, as shown by the people that I have mentioned. Thank you again and continue to write such great reviews.
 
Searching...
{[{ searchResultsCount }]} Results